"Appearing" on the cover of the May issue of Out (expected to hit on newsstands Apr. 17) are CNN anchor Anderson Cooper and actress Jodie Foster. Or rather models being photographed holding up masks of the celebrities' faces.
Cooper and Foster, who have not publicly identified themselves as gay, are ranked numbers 2 and 43 respectively on Out's list of "The 50 Most Powerful Gay Men and Lesbians in America."
Cooper, 40, is an Emmy Award-winning journalist and writer who anchors Anderson Cooper 360 on CNN.
On the Internet, one can easily find out that 44-year-old Foster has been in a relationship with her long-term partner Cydney Bernard since they met on the set of 1993's Sommersby. The couple has two sons aged 8 and 5.
Topping the list is billionaire entertainment mogul David Geffen while Cooper, Ellen DeGeneres, philanthropist Tim Gill, and Massachusetts congressman Barney Frank occupy the top positions. Others on the list include gossip blogger Perez Hilton (#17), interior decorator Nate Berkus (#24) who frequently appears on Oprah, and X-men and Superman Returns director Bryan Singer (#32).
In the same edition, well-known gay writer Michael Musto writes the cover story titled "The Glass Closet: Why Stars Won't Come Out And Play" in which he examines the lives of semi-closeted celebrities who are said to be living in the "glass closet" where they neither refute speculations nor confirm their sexual orientation when asked.
Says Musto: "It's true that stars are free to put up whatever walls they want in order to maintain boundaries with the public. But even at their most controlling, straight stars never seem to leave out the fact that they're straight in interviews. Whenever a subject tells me, 'I won't discuss who I'm dating' or 'I resent labels,' I generally know not so much that they're passionate about privacy but that they're gay gay, gay."
Out editor in chief Aaron Hicklin has denied the list as being merely an attempt to stir up controversy.
He was quoted by radaronline.com: "It's a bit of chutzpah [Yiddish term for courage bordering on arrogance] on our part. The A-list and even B-list gays are mostly in the closet still, and those are the kinds of people we need to have on our cover. This is a way of addressing that."
Many have criticised the magazine's decision to out people without their explicit consent.
A reader wrote on gay blog towleroad.com: "This Out list is unjournalistic, criminal, and downright shameful!! – And please, don't tell me how it's "not shameful to be gay" – this has absolutely nothing to do with it: Gossip are journalism are not intercheangable, nor they should never be. A magazine wishing to be taken seriously in the community cannot get away with establishing a list of powerful LGBT people through relying on trash gossip tactics."
Hicklin however has his flame guard up: "We expect some flak for daring to create a list like this. But it's a mark of real progress that the vast majority of men and women who made our Power 50 have attained their positions without feeling the need to hide their sexuality to do so. We took the task very seriously. We wanted the list to reflect, as accurately as possible, the standing of the people on it." He was quoted as saying on Queerty.com.