Yeah, I realized that I’d misread your last paragraph completely.
So quick…who was the actress who played Alice?
If you’d like to let them know that you aren’t, in a similarly sly way, it shouldn’t be too hard. The next time they talk about some possibly gay person with conservative parents, just say something like, “Yeah, life’s really not fair, is it? The gay kids get the conservative parents, and I get you guys.”
Well it doesn’t work on any family members generally. “Gaydar” refers to homosexuals who detect very subtle flirtatious mannerisms in people of the same sex, too minor for straight people to pick up on. So if your not of the gender to which the child would be attracted, were he gay, then you’re not goimg to get those cues. Anything else is magical thinking. You may as well use a divining rod.
I would like to change the last two words of that post to “ouija board.”
My mothers gaydar was a bit off too. She only expected my younger brother to be gay. When I came out shortly after highschool she was a bit shocked. My younger brother came out shortly after that.
Here’s the thing: I know my brother isn’t gay. He’s never expressed sexual interest in men, he’s dated women, been married twice, fathered a child, very he-man, no vibes, etc. But if he ever came out, I wouldn’t be surprised. There’s something very repressed about my brother that’s hard to explain. And that time I found a photo of a penis in his porn…
I could do that, but I’m reasonably satisfied with a situation that makes my parents reticent in discussions about my sex life.
Didn’t mean to be snarky, I was pressed for time and fired off a two-word response I was going to elaborate on more later: You’re right, I had no idea she was Australian (although it was right there in her Location tag which I am normally compulsive about checking :smack:) and I certainly would have worded my original post differently had I realized that. But America still needs more moms like her 
I don’t know about Australia.
When Smilies go really wrong. D’oh!!
I had to suppress a laugh when a friend of mine said the phrase “A mother knows” about the recent outing of a mutual friend.
Neither of my parents had a blessed (or otherwise) clue before I told 'em.
Here at school, there’s a guy in the pride alliance who I thought for all the world was a Kinsey 6. Find out one day he’s as straight as they come.
::boggle::
FWIW, I’m about as straight as they come (heh) and I was in my high school’s Gay-Straight Alliance, which sounds similar. Thankfully I had “cool parents” and we were able to take in a lesbian friend of mine when the living got too stressful with her ultra-traditional (East Asian) parents.
Not necessarily-- because, if it were, how would I be able to spot gay men?
Here’s my theory on how it works: straight guys grow up, and as puberty hits, they look at girls. “Oh, she sure is pretty.” A gay guy isn’t going to feel the same natural urges to look at girls, so he’s going to look around at the other guys and learn to “do what they do” when they look. So, a gay guy’s ability to act attracted to women is fake, and depending on his skill at acting, he’s going to get spotted at it.
Gay people-- or anyone who’s “hidden” anything by acting like that-- have an inside scoop on spotting the “fake” stuff, because they know what it’s like to fake. But other people can spot it, too.
You’re certainly not the only mother to get this one wrotng. A good friend of mine from high school is (mostly) gay - he is primairly attracted to men and has only had any kind of sexual or romantic relationship with men, but is attracted to some women as well. His mom has no clue to this day; years ago, she apparently assumed he and I were an item (ummm, NO WAY IN HELL).
If I had to extrapolate from her opinions about other social issues, she’d probably be fine with it, but she has no idea. I wonder if she’ll ever figure it out - my friend has come out to his brother, but to my knowledge not to anyone else in his family. (He effectively came out to me when I left for college and he decided it was a good idea to proposition my boyfriend while I was away, which pissed me off - I mean I didn’t care that he was gay, but it’s generally rude in mind to proposition one’s friend’s S.O. But then he has always been a bit on the delusional side when guessing who might be gay.)
Anyway, it’s not just with the homosexuality issue - another H.S. friend, before I knew him, engaged in some fairly serious drug use, to the extent that there are periods of weeks at a time that he doesn’t remember at all. His mother, who is a social worker specializing in the treatment of troubled adolescents, never noticed anything was wrong. Luckily my friend noticed that all his druggie friends were either rehabbing or ending up dead, and managed to quit on his own.
Oh, we have more’n a few straight people in the clud. It’s just that membership in the thing+effeminate!=straight much of the time.
Ah, effeminate too! I missed that. Of course that’s what you meant by “Kinsey 6”. :smack:
Well that’s kind of my point. Here’s my theory: “gaydar” is a combination of stereotypes and confirmation bias, plus a little reverse of the No True Scotsman fallacy, since of course if you say he’s gay he must be, and if he says he’s not he must be in the closet.
How about if HE later tells me he’s gay? Can I trust that? Or if I catch him kissing boys? That’s a good sign. Hands in the other guy’s back pockets, another good sign. Inviting me over to hold the chocolate body paint for him and his boyfriend, bring warm damp towels, and sit around and watch them recreate early Impressionist work on each other’s torsoes? That’d be a GREAT sign (although no one’s ever offered that, darn it).
If someone tells me they’re not gay, I take them at their word. Yeah, that’s led me wrong before (boyfriend #1, thank you very much) but I try to look trustworthy enough that people can tell me this kind of stuff. It seems to be working so far.
By the way, did you ever consider that if gaydar is gay people seeing each other flirt subtly, that there’s nothing so subtle that only gay people can hear it? There are no “gay whistles” in tones straight people can’t hear-- so straight people can catch that sort of thing, IF they’re paying attention. Big if, of course.
For confirmation bias to work, the van actually has to be on the corner once or twice.
A gay man is not going to flirt subtly with you if yuo’re a woman. Flirting with women is perfectly acceptable, so there’s no reason to do so in a way that could just as easily be construed differently.