Valentine's Day 2025

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Valentine's Day 2024

 Valentine's Day

Today we celebrate Valentine's day with athletes kissing.

Above, Italian oarsmen Ercole Olgeni and Giovanni Scaturin kiss after winning a gold medal in the 1920 Olympics.

Cleveland Indians players Bob Lemon and Gene Bearden kiss after winning the World Series in 1948.

During a 1996 football (soccer) match in Scotland between the Rangers and the Inverness Caledonian Thistle, Rangers player Paul 'Gazza' Gascoigne accidentally bumped heads with teammate Ally McCoist, giving McCoist a split lip.  To make amends, Gazza decided to "kiss it and make it better."

English cricket player Graeme Swann kisses teammate Alastair Cook in the 2009 Ashes Test match against Australia.

Liverpool football (soccer) players and buddies Steven Gerrard and Xabi Alonso celebrate a 2005 win over Milan.

Manchester United football (soccer) players Gary Neville and Paul Scholes celebrating a win in 2010.

Michael Sam, at left, the first openly gay NFL player, kissing his boyfriend, Vito Cammisano, when he was drafted for the St. Louis Rams in 2014.

In 2017, L.A. Dodgers player Yasiel Puig kissed his batting coach Turner Ward after every home run that he hit – and he hit 28 of them.

And since this is the Unashamed Male blog, here's Yasiel Puig in the nude from ESPN's The Body Issue.

Jake Atlas, real name Kenny Marquez, is an openly gay pro wrestler, here kissing his opponent Dom Kubrick in 2018.

We end with this photo of kissing and something more.  Are they athletes?  Google thinks they are.  When I tried to do a Google image search on this photo a few years ago, Google categorized it as "collegiate wrestling."  That's not what I'd call it, but I guess there could have been some wrestling involved.

Happy Valentine's Day, sending you aloha (love) from Hawaii.

Valentine's Day 2023

Valentine's Day

This video is a Swedish commercial for an organic beverage called Clean Drinks.  At the end, it says "Happy Valentine's Day" in Swedish.

Happy Valentine's Day to all of you!

Valentine's Day

Kissing on TV

For Valentine's Day, here's a brief history of male-to-male kissing on TV.

An episode of Dawson's Creek when Jack (Kerr Smith) kissed Ethan (Adam Kaukfman), above, in May, 2000, is often cited as the first male-to-male kiss on TV.  That's only off by 49 years.

As far as I can tell, the first male-to-male kiss on TV actually happened on the Colgate Comedy Hour on Feb. 4, 1951, when Jerry Lewis unexpectedly kissed Dean Martin (above).

But that wasn't a romantic kiss.  The first romantic male-to-male kiss on TV was in a 1960 BBC play called Colombe, featuring Sean Connery, of all people, (at left) and Richard Pasco.  The plot had a rather unbelievable excuse for the kiss, to get around the problem that gay sex was still illegal in England.  In the plot, they are brothers, and Pasco is having an affair with Connery’s wife.  Connery decides to find out firsthand what makes Pasco’s kisses so successful.

The first gay kiss on Dutch TV was in the 1970 documentary Portret van een homofiel (Portrait of a Homosexual).  The kiss occurs at the very end, among the end titles (above).

A 1970 BBC TV production of the play Edward II by Christopher Marlowe starred a young Ian McKellen as King Edward and James Laurenson as his lover Gaveston.

If you thought anti-gay hate crimes are a recent development, consider this historical fact: King Edward II, a gay King of England who lived in the 14th century, was murdered by his wife’s lover by having a red-hot poker stuck up his ass.

Here’s Ian McKellen again (above, right) as King Edward II.  It’s hard to believe that this cute guy would become Gandalf.

This clip is from the 1972 West German TV series Nicht der Homosexuelle ist pervers, sondern die Situation, in der er lebt (It Is not the homosexual who Is perverse, but the society in which he lives), a.k.a. Being Gay part 9.  The scene is in a gay club, and this may be the steamiest male-to-male TV kiss ever.  Eat your heart out, Dawson’s Creek!

Kissing

 Kissing

For Valentine's Day, some (mostly vintage) kissing photos.

This Harry Bush cartoon says “Kiss a Marine and see what happens.”  Read on to see what happens when you kiss a serviceman.

What happens when you kiss a sailor?  This is a 1942 photo of two sailors on leave in San Diego.  ACT-UP used this image on a T-shirt.  Very sweet.

But here's the original uncropped image of the sailors kissing, from the Kinsey Institute.  That’s what happens when you kiss a sailor!

What happens when you kiss a soldier?  In 1945, Nazi Germany had just been conquered by Russian and Allied armies.  In celebration, a Russian and American soldier kiss.  This photo became known as the “friendship kiss.”  We don’t know how far the new international friendship was taken after dinner.

Two guys in a photo booth in 1953.  The booth’s automated photo development was a way to avoid having to send in your film to be developed, in the days when a photo like this would get you in trouble.

French runner Alain Mimoun (right) kissing Czech runner Emil Zatopek to congratulate him at the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki, captured by LIFE photographer Ralph Crane.  Mimoun would have been the world champion long-distance runner, except Zatopek kept beating him.  Despite their rivalry, they forged a friendship.  Mimoun finally beat Zatopek in the marathon at the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne.  “Emil, congratulate me,” he said.  Zatopek embraced and kissed him.  “For me, that was better than a medal,” Mimoun said later.

A moment at a 1962 track meet between the U.S. and Russia, captured by LIFE photographer John Dominis.  Another kiss of international friendship?  No, this time it’s a Russian coach or teammate congratulating a Russian athlete.

Turkish oil wrestlers kissing in a 1961 photo by LIFE’s Stan Wayman.  According to the Turks, it’s not gay if they coat themselves with oil, grapple with each other, stick their hands down each others’ pants trying to get a grip, and then the winner kisses the loser.  It’s just Turkish.

Happy Valentine's Day!