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"What it Means to be Straight"

Noodle

Noodle

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Thinking about what choice really means--in relation to sexual orientation and sexual identity--I came across this essay online.



What it Means to be Straight

By Crispin Sartwell




Like a lot of the straight guys I know, I am a homophobe.


I had that realization last week when a guy named Jake gave a presentation to a meeting I was in. I disliked him on sight, though he seemed perfectly nice. And I had the realization that I thought he was defectively gendered. He didn't walk right; he didn't sit right; he didn't talk right.


I am not a fan of Jerry Falwell and Jesse Helms. I don't reject homosexuality on Biblical or in fact any other grounds. But I have a visceral reaction of hostility to men I perceive as gay.


Homosexuality seems like a performance to me, whereas heterosexual masculinity seems natural.


Now sometimes I suppose it's fair to say that homosexuality really *is* a performance. There's no doubt that Greenwich Village drag queens are at play in the fields of gender; that they're very purposefully trying to compromise the categories of male and female. And perhaps Jake, who seemed very androgynous (though in fact I don't know his sexual orientation) was consciously messing around with gender too.


But the funny thing is, heterosexual masculinity is also a performance. My ways of walking and talking and dressing and sitting were things I actually remember choosing and learning in my adolescence. At the time when my own sexual identity was fluid, I consciously chose and performed heterosexuality.


RuPaul is a performer of gender. But you know what? So is, let us say, Bruce Springsteen. The "plain" clothes (jeans and a white shirt) the studiously unkempt hair, the stage swagger: these are public performances of heterosexuality, no more "true" or "natural" than RuPaul's. In fact, the staging of heterosexual masculinity is extremely elaborate and takes a long time to learn. It is extremely elaborate performance that is supposed to be effortlessly natural.


One is simply supposed to be heterosexual and masculine, effortlessly, by nature. But the repertoire of gestures and inflections that mark one as masculine are things that must be learned. Male effeminacy is threatening because it indicates that masculinity is optional, that it is a public performance.

The attack on homosexuality has often taken the form of saying that heterosexuality is natural and homosexuality is unnatural. Heterosexuality is what mammals do in order to reproduce; homosexuality is just a distortion or a pathological state of the reproductive impulse. But in fact sexuality has many functions in mammalian life, including various kinds of partnership and bonding.


As a philosopher, I have long argued that there is absolutely no defensible distinction between the natural and the artificial. Everything human beings do is perfectly natural: we can no more violate the laws of nature than can a squirrel. Our minds are natural objects. And, by the way, everything we do is also artificial, in the sense that it is something human beings do.


Springsteen's outfits are no less artificial than RuPaul's: Springsteen also communicates an identity by his manner of dress. I say this as seriously as possible: natural and artificial are the same.

And that's how I try to reason myself out of homophobia. That's how I stopped hating Jake. But it's a constant task, a constant discipline, because homophobia is built into the structure of heterosexual masculinity.
Click to expand...

source



What do you think of this essay? Is there a kernel of truth here that rings true to you?






...
 
He seems to be going under the tired stereotype that gay/bisexual/queer men are somehow more likely to be feminine or the stereotypical camp/flaming queen.

I've been around Heterosexual men that are very feminine and don't try to hide it and these guys are totally heterosexual.

I've been around bisexual/gay/queer men who are masculine/butch and that your average heterosexual man or woman wouldn't even suspect of being something other than straight.

Most gay/bisexual/queer men are not the stereotypical camp/feminine queens that the author seems to think or suspect we are.

Are there camp/feminine gay/bisexual/queer men that are total flaming queens, yes but there are also straight men that cross dress or act camp/feminine.
 
^I think you're reading too much into it. In order to make his point succinctly, he has to boil it down to some generalizations. But whether or not any particular sexuality points to a particular mode of behavior, there is obviously a large portion of heterosexuals, homosexuals, and everyone in between that is very deliberately putting on a show to loudly declare what that sexuality is. He's right; heterosexuality is no more natural than homosexuality, and homosexuality no more artificial.

I mean, as a roughly bisexual person (closest label to pick easily), that line of argument from the militantly straight has always seemed like a load of crap to me. I've always liked boys and girls, as long as I can remember. In fact, I was more into women as a kid, but nowadays I'm more into guys. And I never chose to like either group in particular, nor did I choose my appearance and behavior to try to appeal to one in particular; I always just did wtf I wanted.
 
This essay has nothing to do with being straight. It should be titled, "What it means to be a confessed homophobe, and how I try to rationalize it."
 
I thought it was an amazing read. Try not to take things so seriously people lol <3
 
I'm with R-n-R on this one.

I've always felt like I walk between the two worlds: gay and straight.

I've been accepted and rejected on both counts by gay fems and butch straights.

:)

I truely believe--that at the extremes--many of the superficialities attributed to both heterosexual and homosexual cultural norms are really more artifice than anything else.

We learn to present ourselves in a way that is acceptable, so we might be accepted, because it is human nature to be cognitive misers.

I think it is great that this man has embraced the reality of his repulsions and is willing to look deeper within himself and into the cultural constructs of sexual identity.
 
zydrunas said:
This essay has nothing to do with being straight. It should be titled, "What it means to be a confessed homophobe, and how I try to rationalize it."
Click to expand...

I think you may need to re-read the article for general idea. The man was rationalizing himself OUT of being a homophobe, very effectively I would say, not justifying his homophobia.
 
The last sentence definitely resonates and I wholeheartedly agree, we need to consciously teach ourselves to become accepting of homosocial behaviours....and he is 100% right about human perception being nothing more than an artifice at the end of the day....
 
Many "straight" people are covert homophobes.
This is because sexuality is a continuum, but society forces us to pigeonhole ourselves.
Anyone who isn't on one end or the other is almost forced to choose.
Those who are even a little bit in the middle learn to fear and hate that part of them that isn't purely straight.
Once they fear and hate it in themselves, they naturally fear and hate it in others.
 
Not read the thread but I feel like chucking my opinion out there. I'm gay but 9/10 times I totally despise gay people, in all honestly it's probably the fact that I'm only spotting the ones that are camp and flamboyant. I honestly don't understand why you would base your entire personality around your sexuality. I've always been into pretty normal things, I've skated and done motocross for pretty much my entire life. I've somehow surrounded myself with male friends (all of whom are straight) and they all know I'm gay. The way I see it is that if I don't make a big deal out of it then no one else will.

It's not important or relevant in most cases so I don't feel the need to broadcast that I'm gay, it's a minor part of who I am.
 
How we choose to dress is a performance? No shit, really?! I don't see what sexual orientation has to do with a person dressing in the manner that they elect to project their image to the world. I doubt straight-seeming gays have any more in common with flamboyant gays than the average hetero has with them, and the post above seems to reflect that as well.
 
thujone said:
How we choose to dress is a performance? No shit, really?! I don't see what sexual orientation has to do with a person dressing in the manner that they elect to project their image to the world. I doubt straight-seeming gays have any more in common with flamboyant gays than the average hetero has with them, and the post above seems to reflect that as well.
Click to expand...

I'm not meaning to start an argument, if sexual orientation has nothing to do with how someone projects themselves to the world when why is it mainly gay people that feel the need to do it in an OTT manor that is pretty much identical to every other flamboyant person you see? I'm really not trying to cause offence I'm just genuinely curious.

I think the main reason it frustrates me is that when I tell people they don't believe me because i don't conform to this stereotype. I honestly think that if it wasn't for gay people being portrayed as camp and in your face then `straight-seeming gays` would be the norm.
 
Cz_x said:
I honestly think that if it wasn't for gay people being portrayed as camp and in your face then `straight-seeming gays` would be the norm.
Click to expand...

This may be true, but I think the real takeaway here is the sheer arbitrariness of such norms in the first place. In other words, there's nothing particularly 'natural' about behaving in a stereotypically heterosexual way - the notion that such behavior may form a kind of 'steady-state' condition into which any orientation will eventually fall is dubious at best, and is, at any rate, somewhat beside the point.
 
As to "learning how to act straight" ...it seemed pretty natural for me. I readily admit to liking certain feminine things (more so as I get older) more than certain masculine things. I'd rather tour a flower garden than watch the fucking Chicago Bears play with their balls. But isn't it kinda gay to want to watch a bunch of guys rough it up in tight spandex? Maybe the difference is genteel vs. butch?

A lot of this macho culture actually hides a closet gay society. Like some of the roughest biker gang dudes actually hump each other, and hardcore ghetto bangers call it "keepin' it on the down low" when they fuck each other.

I know the difference in me is clear...I don't get pleasure from being physical near and especially touching a man. I like that 3 feet of personal space then.

I get extreme pleasure from being close to or touching a woman I find attractive. It's just the way it is, and it doesn't matter if you like flowers, how you talk, how you walk, how you dress etc etc. It's just if you are sexually attracted to women exclusively, and at that, I'm attracted only to women I find attractive. Being a woman isn't enough...you got to be a certain kind of woman, and no certain kind of dude could ever generate the same level of arousal for me. In the end, that's what it's about I guess.
 
Cz_x said:
I'm not meaning to start an argument, if sexual orientation has nothing to do with how someone projects themselves to the world when why is it mainly gay people that feel the need to do it in an OTT manor that is pretty much identical to every other flamboyant person you see? I'm really not trying to cause offence I'm just genuinely curious.

I think the main reason it frustrates me is that when I tell people they don't believe me because i don't conform to this stereotype. I honestly think that if it wasn't for gay people being portrayed as camp and in your face then `straight-seeming gays` would be the norm.
Click to expand...

I think this is a good post. I actually am straight but get along very well with gay people, but the extreme flamboyance of some of them does rub me the wrong way. It's not that I'm repulsed by their sexuality... It's just that I think they're going way overboard with their display of it. I think the same thing when I see a straight guy trying too hard to give off the image of being a ladies' man (think pink button-ups).
 
i find the gay community physically repulsive i do have dislike for other groups but my resentment for homosexuals come from another place,i would imagine most people on this thread were homophobic at some stage,its some thing you have to learn to over come,i believe the rejection of homosexuality comes from a natural defense mechanism built in to humans to protect the species,early and modern human history is based on reproduction,so i really do believe homophobia is a natural built in instinct to protect the species,

but i do believe in modern society we should live and let live,they are no threat and have a right to all the freedom any other member of the community has.
but like i admitted it does offend me.but so does a lot of other stuff,so i can live with that.
 
^ Often times a dislike of gay people comes from the failure to accept a desire for the same sex inside ones self. Food for thought...
 
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