Chen received backlash after he gave an insensitive answer regarding femininity and masculinity in figure skating. While appearing on a podcast Chen was asked if he was ever told to play hockey because it was more “masculine.” “Yes certainly.
Especially as a male athlete… as a straight male athlete in a fairly homosexual-dominated sport, or LGBTQ+ dominated sport,” Chen replied. “I think that there is that connotation and there is that ‘Well we don’t really wanna watch guys skate around’, and we’d rather watch hockey or we’d rather watch females do that, which I think is pretty messed up in itself. “It’s a genuine sport, we spend our whole lives trying to hone this craft, and to just sort of be belittled like that is not something that is