Many NFL fans are furious over videos of male cheerleaders being introduced as part of the 2025 cheerleading squad for the Minnesota Vikings.

While male cheerleaders have been part of NFL squads for several years, a clip of rookie cheerleader Blaize Shiek being introduced went viral on social media, igniting significant backlash. Shiek is one of two male cheerleaders on the Vikings squad, joining Louie Conn this season. 

“Dear Minnesota Vikings, Just Stop. Sincerely, All Sane Americans,” one popular reply on X said. 

“Because nothing says ‘football’ like watching Chad do high kicks in booty shorts,” another person quipped.

🚨BREAKING: The Minnesota Vikings under MAJOR backlash after the team hires a MALE as their LEAD CHEERLEADER for the 2025-26 NFL football season.

Recent Videos of the cheerleader are going VIRAL online with many calling to cancel the team. pic.twitter.com/uwuMAWDTr2

— The Patriot Oasis™ (@ThePatriotOasis) August 12, 2025

Others noted that even though male cheerleaders are nothing new, the presentation now is vastly different. 

“Im not opposed to male cheerleaders like those guys on college teams that help with stunts or whatever but I am opposed to guys holding pom poms,” one person observed, echoing what others have been saying about Shiek’s flamboyant, overly feminine look and behavior.

Shiek seemed to troll critics with a video posted on Instagram. In it, one female Vikings cheerleader asks another, “Wait, where are the boys?” to which the second woman replies, “I don’t know. I heard they were throwing a fit.”

Then Shiek and Conn strut forward with their pom poms, as Shiek dramatically flipped his hair back and forth.

“SEE YOU AT 3,” Shiek wrote in the caption, referencing kickoff time. He went on to cheer during a preseason Minnesota Vikings game against the Houston Texans at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis.

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The response got so bad that the Vikings released a statement to NBC News on Wednesday.

“Male cheerleaders have been part of previous Vikings teams and have long been associated with collegiate and professional cheerleading,” the team said. “We support all our cheerleaders and are proud of the role they play as ambassadors of the organization.”

Per The Spun via Yahoo Sports, 12 out of the 32 NFL teams have male cheerleaders. And while many X users were celebrating that Shiek is at least a male who isn’t pretending to be female, that’s not the case everywhere. 

In 2022, Justine Lindsay became the first transgender-identifying man to become an NFL cheerleader with the Carolina Panthers.

“I have had so many parents of young kids in the trans community say thank you for what I’m doing and that their son or daughter is watching me,” Lindsay said at the time, per NFL.com. “They are so pleased to see that I’m tearing down that wall.”

Lindsay will be cheering again for the Panthers for the 2025 season.

Tom Cruise reportedly turned down a chance to be honored by President Donald Trump with an award at the Kennedy Center, according to The Washington Post.

The outlet reported that the “Top Gun: Maverick” star cited “scheduling conflicts” when asked to attend the gala at the Kennedy Center Opera House in Washington, D.C., on December 7.

Cruise, 63, remains silent on political issues, and redirected the conversation when a Korean reporter pressed him on the issue of Trump and tariffs at a press junket for “Mission: Impossible 8” earlier this year.

“We’d rather answer questions about the movie. Thank you,” the actor said.

Notably, Cruise has a history of skipping awards shows, especially considering how fans believe he’s been snubbed by the Academy on multiple occasions after being nominated for an Oscar three times, but never winning.

President Trump made headlines earlier this week when he announced this year’s Kennedy Center honorees personally during a press conference.

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This year’s celebrity honorees include country singer George Strait, legendary actor Sylvester Stallone, the rock band KISS, “Phantom of the Opera” actor Michael Crawford, and singer Gloria Gaynor, as The Daily Wire previously reported.

“The 48th Kennedy Center Honorees are outstanding people, incredible, we can’t wait … in a few short months since I became chairman of the board, the Kennedy Center, we’ve completely reversed the decline of this cherished national institution,” Trump said during his speech on Wednesday.

When asked if he participated in the selection process, Trump said he was “about 98% involved” and that “they all came through me.”

The president flat out said he turned down certain suggestions for being too “woke.”

“I turned down plenty, they were too woke. … I had a couple of wokesters. No, we have great people. This is very different than it used to be,” Trump added. He went on to mention other Hollywood awards shows, which seemingly take an opposite approach.

“Look at the Academy Awards — it gets lousy ratings now, it’s all woke. All they do is talk about how much they hate Trump, but nobody likes that. They don’t watch anymore,” Trump said.