I have no expert skills and can’t really offer a debate but I can offer my opinion.
Men are conditioned their entire lives to fit male stereotypes. That conditioning teaches them to avoid activities that may be perceived as feminine because people might think them gay. In the world we live in being gay is taught to be a negative quality. ‘Straight men can’t like pageants because they are not supposed to.’
Many straight men if not otherwise trained might be more willing to express their like of show tunes or love of pageants.
The effect works both ways in my opinion. Some gay men are taught that only gays would wear pink or talk with a lisp, when they discover they are gay, they accept those traits and/or amplify them because ‘that’s how gay people are supposed to be’
If we stopped teaching members of each sex/sexuality how they are supposed to behave from birth we’d have a more interesting selection and much wider selection of activities for both sexes and all sexualities.
You know, I was just about to post this. And so of course it is perfectly correct and a brilliant insight.
Many more men might be interested Madonna, Broadway etc. if they were free to do so with no negative social repercussions. Hell, maybe most men would be interested in those things if they weren’t seen as being gay.
As a man in his thirties, I’ve lost track of how many of my male friends have become obsessed with interior decorating since they go married. It’s not just that their wives push them into it. These guys love redesigning not just their own homes, but they rabbit on about it endlessly, they give advice to others, including myself, about what they should do about their colour schemes. They look at stuff in shops and comment how it would look great in their house.
I’ve even pointed out to these men how their behaviour would have been outrageously gay when they were single. That usually prooke s stream of excuses such as their wife makes them do it, it’s great way to get the wife to agree to them buying powertools, it adds value to their house, so it’s an economic interest etc.
These men clearly love interior design. And good on them as far as I’m concerned, it’s s good a hobby as any other. But the point is that until a man is married he can’t show an interest in interest design because he is labelled gay. Once he’s married he has an excuse, and perfect evidence that he is heterosexual, so he can indulge.
So yeah, I have to agree with boytyperanma. To a large extent it’s self fulfilling prophecy. We know that only gay men indulge in these behaviours, and because only gay men indulge in these behaviours no straight man will go near them, and because no straight man will go near them we know that only gay men indulge in these behaviours. Lather, rinse and repeat for 5 or six generations.
That’s true, but those things don’t really need an explanation as far as I’m concerned. They are subcultural affectations and nothing more. We could just as easily ask why certain young Black men engage in stereotypically Black behaviour: accents, pronunciations, walks and other behavioural affectations.
Does this sort of thing really *need *an explanation? They exist to identify a person as a member of a certain subculture. Does their need to be any deeper reason? Why shouldn’t some Gay men not feel the need to use certain behavioural affectations just as some White men do?
Yeah, if the question is “Why don’t more straight men do stereotypically gay things?” then the answer should be clear: they have little to gain and a lot to lose by being perceived as gay. Even in a world without homophobia it would still be annoying to constantly have to explain to people “No, really, I’m not gay. I mean it. No, I am not interested in being set up with your gay friend. Because I’m not gay!”
On the other hand, while an actual gay man or lesbian who behaves in a stereotypically gay/lesbian manner might be running some increased risk of being targeted for discrimination or violence, there is also something to be gained when it comes to avoiding awkward explanations (“Uh, that’s very flattering and all, but I’m gay”) and signaling availability to a partner of the desired sex. If I may risk stating the obvious here, it’s usually going to be easier to deal with other people’s stereotype-based assumptions about you if those assumptions happen to be correct in your case.
Huh. So you guys are stating that many straight men do desire to engage in typically “gay” behaviors, but choose not to out of fear of social stigma? And people like Beware of Doug and pageant dad are just less swayed by social rules?
Seriously, this is one of those things I wonder about too. I like Gestalt’s answer. I would like to behave in a more “European” fashion, but am constrained by others’ opinions.
I think the fact that it’s part of Gay culture is the best explanation. Not only do these behaviors and interests represent nearly a century of history and culture that has a lot of significance and pride even for young gay kids today, they’re also a way of signaling to other folks that you are like them. If you see someone exhibiting these ‘stereotypical’ behaviors and you are gay yourself, it’s a way of knowing that that person is gay and you can be open with them. This is especially true if it’s otherwise risky to discuss your homosexuality openly.
As far as lisps and walks and mannerisms go, I think it’s not necessarily what they “desire to engage in”, but what comes naturally to them. I had a friend in college who was an artist and designer, with a rather effeminate manner and hand gestures and “gay voice” and so forth, but he wasn’t gay.
It wasn’t that he wanted to seem stereotypically gay, it’s just that his natural style was less conventionally “masculine butch” than the average. I think he definitely tried to present a less “effeminate” image in situations with strangers, precisely so as not to “seem gay”.
Heck, I do something of the same sort myself. I like outdoor activities and fixing stuff, and I own a toolbox, and I wear big flannel or corduroy shirts in winter, and I like hardware stores, and so on. But I’m conscious of the stereotypes associated with that stuff and I don’t want to “seem dykey”, so I deliberately emphasize more “feminine” aspects as well, like wearing my hair long and dressing in a more “girly” style for work, wearing “feminine” jewelry, talking about my cooking and sewing, etc.
Though “desire” may not be the right word. As Hannibal the Friendly Chef said, said people don’t go out and look for something to desire. They look at something and then desire it. Most straight men will even give interior decorating or Judy Garland movies a try, so they are never going to know whether they enjoy them. So it’s not that many straight men secretly desire interior decorating or Judy Garland movies. It’s that many straight men would enjoy interior decorating or Judy Garland movies if they were exposed to them, but they never are, so of course they never know that they enjoy them.
When the same men are exposed to interior decorating by their wives, many clearly do enjoy it. But they didn’t harbour a secret desire for years, they simply found that they enjoyed it when they finally gave it a try.
I don’t know if all or many straight more men do desire to engage in stereotypical gay or feminine behaviors but would argue if not for social stigma the number would be more.
I don’t have a lisp, but otherwise as a young kid had a lot of stereotypical gay mannerisms, a rather ‘femme’ walk etc. I had no idea what gay culture was or even what gay was at that point. Some of us just are naturally like that.
Oddly, I’ve become more ‘butch’ over the years, although there’s still probably few people who would mistake me for straight.