Proof After The Fact

WATCH: 8 Videos That Prove Anderson Cooper Has Been Openly Gay All Along


[Peter's Note: Hey! I would have made that same face... Oh, Yeah. I've been gay all along.]
Anderson Cooper came out to the world on Monday, and that’s really super. Really.

But at Queerty we knew the Silver Fox didn’t care for the vixens years ago. Hell, we had incontrovertible video proof. (No, sadly, not that kind of video.) If you look at Cooper’s TV appearances over the years, he was definitely letting his rainbow flag fly.

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1) Anderson in S&M Gear (2007)

Before CNN snatched him up. Anderson Cooper was on ABC’s World News Now, chatting with someone at the Noose, one of your better leather shops. That’s him in gimp mask.

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2) Anderson laughs uncontrollably during a story about peeing (August 2011)

We admit it—water sports make us giggle a little too. (Watch him really crack up at the 2:50 mark.)

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3) Anderson cries when his mom comes on his show

Okay so bringing his mom, Gloria Vanderbilt, onto his daytime talk show kind of contradicts Cooper’s whole “I want to keep my personal life personal” argument, but who doesn’t love a boy who loves his mama? Seeing the two of them get emotional over the suicide of Anderson’s brother just tore us up. Plus with appearances by Kathy Griffin and Diane von Furstenberg, it’s just one big gay meltdown—and worth watching the whole clip.

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4) Anderson goes tanning

In this undated clip from ABC World News Now, the anchors tease Coop by running the old reel of him testing out one of those insta-tan machines. It’s not so much the tanning that’s a giveaway as the fact that he doesn’t even have any armpit hair. Jeez, we knew the hairless look was in, but that’s a bit much. Some years later on his talk show, Anderson, Cooper joined up with tanning Buddha Snooki for another round with the airbrush gun. The boys in the Pines just go wild for it!

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5) Anderson gets covered in mud and massaged by a strange man (September 2011)

Honestly, we’re not intentionally picking videos where Cooper has to strip down—it just happened that way. In this clip, Cooper looks visibly uncomfortable as he climbs down into a communal mud bath. But he really tenses up when the attendant tries to loosen him up with a massage. You gotta buy a boy dinner first!

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6) Anderson sleeps with Kathy Griffin

If you even sit on a bed with Kathy Griffin you’re automatically gay. Imagine what looking at naked pictures of her would do.

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7) Anderson schools a heifer who supports Rev. Worley’s plan to put gay people behind electrified fences (2012)

We probably would have choked a bitch (yes, through the satellite), but Cooper beats her down with unassailable logic. It’s just one of countless times the Silver Fox went to bat for the LGBT community, even if he wasn’t admitted he was part of it at the time.

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8) Anderson queens out with Ellen DeGeneres (2008)

It’s Election Day 2008 and Ellen is talking with Cooper via satellite. The nonstop campaign coverage must’ve been getting to him, because pretty soon he’s making campy Brady Bunch references and schooling Ellen on Real Housewives of Atlanta. “You don’t know about Nene? Oh honey!”