CONTACTStaffCAREER OPPORTUNITIESADVERTISE WITH USPRIVACY POLICYPRIVACY PREFERENCESTERMS OF USELEGAL NOTICE
© 2024 Pride Publishing Inc.
All Rights reserved
All Rights reserved
Scroll To Top
By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Private Policy and Terms of Use.
Working on a computer all day, I spend, embarrassingly, a significant amount of time eagerly scanning Facebook. I'd like to say that I'm earnestly interested in friends' babies or wedding photos, but in truth, I'm mostly just looking at cute boys. Because of the somewhat public nature of my job, I have many Facebook friends I don't actually know, which has provided many an entertaining -- if occasionally depressing (some people are just so skinny ) -- hour of discovering whole new people, clicking 'next picture' over and over and over again. And lately, I've begun to notice something: The gay men of New York and likely anywhere really are becoming so much more...diverse.
Israel's first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, once famously said of his new nation, 'When Israel has prostitutes and thieves, we'll be a state just like any other.' And I think that quote applies here, to this somewhat superficial issue.'I'm not saying the men on my Facebook page or those I see wandering Hell's Kitchen or swishier corners of Brooklyn are thieves or prostitutes (well, not most of them, at least). What I mean is that archetypes or ideals of gaydom seem to be broadening well beyond the simple muscled Chelsea gym god who has served as something of the universally recognized Gay Idol for years now. Instead, current gay crush objects and dream dates seem to be trending pretty, well, nerdy.
Beyond my friends list, we can see this developing in popular culture.'Look at Facebook cofounder turned key Obama strategist turned floppy-haired sex symbol Chris Hughes.'Or Rachel Zoe's hench-stylist Brad Goreski (who is, to be fair, not lacking in rippling physique), who works quietly almost cerebrally at the business of fashion, and wears nerd glasses and staid tweeds to accent that approach. Or gaze lovingly at the political (and otherwise) statistics genius Nate Silver, who sets many gay (and straight, probably) hearts aflutter with his eerie prescience and rumpled-yet-sharp geeky aesthetic.'These are not the Jeff Strykers of yesteryear! They're not even the Rupert Everetts. Sure, muscle-rippling porn gods are still held in regard, but increasingly they don't seem to be the only objects of lust for our ever more eclectic and decentralized group.
Back on Facebook, I see this in some fairly shallow ways. It's cool and almost de rigueur now to sport chunky glasses and dorky, unrevealing cardigans, even for the fittest Broadway dancer in town. But these guys also seem to have decided that it's cool, that it's sexy, to be loudly political, to post coy status messages about books rather than anything involving penis puns or circuit parties, to be as obsessed with media and gadget gossip as celebrity news. Of course, there's nothing wrong with phallic wordplay or shirtless raves or anything else traditionally deemed gay, but it is certainly interesting to see new patterns, whole different tropes, sprouting up everywhere.
Obviously, gay nerds and jocks and goths and artists and whoever else have existed forever; we were never all the same person. But as gayness has become more public, with more people living out than ever before, the breadth of the spectrum of personalities and interests and, yes, lust objects has become strikingly more apparent. And that phenomenon -- the less gay is able to conjure up one single, specific persona -- can only do well by universal acceptance and all that important, positive stuff.
Those who might cringe at the bawdiness of a particularly clothes-free gay pride parade might now turn and see themselves in the ambitious gay tech entrepreneur. Some Marie's Crisis cabaret performer may not stoke your average straight college radio dude's musical worship, but said dude probably sees a lot to idolize in Rostam Batmanglij, the gay member of hipster dream band Vampire Weekend. While we will always love and embrace our admittedly (and somewhat deliberately, if we're honest with ourselves) alienating parades and cabaret acts and triangle-torsoed titans of sex, that a more nuanced'and in today's case tweedier and more subdued'ideal is also becoming a prominent part of the culture is exciting. Because, duh, we were always a state like any other (well, mostly), but as gay ideals increasingly broaden and deepen, maybe the rest of the world will see that state like any other too. When they think gay, they won't just see Carl Paladino's Speedo-clad float dancers, but the rest of us too. The nerds, the dweebs, the prostitutes, and thieves. Everyone. n
From our Sponsors
Most Popular
41 male celebs who did full frontal scenes
September 16 2024 2:02 PM
39 LGBTQ+ celebs you can follow on OnlyFans
November 19 2024 9:39 AM
33 actors who showed bare ass in movies & TV shows
September 17 2024 5:43 PM
26 LGBTQ+ reality dating shows & where to watch them
December 10 2024 12:38 PM
21 times male celebrities had to come out as straight
November 19 2024 3:33 PM
17 queens who quit or retired from drag after 'RuPaul's Drag Race'
November 30 2024 12:26 AM
52 steamy celebrity Calvin Klein ads we'll always be thirsty for
August 27 2024 1:08 PM
15 things only bottoms understand
October 08 2024 5:18 PM
15 gay celebrity couples who make us believe in love
October 03 2024 5:43 PM
A gay adult film star's complete guide to bottoming
September 16 2024 8:50 AM
Latest Stories
Queer cinema triumphs: Best film performances by LGBTQ+ actors in 2024
December 19 2024 7:26 PM
Jolly & horny! These sexy Santas showed up in Speedos for a good cause
December 19 2024 5:06 PM
These iconic pop songs prove that Justin Tranter's pen game is unmatched
December 19 2024 4:43 PM
Keke Palmer on 'Master of Me', Queen Latifah's mentorship, & uplifting Black queer people
December 19 2024 3:00 PM
Sapphic secrets: Are Shailene Woodley and Roberta Colindrez a thing? Here's what we know.
December 19 2024 2:28 PM
Mullet-in-Chief: The Internet roasts Donald Trump's latest hair disaster
December 19 2024 2:20 PM
Luca Guadagnino's 'Queer' featured full frontal, but did we see the real deal downstairs?
December 19 2024 1:41 PM
Jonathan Van Ness: 'Queer Eye' cast gets spicy for season 9 in Vegas
December 18 2024 6:00 PM
Sexy MAGA: Viral post saying Republicans 'have two daddies now' gets a rise from the right