Boys Can’t Dance? Pt 2

You don’t need to have read pt 1. But this time, it’s personal.

Really personal. Why is my boy the only male human in his dance class?

The Manosphere - muscles, money and girls

I’m calling it the MOS from here on out so I don’t bring too many of them this way.

I haven’t watched the Louis Theroux documentary. I haven’t read a shred of what AT has to say on Substack - I haven’t even seen any of his videos. The algorithm doesn’t show them to me; I certainly won’t be searching for them.

But as far as I can tell, these young men are being told to be ‘alpha’ which means looking hyper-masculine, earning a lot of money, and having sexual access to women.

There is so much about football that is MOS coded. Players often look very masculine: defined jaws, stubble, muscular calves, rippling abs on display they swap tops at the end of a match. And ma’am - I am straight. Some of these players are fit. I am happy to say so.

They also earn lots of cash. Erling Haaland earned over £27million last year, and Mohammed Sallah wasn’t far behind on £25million. That isn’t unattractive. Haaland’s girlfriend, Isabel Hausgeng, has been in a relationship with him since 2022 and Mo Salah has been married to his childhood sweetheart, Magi Sadeq, since 2013.

This opens a can of worms, though. Hausgeng is also a footballer. She welcomed her first child last year so her sports career is on hold. However, sources also suggest she worked in a fashion store when she was still playing professionally. This is a common story amongst female footballers and rugby players. There isn’t enough money in the sports to sustain a league of full-time professional players. Salah’s wife, Magi, studied biotechnology at university but doesn’t seem to have pursued it as a career.

Your ATs of the world might call these women gold diggers; other people (me) might say they are involved in the unpaid labour of raising families and supporting home lives while their partners play a demanding international sport. This may be completely their choice, and more power to them.

So far, footballers, and the two examples here of female partners, fit the MOS ideal of an alpha pretty well.

Financially, there is money to be made in dancing. In the UK principal dancers for ballet companies can earn between £70,000-£100,000, and the starting salary for a brand new dancer is £23,000-£35,000 (Ballet Position). Plenty of careers pay less.

While top footballers earn eye-watering sums, like Haaland and Salah, actually only around 180 footballers in the UK earn more than £100,000 a year. Half of these earn this each week, though. On balance, the average salary of a professional footballer is around £26,000 (CV-Library). We are back in the ball park of the dancers.

All this is to say, any parent who is keeping their boy out of dancing and shoving them into football becasue of the potential earnings should their blessed fruit turn pro, then they’re missing the opportunities that are there.

So why else can’t boys dance?

Sex and Attraction

Growing up in the 90s, girls my age had posters of footballers and popstars. David Beckham, Ryan Giggs and Les Ferdinand all shared wall space with Mark Owen, Usher and Justin Timberlake. Not all of these men have made it to 2026 with their reputations intact, but I think the patriarchy has kept their bank balances afloat.

The masculine physicality of the footballers is undeniable, but these popstars are well known for their dancing. And all packed out arenas, then and now, with screaming fans. I see no issue with their attractiveness.

I do remember boys at school calling Mark Owen ‘gay’. I think because he was slightly shorter than average and had nice hair, but honestly? I don’t know. And he isn’t, not that it matters. He’s been with his wife for over 20 years.

In part 1 of ‘Boys Can’t Dance’ I alluded to the physical prowess on show at Ballet Boyz. Any professional male ballet dancer has the sort of muscular physique that would make your eyes pop out like Wyle-e-Coyotee’s when he sees the runaway train headed straight for him.

Let’s also take a minute to consider other kinds of dancing. Maybe a crass example, but the men in Magic Mike are all kinds of attractive. They have typically masculine features: the jaws, stubble, abs, calves. And the dancing only adds to their attractiveness. I could, and will, list any amount of men who attractive because of their dancing:

• Tom Holland dancing to ‘Umbrella’ on Lip-Sync Battle

• Calvin Royal III (Principal Dancer, American Ballet Theatre)

• Gene Kelly in anything

• Derek (played Sean Patrick Thomas) in Save the Last Dance

• Scott Hastings (played by Paul Mercurio) in Strictly Ballroom

• Mikhail Baryshnikov (so sexy Carrie moved to Paris for him in SATC)

• Kai Widdirington (and Alijaz, Carlos and Gorka) from Strictly Come Dancing

I’ll leave it there. These are just my personal favourites. I am also very clearly giving away my status as an elder Millenial.

None of these men are short of female attention. At least one of them prefers male attention, which is more than fair, but for the purposes of this discussion, the MOS cannot argue that these men are not attractive to women. They absolutely are, lads. Please turn to the woman nearest to you and show her these men dancing. We’ll wait. Then we’ll come and pick her up.

Sexuality

Poor little Mark Owen definitely got it in the neck in the 90s for ‘looking’ gay to the boys I went to school with. So did the boys in Boyzone and N’Sync. And the boys who were in the bands at school. Some of them were and are. But why does that matter so much to the MOS?

Is this link between music, dancing and sexuality what is keeping little boys away from dance classes?

I don’t want to start divulging names of male dancers who are and are not gay, out or otherwise. It’s not my business, and it’s not your business. But here’s what’s interesting: there is not a single out gay footballer in the English Premier League.

How extraordinary.

Stonewall UK estimates that around 4% of the population identifies as gay, lesbian or bisexual. I would expect that to be reflected in the footballing population. There are out male rugby players. There are over 50 professional female footballers in the UK that identify as lesbian.

Let’s be clear: some of these male footballers are gay. They are. It would be so incredibly odd if none of them were. But they don’t feel they can be open and honest about it. And that’s ok. I’m not here to shame anyone for anything. But it is surely high time our culture - specifically the culture around football - held a mirror up to itself and asked itself a few difficult questions.

Why can’t you play football and fancy men? Why does enjoying a masculine physique whilst being in possession of one mean you can’t play football? Why can’t you play football at 8 and go to G-A-Y at 12?

The answer is that you can, of course.

I don’t want to open up the tangent of straight men being scared of gay men in the locker rooms. Sigh. It’s boring, and old, and pointless, because we ALL know who we should ALL be scared of. And it’s not the gays.

So let’s look at Heated Rivalry.

Indulge me.

Heated Rivalry focuses on Ice Hockey, not football, but it’s another hyper-masculine sport, full contact, only the strongest will survive. When Rachel Reid’s novel hit shelves in 2019 it did some moderate business. But the 2025 TV adaptation has had the girls, gays and theys SCREAMING.

I’m coming to the cottage.

See?

It helps that Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams are easy on the eye, that they have never missed leg day and that hockey warm-ups are echoing Magic Mike. I can even hear the opening bars of Pony by Ginuwine as they take to the rink.

Apart from the glutes and gun on show in the graphic sex scenes, we also see two male sports stars at the top of their game being tender, vulnerable, emotionally intelligent, and kind. I need a whole other article on Scottie Hunter, too.

Here’s the thing: straight women (for the purposes of the MOS argument) are often attracted to men’s physicality, confidence and success. There is a discomfort for me in admitting that, because it isn’t a truism. It’s a gross generalisation, but that’s what the MOS exploits. They turn it, and twist it, into something else: women are attracted to dominance.

Nope. No thank you. Liking attractive men does not validate misogyny. I’ll be getting this inked up my spine soon. The girl with the feminist tattoo.

Sexual attraction is complicated, contradictory and messy. One partner may be the exact opposite of the next one. Some people have a type - some don’t.

We know that young men are really vulnerable right now. They are lonely, economically anxious and looking for identity. They need a road map. Following a ready-made one by MOS weirdos who pose beside hire-by-the-hour private jets, hold warm bottles of Cristal and boxing gloves, while telling them exactly how to be a man is intoxicating. It must feel like a relief: finally, a community. Someone to tell me how the hell to live this insane reality I’ve found myself in.

I get it.

And football fits that narrative. It’s easy for MOS men to point to footballers and the beautiful game, with their zero gay player, as the ideal. Be like these guys. Earning the big bucks, chiseled good looks (only some Made in Turkey), plenty of women around.

But if we let our little boys fall into this trap, then they are going to miss out on so much.

Not just the variety of other sports out there but the opportunity to be any kind of man they want to be.

I want my son to be free to move his body in any way that feels good to him. Be that to music, following a ball over a grassy pitch, skating on an ice rink, on a tennis court, in a swimming pool - anything. Why would I limit him?

Dancing is what he enjoys now, and long may it continue. I so hope some other little boys get the chance to take part too. It’s such fun and watching the freedom the kids have is wonderful.

Scale that up to adulthood and the masculine physique, the money, the access to girls (ohmygodiamsosorry) are all present for male dancers.

Tomorrow is dance class. I know it’ll still just be him, and that’s ok. He’s going to have a great time.