(This is not a rant. Possibly it’s more of an GD thing, or IMHO, but I’m placing it here because it has a good chance of ending here anyway, given the volatile nature of the subject matter. )
I was watching the PBS show “In the Life” tonight, which is a show about GLBT issues. They had a segment on harrassment of gays in the military, and the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
One of the commentators said something very interesting, that I had never thought about before. I can’t give the exact quote, but here’s a pretty close paraphrase: “Straight men are afraid of gay men because they think that gay men will treat them the way they treat women.”
That really struck me! I am straight male, but I have never understood why some other straight guys feel threatened by gay men. Why should they care if some guy is attracted to other guys? How does it affect them?
But that quote made me think. The kind of guy who is hostile to the idea of guys liking other guys is also often the kind of guy who treats women as mere objects to be used for their pleasure. So naturally, in their minds, a gay guy will be looking at them the same way, as an object to be used! Naturally they are defensive!
So where am I going with this?..I don’t know. I’m definitely not trying to excuse such behavior. It’s reprehensible, based on pure ignorance. But I think it may be a valuable insight, and I’m interested in what other Dopers think of it. What do you guys think? Is homophobia (sometimes, at least) a kind of projection of one’s own bad behavior towards one’s object of desire?
Possibly I’m just being naive here, and some of you will say “Duh! Isn’t that obvious?” But that perspective has quite honestly never occured to me. What do y’all think?
That is quite interesting, especially in this context.
(I remember reading a quotation from a person-on-the-street: “They’re supposed to sail all over the world, crawl through muck, under enemy fire, and they can’t take some guy looking at them?”)
That is not the first time I have run into that viewpoint on homophobia, and from my experience both hitting on women and being hit on by a man who would not take no for an answer (various of you old-timers will remember my thread on my roommate) I would say it is at least partially valid.
Too, in some (and the groups who think this way may well be largely one and the same) there is a fear that, as much as they sometimes have the desire to just go find someone to have sex with, so too will men be indiscriminate and forceful. And even when the desire is less strong in them (straight people) to find someone, there is this large-ish sense that gay men have, well, no taste. That they don’t care who they fuck so long as they get off.
I don’t think it’s necessarily naive that this is the first you’ve thought of it, Ferrous, because there are an awful lot of issues that come up any time homophobia is discussed. Anywhere. A lot of side issues are brought in … it is an intensely complex and nuanced topic, and while to be able to stick to one aspect of it is difficult if rewarding, at the same time it ignores a lot of other aspects, which raises this question to me (and I raise this not to try to slight you but because it didn’t occur to me before):
As compared to other causes of hompophbia, where does this “Straight men are afraid of gay men because they think that gay men will treat them the way they treat women.” (and, tangentially, the issue that gay men have no taste/scruples, which I think is implicitly stated in the “way they treat woman” bit)rank on the scales of offensiveness, validity, pervasiveness, difficulty to debunk/rebut, etc?
Yes, that’s what I’m wondering too. I certainly don’t mean to imply that that attitude is the only one that causes negative feeling towards homosexuals. But I feel it may be a pretty common one, and since it had never occured to me before, I was interested what others, who have more experience with the phenomenon, thought of it.
And don’t worry, no offense taken. I value your input. (Yours too, matt.)
Ferrous my (female) best friend and I have suspected this for quite a while too, especially given how homosexuality is associated with promiscuity so often. I get the impression that there are some straight men out there who are freaked out at the notion that a gay man might choose to hit on them. If I were feeling particularly tart-tongued (entendre partially intended), I’d tell them, “So what? Men hit on women all the time. Deal with it.” and “As far as I’m concerned, people hitting on you isn’t something you need to worry about.”:rolleyes:
Then again, when it comes to heterosexual guys, I’m still trying to figure out the whole “2 women =hot! 2 men = gross!” mindset. I don’t think I ever will.
Siege, speaking as a straight guy, let me explain what goes through some straight guys’ heads when a gay guy hits on them.
“Oh my god! He thought I was gay! Why did he think that? Was it something I did? Or something I said? I’m not gay! I’m not gay! Where did he get gay vibes from me? I’m the straightest guy I know! How could he possibly think I was gay?”
It rocks our fragile little world.
Now, if you want my non-expert opinion, I think a lot of it is cause some of the more-fearful straight guys don’t actually KNOW any gay guys, so they’re just these mysterious guys that may want to Do Us, Even Though We Are Perfectly Straight. I think it’s partially the whole macho male thing, coupled with the “Don’t be a fag” that we get pounded into our heads from, say, grades 6-12.
So if the guy’s an asshole, it’s the “He wants me to be his bitch” explanation Ferrous mentions. If the guy isn’t, it’s “He thought I was gay! Why?”. Just one question, GMRyujin: Why does this rock your fragile little world? What’s the deal?
That is an interesting idea, I have never heard that before.
For it to be true though, wouldn’t the homophobic man have to recognise that he treated women badly?
I have met a wide variety of homophobic men, from those who like nothing better than to go out queer bashing to those who say:
“Well, I like your friend Joe, because he isn’t camp, but I feel sorry for them, really”
If you were to tell either of these that they mistreated women, both would be horrified, as number one homophobe has “MUM” tatooed on his knuckles, buys Sharon a “gold” necklace every Christmas and beats other men up at her suggestion.
Number two homophobe sends his mother flowers when it’s not her birthday and he whisks Portia off to Paris for the weekend. He buys Tampax when he sees stocks are low in the bathroom.
Are both homophobic? Is one?
The answer depends on whether you are a woman or man or if you are gay or not.
Both would say they didn’t mistreat women and their women would back them up.
God in heaven, men who batter their wives don’t think they mistreat women, so who are these men who are likely to admit that they mistreat women and that’s why they are homophobic?
Not consciously, necessarily. They will rationalize their maltreatment of women. Some of them may truly believe women are inferior to men. Others just have fucking bad tempers.
But surely you don’t believe that every wife-beater or rapist thinks he’s doing nothing unpleasant, and (and this is the key point) wouldn’t mind being on the other side, ie being beaten and raped? That’s what you have to assume to make this argument. Even if they don’t think rape or battery is wrong, don’t you think they recognise, at the very least on a subconscious level, that it’s unpleasant to the victim? Would they not therefore object to being that victim?
To be honest, I don’t really know. A gay guy has never hit on me (to my knowledge anyway) ((and neither has a gay girl, I am equal opportunity clueless)). I’m just making some guesses based on guys I know.
Maybe it’s because being gay is seen as girly1, and how could they possibly think a Manly Macho Man could be gay?
Yes, I know, some gays like manly, butch men. Don’t tell the straight guys. Shhhh!
Priceguy addressed part of this. There’s another part to it, though.
Even for a guy who isn’t openly misogynistic, being a girl, being a sissy, is to somehow be less than a man. You can like women perfectly well, send your mother flowers, never raise your voice to your girlfriend, and still consider being female to be a lesser thing, an insult to be called it–sissy, pussy, etc.
I don’t think this is the only motivating factor behind homophobia, but I think it’s a large part of what’s behind some men’s extreme fear and disgust of being hit on by a guy–potentially being put in the “feminine” position and being basically turned into a girl. And I have to admit, when I meet a guy like that, who buys flowers for his girlfriend and calls his mom every month, I wonder what he says about women when it’s just the guys.
I am a closet homophobe (I am uncomfortable with the idea of homosexuality but try not to let that effect my actions)
However I think the issue is simpler than not wanting to be treated like a woman.
How many women in the forum would be comfortable sharing toilets/showers/dorms with men. I don’t know what happens in the Army but I assume there are seperate male and female fascilities (anybody care to confirm?)
It is the same with men and gay men. If a women doesn’t want a straight man to see her naked why would a man want a gay man to see him naked (although this is bound to have happened to me at some time in some changing room somewhere).
I can’t explain this, but as a straight woman I do not want most men to see me naked, no matter what their sexuality may be. I would have no problem changing in front of a lesbian or bisexual woman. I would be far less uncomfortable in front of a lesbian than I would a gay man.
Originally posted by spanna
I am a closet homophobe (I am uncomfortable with the idea of homosexuality but try not to let that effect my actions)
Good. Admission is the first step towards cure.
I find this to be slightly offensive. Gays will come unglued if it is suggested that they can/should be cured of their “condition”. I feel that the same applies here. I don’t think I need to be “cured” of my attitude towards gays, either. I don’t bait gays, or attack gays socially, physically or otherwise. I am as accepting of gays as I can be, but to imply that my lack of total acceptance of gays (which a gay person I know suggested included participating in a gay relationship) is somehow something that needs to be “cured” is wrong.
spanna, with one exception (see sig), when I don’t want to be seen naked it’s universal, and when I don’t care about being seen naked it’s equally universal. I think the (general) fear of being seen naked arises from this sense I mentioned previously that gay men have no scruples/taste. Too, there may be an aspect of “Well, since I wouldn’t pause to smell my breath in going to have sex with a woman who happened to be naked, I bet any gay guy who saw any guy naked would act with equal haste”. And even if the former is not as much the case as it sometimes is (and there is also an issue of “Oh, I want to seem macho so I’ll agree with the guys that I’d fuck any naked woman I saw”), there is often times a fear that if one is ever naked around a gay man, there is the inevitability that one will have to fend off advances, or worse.
I do not, obviously, believe that your typical gay man is going to try to anally please himself with any anus he happens to find attached to a human male any more than your typical straight man is going to plunge his rock hard, 12-inch erection* straight into the vagina of any nearby naked woman and instantly impregnate her (fertility is a sign of machoness too…).
There are people, regardless of sexuality or gender or whatever else, who do not generally give two shits whom them offend when they want to orgasm. Ascribing such behavior solely, or predominantly, to gays, and demonizing it, while simultaneously proclaiming as “masculine” or “powerful” or anything positive like that any time a guy does that to a woman, is … well, lacking. Even more interesting is the dichotomy between “easy” and “slut” regarding the same behavior; normally the only difference is that the person calling the girl a slut usually was unsuccessful in bedding her.
*Guys who don’t usually have penises inside them seem to have this notion that length determines quality. Erm, no, so long as you can get it in:) And JFTR, it can be too thick as well, though both of these facts I glean from others, as I am still a virgin when it comes (ahem, ha) to having sex with men.
(Yours too, matt.)