Research (Ravenhill, & de Visser, 2018 Sánchez, & Vilain, 2012) shows that many gay men express a desire to act and look more masculine, and less feminine, than they currently do. Personally, I have heard so many men, ranging on different ends of the sexuality spectrum, talk about how some gay guys “are just too much”, or have had people attempt to compliment me by saying “Oh, I would have never guessed you were gay”, as if that’s a particularly great thing. It’s a struggle between two seemingly conflicting identities that the person holds. This negative attitudes towards effeminate gay men, and preoccupation with being masculine, is often a reflection of a gay man’s feelings about himself. Further research by Sánchez, & Vilain (2012) have also linked masculinity in gay men with negative feelings about being gay. A study of homosexual Italian men by Hunt, Fasoli, Carnaghi, & Cadinu (2016) showed that in an experimental condition when the “masculinity” of the participants was threatened, these men identified more with ‘masculine gay men’ and had a lesser desire to interact with ‘feminine gay men’ as compared to the condition where their masculine identity was affirmed.
I’ve seen so many gay men look down upon and reject other gay men for being “too flamboyant” or behaving in gender atypical ways. Many men in order to affirm their masculinity, distance themselves from effeminate gay guys and alienate themselves from a community that understands their specific struggles, losing support that could potentially have many benefits, which may contribute to the higher rates of mental illnesses found in the gay population as noted in many prevalence studies. This norm of masculinity and need to identify with this ideal has been linked to psychological distress and many potentially problematic behaviours (Ravenhill, & de Visser, 2018 Sánchez, & Vilain, 2012). Societal ideas of masculinity are rigid and create a mould that is difficult for gay men, on account of their homosexuality, to fit into
However, being men, they still have a need to identify with this ideal of what it means to be a man, and so many men cut away parts of themselves, and distance themselves from their community, sometimes behaving in ways borderline homophobic, in order to be confident and comfortable with their masculine identity. Furthermore, societal ideas of masculinity are rigid and create a mould that is difficult for gay men, on account of their homosexuality, to fit into. Some researchers (Ravenhill, & de Visser, 2018) believe that this possibly stems from the fact that many gay men, during childhood were gender non-conforming boys, something they were most likely bullied for, and consequently learned to de-feminize or have negative connotations about being effeminate. This importance towards being a masculine gay man, or be gay but “straight acting”, is a popular phenomenon in the gay community, an attempt to chip away parts of oneself to fit in. Many gay men will describe themselves as “I’m gay, but not THAT gay, like I’m just a regular dude.” As if simply being gay makes the person less of a man. Masc4Masc is a common phrase used in dating apps to indicate that the person is a very masculine gay guy and only wants to talk to and be associated with similarly masculine men. There are people who will distance themselves from their own community in an attempt to fit into a mould, that was never really made with them in mind. Ask any gay man who’s been on dating apps or has gay friends what Masc4Masc means. One would imagine that homophobia is an evil of the straight community, like you can’t be openly gay, and still be homophobic right? Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. This year a selection of these written blog posts is published on Mindwise. Second-year Psychology students participating in the University Honours College follow a workshop on Blogging Science, in which they learn to communicate science to the general public, by means of informing, giving an opinion, and relating issues in science to issues in society.