In all my gay years I have often been asked many questions by well meaning heterosexuals, questions that often times starts with the phrase “Can I ask you something personal?” The questions that follow usually would be about my queerness, our gay old lifestyle and homosexual intercourse. And I have always answered these questions, frankly and in great descriptive detail, sometimes to the regret of the questioner. So now I thought it appropriate to flip the tables and ask a few questions of my own about heterosexuality that I have been burning to ask for years. So here goes…
I have always wondered whether straight folk where "born that way" or whether heterosexuality is actually a lifestyle choice. You see I have been pondering on this for a while. Why on earth would any person choose to be straight? Straight folk never have any fun. They never have any colorful parades. They only dress up once a year for Halloween. Very few have any fashion sense and then there’s the small little horror of accidentally falling pregnant – something that never happens with homosexuals! Or at least the ones I know off.
And then there is the sex. I don’t understand heterosexual intercourse and I find it puzzling. Firstly, the equipment that’s to be utilized for pleasure differs vastly in mechanics, design and general function. At least with homosexuals we have an innate understanding and intimate knowledge of our sex partner’s erogenous areas, the only thing that differs is the model size, religious cosmetic alterations and grooming.
Queers don’t necessarily have to learn how to swim in the sea of pleasure, we can jump right in, have a splash and both can make it to shore satisfied. With heterosexuals I suspect this may be slightly different and some experience is required before they get their sea legs. This being said, heterosexual sex must be terrifying and possibly dangerous!
Queers don’t necessarily have to learn how to swim in the sea of pleasure, we can jump right in, have a splash and both can make it to shore satisfied. With heterosexuals I suspect this may be slightly different and some experience is required before they get their sea legs. This being said, heterosexual sex must be terrifying and possibly dangerous!
Imagining the experience of heterosexual intercourse could easily make a standard homosexual lightheaded. Having seen the female anatomy in all its glory a few times in my life (for which there will follow no explanation or elaboration) I just can’t figure out why straight guys enjoy it.
The vigina must be the strangest organ in all creation. It’s a curious little fleshy miniature canyon with understated accessories sometimes hidden by a forest and other times just plain bare. Then there are the breasts for which I fail to see the purpose off during intercourse. It seems like they would just get in the way and could potentially be hazardous. Depending whether they are coconuts or tennis balls they do have the potential to cause a concussion or lead to suffocation.
The actual act of heterosexual intercourse I think we can all figure out on our own. The train goes into the tunnel and then comes again, as Freud would say. But, I have heard some straight guys boast, when trying to make straight sex seem better than gay sex, by stating that they have a choice of three orifices to choose from, whereas gay men only have two. To which I ussually candidly resond "Well honestly, I do really just care about the two!" Besides I always also tend to take matters that one step further by asking the said heterosexual guy’s girlfriend whether she has taken it up the ass before and if not I am always willing to give her some pointers.
But then having sex with straight men could be daunting too. For woman having to deal with a penis and testicles could pose their own challenges as not all men are created equal and not all men tend to their gardens, if you know what I mean. Being faced with an erect penis and not knowing how it works could easily lead to confusion. And when it’s surrounded with a moist and uncultivated tropical rain forest, its appeal factor can easily drop to zero. Then there are the differences: some wieners are turtle necks and others are kosher, and some women prefer the one over the other as do we queer folk.
The last thing I have wondered about is, can heterosexuals see and appreciate the beauty of people of their own gender. If a straight guy walks down the street and see another guy who’s attractive, well build and groomed can he say to his mates or girlfriend “Wow” without having his own masculinity threatened or questioned? Or can a woman admire another without thinking she has lesbian tendencies. We queer folk can do that all the time, gay guys appreciate good looking women, lesbians can acknowledge a fine male speciment, but that does not mean we want to sleep with them. Can straight folk do the same?
Yes, heterosexuality is a queer phenomenon that’s highly prevalent, very public and truly fascinating. I don’t think I will ever understand it and the fact that they flaunt their sexual preference and lifestyle choice in our streets, offices, shopping malls and on television sure isn’t making it easy to ignore them. At least they don’t have a flag yet, but I’m sure that too will happen someday. Even though I don’t understand it, sometimes don’t approve of it, I accept my heterosexual friends, family and colleagues just the way they are – they are people too and the heart doesn’t choose who you love.
Till next time.
Margaret Cho: Beautiful
26 comments:
I wrote a response to this post:
http://clarissasbox.blogspot.com/2010/10/homosexuality-and-hatred-of-female-body.html
@Clarissa, In my defense I must firstly state that my blog post is meant to be seen as humorous and in no why ridicule the female body.
It’s a commentary on questions and preconceptions I as a gay male face from heterosexuals in society.
I believe gay men respect women more than heterosexual men maybe because we don’t view women just as mere sexual objects.
I would love to get your perspective on what I wrote about the male body as well. It cuts both ways.
Okay, well actually I've found that my own imagination works pretty well for figuring out the female anatomy, and usually as you get to know a girl she kind of gives you, shall we say, tips about what gives her pleasure. I've never had a chance to try this out, I am a virgin, but I suspect they have been being honest with me this whole time.
You know, I actually love the fact that my partner is that different from me. I love the fact that the person I get together with has such a different nature then my own. It inspires me, it energizes me, it even brings out of me a certain kind of worship, a feeling that I am in the presence of a goddess who has accepted me as a ritual sacrifice. And for your information pal, I do have fun. Straight guys have bars too you know! The only difference is that I don't usually date someone I meet at a bar, bar girls are in my mind off limits as girls who would, shall we say, open themselves up to guys while slightly intoxicated probably are not the most trustworthy or dignified variety.
The "lack of fashion sense" is usually a disguise that many straight men use to cover up the fact that they aren't really what the lady is looking for. See, if you actually go for the traditional rustic cowboy/lumberjack/blue-collar look, certain things are kind of expected and required of you, like actually being a man. By being disgusting, they haven't actually agreed to anything, and they aren't advertising what they actually are (urban wuss) either. By saying nothing fashionwise, they confirm not how big of a wuss they are. Occasionally really wealthy men will advertise an acceptable alternative, the man about town, also known as boardroom warriors, barbarians of the financial world, but there are even fewer of those then there are the traditional strong and proud variety.
Oh, and actually yes, I can notice when a guy is good looking, though I usually keep quiet about it. It's a shame too, because in most societies at most times (even America's up until about 50 years ago, as you can see from literature [e.g. certain descriptions in "two years behind the mast"] that predates the current paranoid period) it was considered perfectly fine and healthy for a heterosexual man to be able to understand how, ideally, a heterosexual man should look. If I have time and a situation where people are really listening, I sometimes share this fact, but most people really don't listen, at all, at any time. As you can see, while it is certainly not as severe as what gay men deal with, the world is not a picnic for the straight man either, for many of the same idiotic, puritanistic, hyper-conformist reasons.
Jeremy Janson, I love the fact that you commented from a straight guy's perspective. This makes me wonder, how many straight men like you are out there in the world. Are you in the majority or minority?
I understand the humorous intent of the post. I think the post is very good - except the paragraph I quoted - and it would be a good idea to hand it out to students (I'm a college prof) to raise awareness about the many preconceived notions they have.
Not all hetero men see all women as sex objects. There are many hetero men who will never find me attractive or see me as any kind of a sex object. Sometimes, that's upsetting to me. :-)
Clarissa, I hoped this post would get some discussion started about how we view sexual orientation, and I guess I achieved this. If you hand it to your students I would love to get some feedback on their reactions.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder Clarissa, the wrong guys are looking at you. Many people look but don't see.
Thank you for always entertaining. I absolutely loved this post.
Similarly, I get the black questions. Once, a white woman wasn't satisfied with my answers and took it upon herself to send me articles about the black community, because she felt that I had lost touch.
I would have been offended, but it was just too funny. She was so proud of herself.
As a woman - I can comment on another woman's beauty and not be accused of being a lesbian. My boyfriend has never made a comment about a man's attractiveness; at least not in my presence.
My boyfriend wears tshirts, sweatshirts, and jeans or shorts. He won't wear sandals, that's not manly. He gets excited about tools, yard work (not gardening, mind you), and fixing stuff (and demolition too).
He's absolutely shocked when he meets a gay man who has the same interests.
The sex is fantastic. What's funny is that I can understand gay (as in guy) sex, but not lesbian sex.
Oh and I was born this way. :)
Cheers!
I particularly like the description of the female body, it made me laugh so much! : )
Beside that, it's not hard for me to imagine how ridiculous or stupid some questions you and so many other gay people receive must be.
I also guess sometimes being extremely patient and answer the most absurd questions may have a positive effect if the person who asked eventually realizes gay people are not aliens form outer space like they probably thought, which usually also comes with recognizing their questions were just so silly.
...But basically yes, what they ask is still not making any sense XP
Sara, true but sometimes it's quite fun watching people's reactions when answering their silly questions!
TO each their own,
But one, Gay men do not respect women more than heterosexuals, it's an individuality thing. And unfortunately there are a lot of assholes out there including gay men.
Two your post included a very interesting line that i feel necessary to quote; "Gay folk don’t have these pressures, we can meander through a full life without being expected to do any of these things"
funny with that statement you simply state that you have no ambitions and no expectations of rising above your current station in life. Procreation is not a trait to be mocked bud how the hell do you think you were born? Heterosexual sex that's how. So yeah inherently people are born to be heterosexuals to keep the circle of life going.
Do I care whether or not someone "chooses" to be gay? No I do not, the people you choose to lay with are a simple choice period, man, female or both lol. But humans by design are made to give life and to lay with an individual and not achieve that is done in vain in my most humble opinion.
However I do believe that people who treat the gay community with contempt and do some of the things they do I believe should be met with harsh punishments. I could care less about what or how things work with sex between homosexuals, as it isn't a rocket science thing there are only so many places you can stick things and quite frankly I don't even want to think about it as for me it is a very disturbing image.
As far as males go what the hell ever they are a beast that will always be defined by their stupidity and some moments of greatness.
Have fun in your endeavors in life and well structured post
Anonymous, you forgot to include the rest of the sentence "we do some of it because we choose to", these days procreation is not only limited to heterosexuals intercourse.
I find it interesting that the majority of posts and e-mails I have received as reaction to this article comes from the straight community, did I hit a nerve?
Well, as a regular gay male reader of your blog, I had a few giggles, not just about the questions that straight people ask, of which I've had some. Interestingly, not so much about the sex act, as what I find attractive in men, and whether I have any attraction towards women as all (and for the curious, I do, but more in an aesthetic sense, rather than sexual).
However, I was equally amused at the gay stereotyping in the post as well. I'm one of those gay guys who is hard to distinguish from my straight friends at first glance. I'm known to frequent hardware stores, have enjoyed driving a truck on the odd occasion, and I do enjoy sports (especially participating) from a competitive perspective. I've also been called on by straight friends to open their beers, when their grip isn't up to it. :D
And on the flip side, my idea of "fashion" is a T-shirt and a pair of tracksuit pants, as in being ready for playing sport, and I'm not one for dressing up. I'm not keen on the fuss and bother.
So, in the end, we live in a wonderful, diverse world, where there's all sorts of people, gay and straight. It would be boring if it was any other way! :)
Keep up the good blogging, as I said, I enjoyed the post and had a lot of giggles. :)
Tony, I am glad you enjoyed the article. It just goes to show queer folk comes in all shapes, forms and sizes. We are as diverse as our rainbow flag!
"Clarissa, I hoped this post would get some discussion started about how we view sexual orientation, and I guess I achieved this. If you hand it to your students I would love to get some feedback on their reactions."
-I teach in the Bible Belt area of the US. Many of my students react in a scarily unhealthy way when the word "gay" is mentioned which makes me fume with rage. I also have this very brave gay student who came out to the class in the midst of an oral presentation. I wasn't very happy with the shocked silence that ensued. So I based our next oral exam (which the students will do in the langauge lab) on a romantic gay video. After they watch it and asnwer the question based on it, I will give them your post to translate. (It's an advanced Spanish course.)
I promise to come to your blog and teel you about how both the video and the translation go.
"My boyfriend has never made a comment about a man's attractiveness"
-My husband keeps telling me that I don't get what male beauty is about and keeps pointing out which men are truly attractive. :-) This makes me feel happy that he is secure enough in his sexuality not to feel that this will make me - or anybody else - question whether he is gay. "Gay" for him is not something scary and offensive, it's something normal and good. That's why he makes such a good partner for a feminist woman.
Clarissa, it sounds like your students are getting an education in more ways than one!
If I may be permitted a knee jerk reaction... (being bisexual, which usually translates into despised by both homosexuals and heterosexuals, i can say this without too much fear of anything changing) you're all completely crazy.
I don't understand how you can see the beauty in the male body and not in the female, or vice versa, and that's just talking about bodies. Not everyone does, of course, but people can have beautiful spirits also. I know I'm in a definite minority, but i really don't get how gender can even be a factor...i can't imagine not finding women attractive any more than i can understand not finding men attractive. Naturally, there are some women and some men that i find repellent, and would sooner nest in a bed of crocodiles than sleep with, but that's probably got less to do with their gender and more to do with their personalities.
So i have to ask...do you believe in soulmates? If you do... and your soulmate was born into the wrong gendered body for you to find attractive...what would happen? What about love? Do you believe it conquers all? Would love cause you to still be attracted to your beloved if they were horribly disfigured or maimed? If you loved someone that much, would gender still matter? OK, so i guess I'm just a hopeless romantic at heart...but i suppose it's just beyond the scope of my understanding to only be attracted to one gender. I do know, however, that i would not care to define the physical expressions of love (or lust) between two consenting adults (or even three or more consenting adults)as odd. As long as I'm not involved, then...i guess it's whatever floats your boat.
I'm not truly qualified to answer your questions, i suppose, but I'll try to the best of my ability. Heterosexual sex is not particularly frightening to me, nor is homosexual sex...if i were frightened, i would consider that i probably shouldn't be having sex with that particular individual. (caveat: non-consensual heterosexual sex is scary as hell. I don't think it would be any less scary if it were non-consensual homosexual sex)
i don't find that having the same equipment necessarily means you have a road map to your partner's pleasure (note: i am female, this might not be true for males) oh, sure, you may have a better understanding of the sensory experience your partner will receive if you do X, but that presumes that X will give the same sensory experience to every person of the ___ gender, and my observations have led me to believe this may not be wholly true. For example, breasts (i must digress a moment...how can you be afraid of being suffocated by a breast? Do you also fear choking on a penis, which is equally likely?) many women enjoy having their breasts stimulated, but do you know, i don't think I've met even two who liked having them stimulated in exactly the same manner, and I've met some who don't particularly care to have them stimulated at all. So yeah, the basic erogenous zones may be the same, but there's still a certain aspect of unique preference. I think true understanding comes with thorough exploration whether or not you've got the same stuff in your underpants.
As far as curiosity about that which we perceive as different, i suppose it's very natural, and to tell you the truth, i prefer personal or even intrusive questions, to unreasoning hatred...i guess i still keep hoping knowledge will breed understanding. I am a little more disturbed by the slight misandry and misogyny i sense from some homosexual (and even some heterosexual) men and women. Just not sure where that comes from...anyway, am rambling so i should probably shut up now
Hana, I think your post is a record for my blog. This must be the longest comment anyone has written to one of my articles!
I really enjoyed this blog post. As a woman born interested only in sex with men, I've never thought to ask anyone questions about his or her sex life. As much as I wonder sometimes how the mechanics work for people of disproportionate size or whatnot, I think it's just rude to question. I would, however, like to listen in on a question and answer session. I'll bet you really make some faces burn. Good for you!
way too lazy to read the comments.
a. you crack me up
b. yes my first time, i was less than allured at the sight.
c. women can acknowledge another good looking woman without her sexuality being called into question. men cannot. shitty double standard.
um, i enjoyed this one. but, hell, i enjoy them all.
oh and boobies... they are supposed to stimulating for us girls, but then you have a baby, breast feed, then they become handles to climbing and falling toddlers, and they are completely desensitized and can be annoying during sex :p
"I believe gay men respect women more than heterosexual men maybe because we don’t view women just as mere sexual objects."
and this is why, aside from my amazing husband who i lucked out by finding, all my closest male friends are gay. i'm a big girl, always have been, and no man, aside from my husband, has been as sweet to me or seen the beauty in me (inside and outside) like my gay friends.
I really liked your post, but I am somewhat disappointed that you forget that some men do have vaginas and some women have penises. I feel like a debbie downer because I like your sense of humor, so don't take my comment as too much of jab. I'm a gay trans man that constantly encounters gay men that afraid of my vagina. The only thing I can say to that is "you don't have to stare at it, just stick it in!". So that would be my advice to someone who's confused by anatomy - it's just flesh and the mechanics of sex will soon become apparent after a few test drives. No need to be afraid.
Anyway, this is my first time at your blog and I'll definitely be stopping by again.
Kian, well what you brought up with your comment is a whole different article all together. I will ponder on this and may even write about it!
As a bisexual, I have a kinda different approach to it. The strangeness of the female genitals to me (I'm male, dontchaknow) when I was a teen in no way deterred my sex drive from kicking in. Neither did the first ever time I saw a real-life circumcised penis (they just look weird, it turned out.) As for the appeal of boobs, I can say that they are bouncy? round? I dunno, but I really like them.
The most awkward sexual encounter I had was, contrary to your views, my first anal experience. We were both about 16, and he was kinda... erm... hung like a horse. To put it plainly, it didn't fit. I didn't try that for another six years.
I absolutely loved this article...
I'm proud to be called a fag hag by my friends. I'm a very outgoing straight girl with a big circle of close friends and I have only 2 or 3 straight female friend. My closest friends are all gay males and I wouldn't change this for anything in the world.
I have been with both guys and girls just to see what the fuss is about and have even tried 'homosexual' sex. Though personally, it's not for me (I'm not a fan of pain).
Stay fabulous.
Mwa
You are hilarious, I'm soooo glad I stumbled on this blog!!
Post a Comment