'Anderson' Coming Out Or Not

Yes, "EW," Anderson Cooper DOES Talk About His Personal Life. Except For That One Thing.

Posted by Brent Hartinger | on August 29, 2011





Just how stupid do Anderson Cooper — and Entertainment Weekly — think we are?

Really, really stupid, apparently.

In a profile of the celebrity newsman in the magazine's latest issue promoting the upcoming talk show Anderson, Cooper talks about a lot of things: •His favorite TV shows. •Intimate childhood details and memories. •The emotional impact of his dad's death when Cooper was ten. •The emotions he felt when he learned his brother had committed suicide.

And yet, in the second-to-last paragraph of this lavish four-page spread, the magazine also tells us, "There's no clarity, however, on whether Cooper will address the one topic many people want him to talk about: his personal life. For years, he has declined to speak about it."

"The less I know about reporters, the better, from my perspective as a viewer," Cooper tells us. "I'm not interested in their personal lives."

WTF? Didn't Cooper just spend the whole profile talking about some of the most intensely personal moments of his life? If that's not his "personal life," what is?

Oh, right. Cooper won't answer the question, "Are you gay?" And he won't give any details about the "person" he is or isn't dating — although he slyly allows that he might talk about it on his new talk show, saying, "I'm going to do stuff that's real and natural to me. But I certainly want to be a fully formed human being."

But wait, now I'm really confused. Didn't Cooper just tell us that he doesn't want to know anything about the "personal lives" of reporters?

Look, I'm not surprised that Cooper is offering these ridiculous, contradictory rationalizations to avoid answering questions that might reduce his Q-rating. He might call himself a "reporter," but first and foremost, he's a celebrity with an "image" to protectively guard.

But what the hell is Entertainment Weekly doing totally carrying his water and going along with this charade? This isn't just intellectually offensive, it's bad journalism: after all, the most basic part of journalism is to tell the truth, and what both the magazine and Cooper are telling us — that he doesn't discuss his "personal life" — simply isn't true.


I was also under the impression that it's not the job of a journalistic outlet to merely help a celebrity hopelessly shill some upcoming project, which is basically the role that Entertainment Weekly has been reduced to here.

Shorter EW Anderson Cooper interview: "I hate it when reporters talk about their personal lives, and I don't talk about mine, except when I'm talking about the death of my dad or the suicide of my brother — but I just might come out as gay if you tune into watch my new show!"

Does entertainment "journalism" no longer even pretend to point out blatant, wildly self-serving hypocrisies on the part of their subjects?

Even worse, Cooper (and Entertainment Weekly's) bald P.R. spin worked: dozens of media outlets breathlessly repeated the news that Cooper might — just might! — be coming out on his new show.

Look, I get it. It's complicated when a celebrity comes out, especially a celebrity as famous and widely liked as Cooper.

It's especially complicated when the celebrity is living in the "glass closet" — the term coined to describe celebrities who are open among their friends and family, and even professionally, among their colleagues, but who still refuse to acknowledge their gayness to the public at large (who generally have no clue).

Here at AfterElton.com, we've written about these issues many, many times — even as we've long defended (not endorsed) the right of all GLBT celebrities to remain closeted if they choose to.

Likewise, there are definitely celebrities, gay and not, who really don't talk about their personal lives in any capacity. Daniel Craig is one, Ewan McGregor is another. They don't write memoirs or agree to "personality" profiles, and they only talk about their artistic projects.

But that doesn't describe most celebrities, who will gladly divulge very intimate details in order to promote their new project, and it absolutely doesn't describe Anderson Cooper, who's willing to talk on the record about the suicide of his brother. I can't really think of anything more personal than that, unless maybe we're talking about specific sexual practices.

By contrast, merely acknowledging one's gayness, or naming the person you're dating, doesn't seem very personal to me at all. After all, that's the kind of thing you put on your social media profile, available to even the slightest of friends. Or it's something you might indicate to someone within five minutes of meeting them at a party or the office.

I know, I know. Some people still freak out about gayness, so it's a "big deal," whether it's "personal" or not.

But would it kill Entertainment Weekly to at least pay lip service to some of the hypocrisy and contradictions involved here? Because I'm kinda tired of having my intelligence insulted.