Homophobia totally the fault of straight women, according to Men’s Rights Redditors
Men forced into hypermasculine role by straight women, out cruising for chicks.
So we learned the other day from that Man Going His Own Way that male violence was, like, totally the fault of evil sexy ladies. Now, from this Men’s Rights Redditor, we learn that homophobia — or at least homophobia directed at gay men — is all the fault of straight women and their desire for macho dudes. Because straight men don’t ever express any sort of hostility towards gay or effeminate men — it’s just those darn ladies!
But, huh, what about all those straight dudes who are always calling other dudes “gay” and, you know, that other word that starts with an “f?”
Well, apparently that’s just playful joshing. No harm, no foul! If anything, it shows how wonderfully tolerant of gayness these guys are. I mean, come on, if you can’t see this, you must be stupid, or something. Or so says this other Men’s Rights Redditor:
They’re just having a little fun. You’re not against fun, are you?
Thanks to the AgainstMen’sRights subreddit for pointing me to these quotes.
Posted on June 3, 2013, in a woman is always to blame, crackpottery, evil sexy ladies, evil women, homophobia, I'm totally being sarcastic, masculinity, misogyny, MRA, reddit, whaaaaa? and tagged homophobia, men's rights, misogyny, MRA, reddit. Bookmark the permalink. 498 Comments.
IT’S JUST FUN. FUN PLAYFUL FUN. THEY ARE JUST SHARING FUN PLAYFULLY AND FUNLY. NO I HAVE NEVER READ ACT 3 SCENE 2 OF HAMLET WHY DO YOU ASK.
So… Women can’t want sex much because then we’re sluts. We can’t NOT want sex because then we are depriving men of sex. We can’t be anything less than attractive because men need us to look good! We can’t have preferences in what we are attracted to because, not only are woman so shallow, we also cause nonstop problems for both gay and straight men.
Man, woman really can’t win.
That totally explains all the times I, a straight woman, have fallen for gay men.
Except it doesn’t.
Try again.
Why do so many homophobes seem to think gay men = effeminate/feminine men? This assumption persists despite hypermasculine men on covers of gay magazines, hypermasculine men dancing as go-go boys in gay clubs, hypermasculine men modelling in Aussiebum and Abercrombie and Fitch ads, hypermasculine men in the artwork of Tom of Finland… and don’t get me started on the concept of camp, which is arguably another way of expressing masculinity for men who are particularly assured of their sexuality and don’t give a fuck what anyone else thinks…
Of course this goes beyond the MRM but for them this is yet another example of their relentless gender role policing.
… there’s also Gymrat’s claim that he “appears gay”- what the fuck is that supposed to mean? Gay men and women are a diverse bunch and while some may be walking stereotypes, there are many heterosexuals who could also be said to “appear gay”- not least of all the “feminazis” MRAs attack for not looking feminine enough. Again, this is more gender role policing.
Is Gymrat’s “I look too gay” just another variant of “I’m too nice”?
Also, Gymrat maybe should consider that his (real or perceived) homosexual orientation is not the only reason anybody could possibly dislike him.
So their response to real or perceived homophobia in the MRM is “I know you are but what am I?”?
Also, gay bashing was never a thing apparently. All those people were really beat up by women and not the men they claimed in their statements.
Ugh. They cannot be this dense.
Lol, “obtuseness.” Because only intent matters here!
This must be why I have had some wonderful gay male friends.
*Rant Alert*
“When one man calls his friend “gay”, he is playfully asserting his own dominance over his friend.”
Hm, and why is this ‘asserting his dominance’ over the friend he calls gay/ f*g? I guess that associating ‘gay’ with ‘dominated by alpha hetero guy’ totally doesn’t portray any assumption of inferiority.
In my world, ‘subtle’ homophobia is pretty evenly distributed between genders. It seems that aggressive homophobia falls more on (cis hetero) men, but let’s talk about the relationship argument.
Many people assume ‘real lesbians’ don’t exist. All she needs is the right cock, and poof! not a lesbian anymore. Plus, they totally were lesbians to turn the guys on. Interestingly, I know many guys’ little egos that got bruised by their girlfriend leaving them for a woman. Don’t get me wrong, it hurts to be dumped. But the ‘for a woman’ part seems to be the ultimate blow for many men (the opposite is also true for women being dumped for a man).
The opposite is true for men. People, men and women, often assume that if a man has ever had same-sex attractions, he is gay forever. There’s a significant difference in perception, and both are messed up.
On a possibly TMI personal story: my partner and I are both bi (I’m a cis woman, he’s a cis man). It is constantly assumed that I am not really into women, I’m just trying to be hawt for men. My partner is always seen as gay, I have been warned that he will dump me when he fully accepts his homosexuality. As if it would be worse to be dumped for a man than for a woman. *eyeroll*
Our culture doesn’t see lesbians as a ‘thing’. What’s the first thing that pop-up in the media when discussing same sex marriage? Two white guys. Because that’s still what ‘same sex’ means in many people’s head.
Finally, about women loving super hyper masculine guys. I thought MRAs were bitching about the opposite? That women love the ‘metrosexual’ look to shame male sexuality? Not anymore?
I searched for “sexiest man” and these came up:
http://www.last.fm/music/Shane+Harper/+images/54729661
http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20669632,00.html
http://www.crushable.com/2012/03/13/entertainment/25-crushable-guys-under-25-for-2012/gallery-page/15/
http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/the-jonas-brothers/images/2696330/title/joe-jonas-wallpaper
Too… much… caveman! Chest hair, grmblblb….POW! (that’s my libido going through the roof because I cannot possibly escape my cavewoman instincts)
Somehow it’s a bit hard to believe that a gay man has NEVER had any trouble whatsoever being accepted by straight men, ONLY trouble being accepted by women… It’s a bit like fundies going “here, let me share my views on da evol homosexuals, although I TOTES HAVE LOTS OF GAY FRIENDS”. Don’t know if American fundies do this, but Swedish fundies do it all the time, like they think the “I TOTES HAVE LOTS OF GAY FRIENDS” part will make people go “Oh, you must really know what you’re talking about then”. Only this is taking it one step further with the “I’m totes gay myself!”.
(Yeah, I know it’s generally bad form to question people’s sexual orientation like that, but this “I’ve never ever experienced any kind of homophobia from men” is just SO weird.)
So “playfully asserting his own dominance over his friend” by implying his superior masculinity is all about acceptance. Who knew?
Yeah, this SO MUCH. I talked about this with a male colleague. We’re both bi, but while I’m usually considered (if it even comes up, nowadays I guess most people just assume I’m a “normal” straight woman since I’ve been in a monogamous marriage for twelve years and in a mono relationship with husband for thirteen years and a half) an extra hawt straight girl, while he’s usually considered actually gay man who for some reason don’t really wanna own up to being gay.
No, it goes like this: Women like to fuck hyper masculine assholes, but they simultaneously like to shame male sexuality because women are EVOL. Plus women also want to marry a less masculine submissive man who’ll support all her shopping sprees, the scented candles etc, while she’s fucking hyper masculine assholes on the side, at least until she gets old and ugly (thirty) when the assholes won’t want her anymore. That’s how it works.
Maude- you beat me to mentioning “metrosexual man”! It seems that MRAs complain about women wanting feminised “metro” men, but also about women wanting masculinised “alpha” men… maybe they think we’re doing this deliberately to confuse them, that we’re lying about what we really want from them as if there’s a secret formula we’re keeping under wraps, and this is why they all claim to know what we really want when none of them seem to have a clue.
Really they should consider the radical notion that- get this- us women are all different and have different preferences! Of course they will never consider this because they don’t want to believe we have sex drives and desires of our own.
Item 0 on the expanded Kinsey scale: “So heterosexual that you think all other heterosexuals should be shot, because they seem a little gay.”
I must have been dreaming up all the women I’ve had sex with after I told them I was actively bisexual. Also, there is no such thing as the “I <3 Yaoi" fetishizing of gay/bi dudes from (some) geeky anime-loving heterosexual women.
Is there some heteronormative bullshit homophobia and biphobia sometimes coming from heterosexual (and the occasional bi) women? Have I seen it when dating, or on OKC? Yes. But in my day to day life, it pales in comparison to the ubiquity of male gender policing.
Oh THANKS Katz!
I always say there’s a difference between being a) straight, and b) so super-straight that you can’t even grasp the difference (if your male) between Ryan Gosling and Quasimodo – they’re both MALE so how are you, a straight man, supposed to know which one is hotter? – and would rather shoot yourself in the head than make out with someone of the same gender.
My husband is straight, but I’m glad he’s not super-straight. I don’t think I could ever be with someone super-straight.
It takes “advanced cognitive ability” to understand why men call each other gay, and why that’s not homophobic when they do that. Hmm. That’s one way to put it. Another way to put it is that he is rationalizing men’s homophobia away, so that women are always at fault for all homophobia. Oh, but my mistake, only women have a rationalization hamster. He’s just doing some manly reasoning with his manly logic!
Also, yes, hetero dude bros are all *very* accepting of lesbians and bisexuals… as long as it’s pornified fantasy and has some odds of resulting in a dude-centered threesome. In my experience though, lesbians get massive backlash for Failure To Cater To Men, and bisexual women tend to often face a lot of sudden insecurity and backlash when they come out to their boyfriends or lovers, even when they were all for bisexuals as long as it remained theoretical/fantasy.
(In fact, being a cynic I feel like most het dudes are turned on by the idea of their gf getting it on with a woman while *having no interest at all in doing it*, and that any hint that the threesome or lesbian encounter would result in pleasure on the part of anyone but The Dude is an immediate No No.)
Don’t most stats show that the majority of women are for gay rights, while only under 50% of men are for them?
Also “asserting dominance” does not sound like play. Were Matthew Shepard’s “friends” just having some fun too?
@ Dvarghundspossen
Oh, I forgot the “EEEVOL women!!1!” factor. I need to keep my MRA theory up to date.
@ Stepford Knife
Finally I’m the ninja-er, not the ninja’ed! ;-)
But no, I don’t accept your radical notion that women are individuals. That’s just not what the evo psych scientists over on mr/reddit have been finding. And evo psych explains *all their theories.* (in fact, give me any theory and I can fit it into a pleistocene narrative I pulled out of my ass, no problem. Science!)
#1 The tight relationship between all women and scented candles is due to our hunter gatherer past, when women’s olfactive glands had to be developed to find berries in the forest while the men hunted mammoth for them selfish whores, so the men didn’t give a shit about scented candles and they just bonded over a mammoth roast in the night while the ladies sat on their asses eating berries. It works!
As a bisexual man, I have totally encountered women on the dating scene who were totally freaked out about me having been with dudes. It’s an interesting phenomenon, I think, because across the board, these are intelligent, liberal-leaning people who openly and loudly support things like the rights of transsexuals and gay marriage. Surprisingly to me, the men I dated never seemed to care.
I got some insight when I asked a friend about it who didn’t know I was bi. She loudly asserted Oh my god I would NEVER date a bisexual man!, and then when I told her, she had this look on her face that made it very clear that she never actually expected to ever interact with a bi dude in her entire life. So I think that’s part of it, as people have said: many folks just don’t empathize with someone they never expect to see.
She apologized and has since been a great ally. But I asked her and another friend to explain those initial feelings, and they said two things that were enlightening. One was, “He’ll cheat on you with a man!” (they never said “he’ll leave you,” it was always cheating), which is what people have said before: This idea of men’s sexual power allowing them to take whoever they want.
But the other was, “It’s hard enough competing with all women. I couldn’t take having to compete with all MEN, too!” So (aside from it being a misunderstanding of how bisexuality works) it also ties in to things like women being in competition with one another, with women’s self-esteem and worth being inherent in being “chosen” by a man, with men having the agency.
Huh, sounds a lot like that patriarchy shit that feminists are always complaining about. Why aren’t these guys on our side, again?
Yeah, and that’s why when dudebros talk about how much they love lesbians or bi women, they also mean femme ones only. They are awful to butch women, because they aren’t doing everything to look the part of that pornified fantasy.
All these cases where men has beaten up or murdered gay men just happened because da evol womenz were cheering them along.
@TedtheFed: That kind of reaction explains why bisexual male colleague broached the question of orientation by asking me if I’d ever consider dating a bi man, and I cheerfully answered: “Sure! I already have! And I’m bi too!”. I’ve always considered it, if anything, a PLUS that a date is bi too, since bi men (in my experience at least) seems to have less weird views of bi women than most straight men (I mean, my husband is straight and completely normal about bi:s, but LOTS of straight men really have a fucked-up view on bi women).
Oh, just remembered that AWFUL SATC episode about bisexuality… one reason why I absolutely hate SATC.
Gymrat’s cognitive abilities are certainly too advanced for me. Either that, or that post *is* actually as full of fail and burning stupid as I think it is.
@Dvärghundspossen
I just read the script of that episode (where they discuss about bisexuality) and it is terrible. I hate SATC too. They reinforce the ugliness in ugly stereotypes. Ugh.
Silly question: What’s SATC?
Just wanted to say I have new blog focused on the most important issues of our time
http://whataboutmyboner.wordpress.com/
Any suggestions for content?
SATC means Sex and the City, the TV show from HBO.
@bionicmommy
Thanks. Just hadn’t seen it abbreviated like that before.
Well, you know, there was no reality before he was born, and now that he’s around, his experience is totally, completely, 100% the same as all other experience, everywhere. And his feeling completely safe among and accepted by the men around him has totally nothing at all to do with decades of work and struggle (and the brutalization and death) by others on his behalf toward acceptance (or with potential class or other privilege on his part).
Because he said so.
And that’s real.
That SATC episode was awful, wow. I’d forgotten all about it.
Tipping my hat to everyone in this thread who spoke so eloquently about the perception of bi men and bi women.
It’s amazing what these people can come up with starting from the simple premise that women are to blame for absolutely everything that they don’t like!
Yes, I like to playfully assert dominance over my friends by chastising their potential love lives. It’s all in good fun. I mean, obviously, the kind of good fun where I imply they are inferior and I’m better for not being what they are, but, you know, fun!
Curious.
On the bi men/women thing, it all boils down to patriarchy. After all, both the assumption that bi women are actually straight, AND the assumption that bi men are actually all gay, are equally based on the notion that they really want to sleep with the cis-, straight dude making the base claim (and which then gets repeated and magnified through the media to get other people to say it, too, per standard patriarchy mechanisms). So yeah, it’s all about us (where ‘us’ refers to straight, cis- men).
Blech. I hate being able to remember that mindset so clearly.
Soo…. The famously homophobic Mr. Hitler who wanted to execute gays along with the Jews was just joshing around and having a little fun, eh? Or maybe he was a lady in disguise wearing a really bad fake moustache? It’s probably that. After all, stating a lot of evil despots have been straight white males… MISANDRY, MISANDRY! But stating a lot of great things have been achieved by straight white males… APEX FALLACY!!! [Or is that the one which they use to "prove" 99.9% of men are amazing overachievers because 0.1% of men have amazingly overachieved? I forget.]
Gymrat totally explained to me why the Boy Scouts are still resisting allowing gays to be scout leaders while the Girl Scouts have been accepting them for years.
Except he didn’t.
I’m kind of tangenting, but I just reminded myself of this letter to the editor I saw in the San Francisco Chronicle last week:
“Let tradition alone
A recent writer seems to support the idea of girls joining the Boy Scouts (“No atheist scouts,” Letters, May 27).
I assume by the same logic that he would also support the idea of boys being able to join the Girl Scouts. That, of course, leads to the image of boys someday selling those famous (and mostly delectable) Girl Scout cookies.
Shouldn’t some venerable traditions be left alone?”
(http://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/letterstoeditor/article/Letters-to-the-editor-May-29-4555022.php)
I wonder why the author or this letter seems to think boys selling cookies is such a horrible thing to imagine?
I actually didn’t know that about the Girl Scouts. Interesting that gay men are still viewed as so predatory that they can’t be allowed around Boy Scouts.
And boys selling cookies — THE HORROR!!!
I suspect that is more… accurate.
What about women who actively prefer men who are bi, because they are too? Eh, whatever, I’m used to not existing in the minds of zealots.
People really can be weird about men who’re bi, though. With my ex I got the “what if he cheats on you with a man?” questions occasionally, which was odd because all of the people asking knew that I was bi too. I’m not sure if they didn’t think my cheating with a woman was a possibility or if they thought that would be less-bad than him doing it? I dunno, I don’t speak bi-phobic weirdo.
NOOO NOT BOYS WITH COOKIES!
Incidentally, grumpycat, it seems safe to assume that when he says “girls joining the Boy Scouts,” he means trans* boys?
No doubt this is the fault of evil women wanting to deprive poor men of everything.
What’s funny to me about GymRat’s bit is that he actually says that no women have ever told him to be hypermasculine and abuse less masculine, gay or perceived gay guys, just says it’s something “men pick up” on. So not only are all women supposedly controlling straight guys to be douchey to gay men, but we’re doing it silently WITH OUR MINDS.
Can I just say how amusing I’m finding it that everyone is totally ignoring our boring troll on the Fidelbogen thread?
Also, can’t stay, have meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeetings, but there’s a pretty funny misreading of an interview on dating by a feminist from WAM! — misread by The Spreadhead, and then by r/mr. (Said feminist does get some deserved heat from feminists for mis-gendering trans* men in her interview, but at least she apologizes in the comments.) Anyway, she describes an obviously successful run of dating feminist men and women, and in one paragraph talks about being frustrated with a particular type of feminist man, so of course Price and the misters use this to prove that all feminists secretly want to date manly anti-feminist man-men. Also, she’s a size 16, so lots of “She is not pleasing my boner” comments too.
It’s a regular bonanza of crapitude!
Oh here’s the link:
http://www.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/1fkx9v/a_feminist_admits_feminist_men_turn_her_off/
More messages from Bizarro World – how fun!
I mean, from experience, it’s been the complete opposite: straight men bullying gay men for somehow being “unmanly” (not that they even know what that means) than as any sort of “friendly jest.” While there are women who do the same, like Dr. Laura, many tend to show empathy and support. I guess I was just brainwashed by the Gyno-Centric New World Order…
There was actually a big backlash against the Girl Scouts after they accepted a trans girl last year in Colorado: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/01/religious-right-calls-girl-scout-cookie-boycott
Can’t imagine how traumatic it must have been for that poor 7-year-old child that all these people freaked out about her wanting to be a Girl Scout.
The only cases I’ve seen of women really displaying any strong dislike of the behaviors this guy means by “gay” have been in situations where the women were really into macho guys and they were looking for someone to date or fuck. That’s a sexual preference, not bullying. It’s expressed by not fucking the person whose behavior doesn’t turn you on.*
All of which is kind of irrelevant to you if you’re a gay man.
*I, on the other hand, tend to like the men who women like that don’t want to fuck, because women are not the Borg.
I meant condemning/mocking someone for being gay (which I think counts as bullying), which is why I brought Dr. Laura as an example.
[potential TW for mention of homophobic threats]
Huh. I know this particular MRA screed is mostly about gay men (because, c’mon, it’s not like MRAs actually understand that lesbians even *exist*, tying into ^^ what Maude said) — but I’ll be sure to remember this next time some strange dude on the street starts hassling and even tries to physically assault me and my lady friend when we’re just walking around minding our own business.
It’s not like women can’t be weird towards gay women (also tying into what Maude said) — but in my near-thirty years of being a fairly gender-role-atypical woman who loves other women and all that goes along with it, I’ve pretty much only ever had *men* follow me and a ladyfriend down a city block in a car or on foot, asking us where our boyfriends were, hurling taunts and threats, getting really pissed off and even violent when we ignore them or respond curtly, etc. (Once we even had some dude stop dead in the middle of the sidewalk in SoHo, NYC, block my path, and hold his hand up in my face as if to smack me. We kept walking around him without a word, and he and his bro-friend followed us shouting, “What, b****es, d**es don’t high-five??”)
I’ve had women cut me to the bone emotionally, but I’ve never been physically afraid of women who’ve passed us on the street. Can’t exactly say the same for random men.
Well, “brought UP” anyway…
GymRat is setting off my troll-dar, actually, because he seems to be specifically referring to the fact that some women do refuse to get into relationships with men who aren’t macho and framing that as a way that women oppress men who are insufficiently manly, and I’m just not seeing why a gay man would key in on that in particular as the reason women are terrible. There’s something off about the whole thing. Maybe someone trolling them again?
It’s absolutely puzzling to me – much like FeMRAs. The group in general is downright bigoted and the idea of a woman, a gay individual, a transgender person, etc. is absolutely bizarre and kind of frustrating to try figuring out.
It’s like being a black slave during the Civil War and fighting for the Confederacy, blaming abolitionists for all their horrible conditions. It’s ass-backwards logic.
Gah! I mean “a woman, a gay individual, a transgender person, etc. JOINING THE GROUP”.
I guess maybe he’s offering this idea up in the hope that it will make the other MRAs more likely to accept him? So very much like the FEMRAs.
I feel sad for people like that, at least until they start doing things like writing apologias for Saville.
With the civil war metaphor, you have to remember that these women feel superior, one form of patriarchy is saying that women can be equal to men only if they also take care of their “womanly duties”. So these women just view themselves as more clever and moral than us feminist slutbags since that form of patriarchy praises them and makes them feel like a special kind of girl.
Btw, I’m typing on an iPad and I find it rather difficult… Sorry it this seemed too brief or “off” in some way.
Yeah sorry that didn’t make sense, the iPad typing makes me sound high or something…
*delurks*
Man, I want to meet this fellow, just watch his head explode when I tell him that there’s an entire freakin’ diverse genre of male/male romance novels written by and enjoyed by some ladyfolk.
But we’re such contrary creatures that we’ll pay money for stories about people we secretly despise.
MRAs wouldn’t think there was anything odd about being aroused by people you despise.
Only tangentially related, but in today’s feminist climate I’d argue (it’s a recurring theme on AVfM too) that it’s in fact easier to be gay than straight. Feminist’s and women’s behavior is so uniformly poor, and so influenced by feminist entitlement, that it’s very difficult for men- especially white men- to engage in a heterosexual relationship without accepting emotional abuse and demeaning behavior from a misandrist partner who sees them as less than fully human.
It’s one reason I think gays are somewhat underrepresented in the MRM- they don’t have that visceral experience that so often serves as a “lightbulb” moment.
Good point.
Another delurker! Squee! Please accept this Complimentary Welcome Package!
“MRAs wouldn’t think there was anything odd about being aroused by people you despise.”
I’ve long been of the opinion that some people find it essential to despise the people they desire sexually.
Argenti:
I get welcome prezzies? Sankyuu!
Clyde:
Funny, I’ve never seen any of my male partners are less than human. The human part is kinda part of the attraction.
You may be speaking out of your ass on this one. Jus’saying.
True.
Yet another way that MRAs minimize the oppression of other populations. “Ladies are mean to my boner” is just exactly the same as this.