Margaret Cho: Adam Lambert is confronting a homophobic rock world

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Quote :: "American Idol" first runner-up Adam Lambert seems to be surprised that he's running up against some resistance as an openly gay man in the world of rock music, but comic Margaret Cho? Not so much.

"It's very weird, isn't it, how rock and roll is very homophobic in a lot of ways," Cho, who stars in the Lifetime dramedy "Drop Dead Diva," tells Zap2it. "Women are given a lot of freedom to define their sexuality. I mean, Lady Gaga is able to pretty much do anything she wants. And Madonna, before her, was free to play around with gender roles.

"I don't think the same flexibility exists for men, even though some of the greatest rock stars have been pretty androgynous, like Freddie Mercury or David Bowie -- although Mercury wasn't really out and Bowie was straight. There's definitely a double standard, and it's true for a lot of gay men in rock and roll."

And those stars adopt different career survival strategies, says Cho, like Morrissey, who professes to be celibate yet is presumed to be gay, and Elton John and Ricky Martin, who came out late in their professional careers.

"Rock and roll is super-progressive in a lot of ways, but in other ways, it's not," Cho says.