Bob biggest loser gay
'Biggest loser' trainer Bob Harper comes out
On the Nov. 26 episode of the NBC show The Biggest Loser, personal trainer Bob Harper, 48, came out as a homosexual man.
Contestant Bobby Saleem revealed that he was gay on the entertainment, but struggled to fracture the news of his sexuality to his father. To help encourage Saleem to come out to his dad, Harper decided to share his hold story. At one show Harper said, “Being queer doesn’t mean that you are less than anybody else. It’s just who you are.”
Harper stated on the show: “I haven’t talked about my sexuality on this show ever. And now, meeting Bobby, I really do consider this is the right time. I want to show Bobby that he doesn’t have to reside in shame.”
Jillian Michaels, who was an original trainer on Biggest Loser and has come back on the show periodically, is bisexual and raising two children with her significant other Heidi Rhoades.
Loser trainer reveals: I'm gay
The Biggest Loser trainer Bob Harper this week revealed he is lgbtq+ in an episode of the trendy US reality weight-loss series.
Harper, below, who has appeared on seasons of The Biggest Loser Australia, took the opportunity to open up about his sexuality on the show's Wednesday night episode in the US when a contestant, Bobby Saleem, admitted he was too afraid to approach out as lgbtq+ to his have father.
"I haven't talked about my sexuality on this present - ever," Harper said in the episode. "I really do believe this is the right time. I yearn to show Bobby that he doesn't have to reside in shame."
Harper then revealed that he had known he was gay preliminary on and that he had told friends and family when he was 17.
Since the episode aired widespread praise has poured in for the 48-year-old trainer, who took to Twitter to thank his supporters.
"Thank you for all the great comments, love respect and most of all, SUPPORT," he wrote. "I felt fond it was necessary to talk about being gay to the athlete on my team that has been struggling for such a long time and filling himself with self-hatred and shame."
When you're on a reality television performance, you're typically in the spotlight. But for "Biggest Loser" trainer Bob Harper, he was never the big storyline. Instead, as he tells "Oprah: Where Are They Now?" in the above clip, he was the support behind the contestants -- they were the real focus.
"Doing my job on 'Loser,' it always had to be about them," Harper says. "It was never about me."
...Until it was.
In 2013, Harper's sexuality became a part of the larger conversation on "Biggest Loser" when he publicly revealed he was same-sex attracted during one of the episodes. The reason why Harper chose that moment to come out, he says, wasn't necessarily for himself. It was to help someone else.
"I had a contestant that was queer , that was just struggling with his whole identity and his self-worth," Harper says. "I didn't want him to feel so adv about himself."
That contestant was Bobby Saleem, and he was having a difficult time with the idea of coming out to his family. Though Harper's personal life hadn't been highlighted on the show before, he sensed that opening up was another way to support his trainee.
"I thought that ... relating to him and coming out and talking about my sexuali
The Biggest Loser's Bob Harper Comes Out as Gay to Uplift Contestant
Bob Harper has encouraged a contestant on The Biggest Loser to do more than shed weight.
During Tuesday's episode of the show, the personal trainer came out as lgbtq+ to help blue team member Bobby Saleem, who revealed he was struggling to do so himself with his father.
"I haven't talked about my sexuality on this show ever, and now meeting Bobby, I really execute believe this is the right time," Harper said during the program. "I want to exhibit Bobby that he doesn't hold to live in shame."
Harper then sat down with Saleem and shared his own story with him.
"I totally understand what you're talking about. I totally receive it — I'm gay. I knew a very long day ago that I was lgbtq+, and the family that I grew up around was very much the same in that way — you know, there was so much repression there," Harper said. "I think that when I came out, when I was 17 years aged, it was one of those kind of things where I realized there were so many obstacles."
He added, "But being same-sex attracted doesn't mean being weak. Be