Welcome to The Outfielder!

First things first: This isn’t about baseball.

It’s about all of us on the periphery of a too online culture and a politics fueled by outrage. The Outfielder puts people before party and lived experience over slogans.

If you’re interested in:

• Looking for gay culture beyond acronyms and shirtless selfies

• Addressing the needs and concerns of ordinary Americans – not the loudest online voices

• Seeing American life from the middle – close to the ground, far from the hot takes

…then The Outfielder is for you.

Who Am I?

I’m Jay Burdette, a lifelong writer and editor at the far end of my 40s. I wrote opinion columns in college and grad school and blogged intermittently. I grew up where the suburbs meet the farms. In high school, I couldn’t wait to leave. I spent a decade at leading universities and lived three glorious years in West Hollywood. Then, I got a job in Europe and worked abroad for 15 years. Covid blew up my life there, so I returned to my hometown.

I was out in the world for so long, and now I’m back where I can see farms from my house. My state and our country have changed so much – but there’s so much work to do. On a personal level, it’s been an adjustment from walking to the neighborhood gay bar to driving past the occasional, brave pride flag on someone’s porch.

Why The Outfielder?

These days, it feels like the algorithm determines everything. Why govern when you can indulge in an endless stream of grievances? Instead of solving problems, we’re sorted into teams. Our politicians keep feeding the outrage machine all the way to the next election.

The algorithm wants gays dumb and horny. We’re flooded with gay content, but it’s the shallowest clickbait. The richer, deeper waters of gay culture are harder to find. We used to share it man-to-man: we connected through songs, books, bars, glances, stories. We were a community; our survival depended on it. Now we’re flattened to the letter G or reduced to scrolling through thirst traps in the same five poses.

So I want to write toward a better country and find gay culture to delight, challenge, and sustain us. It’s time to turn the page and give a voice to those of us who are far from the center of the action. It’s time for The Outfielder.

In The Outfielder, I write under a pen name to keep this newsletter separate from my professional work. Some names and minor details may be changed to protect privacy. Everything else is real.

Expect weekly essays, plus occasional Base Hits: quick notes on gay film/TV/books/music when something feels like a real cultural moment.

This won’t be outrage for sport. It’ll be candid, sometimes cheeky, and always interested in what helps us live better. Gay and straight, Midwestern or otherwise: let’s talk, let’s listen, and we’ll turn the page together.

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— Jay

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