The Dark History Of NFL Cheerleading

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Scantily clad girls with pom-poms dancing on the sidelines of a football game are as American as apple pie ... which Mashed says is actually English, but that's a whole other story. While it might seem like they're having the best time of their lives cheering on their team's men, accusations and allegations made by NFL cheerleaders from multiple teams suggest that there's something incredibly dark going on behind the scenes.

Do enough digging, and it seems like it's been that way for a long time. Cheerleaders have all different reasons for trying out for an NFL team: Some might love the action and the interaction with the crowds; some might hope to launch a modeling or acting career; and for others, it might be a natural extension of a lifetime of dance. But according to what past and present NFL cheerleaders have said, the stress of making the team is nothing compared to the stress of staying on it ... and dealing with everything else that goes along with the uniform.

And it's awful stuff, including body-shaming, sexual harassment, abuse, long hours for little to no pay, eating disorders, and rampant misogyny. Hearing what cheerleaders have to say about their job suggests that those smiles are just for the cameras.

Cheerleaders, it seems, have always been expected to cater to the fans. Ultimate Cheerleaders spoke with former Chicago cheerleader Maribeth Duffy-Bolger, who recalled that while there were a lot of fun times, there were questionable ones, too. She referenced a game where the squad — called the Honey Bears — headed out on the field dressed in skirts instead of their usual, underwear-like bottoms. They were booed so badly and heckled with calls of "Take it off, take it off!" that they had to go, change, and return.

The Honey Bears were founded by Cathy Core, who told Vanity Fair that the Bears owner had specified that he wanted to "give the people something more for their dollar," and that included cheerleading uniforms designed to fit the more well-endowed girls in a more flattering way. Core also summed up the complaints about things like sexual harassment like this: "My feeling is that when you come into a group, you sign a contract. You know what you're getting into. Nothing that you're gonna cry about is gonna make it any different."

Interestingly, the Chicago Bears decided not to renew the contract with the agency that oversaw the Honey Bears way back in 1985. The Chicago Tribune quoted GM Jerry Vainisi as questioning, "Do we feel cheerleaders have become passé, or are they still a part of the game?"

Texas Monthly interviewed Dana Presley, who kicked off her career as an NFL cheerleader in 1981. At the time, they got paid $15 per game — and in spite of repeated attempts at getting a raise, they were pushed off until the 1990s. That's when their pay went up to $50 a game. It's increased since, but the justification for saying no has always been the same: You're lucky to have a spot, there are hundreds of other girls who want it, and they're not going to complain about pay, are they?

Pay obviously varies by team, but in 2022, NBC took a look at averages. Even though cheerleaders spent an average of 30 to 40 hours a week at practice — not including travel and wait times before games — they earned an average of $150 per game, and between $50 and $75 for a public appearance. That's about $22,500 a year. Meanwhile, an average waterboy salary is $53,000 per year.

In 2018, The Daily Beast reported on a massive lawsuit filed against the Houston Texans. Several of their cheerleaders claimed that not only were they not compensated for things like mandatory time spent tanning and in salons, but that when they raised concerns about discrepancies in their pay, they were told they would be fired if they pushed it. They're not alone: Cheerleading squads for Tampa Bay, Buffalo, Cincinnati, and the New York Jets have all sued for payment.

One particular team's cheerleaders tried to take things into their own hands, and it's the reason that the Buffalo Bills no longer have cheerleaders.

It started in 1995 when the Buffalo Jills decided that they were going to try to unionize — and they did. Their goal was fair compensation: Vanity Fair says that at the time, they only got a parking pass and a single ticket for each home game they performed at, while they wanted $25 per game. Not unreasonable? Their sponsor — a local fast food place called Mighty Taco — was horrified, with co-owner Andrew Gerovac saying (via AP): "I see no need for this. ... It's not like they work in the coal mines."

Mighty Taco ultimately stopped sponsoring the Jills, who got another sponsor to step in with one caveat: getting rid of the union. Seeing no choice, they did — but in 2014, they filed a lawsuit for back pay. It took until 2022 to settle. Spectrum reported that they'd be getting $4 million from their management company, Cumulus, and $3.5 million from the Bills. The Jills, however, are no more. To hear them talk about it, that's no biggie. During a deposition in 2017, Bills president Russ Brandon said (via WIVB) that the cheerleaders were "inconsequential from a business standpoint," and added, "My give-a-blank meter would have been zero. ... I couldn't have cared less if the Jills existed."

In 2015, an anonymous cheerleader wrote an expose for Cosmopolitan. In it, she detailed just how much of their appearance is governed by their job — and it's pretty shocking. Keeping the required skin tone, she wrote, left her with permanently discolored patches of skin. One day, she was told she needed to start dying her hair a shade they'd chosen because "My natural hue made me look 'too ethnic.'" Any haircut had to be approved first, and requests for changes — like the aforementioned dye job — well, paying for the trip to the approved salon wasn't paid for by the squad, team, or NFL. Instead, it came right out of her pocket.

In 2018, The New York Times got ahold of seven handbooks for various teams' cheerleaders and found there were rules for everything up to and including the right way to use a tampon. The anonymous cheerleader wrote that when she signed her contract, she agreed to the statement, "Your appearance must be impeccable at all times," and that was no joke.

Tattoos and piercings had to be covered and removed, and nails always had to be manicured — but only with clear or light colors. Anyone who throws on a pair of sweatpants when they're running down to the corner store, going to the gym, or just out running need not apply to be a cheerleader: That's forbidden. Think that's not personal enough? Some of the handbooks acquired by the Times even gave cheerleaders directions regarding shaving.

When The New York Times got ahold of several of the handbooks for NFL cheerleaders in 2018, among the written rules were guidelines about interactions with pro football players. While the NYT reports that cheerleaders can't follow players on social media and have to block those who try to follow them, some teams go even further. According to Vox, New Orleans cheerleaders have to block all accounts of all 2,000-plus NFL players. They're also forbidden from entering a public place where a player is, and if they're in, for example, a restaurant and a player walks in, they have to leave. An anonymous cheerleader writing for Cosmopolitan said that the strict no-interactions-with-players rule meant that she had to end friendships with guys she'd known since college. At the same time, some of the cheerleaders made it well-known that they were on the hunt for a player to marry, despite the repercussions. 

It's always been like that, and when couples get caught, punishment is one-sided. When Vanity Fair talked to Chicago Honey Bears founder Cathy Core, she recalled an incident in the late 1970s where a relationship between a player and cheerleader went public. She was released from the squad, and the Bears' general manager at the time — Jim Finks — laughed at the idea of reprimanding the player. "Do you think I'm gonna bench him? He's not gonna lose his job," she recalled him saying.

In 2018, the director of the Houston Texans cheerleaders quit. According to The New York Times, the official statement Altovise Gary gave was that her retirement came from personal reasons, but they also noted that it came amid accusations and a lawsuit filed by several of the cheerleaders.

KHOU outlined some of the accusations, noting that they were based on what the cheerleaders alleged was a pattern of body-shaming, threats, and targeting certain women because of their ethnicity. Included in the list of accusations were cheerleaders who said they were body-shamed by being told they had "belly jelly," a "chunky cheek," and being asked if they "ate a plate of salt." One cheerleader said she had been pulled aside and had duct tape applied to her stomach beneath her costume.

That was Angelina Rosa, who said (via The Daily Beast) she was singled out and targeted as an example for her teammates. In addition to the duct tape incident, Rosa said that she was told not to eat in order to keep her weight down and said her decision to join the lawsuit was made with the hope of preventing others from going through the same thing. "I realized my silence would only encourage the same treatment to be done to the next girl caught up in the whirlwind of achieving her dreams, only to be devastated at the reality of being ... used to profit a multibillion-dollar organization that she actually supports."