Study: Why Straight Women Are Often Close Wh Gay Men - The Atlantic

Contents:

• WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN ARE ATTRACTED TO GAY MEN
• I’M A STRAIGHT WOMAN WHO MARRIED A GAY MAN
• WHEN GAY MEN (MIS)MARRY STRAIGHT WOMEN: BONNIE KAYE'S STORY
• STUDY: WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN ARE OFTEN CLOSE WH GAY MEN
• DO STRAIGHT WOMEN BELONG ON GAY DATG APPS? (NO.)
• WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN AND GAY MEN ARE OFTEN SO CLOSE
• WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN AND GAY MEN MAKE THE BT OF FRIENDS
• WHAT'S THE SCIENCE BEHD STRAIGHT WOMEN LIKG GAY MEN?
• ‘IS WEIRD FOR A GAY MAN TO HANG WH STRAIGHT WOMEN?’

WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN ARE ATTRACTED TO GAY MEN

Both gays and lbians were, however, nsirably more likely to date a trans person nsistent wh their preferred genr prentatn rather than their preferred genalia (transmen for gays, transwomen for lbians). That is, how important is to a gay man that his transman date do or do not have a penis or to a lbian woman that her transwoman date has or do not have a penis? Sure, an ocsnal teenage girl falls for a boy who's gay, but don't take most girls very long to figure out that, this se, where there's smoke, there's most fely not fire.

In general, the attractn women feel for gay men tends to be emotnal nature, clearg the way for a highly satisfyg relatnship that outlasts most other relatnships gay men and straight women have.

I’M A STRAIGHT WOMAN WHO MARRIED A GAY MAN

Send, straight women love gay men bee closens wh gay men provis a wdow to how the mds of men work, somethg that women want to know as they navigate datg waters wh their straight male peers. Though there are, of urse, differenc between straight and gay men, gay men are neverthels men who share many characteristics and motivatns wh straight men. When to the sexualy of young straight and gay men—meang, how equently they thk about sex, want , or feel impatient to get to the actual sex part—there are undoubtedly siari.

In general, gay men, and gay women, too, tend to be more fearls than their straight unterparts—particularly straight men—bee they’ve ually experienced bullyg and prejudice bee of their sexual orientatn. Meanwhile, gay men have the social license to be as outrageo or emotnal as they want to be bee gay men don't have to f to such a tightly prcribed role. Instead, they feel more fortable removg the sexual factor that exists at straight bars and prefer the harmlsns that wh socializg wh gay men gay surroundgs.

WHEN GAY MEN (MIS)MARRY STRAIGHT WOMEN: BONNIE KAYE'S STORY

If straight women and gay men foc on fdg iendships where there's te emotnal patibily and rpect, they n velop one of the most rewardg relatnships a person uld have.

The qutn of how he se his gayns relatn to his two marriag to women, specifilly his current marriage to you, is both more salient and open-end, so I’d suggt you start by askg him to share more of his thoughts on the subject wh you. That will get you a lot further than tryg to figure out if your hband is “really” bisexual (and, implicly, whether that means you n safely hope he won’t leave you for someone else) or “really” gay (and, implicly, whether you have to fear that he’s gog to break up wh you for another man). I don't say this to create a further divi between people, but given the society we live (one that has vic stereotyp about bisexual men, pecially when to havg a relatnship wh one), 's naive to believe that datg a bi guy is the exact same as datg a straight man or a gay honor of #Biweek, here are 10 thgs you should know before datg a bisexual guy!

I recently spoke wh Bonnie Kaye, thor of Straight Wiv, Shattered Liv: Stori of Women wh Gay Hbands, among other books, and host of Bonnie Kaye’s Straight Wiv Talk Show on BlogTalkRad. Bee I know untls gay men who were once married to straight women, wh varyg gre of short and longer-term happs and misery, I wanted to discs this topic, and I wanted to do so om the straight wiv’ perspective. Our discsn was wi-rangg, begng wh her own marriage to a gay man and progrsg to how she was able to move on post-marriage, eventually beg a rock for other women siar suatns.

STUDY: WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN ARE OFTEN CLOSE WH GAY MEN

Then somebody who was part of my social work rmed me, a uple of weeks before we were supposed to get married, that he had spicns that Robert was gay.

DO STRAIGHT WOMEN BELONG ON GAY DATG APPS? (NO.)

One gay man om Iowa who has been g Grdr sce 2011 told me via Redd DM that “the uptick of cis women on the app happened the past 3 years, absolutely explodg this year.

WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN AND GAY MEN ARE OFTEN SO CLOSE

”Wherever cis women go, cis het men follow… The biggt worry is that if Grdr be the place where everyone looks for sual sex, will stop beg safe for LGBT people, ” he lls self the “world’s largt social workg app for gay, bi, trans, and queer people, ” but for about a year, Grdr ers have been plag about an flux of cis women seekg hookups wh bisexual male partners, although they’ve been allowed on the app sce about 2017. If a man qutns why she’s there, she said she tells him, “I’m not there to hound down gay men… I went to where the fish I wanted to tch were, ” meang the bisexual men who don’t feel fortable beg out as bi on other datg s.

“When I’m male gay spac…gay dus are drawn to me whout any effort on my part… It’s not unual for somebody to e kiss my boots, kiss my hand, buy me drks, sometim sneaky grope me, ” she said.

WHY STRAIGHT WOMEN AND GAY MEN MAKE THE BT OF FRIENDS

” But she wonred what gay men thought, so recently she posted a qutn on the Grdr subredd: “How do gay men on Grdr feel about seeg cisgenr women on the app? Still, he said he’s tried to fd cis women on the app but the “cis women there that I’ve seen go there to fd a ‘gay bt iend, ’ which as a bi guy I found really annoyg.

A zegeisty psychologil experiment b straight/gay iendships, the "matg game, " and fake Facebook gay bt iend, or GBF, may be a cliché, but 's a powerful one.

Powerful enough -- at least the mds of straight girls -- that a helpful article om Wikihow feels obligated to warn GBF seekers that, "Even if you believe you mt have that flamboyant gay man to be your BFF, nsir first the person si -- what you are lookg for is a soul mate iend, not a rative accsory. "But when avoids teeterg to rative accsory terrory, the "unique and important bond shared between straight women and gay men" is both observable and unrstudied.

WHAT'S THE SCIENCE BEHD STRAIGHT WOMEN LIKG GAY MEN?

So rearchers at the Universy of Texas at At signed an experiment aimed at empirilly evaluatg how, exactly, both parti benef om beg soul mate do so the rearchers signed a fake ter persona -- "Jordan" -- and evaluated participants' abily to form a relatnship wh him based solely on his Facebook that Jordan was always a "he": The 88 heterosexual women who signed up for the study experienced Jordan as eher a straight woman, a straight man, or a gay man. For the 58 homosexual men who participated a siar experiment, Jordan was eher a straight woman, a gay man, or, a "novel 'lbian female' target ndn, " a gay woman.

The rults, published Evolutnary Psychology, showed that straight women are more tstg of matg advice (the thors' preferred term) when om a gay man, although they don't put any more fah gay men's abily to help them fd a mate than they do straight men or men, too, were more likely to tst advice om straight women than om straight men or lbians. They thought that straight women were more likely than gay men, but not signifintly more likely than lbians, to help them fd a all this, the rearchers see support for their hypothis that "close iendships between straight women and gay men may be characterized by a unique exchange of unbiased matg-relevant rmatn that may not be available their other relatnships. ""One-sid sexual attractn on the part of lbian women may further plite [relatnships between straight and lbian women] and crease the perceived tstworths of advice [lbians] provi to straight women, " the thors wre, and same go for gay and straight men.

For gay men, facg shared social challeng, as they do wh lbians, appears to matter much ls the formatn of ep emotnal bonds than the abily to mutually assist one another the datg world. When they attempt to expla why straight women, although tstg of gay men, fd them more or ls els helpg them fd a mate, the rearchers' theori bee more theoretil. Or maybe the datg pool is large enough for straight women than they don't need help intifyg potential partners, while gay men are more likely to benef om a straight female iend's help trackg down other gay men.

‘IS WEIRD FOR A GAY MAN TO HANG WH STRAIGHT WOMEN?’

And, brgg all home, they remd that straight women tend to be good iends wh gay men: "Therefore, is likely that gay men perceive women to have close nnectns wh other gay men who uld bee romantic partners.