add on Q. (hope to nobody’s offense)
in the context of male homosexuality, would the gaydar be different for the different roles in the relationship (I assume this is how it works)? … e.g. for the female and male role?
iow: the prototypical efeminate male … vs. the extra macho-male (Freddy Mercury style)
(I hope this makes sense)
Hope that link just shows the cartoon.
I often tell my Mom about that cartoon when she tries to figure out the roles in my sister’s marriage to another woman.
A hefty percentage of male flight attendants are gay. Well above their percentage in the larger world. I’d WAG it north of 30%, and maybe even above 50%. Very rich ore so to speak.
I worked closely with that crowd for decades as the ranks of male FAs of any orientation swelled from very very darn few to nowadays ~30% of each group of new hires. As the number of males on the job increased, there began to be a real sub-society of the men amongst the vastly more numerous women, regardless of anyone’s orientation. And eventually the men became numerous enough that the gay and straight subgroups emerged as distinct groups, not just isolated individuals.
Given all that exposure at work and at hotels & bars & eateries while off-duty on the road, I like to think I’ve got a fairly well-honed and well-exercised capability to tell them apart. Which really amounts to being good at spotting the far outliers in either group, but with a muddied middle. Once in awhile I’d get propositioned which I can attribute either to being obviously completely accepting of gayness as a non-issue, or maybe to a bit of metrosexuality in my off-duty dress or mannerisms.
Anyhow, this interesting event from 20+ years ago suggests that while gaydar does exist, it’s highly flawed in both straight and gay men. As in “we see the obvious cases and congratulate ourselves while overlooking the massive confirmation bias inherent in our thinking”.
For your reading pleasure:
I had a similar experience about 40 years ago. My girlfriend then loved San Francisco and although we lived in San Jose a number of dates wound up with us staying overnight there. Consequently she was always looking for cute boutique hotels. We were in the Tenderloin and she spotted an interesting one, Hotel Brothel.
I don’t think she even noticed the name but I did. The sign was an escutcheon with a linked HB on it and two nude male supporters. The front desk was far back from the entrance and she made a beeline for it, ignoring the decor and the two archetypal gay guys coming up the stairs from something in the basement.
She asked for a brochure and the desk clerk rather disdainfully gave her one. As we walked away she said, “Well, he wasn’t very friendly,” then opened up the brochure showing the amenities the hotel offered and who was using them. “… Oh.”
It’s nice to read stories from our female Dopers of not having gaydar, because I can tell you from experience that men have lousy Lesdar. Maybe not with the flannel shirt and Timberland boots contingent, but if a man sees a woman with hair that at least touches her ears, wearing a skirt, and makeup, he will instantly assume she’s straight. Back in the day when my friends and I were all single, every one of us had a story (often multiple stories) of asking out a woman only to discover she was in a committed relationship with another woman.
I have taken a number of cruises on Virgin. Because they prohibit kids, discourage old fogeys (as distinct from retirement-aged who’re welcome) and are consciously chasing the 30-something demographic, they also get a lot of LGBT, etc., customers and have a deserved reputation of seeking those customers & making them feel actively welcome, not just tolerated.
So on the boat GF & I get to see lots of gay or lesbian couples being out & proud.
And yeah, there are a lot of members of very much lesbian couples who I’d never peg as les if I saw them separately in a neutral situation.
My gaydar is much more effective but still misses a lot of the less overt gay dudes.
(snipping mine)
Man, I have terrible to non-existent gaydar, the first time I realize someone’s a homosexual is when they tell me they are. On top of that, girls in flannel shirts and boots are kinda what I’m attracted to. So, there’s more than once that I came home and told my gay roommate that I had met a really cool girl only for them to ask their name and have the instant reply be “Oh, she’s totally gay”.
So, if gaydar exists, it doesn’t exist within me in any manner I can discern.
Back in the early 80’s, Adam Ant. Now you remember, that was when flamboyance ruled the earth (or at least, MTV) so anyone that was really out there was probably gay, or so it seemed.
I actually got into a bit of verbal “fight” because someone asked me if Adam Ant was gay and I argued back, basically, who cares. But it got me thinking about stereotypes and the subject that would later be known as gaydar. And I eventually found out he was most definitely not. (Now if I could go back in time and tell that guy about Judas Priest’s Rob Halford…his head would have exploded!)
Julian Sands, Noel Fielding and Richard Ayoade. Not just a case of “Gay, or just really British”, either.
Naah, I don’t generally assume, college drove that out of me. Lots of lipstick lesbians, at least at mine. Also lots of very femme lesbian or bi Goth women.