Will Petersen is a New York based writer, and yes, he does love to tell that to anyone who happens to ask. While his academic background centers around international migration and queer theory, he now spends most of his time writing at the intersection of sports and culture.
Personal work
Everybody Wants to Be a Part of Something: “Who Gon Be the Boys?”
Why did the internet go from celebrating men in skirts to policing rhinestone hoodies and ballet flats? This essay traces the backlash against masculine femininity through post-COVID identity, cultural conservatism, and the increasingly rigid boundaries of gender. A reflection on finding clarity in the silence between the noise of city life and the internal search for belonging.
When Everything’s Gnarly, Nothing Is
What Katseye’s “Gnarly” and the bizarre popularity of AI Fruit Love Island reveal about a culture so obsessed with irony that ironic participation can become completely sincere. The piece asks what happens when being “in on the joke” becomes its own form of social currency.
I Hate You, Tyler Catastrophe!
A meditation on body positivity, confidence, and the internet’s increasingly hostile relationship with people who refuse to be ashamed of how they look, centered on the strange online fascination with Tyler Catastrophe and the particular stakes of his refusal to see himself through other people’s eyes.
I Am Straight. Everyone Else Is Gay
A street-interview TikTok where every man confidently identifies himself as straight while reading everyone else as secretly gay becomes an exploration of gaydar, masculinity, and the strange impossibility of knowing who someone is from the outside.
RPFing Your Way Into Sports
How queer fans use real-person fiction and sports shipping to carve out forms of belonging that institutional Pride efforts cannot provide, from Haalingham to Willmack. Rather than asking sports organizations to make room for queer fans, RPFing lets queer fans build their own subculture within the sport.
Get in touch
Have a project in mind? Need to ask a question? Want to reach out and tell me how smart/great I am? My inbox is open to all of the above and anything in between.