Comments on What if It was a Woman That Got Arrested in that Bathroom?

I see your point but there is still a difference. I've known a couple women such as the one you mention who aren't lesbians, but at one time in their life ended up in a relationship with a woman. Essentially they were open enough to accept the person as they were instead of their gender.

That's different than going out and seeking sexual contact with someone of the same gender. Craig hasn't had an ongoing relationship with another man, he was just getting off. So what is he? Straight with gay tendencies, bisexual, or just gay?

I am a little tired about the Sen Craig thing already. Yeah he is a douche bag hypocrite and is out of office.

Time to deal with real issues like making sure the Democrats stand up to Bush since congress is back in DC. FOCUS PEOPLE!!! FOCUS!!!

I think it's because women's sexuality has proven to be more fluid in numerous studies, whereas men's sexual orientation is generally more fixed one way or the other. I think there's still room for experimentation, but most men know for certain if they're gay or straight despite what their actions are (i.e. married to a woman and has kids).

Maybe she said she's not a lesbian because she considers herself bisexual?

I think it becasue women are generally 'allowed' to be more fiuld in gender and sexual roles. For example women can wear mens clothes, engage in male activities, without being labeled a cross-dresser or transsexual.

Men on the other hand generally demand much more conformity to gender and sexual roles of men.

I credit feminism for question these roles and thus allowing for more diversity in behavior. It would be nice if us men could do the same.

Sexuality: either you're for it or against it. None of this definitions shit.

does she identify as straight? that is the real question. because there are several queer identities that are not "gay".

Josh,
At *some* point, just by blind chance, I think you should talk to a straight woman, if only once.

Perhaps we take women saying they are gay less seriously because, as Dan Savage has mentioned, women's sexuality seems to be more fluid. I know tons of straight identified women who have had sex with women a few times. I know a few straight identified women who use to identify as bisexual. Savage has mentioned in Savage Love bisexual women who used to identify as lesbian. I know straight women who haven't had sex with women, but have said they might. I don't know a single guy who would fall into similar categories.

(I also know quite a few women who are very rigid in their identification as well, and they probably outnumber those I know who are more fluid.)

I'm with #4 and #7. But then, I'm bi.

Personally I think a lot of this denial crap comes from being vaguely bi. If you're taught that being gay is a bad choice, then if you are attracted to both men and women, it's easy to think "oh, this is what being gay is like - it's a choice". Even if you're a male Kinsey 5.5, and barely attracted to any women, you can rationalize that this is what's "normal".

(Meanwhile the 6s, who are totally gay, are freaking at the idea that it's a choice. And the 3 are saying, "It's not about gender, idjit, it's about people.")

Gore Vidal said it long ago: "Homosexual is not a noun, it is an adjective," it describes behavior and orientation, but not a person. That is a social construction. "Homosexuals" are not some subspecies of homo sapien. Sexuality is more complex than that, and its just as shallow to DEMAND someone MUST identify AS a thing based on behavior as it is to discriminate on said behavior.

Since men must peter - form, they are not capable of just being passive in sex.
They do or they don't.

It is ironic for women to talk of fluid sexuality.

No such thing exists for males - oh, I forgot the spirit kingdom.

josh. you are SO gay. and you will remain so until you prove otherwise.

I think it is the opposite. All women are bisexual at their core. Most women I know have at least one experience of being sexually attract4ed to another woman.

From a societal perspective there is a long historical tradition of de-sexing lesbian sex. In other words, our society does not consider something 'real sex' if you don't stick a penis in something. Since women don't have penises how can we really have sex with each other right?

There has long been a double standard between lesbians and gay men.

At its core, the double standard is a misogynistic thing. Straight guys think women are hot. All soft and feminine. Straight guys think two women together is just more of a good thing, double your pleasure. Still soft and feminine. Still hot. Not a threat to their manhood. A woman can be just a little bit gay, but still dig guys, according to the het male code.

Gay men are more of an affront because gay men are perceived to be effeminate, and a threat to the macho straight guy persona. The concept of being a bottom is particularly threatening to the straight guy persona; it's passive and weak. It is much more difficult to believe that you can be just a little bit gay if you are a guy.

I know these are broad generalizations and stereotypes. But this is what the double standard is based on.

@5: What 'male' clothing can women get away with wearing? Y-fronts? And what 'male' activities? Circle jerks? Peeing against a wall? Methinks your gender bias is showing.

I disagree with your example of Maria Cantwell, but generally I agree with the rest of your premise. This is of course not to even suggest Cantwell is gay, that's not where I'm going.

Consider that like men, women have professions that prompt "automatic assumption" of their sexuality in society. Like female athletes.

Think about Margaret Thatcher - there have been many times I talked to people and they have outright assumed she was a dyke. Why? That is something I haven't completely understood but probably that has to do with her being in a position of power and also "the iron lady".

Better yet, think of the how many people probably think Clinton is a lesbian.

My point is, I bet people would assume that a female politician involved in a so-called "lesbian" sex act was gay.

Now if it was some other high-profile incident, a la the Jaguars cheerleader from a few years ago, maybe people would just think it's "hot" and leave it at that.

@16, It was intentional. Go back 50 years or so and ask yourself was it generally acceptable for women to wear pants, play sports, etc. Of course not,tThose are 'male activities'. Not that they really are, but that’s how we have categorized them. The gender questioning brought on by the feminist revolution has lead to reevaluation of what its 'ok' for a woman to do.

Men unfortunately have not followed suit nearly to the extent we should. I would gander a man wearing a dress or works as a florist is going to face more questions about his sexuality then a woman in pants or working in law.

#17 - I agree. There is a ton of lesbian baiting that goes on for women in power. Women politicians in particular are often forced into defending their heterosexuality.

Maria Cantwell is a great example. I have actually heard this speculation before. Because she is unmarried and a powerful woman it is assumed that she is probably a dyke.

But Josh, just because someone is coming out of a lesbian bar does not mean they are a lesbian. If Maria was caught having sex in the Wildrose bathroom (or soliciting sex) well then I might think she is a lesbian.

Wow! Interesting to see all the theories, and the really interesting bit: They almost all ring of truth! I suspect the real answer for this double standard isn't just one thing. Rather, a confluence of factors make it happen. My initial tendency is to disagree with Josh's theory though, because my personal feeling (before I got to know more solidly hetero women) is that all women are lesbians waiting to happen. All they had to do is realize how unappealling men are and women is all they'd be left with, right? It was a feeling based on that typical human tendency to assume other people feel the same way you do (in this case, attracted to women).
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Isn't the new "kissing girls is hot" fashion that we see in so many drunken nightclub scenes are part of this equation? Outside of the very real discussion of sexual identity and fluidity there is a discussion to be had here about pop culture images of wild party girls making out with other wild party girls in drunken orgies. And let's not forget the bizarre phenomenon of straight boys getting hot for femme girls tonguing it up...

I'm just sayin...

I have heard these kinds of statements from women too. Here is my take;

Some of these chicks are bisexual.

Some of these chicks don't like the term 'lesbian'. It's kinda an icky word.

Some of these chicks have an association with the term 'lesbian' that they cannot relate to. The stereotype they visualize involves some butchy softball playing, mullet wearing, bad fashion woman.

Some of these chicks don't like to be labeled.

Some of these chicks still have a little internalized homophobia toward their sexual orientation.

Given: male homosexuality receives more negative social reinforcement than female homosexuality.

I believe the reasons for this are much more complex than the limited scope of what's been discussed so far. One thing to consider is that society is not an absolute patriarchy, particularly not when it comes to sex: the main stream of heterosexual female opinion about male sexuality is that it should be unqualifiedly masculine, so men who experiment sexually with other men are taking a significant risk.

Example: When I was about 21 I was out with a gay male friend and I tried to chat up a woman I was interested in. It didn't go very well and after the woman had left my gay male friend pointed out that I had done a number of peculiar things when I was talking to the woman: spoken more softly, slouched down and made less eye contact. I told him I did these things because I'm a big guy and it had been my experience generally that women -- particularly short women -- were intimidated by my size and tended to react as if I were threatening them even if I was just trying to make conversation. So I tried to make myself seem less threatening during conversations by engaging in the set of behaviors he'd described.

My queer friend pointed out that, while that strategy may or may not be a good idea in general, it was definitely a terrible idea when trying to score a date. "Straight women want to have sex with men," he said. "Which means they like men to be masculine. Stand up straight, use your whole voice, look them in the eye. Be aggressive. That's what a man is to a straight woman."

And he was right: once I started paying attention, I found I did much better hitting on women aggressively than I did using the sensitive ponytail boy approach.

What I took away from all that is that there is definitely pressure on men from women to present a certain set of stereotypically masculine behaviors; which is to say that failure to present those behaviors isn't just transgressing against a male standard, it's transgressing against a societal standard.

Consequently, people in this thread who have claimed that straight men don't find lesbianism intimidating are deeply mistaken. Straight men don't find female bisexuality intimidating because yes, they do hope to benefit from it. But honest-to-god lesbianism scares the piss out of straight men. Whether it's social or biological I can't say, but most straight men need the company of women in a way that women, while they're happy enough to take advantage of it, really don't seem to understand. The idea that there's a group of women out there who feel no compulsion at all to be around men -- who might actively avoid us -- is fundamentally terrifying to a straight man.

Judah- terrifying? More like depressing. Yet still ineffably romantic. For some reason, a lesbian love story is more emotionally impacting to me than a hetero or man-man love story. Why is that? My balls got crosswired with the emo parts of my brain, I s'pose.
I'm as "lesbians arr hawt" as the average jock, but it's expressed differently. This is all very funny stuff, looking at it abstractly.

We take female homosexuality less seriously, because homosexual females take their homosexuality less seriously. Okay, I know I sound like a dick when I say that, but given how many girls I knew in college who worshiped Andrea Dworkin and accused me of rape when I engaged in very consensual buttsex with other very eager boys that later starting dating or becoming boys, I get the feeling that womens' sexuality is a lot more fluid than mens'. I mean, every guy I know who sucked cock in college is still sucking cock.

Well, some straight guys like to jerk off with other guys, and they're not gay. Some straight guys also experimented in college and they're not gay.

Some people have a serious need to box others in. Being gay is much more than sex and getting off, for me it's more about who you want to form relationships with. For that reason, I don't think that Larry Craig is gay.

Gitai @ 25,

Are you saying that you banged several FTMs in college? That's really hot.

Women just have more socially accepted options, including the whole Lesbian Until Graduation and Hasbian phenomena.

Judah- terrifying? More like depressing.

Trust me dude, you go out to Spokane and tell Joe Sixpack that a girl he wants to get with isn't into him because she honest-to-god only wants to have sex with other chicks, you'll hear some serious fear-of-the-abyss-sudden-shocking-awareness-of-his-own-mortality type shit rattling around under his trucker cap.

i can't help but feel that the lesser threat of lesbians doesn't extend to butch lesbians. as long as women are presenting in gender-normative kind of ways, it's ok with most people. but when gender norms start getting violated, it's a whole different story.

@16 - what's a Y-Front?

@26 No, I've never had sex with an FTM. The opportunity has just never come up.

Isn't this all about patriarchy? After all, in a patriarchal society, you can force a woman to be(come) pregnant no matter what her sexual preference. But it is harder to force gay men to father children against their will.

@23 - As George Costanza said: "I always get the feeling that when lesbians are looking at me, they’re thinking 'That’s why I’m not a heterosexual.'"

@31 - that makes no sense at all. If the ill-defined, oft-cited Patriarchy (TM) was all about using sex as a means of forcing women into pregnancy, why would it be any less disapproving of lesbian sex?

Agreed with 32- sorry, Tlaz. I do believe in patriarchy, do believe it's rampant and unfair and so on, but what we're talking about has zippity-do-dah to do with pregnancy.
Maybe it's tangentially related, in that patriarchy is one of the myriad ways in which human culture and it's perception of sexuality has less to do with Reason and righteousness than it does to do with observing ancient tribal codes that damage us all. But on this particular topic, it's a pretty big leap you're taking.

That reminds me, my freshman year there were two gals in a relationship who were having regular three ways one of the other gay gays in my dorm.

I still haven't figured that arrangement out. What a mindf&%k that was!

I also blame the Patriarchy(TM).

Ok, # 34 should read that there were two gals (who claimed to be lesbians) having regular three ways with one of the other gay guys in my dorm. (Sheesh, caffeine is a hell of a drug…)

Anyone who can explain that situation wins a prize.

It's simple really:

1) Corporate media controlled by straight white males.

2) Certain straight males are threatened by or thinks it's gross two guys or more "doing it" = hate homos which filters into culture via media and other methods.

3) Certain straight males think that lesbian = 2 or more hot chicks that will sleep with them in their fantasy = lesbians ok as long as they think they can sleep with them, which filters into culture via media and other methods.

Like it or not a great deal of America thinks they miss the idea of the Leave it to Beaver era. Nevermind that June couldn't do anything but cook and vacuum even if she wanted to, that Wally being gay would be hidden (and the Beaver would have to have different sleeping quarters) but Ward's dalliance on the side was absolutely proper as long as June didn't find out about it, and even if she did it was an "internal family matter"

I think a big part of it is that women are sexualized in society. Women's bodies sell almost everything incuding products for women, not just men. Women are raised to view other women as sexual objects. I think as men become more sexualized, male sexuality will be more fluid. So, straight men will be curious about being sexual with another man bc they will become acustomed to seeing other men as sexual objects.

i don't think it's as much a matter of the media taking females seriously as it is one of female sexuality being seen as intrinsically less valid.

i don't think it's as much a matter of the media taking females seriously as it is one of female sexuality being seen as intrinsically less valid.