h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

A lot of the time I think that people get upset by things they're just not exposed to very much, or haven't thought through. I used to get quite insulted when watching Will & Grace (a program I find very funny) at the (fairly constant) implication that there's something revolting about the thought of sleeping with a woman. But after thinking about it a bit I realised that I feel exactly the same way about sleeping with a woman, BECAUSE I'm heterosexual. It's not that I think we women are inferior, or that I have a bad body-image, it's because my brain is hard-wired that way, just as a male homosexual's brain is hardwired the other way.

As to the original post - maybe the poster just doesn't have a very high sex-drive? Lots of girls don't, in their teens. I was well into my twenties before my sex-drive cranked up If you're not being sexually turned on by boys (and let's face it, teenage boys can be very off-putting ROTFL) you might be inclined to search for other explanations. Best to just wait and see what happens, and accept whatever your sexual orientation is when you finally figure it out

Yeah, I am just going to wait, RunningDog. I don't really care.

But more to the point is society's perception, and I agree with you that it often has to do with things people are 'just not exposed to very much.' Fear of the unknown... almost cliche, really, but it makes sense.

To Boldly go where no man has.......



Maybe not.

Interesting thread, I wish I'd found it earlier.

Regarding 'gay' as a derogatory adjective - it's been around for a while. My ex's circle of friends were using it in Scotland about 22, 23 years ago, though they pronounced it 'gea'. They did not literally mean 'homosexual', but they did mean 'girlie' or 'pouffy', I guess. I called them on it at the time, I think, but it is a long time ago now and I cannot really remember.



>> someone else who's never heard the term used *in anything like that particular context* before can immediately understand it

Silly story. The girlfriend of someone I once knew was French and had only heard the word 'cool' in its meaning of , and not in its meaning of . This only became apparent when she was confused that some British-bought medicines he'd got had a label which said that they should be 'stored in a cool place'. Poor lass. She was *very* confused by that one.



>> A lad had turned down a night with his mates to spend sometime with his girlfriend. They all called him gay, at which point I burst out laughing.

Me too!

Two of the current denizens of the Big Brother house were discussing fellow inmates - they were slagging off the the homosexuals and admiring the girls. One of them then said something to the effect that he fancied a particular girl but not in a gay way.

So presumably gay is coming to mean 'emotional', 'sensitive' or maybe even 'over-sensitive'.

Ben

I decided to post the things which are new to the thread in a separate post, so here they are.



One thing which has occurred to me through observation is that some gay men are more blokeish than some straights, because they don't have to temper their masculinity to accommodate a female partner. It's taken me a while to come to this conclusion, but I've come to it watching really boysie blokes come over all nice around women they fancy, and I've seen gay men behave like - well - the blokiest of blokes in a relationship. So in some ways I think that straight men are the feminised ones.

Just a thought.




My other thought is that there are in fact two separate things under consideration - who you sleep with and the community you identify with.

There was a rather self-indulgent show called 'Angels in America' on last year, and Robert de Nero had a powerful polemic in it, the long and the short of which was that although he screwed men he wasn't a fag, because fag-homosexuals had no power in corporate or political America, and he was financially and politically powerful. His character wasn't in any kind of denial about his sexual choices. He simply refused to accept the social emasculation that went with the label, and so he rejected the label.

Ag was very eloquent, that by joining the straight marrieds she was percieved by some people as having 'sold-out' the gay and bisexual communities. But if you don't identify as part of those communities in the first place, then the label is really just a dating-tag. Not everyone is communal in that way - some people intersect with many groups and find that sort of demographic labelling limiting.

Ben

It is often postulated that women retain a sexual interest in other women - even when traditionally straight. I, obviously, have no knowledge of this, but suspect it is a projected male fantasy.

I have certainly met a very blokish lesbian - she broke a friend of mine's nose because he wouldn't take the hint. I nearly
against that I have also known a very attractive and feminine young lady who had 3 elder brothers, who laid out another of my friends (go on hit me in the stomach - obviously he'd never heard of Houdini) she did.

I think that labels are things we apply to people from our own perceptions, and most of the time they are meaningless except to allow us to catagorize others, according to our prejudices.

"Gay seems to be used to refer to a particularly 'un-butch' style or behaviour, as most homosexuals do not act like Julian and Sandy, it is a derogatory term directed at a perceived group, rather than an actual group of people."

It's rather ironic that I have a friend who is gay who believe it is somehow his duty to behave in that stereotypical way in order to somehow prove he is gay.

I have a particularly annoying story to share that somehow seemed to fit this thread.

I was walking out of school the other day, and right behind me were two girls. I heard them laughing and talking, and one said, 'If we were lesbians I'd be the butch one, and you'd be the feminine one,' or words to that effect.

I wanted to call them on their inaccurate stereotype, but I didn't know them and as I was dressed in Renaissance clothing at the time I was concerned they wouldn't take me seriously. But where do they get these stereotypes? Obviously they don't know very many lesbian couples, or they would realise that their stereotype was incorrect. But if they don't know very many lesbian couples, how can they form any conclusions at all about what lesbian relationships are like?

People. I shall never understand them.

B: On blokish gays... I have no argument. I think the heterosexual male need to repress certain aspects of his personality in female company is the reason we tend to enjoy exclusively male company from time to time. It's a chance to be yourself without worrying about offending anyone. When the ladies are away, we become very different people.

Hetero ladies, on the other hand, are under no pressure to seem less feminine, and perhaps this is why hetero female-female bonds aren't nearly as strong.


EMR: Noting that anecdotal evidence isn't worth anything, the one lesbian couple I have known couldn't have had a stronger demarkation between the butch and the b*tch. The butch was built like a fireplug, with short-cropped hair and a masculine stride and carriage. The other was very feminine, with all that entails.

A similar conversation has broken out elsewhere in which it was pointed out that sexual orientation, like practically everything else in the universe, was not a binary proposition, but something which existed on a continuum. The fact that the butch was at the far end of homosexual and that the feminine one was more hetero than homo probably was the dominant factor in their attitudes.

>> this is why hetero female-female bonds aren't nearly as strong.

WHAT?

I admit that I didn't form strong heterosexual female-female bonds until my 30s, but I think that once women are no longer in sexual competition because the have husbands and are mothers they tend to form much stronger bonds.

A large number of women I know have friendships going back 20 years or more with the women who had children at the same time that they did. The shared experience of the maternity ward or the toddler group formed a bond which lasted for life. And women will bond over the question of 'what do I do about hubby?'. (Note the sweepingness of this generalisation, and the fact it therefore does NOT apply to everyone).

For this reason, I think that women tend to form lasting friendships later in life: as a girlfriend of mine concluded "It's scary introducing your boyfriend to your girfriends, because the girlfriends will last longer". One of the reasons I loved 'Sex in the City' was the complexity and depth of the female friendships it portrayed over the years.

Women in sexual or professional competition may not form these bonds, but most mature women do. It is one of the things I really like about women and one of the things I like about being a woman.



Kat, the Butch-Fem stereotype was common and it was for ages the simplest way for lesbians to identify as lesbians, but it is now fading. As society becomes less heterosexual, it is possible for gays and lesbians to explore and develop non-heterosexual models for their looks and behaviour, and this is visibly happening. What women *tend* to find attractive in women is different from what men *tend* to find attractive in women, and lesbians are beginning to develop their own style based on their own model. But there are still many many butch lesbians around, though the fems are less obvious.

Another reason for the slowly reducing number of butch lesbians is the fact that medical advances make transsexuality easier, so men who would have had no choice other than being butch lesbians some decades ago are taking the surgical and hormonal route which enables them to visibly be the men they in fact are.

Ben

I had an interesting chat with someone the other day, talking about my best friend (lets call him Q)
The person I was chatting to had recently met Q for the first time and started talking about him by saying "So he's the guy who stole your heterosexuality then" and when I asked what he meant he said "It'd make more sense if Q was gay and [I] was straight" rather than vice-versa
It was just funny to see how people judge. Personally I wouldn't think of Q as gay, I just don't see it and he isn't particularly effeminate. I think what my friend was trying to say was I seemed to hold the dominant role in mine and Q's friendship (I certainly hold the 'loud-mouthed and bossy' role) and that naturally the dominant person should be straight while the quiescent person should be gay
Oh well

<>

I couldn't agree more. Gender's got a continuum to it, too - not all females are composed of entirely feminine traits, and not all males are composed of entirely masculine traits. But you try telling this to a group of little kids who wonder why you're dressed in boys' clothes, and they start looking at you funny.

You'll be wanting to play with my toy cars next.

So what makes one guy - "a man's man" and the next guy "puffy" - its not clothes or length of hair, or what they drink - so what is it ?

And I'm guessing that ladies will see this one differently to the boys (and I just don't know about the laydees)

In some people's minds, it can be small, obvious traits like you've suggested, McKay. I read this horrible story about a man who was beaten to death in a club because other people there thought he danced in a feminine way. Guys at my school have been called gay because they wear their hair long or wear a pink shirt or tight pants. It seems to me like the guys who are actually gay are far less 'gay-looking' in the minds of the populace!

In reference to the cars - my sister told me that one of her friends had seen me in my boys' clothes at a school event and asked her, 'Is your sister a *tomboy*?!' in a very shocked tone of voice. Sorry to be talking so much about myself, but I'm just so *fascinating*, you know?

Interesting. The only girl at my high school who I know dresses in boys' clothes also happens to be hetero. So clearly

The way people hold their cigarettes (assuming they smoke). If you're a smoker, here's a clear difference between the way women normally smoke and men normally smoke.

Men & women throw balls differently don't they? (Overarm/underarm)

Do women cricketers bowl underarm? I find that hard to believe.

So surely the difference in bowling is culural rather than physical, though I was told it was because of the different shape and tilt of women's pelvises.

Ben

I throw neither underarm or overarm (usually). I use the half way one that involves bending your arm and keeping it level with your shoulder. Can't remember what it's called.

There is, however, a difference between the ways men and women 'instinctively' (as apposed to trained sports-players) catch a ball.