Internatnal OCD Foundatn | How Do I Know I’m Not Really Gay/Straight?

Contents:

• STRAIGHT MEN WHO SEEM GAYSTRAIGHT MEN WHO SEEM GAY
• KEV SPACEY: I N’T TELL WHETHER MEN ARE GAY JT BY LOOKG AT THEM
• WHY DO SOME GAY MEN INTIFY AS "STRAIGHT-ACTG" AND HOW IS IT RELATED TO WELL-BEG?
• GAY OR STRAIGHT, A MALE IS A MALE IS A MALE
• WHY STRAIGHT MEN SHOULD ACT GAY
• GAY STEREOTYP: ARE THEY TE?
• WHY STRAIGHT GUYS ACT AS GAYS?
• HOW DO I KNOW I’M NOT REALLY GAY/STRAIGHT?

STRAIGHT MEN WHO SEEM GAYSTRAIGHT MEN WHO SEEM GAY

We currently have a survey vtigatn unrway that explor some of the posive out of “bromosexual” iendships, cludg our theory that gay men and straight men n be optimal wg men for one another.

Send, recent rearch has argued that genr and sexual orientatn might not be as black and whe as prevly thought, which opens up new avenu for explorg how gay and straight men n relate to one another. If a straight guy and his gay male iend are ls rigid about their masculy and sexualy, they’ll probably be more likely to discs tails about their sexual and romantic liv openly wh one another.

KEV SPACEY: I N’T TELL WHETHER MEN ARE GAY JT BY LOOKG AT THEM

In short, women are able to tst the datg advice om gay male iends bee they know their gay iends don’t have any ulterr motiv: They’re not tryg to hook up wh them or pete wh them for guys.

WHY DO SOME GAY MEN INTIFY AS "STRAIGHT-ACTG" AND HOW IS IT RELATED TO WELL-BEG?

Jt as a gay man might be able to pass on advice about women to his straight iend, a straight man uld nnect his gay male iend wh another sirable gay man, sce neher the gay man nor his straight iend are petg for the same person. We believe that havg a tstworthy nfidant to help wh romantic pursus is one of the major reasons straight and gay men are leavg the fort of their same-sex, same-orientatn iend groups to form “bromosexual” iendships.

My last post scribed a populatn of mal who nsir themselv heterosexual, do not label themselv gay or bisexual, chew volvement wh the LGBT muny, are often married or romantilly volved wh an oppose-sex partner, and who engage sex wh mal or exprs the sire to do so. Due large part to the popularizatn of the topic the btsellg 2005 book On the Down Low: A Journey to the Liv of 'Straight' Black Men Who Sleep wh Men, [i] Lato and Ain-Amerin men are the primary subjects rearch wh non-gay intified MSM.

One of the earlit studi, "The Bisexual and Non-Gay Attached Rearch Project" om the early 1990s, found that participants engagg same-sex sexual behavr but not intifyg as gay or bisexual scribed themselv as “kky, ” “normal, ” or “jt a guy. [iii] Daryl Hood, Garrett Prtage, June Crawford, Tania Sorrell, and Chris O’Reilly, "Report on the BANGAR Project: Bisexual Activy/non Gay Attachment Rearch Targetg Strategi Intifitn Project.

GAY OR STRAIGHT, A MALE IS A MALE IS A MALE

Ramamurthi, Cleo Manago, Serg Ava, and Marv Jon, “Sexual Behavr, Sexual Inty, and Substance Abe Among Low-Ine Bisexual and Non-Gay-Intifyg Ain Amerin Men Who Have Sex wh Men, ” Archiv of Sexual Behavr 37, no. Straight guy here but was havg a bate wh someone who said that the way straight guys are jokgly "gay" wh each other is sentially makg homosexualy the butt of the joke, s makg jok about a mographic who as a straight male you nt unrstand their stggl/issu, and by makg the jok you're implyg to each other that s okay to make fun of gay people? Bisexual men are perceived to sound more mascule than men who are straight, acrdg to a study of Atralian subjects.Amics at the Universy of Sydney pared the voic of gay, straight and bisexual men a study volvg 160 people.In the rearch led by clil psychologist Jam Morandi, people were reced to analyse the voic of 60 men, 20 of whom were gay, 20 straight and 20 bisexual.

They were then asked to rate the men on their sexual orientatn g a sle om zero (exclively heterosexual) to 10 (exclively homosexual).Listeners were also asked to rate each man’s perceived level of femy or masculy the voic on a siar sle.The men volved the study were asked to rerd themselv on a smartphone recg the first two l of the Atralian natnal anthem.Voice sampl were then modified to remove any background noise while volume levels were ma the same to ensure nsistency.Rults om the study showed listeners uld distguish between gay and straight men’s voic wh an accuracy of 62 per cent, apparently nsistent wh prev rearch.However, the study participants uld not terme any differenc between bisexual and straight men’s voic wh any gree of accuracy. The thors said their rearch showed bisexual men’s voic were perceived as beg more exclively attracted to women pared wh both gay and straight men’s voic.Bisexual men’s voic were rated as more mascule than both gay and straight men’s voic.Rearchers claimed the abily to intify a man’s bisexual inty om his voice alone uld have cril social implitns such as helpg to rce feelgs of alienatn.‘Voice may unter visibily many bisexuals feel’An abstract of the study, tled Can listeners tect if a man is bisexual om his voice alone, reads: “The prent study examed whether bisexual men n be intified om their voic ak to how gay men n be intified on their voice alone.“If this is the se, voice may be an important target of discrimatn on the one hand but may also unter the visibily many bisexuals feel (if their bisexual inti n be apprehend by their voice alone, whout explic disclosure required).“The fdgs may also she light on whether bisexual male voic, like gay male voic, differ om straight voic terms of their genr non-nformy – a qutn that to date has not been examed.”But amics noted the rearch was limed on the grounds all men who participated the study are Atralian, which may not be reflected among wir cultur.And the thors nced the study did not ntrol for the rerdg environment or microphone-to-mouth distance, which uld have affected the qualy of the voice sampl.The thors said the fdgs suggted that while the voic of bisexual men the sample were perceived as more mascule and attracted to femal, listeners did not associate this imprsn wh bisexualy.As a rult, while bisexual men may appear to be at lower risk of facg voice-based intifitn and discrimatn than gay men, they may often be mistaken as beg straight.The study was published the Journal of Sex Rearch. Osr-wng actor Kev Spacey has said he is attracted to mascule men but is not able to tell whether someone is gay jt by lookg at cross-examatn durg his trial on sex abe charg, the Hollywood star nied he was a “sexual bully” and told the jury he did not have a “power wand” to make people want to sleep wh about his sexual preferenc, Mr Spacey said he had prevly had romantic enunters wh men who would not scribe themselv as homosexual.

While mascule self-prentatn posively predicted well-beg and ternalized homophobia negatively predicted well-beg, straight-actg intifitn, which posively rrelated wh both, did not penntly predict eher psychologil distrs or physil well-beg. "In fact, I thk "straight-actg" straights are jt as secure as "straight-actg" gays and, for that matter, "gay-actg" gays--"actg" beg the key word the hell is "straight-actg? " Personally, I believe my performance was worthy of an, when I see gay men state that they are "straight-actg" on plac like the "men seekg men" (m4m) posts on Craigslist, or on ManHunt, I sometim wre them and ask: "If you were 'straight-actg' wouldn't you be postg the 'men seekg woman' (m4w) sectn or on WomanHunt?

WHY STRAIGHT MEN SHOULD ACT GAY

The very word "effemate, " when applied to gay men, seems to suggt that they're "not like a man" but "more like a female, " and therefore plays right to myths, misnceptns and stereotyp of what is "mascule" and what is "feme. But as I’ll be monstratg, the major (and ltle regnized) siari between them ultimately suggt that a gay’s “sexual psyche” is much more plementary to a heterosexual male’s than ntrastg to .

As the two thors put : “The vast majory of gay men prefer to masturbate while thkg about wboys, firemen, or David Beckham stead of drag queens, ballet dancers, or Elton John. But returng to gay preferenc, is not cur—not to say, untertuive—that, overall, gays’ aroal would be more strongly activated by heterosexual mal than by fellow gays (where their attractn would much more likely be reciproted)? But here, too, the dynamic would seem to dite that gays’ bras are “preload” to genr cu that (if anythg) are hyper-mascule, sce they’re generally attracted to mal more mascule than they are.

So, unsurprisgly, the genr cu operatg gays e them to be drawn toward other men and (also siar to most women) make them more fortable a sexually submissive, rather than domant, role. ” Also siar to nventnal heterosexual porn (and unlike porn tailor-signed for women), gay vios show very ltle tert prentg a narrative, or romantic prelu to the actual sex portrayed. In short, by addrsg the likelihood that gay men posss the same bra software targetg youth cu as do straight mal (and, once aga, distguishg both of them om women—who typilly sire their partners to be olr and more experienced).

GAY STEREOTYP: ARE THEY TE?

Gays also search the Inter much more for athletic, full-bodied actors than for skny on, addnally parallelg a preference on the part of straight mal that’s unter to what much popular culture might have believe.

WHY STRAIGHT GUYS ACT AS GAYS?

Moreover, jt as straights reveal a penchant for BBWs (“big, betiful women”), so do gays show a strong tert Bears—hairy, olr, oversized gay men, who are yet warm and accsible. Ogas and Gaddam disvered lerally hundreds of gay s celebratg the phall, notg that many amatr s display assemblag of penis shot at close range, omtg altogether any acpanyg face or body.

HOW DO I KNOW I’M NOT REALLY GAY/STRAIGHT?

“Feet, butts, and chts are highly popular both gay and straight porn, as are domatn, submissn, group sex, amatrs, and numero typ of squickier terts [and "squicky" is porn jargon for preferenc that, nventnally, would be viewed as repulsive]. Instead, gay guys like the same thgs as straight guys: youth, aggrsive and sctive matury, graphic tails of the body, large penis, ejaculatn shots, and anonymo, emotnls, nonmonogamo sex” (p.

Reportg on the fdgs of a mammoth ternatnal survey (wh over 250, 000 participants), Ogas and Gaddam note that both gays and straight mal were found to “prefer appearance and visual attractivens over all other quali when selectg a partner. ” And they add that when, another study, gays and straights were placed a bra snner and shown pornographic vios, “their bra activy was strikgly siar”—as ntrasted, that is, wh the snner rults when women were subject to plementary aroal cu. Gay men watch more porn, have larger porn stash, search for more porn onle, subscribe to porn s more often, mata more subscriptns at the same time, and renew their subscriptns more often” (p.