Is lonels the gay man’s curse, or a product of 21st century life?

Contents:

• IS FEMMEPHOBIA GAY CULTURE CONTRIBUTG TO LONELS?
• IS LONELS THE GAY MAN’S CURSE, OR A PRODUCT OF 21ST CENTURY LIFE?
• BEG CHRISTIAN AND GAY
• GAY, BISEXUAL MEN UTAH N GIVE BLOOD UNR PANY’S LOOSENED RTRICTNS
• GAY LONELS IS THE SILENT EPIMIC FACG THE QUEER COMMUNY

IS FEMMEPHOBIA GAY CULTURE CONTRIBUTG TO LONELS?

Still, even as we celebrate the sle and speed of this change, the rat of prsn, lonels and substance abe the gay muny rema stuck the same place they’ve been for s. In a survey of gay men who recently arrived New York Cy, three-quarters suffered om anxiety or prsn, abed dgs or alhol or were havg risky sex—or some batn of the three.

IS LONELS THE GAY MAN’S CURSE, OR A PRODUCT OF 21ST CENTURY LIFE?

“Marriage equaly and the chang legal stat were an improvement for some gay men, ” says Christopher Stults, a rearcher at New York Universy who studi the differenc mental health between gay and straight men. In the Netherlands, where gay marriage has been legal sce 2001, gay men rema three tim more likely to suffer om a mood disorr than straight men, and 10 tim more likely to engage “suicidal self-harm. When the dispary first me to light the ’50s and ’60s, doctors thought was a symptom of homosexualy self, jt one of many maniftatns of what was, at the time, known as “sexual versn.

“That was the ia I had, too, ” Salway says, “that gay suici was a product of a bygone era, or was ncentrated among adolcents who didn’t see any other way out. He found that gay men everywhere, at every age, have higher rat of rdvascular disease, ncer, ntence, erectile dysfunctn, ⁠ allergi and asthma—you name , we got . “We see gay men who have never been sexually or physilly asslted wh siar post-trmatic strs symptoms to people who have been bat suatns or who have been raped, ” says Alex Kroghlian, a psychiatrist at the Fenway Instute’s Center for Populatn Rearch LGBT Health.

For s, this is what psychologists thought, too: that the key stag inty formatn for gay men all led up to g out, that once we were fally fortable wh ourselv, we uld beg buildg a life wh a muny of people who’d gone through the same thg. It got so bad that I ed to go to the grocery store that was 40 mut away stead of the one that was 10 mut away jt bee I was so aaid to walk down the gay street. Several studi have found that livg gay neighborhoods predicts higher rat of risky sex and meth e and ls time spent on other muny activi like volunteerg or playg sports.

BEG CHRISTIAN AND GAY

Acrdg to Dane Whicker, a clil psychologist and rearcher at De, most gay men report that they want to date someone mascule, and that they wished they acted more mascule themselv. Rearchers say this kd of trag, liberately tryg to appear more mascule and takg on a different sex role, is jt one of the ways gay men prsure each other to atta “sexual pal, ” the equivalent of gog to the gym or pluckg our eyebrows. Usually when you hear about the shockg primacy of hookup apps gay life—Grdr, the most popular, says s average er spends 90 mut per day on —’s some panicked media story about murrers or homophob trawlg them for victims, or about the troublg “chemsex” scen that have spng up London and New York.

But the real effect of the apps is quieter, ls remarked-upon and, a way, more profound: For many of , they have bee the primary way we teract wh other gay people.

In terviews that Elr, the post-trmatic strs rearcher, nducted wh gay men 2015, he found that 90 percent said they wanted a partner who was tall, young, whe, mcular and mascule. Walt Ots, a psychologist who’s been wrg about social isolatn sce the 1980s, says that gay men ed to be troubled by the bathho the same way they are troubled by Grdr now.

GAY, BISEXUAL MEN UTAH N GIVE BLOOD UNR PANY’S LOOSENED RTRICTNS

“We often live our liv through the ey of others, ” says Alan Downs, a psychologist and the thor of The Velvet Rage, a book about gay men’s stggle wh shame and social validatn. One of the most strikg studi I found scribed the spike anxiety and prsn among gay men 2004 and 2005, the years when 14 stat passed nstutnal amendments fg marriage as beg between a man and a woman. Now square that wh the fact that our untry recently elected a bright orange Demogon whose admistratn is publicly, eagerly attemptg to reverse every sgle ga the gay muny has ma the last 20 years.

Only around 30 percent of school districts the untry have anti-bullyg polici that specifilly mentn LGBTQ kids, and thoands of other districts have polici that prevent teachers om speakg about homosexualy a posive way. His parents meant well—they were jt tryg to enurage him to a field where he would enunter fewer homophob—but he was already anx: If he gave up on fance, was that surrenrg to stigma?

GAY LONELS IS THE SILENT EPIMIC FACG THE QUEER COMMUNY

In the last five years, as evince of this ternnectedns has piled up, a few psychologists and epimlogists have started to treat alienatn among gay men as a “synmic”: A clter of health problems, none of which n be fixed on their own. There will always be more straight kids than gay kids, we will always be isolated among them, and we will always, on some level, grow up alone our fai and our schools and our towns.

On many apps that ter to gay men, is not unmon to see headl that explicly state the typ of people someone is not terted datg or hookg up wh—such as “no fats, no femm! Yet, at the same time, numero rearchers have also been explorg the ncept of lonels among gay men through the juxtaposn of "datg" apps that predomantly foc on short-term hook-ups while nyg the sir of gay men to fd lastg relatnships. Recent rearch has explored the experienc of gay men on datg apps and found that many report the need to hi or supprs their emotnal needs or sir an effort to appear more mascule and, nsequently, more sirable.

The prsure to adhere to mascule norms wh the gay muny may be terferg wh perceptns of social support and meangful social nnectns, thereby advertently ntributg to a panmic of lonels.