No Fats, Femmes, Asians, or Oldies

Online dating/cruising is a minefield of snap judgments and highly specific standards that the gay community knows all too well. Maybe it's because there's not too many of us to begin with (as compared to our straight pals) and we flock to the net to find each other, or because dating websites are just so damn popular now... or maybe both of these reasons, but the world of online dating/cruising is not new to LGBT people. I remember when I was first coming out, the internet was such an amazing resource for talking to individuals who actually understood the issues I was going through. I have and always will have a special place in my heart for the web, as it is both a meeting point for like-minded individuals who have not been given a voice, a resource for education, and also a tool for social justice.

So there I was, talking to another gay guy about life... when he mentioned to me that he felt so amazingly old. He confided in me that not too many gay guys talked to him anymore because of his age. He was 25. He mentioned that he wants to find a LTR (long term relationship) before he turns 30, because at that point he will be considered dead in the gay community.

I was watching Another Gay Movie with some friends (pretty funny at parts, if you can get over the crazy stereotyping... it became such a staple in my apartment that we would watch it in conjuction with Mamma Mia  almost daily while doing homework and refer to our evening plans as experiencing 'Another Gay Mamma') when I noticed a movie gag about 4 guys going into a gay bar. They're asked how old they are by some bears to which one guy sweetly replies that he's only 17. The bears scoff and say that he's already peaked within the gay community, and leaves him to find younger guys.

Of course this movie gag is completely in jest, but it brings up an interesting piece of gay male culture: the rampant ageism. The man I was talking to online was not kidding when he told me that he felt like he was going to be considered dead when he reached the age of 30. He was perhaps making an exaggeration, but was picking up on a very real truth within the gay male community: youth is worshiped. This may sound no different from straight culture (given that bieber is being fetishized by women) but ageism is even more apparent within the gay male community.

In Darker Shades of Queer, Chong-suk Han discusses his experiences as a gay man of color, and how he has noticed blatant racism within queer circles in addition to homophobia in communities of color. He brings up the critical point that oppressed groups that would benefit from being empathetic to each other's causes (people of color and non-heterosexuals) often discriminate against each other in order to cling to the small piece of privilege that hate brings with it, leaving queer people of color to live in the borderlands of these groups, not necessarily feeling welcome in either. Think about it. In Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, The L Word, and Queer as Folk (which are unfortunately seen as the tantamount of gay experience) mainly feature upper middle class white people.

Author Jason Chang really hits the nail on the head when he discusses how Asian-American men in particular are seen as feminine and as undesirable sex partners (sexism/racism/heterosexism connection). This goes in concert with Chong-suk Han's argument, who agrees and goes on to discuss how Black and Hispanic men are seen as hyper-masculine and over-sexualized to the point of people viewing them as sex objects.

I was on a cruising website (probably not the kind of cruise you're thinking of) talking to this guy, when he responded by telling me that he wasn't interested in femmes. At the time, I had no idea what he meant by 'femme' other than that I was probably being associated with a woman. I probed him for more information (as I often do with strangers) and he told me that based on how I look/presented myself, I was too feminine for him. He told me that he is only looking for straight-acting (i.e. masculine) men. I thought to myself, "Okay, that's just one person's preference" and proceeded to look for other guys with less gender-representation-specific standards. I took me all of 1 minute to find another guy with a profile that said "No femmes"... and then another and another and another. I have never seen a dating/cruising profile or even heard of a gay man who is unattracted to 'straight-acting' men. 

All of these connected stories lead to my main idea: marginalization of these groups. Unfortunately it's all too common for gay men to proclaim they deem a combination (or perhaps all) of these groups unattractive. Many claim that their attraction is based on personal preference... and indeed it is... but (if you know me) you know that I like to look at how the big-picture/society shapes our individual experiences/actions/motivations/desires. To say that our desires are only internal and biological would be false, as it pays no homage to how culture and history shape our current situations/desires (and indeed they do). Of course biology does play a role in our sexual attractions, but so do social norms and cultural expectations. What individuals in one society may collectively deem attractive may not carry over to another time period, or even another culture. To say that men are only attracted to blonde haired and blue eyed women is an amazingly white-centered, hetero-normative idea that does not hold up when looking at sexual attraction across the world, throughout time, or among same-sex couples.

 That being said, in gay male culture in United States, there are some cultural moors that dictate who is and isn't attractive. These ideals that white, trim, masculine men are the most attractive are, I believe, a potent mix of sexism, racism, and internalized hetero-sexism. Actually, it's not just here, and not just with gay men.

This is not to say that all people are racist (white people tend to freak out when I use the word 'racism', so I try to explain myself extra carefully so as to make them less defensive and more likely to listen), but it is to say that our snap judgments we make about who is and is not attractive are influenced in part from several cultural ideals that place specific individuals (who have historically held the most societal power) at the pinnacle of attraction. Is it a coincidence that gay males tend to view feminine men as less attractive, when we live in a society that grants more social, cultural, and economic power to men? I think not.

It could be said that my argument is simply me lamenting from not being labeled at the most attractive, but I ask you to do your own research. Go onto gay male dating/cruising websites and take a look. Hell, go onto craigslist. See for yourself. Tell me what you find.


P.S. The female cast of the L Word is actually made of entirely heterosexual women... because apparently straight women are better at being lesbians than... lesbians. Really makes you think about how 'gayness' marketed on TV is actually quite different from the everyday experiences of queer people.

Today in Hate Yourself Media.

There are so many many forms of rampant discrimination ingrained in modern society: racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, and sizeism to name just a few.

This article points out that "obese" women are much less likely to have sexual partners than "obese" men. I'm really not at all surprised about this finding, given that there is a severe double-standard as to what constitutes "attractive" for men and women. Women are unfortunately held to higher standards of "beauty" than men, and expected to police themselves and other women regarding their appearance. Think about as many popular sitcoms as you can that feature couples that consist of a young, thin, beautiful women and an 'overweight', moderate-looking man.

.... are you doing it? I'm serious! Get out a pen and pencil and make a list.

Okay. Now, try to do the reverse: list as many popular sitcom couples as you can that feature a young, gorgeous, in-shape man and an 'overweight', moderate-looking woman.

It's a bit more difficult to do the latter, isn't it?

Again, this study's findings are not super surprising. Also not surprising was the finding that "obese" women may feel stigmatized in medical settings, and thus not seek needed care.

What did strike me was the response of some of the "experts" who were asked to comment on the results.

Dr. Sandy Goldbeck-Wood, a specialist in psychosexual medicine at a London sexual health clinic, said physicians must talk to obese women about birth control.

"Doctors need to get over their own embarrassment and ask the difficult questions," she said. Goldbeck-Wood was not linked to the study but wrote an accompanying editorial in the BMJ.

Um... Ya think? I would hope that doctors already give the same amount of effort when helping thin patients as they would with 'overweight' patients, but apparently this is not the case. Oh boo hoo. The doctors now have to ask bigger women about sex. These doctors have it rough. *warranted eye roll*

"This is not a heart attack or a stroke...but it's an important quality of life factor and a public health problem," said Dr. Andrew McCullough, an associate professor of clinical urology at New York University of Medicine and director of male sexual health at NYU's Langone Medical Center.

He said the study's findings should provide another reason for people to trim their waistlines.

"It seems like a no-brainer," he said. "If you lose weight, you will feel more attractive and that could improve your sex life."

Oh... okay. "Obese" people are discriminated against... so they should lose weight to make the discrimination go away... right. Or we could examine our own prejudices and acts of discrimination against bigger people. Oh, right. That would actually require effort and understanding on our part... which is just too much work.

Far too often, "overweight" people are assumed to be lazy (without any consideration for other factors in their life that may influence their body shape). I think the real culprit of laziness in this situation are those who are unwilling to reflect upon their own internalized hatred of groups of people.

Does this all sound familiar? It should. So many anti-gay groups use the same kind of "logic" to cure the social ill of discrimination. "They can change! These therapies work! Why would you want to live that unhealthy lifestyle where people will discriminate against you? You could simply be straight and have it much easier!"

While the idea of enjoying heterosexual privilege is tempting, "changing" the individual does nothing to address the larger social issue of hatred and discrimination. Focusing on the individual person and how they can "fix" him or herself is an incredibly lazy solution to a pervasive social problem that does not affect individual people, but actually affect and limit us all.

Fat people and gay men are paid less in the work place, so they should change the way they are to suit our needs. Right... because that makes sense. Fat people and gay people are at risk for developing certain illnesses... so we should recommend that they change their lifestyles to fit the "norm". How compassionate...

In the United States, we tend to have an obsessively individualistic view of the world. If a person if poor, fat, gay, a sex worker, it is "their fault". By keeping the issues of inequalities at the individual level, we prevent real social change from occurring that could not only end discrimination, but could restructure society to end the inequalities themselves. By shaming and guilting people into changing who they are, we can capitalize on this need for services and products that assist in these quick-fixes of "normalization" (that don't actually work). It's the American way, right? We can create conversion therapies, pills, and potions that can make you the way you "should" be, and then charge exorbitant fees along the way. These industries have a vested financial interest in perpetuating the notion that these identities are "undesirable". When the media brings to light a blatant inequality experienced by these groups of people, "experts" jump at the chance to convince vulnerable people who experience inequalities that they can change... for a price.

Oh, and I looked up some info about Dr. Andrew McCullough. He was one of the individual clinical investigators for Viagra. Why am I not surprised? Yet another industry that financially depends on making you feel inadequate. Awesome.

-Harvs

True Blood (not the show)

What constitutes dirty blood? Oh, right: blood from men who have sex with men... because, you know... all men who have sex with men must have AIDS.

This is basically the thinking of the Federal Advisory Committee on Blood Safety and Availability, who voted 9 to 6 against lifting the ban that prevents men who have sex with men from donating blood.

Heterosexual privilege #3: I can donate blood.

This sounds so simple, but it is a ban that is mired in archaic language that lumps together an entire group of people and actually prevents them from providing much needed aid to the rest of the world via donations.

When it boils down to it: this ban is hurting more than it is helping. I don't want to make the mistake of trying to make this "seem" more important by getting the attention of straights, because it's already a blatant injustice that should not need fear-mongering to make this topic newsworthy. Heterosexual people should care about this, even if it didn't affect them and their health. That being said, the logic of the Federal Advisory Committee (whom one would think would be making decisions in interest of improving the health of all) is simply unfathomable to me, given that all donors are tested for HIV before donations are accepted.

Interestingly, it's not just gay men, but African-Americans who are also at high risk for contracting HIV. I absolutely do not think that the Federal Advisory Committee should generalize and stigmatize all African-Americans in addition to gay men, as any form of discrimination is abhorrent and unwarranted. I do, however, think that this underlines the faulty logic of the FAC in coming to their decision. Unfortunately, non-heterosexuals and African Americans (note that these are not mutually exclusive categories) are two groups who suffer from discrimination within the medical field when they are sometimes the two groups that need the most medical assistance due to being at risk for contracting these and other diseases. As you could imagine, this can be incredibly problematic when it comes to preventative health care. Groups that do not feel welcome within doctors offices and hospitals may not trust medical practitioners whole-heartedly and may choose to not utilize such services when needed. Another related example is with size discrimination, as people who are considered "overweight" or "obese" are unfortunately stigmatized in medical settings, which may lead to these individuals to become less likely to take necessary steps to prevent illness.

Discrimination against particular groups in medical settings is a clear example of highly-educated people who are still largely influenced by stereotypes and misconceptions. Far too often, it is assumed that these forms of outright discrimination are only perpetuated by the uneducated, but this is a dangerous falsehood that must be brought to light. Whether perpetuated by a child playing in your neighborhood or by the board members for the FAC, these forms of blatant discrimination and slander must be corrected if we have any hope of living in a just world.

-Harvey Milk Jr.