Maroon 5 singer and coach of talent show The Voice Adam Levine, has hit out at rival show Idol to say that it discourages aspiring singers from coming out as gay.

Levine made the comments during an interview with Out Magazine, during which he strongly accused the Idol series of stopping people from revealing their sexuality if they are gay.

He said: “What’s always pissed me off about ‘Idol’ is wanting to mask that, for that to go unspoken,” Levine groused. “C’mon. You can’t be publicly gay? At this point? On a singing competition? Give me a break. You can’t hide basic components of these people’s lives. The fact that ‘The Voice’ didn’t have any qualms about being completely open about it is a great thing.”

The Voice America had several openly-gay contestants, two of whom made it to the competition’s final round.

Idol contestants Clay Aiken and Adam Lambert both publicly revealed that they were gay after the competition had ended.

During the interview with Out, Levine also revealed that his younger brother is gay, and asserted that being gay is not a choice.

“I can single-handedly dispel any ideas that sexuality is acquired,” he said, continuing: “Trust me, you’re born with it. My brother is gay, and we knew when he was two. We all knew.”

Back in June, The Voice host Carson Daly commended the show for its gay-friendly nature. He said: “The thing about The Voice is no one knew anything about anybody. It’s not like it’s a gay friendly show on purpose … There wasn’t any bias, but we embraced the fact that the gay community was so well represented in our show, and we were very proud of that.”