The Construction of Gay Masculinity
Prior to the gay liberation movement, gay men embodied the stereotypical representation of effeminate and feminine men. The discourse on gay stereotypes changes around the 1970s when society began to understand homosexuality through the lens of sexual orientation instead of gender, inaugurating an era of gay identity formation. Accompanied this transformative understanding of homosexuality is the “masculinization” of gay men’s gender performance, exemplified by the adoption of normatively straight-looking dresses and behavioral codes. In this essay, I argue that the masculinization of gay men’s gender performance is not a unidirectional process whereby heteronormativism enforces gay men to adopt masculinity; rather, the construction of “gay masculinity” should be analyzed through intersectional scopes. It is an evolvement that de-stigmatizes homosexuality, eroticizes and interacts with hetero-masculinity, but marginalizes effeminate gay men.
According to Butler (1993), gender is performative. The heteronormative norms and discourse regulate gay men’s gender and sexual performance. On the one hand, the term “homosexuality” stigmatizes a gay man through reiterative shaming interpellation, disciplining him to be effeminate. On the other hand, gender norms require a man, not solely a gay man, who was born as a biological male, to perform normatively accepted masculine behaviors and display masculine traits, such as independence, assertiveness, and strength. Consequently, the performativity of masculinity reflects an ideal masculinity, which is molded by heteronormative norms and is expected to be possessed by, ideally, all men. However, a homosexual identity deprives one of the legitimacy to claim the idealized masculinity. Using Rich’s (1980) framework, compulsory heterosexuality mandates that men are sexually attracted only to women. When a gay man is identified by society as gay, he defies the assumption of compulsory heterosexuality and thus is expected to “be effeminate in manner, personality, or preferred sexual activity” (McIntosh, 1968, p. 185). Gay masculinity, in this sense, can only approximate heterosexual masculinity through gay men’s mannerisms, body appearance, and other gender performances, but it can never achieve the equal power owned by normative masculinity.
Then, how has gay masculinity been constructed throughout history? This question may be answered through a careful examination of knowledge about male homosexuality. While “homosexuality” is a modern coinage, same-sex sexual behavior and men having sex with men (MSM) are common phenomena in different cultures in history. Most importantly, the MSM had particular connection with effeminacy. For instance, not until the seventeenth century did homosexuality become detached from transvestism, but gay men, particularly those played the passive role in sex, could not disentangle from effeminacy, reflected by terms such as “Molly, Nancy-boy, Madge-cull” (McIntosh, 1968, p. 188).
With the development of modern medical science and sexology, the gendered interpretation of homosexual behaviors became more nuanced. Specifically, sex role divisions among gay men determined societal expectations of their gender. Whereas gay men performing the penetrative role (the “real man”) could retain their manhood, those in the receptive position (“fairies”) had been highly stigmatized in heteronormative societies where femininity is regarded as subordinate to masculinity (Ward, 2015, p. 61). A telling example is John Hinson, who was able to be forgiven after the revelation of his homosexual behavior; but lost such privilege when he was reported to be orally penetrated by a black man (Ward, 2015, p. 79). Plus, the sexual participants’ original gender performance can help salvage their masculinity. For instance, sex between “real men,” such as that between “sailors, soldiers, and other embodiment of idealized masculinity,” did not threaten their straightness and masculinity (Ward, 2015, p. 61). In essence, this sex role-based binarism of sexuality is highly gendered, stigmatizing the “feminine” sexual players in homosexual behaviors for they transgressed socially accepted sex roles reserved for males.
The massive stigma derived from effeminate performance and conflicting social expectations force gay men to choose between two ways of gender performance: either embracing overt effeminacy or conforming to normative masculinity (Cole, 2000), the former option satisfying heteronormative expectation of gay men being effeminate and the latter congruent with gender norms. The transformation of a significant proportion of gay men’s gender representation from gender nonconformity during childhood to “de-feminization” during adolescence, is thus a “response to stigmatization and society’s gender-role prescription” (Taywaditep, 2002, p. 20). Taywaditep’s observation resonates with Simon and Gagnon’s (1968) sexual script theory, which posits human sexual development as a learning and interactive process whereby individuals acquire specific scripts to conduct sexual behaviors. Likewise, one’s body appearance, being masculine or feminine, is scripted by “the culture-producing institutions” such as schools, churches, and families (Simon & Gagnon, 1968, p. 179).
Against the backdrop of historical development of homosexuality and masculinity, gay activists in the 1970s began to masculinize gayness. The masculinization of male homosexuality had mixed implications, liberalizing those who subscribe to the newly constructed gay masculinity but marginalizing the “others” who cannot or do not want to embrace a prototypical masculine self-representation. On its positive side, gay masculinity protects gay men by resisting the heteronormative discourse that denies the compatibility between homosexuality and masculinity. Tom of Finland, for example, had drawn inspirations from proletarian masculinity, which was embodied by “Finnish lumberjacks and loggers, farm labourers or truckers,” to create a ideal gay man who was “square-jawed, snub-nosed, clean-cut, with short hair, immaculate sideburns and sometimes a moustache” (Snaith, p. 78). This iconization and appropriation of working-class masculinity were also present in the United States. Levine’s ethnographic account of the 1970s gay macho culture shows a collective effort to challenge the heterosexual assumption of masculinity. Against the stereotype that gay men were effeminate, gay “clones” presented themselves as “hung, built, and butch—young (early 20s or so), ruggedly handsome, with a mustache or trim beard and short hair, a tight well-toned body, round and firm buttocks, large genitals, and visibly distended nipples” (Levine, 1998, p. 82, as cited in Green, 2008). The hypermasculine self-representation thus bridged gayness with masculinity, empowering gay men who were able and eager to become clones.
At the first glance, the masculinization of homosexuality appears to be a capitulation to and assimilation by heterosexual masculinity. This argument is built on the empirical data that masculine gay men rejected femininity (Taywaditep, 2002) and the assumption that femininity is, in a heterosexist society, subordinate to masculinity. Indeed, the process of de-feminization and masculinization involves subtle calculation of cultural values of femininity and masculinity. The choice of masculine gayness does reflect gay men’s preference for masculinity over femininity. But the way gay masculinity was constructed hints at more nuanced motivations and functions of gay masculinity. Snaith (2003) comments that hypermasculine bodies “have no use in our sophisticated urban culture; the only purpose they serve for gay men is to attract other men, a perversion of what the male body is meant for according to compulsory heterosexuality” (p. 82). The appropriation of blue-collar men’s gender performance thus cannot be interpreted exclusively as gay men’s conformity to heteronormativism. Indeed, if hegemonic masculinity is conjured up as a white, middle-class and heterosexual male symbol, possessing working-class physical attributes renders no additional benefits to the ones who have already enjoyed male supremacy. After all, heteronormativism requires straight masculinity to perform “nonchalance about appearance” (Cole, 2000, p. 129). Gay men’s deliberate recalibration of their bodies served to protect themselves from being identified and discriminated by the heterosexuals. Not familiar with the new performativity of gayness, straight people might not be able to tell whether a man is gay or working-class straight based on his hypermasculine appearance. The masculinization of homosexuality, therefore, is a stigma management strategy that involves self-protection than aspirations for heteronormative power.
Aside from self-protection, gay masculinity eroticizes masculinity. As Fejes (2009) rightfully claims, most masculinity studies “minimize, if not totally make invisible, the phenomenon of erotic desire” (p. 114). The pursuit of gay masculinity is an agentic process, whereby gay men collectively build a countercultural interpretation of masculinity and individualistically seek erotic pleasures. The individualistic and erotic element of gay masculinity can be demonstrated through the comparison with straight masculinity, the latter expressed by and emphasizing gendered power. For instance, Hoang (2015) maps a complicated procedure of masculinity invention in Ho Chi Mihn City’s sex industry. Elite Vietnamese businessmen and Viet Kieus (overseas Vietnamese descents) sustain their masculinities through conspicuous consumption of hostess service, wines, and luxury goods, an action reflecting one’s social position and a man’s largesse. In contrast, having an orientalist imagination of Vietnam as a poor and backward country awaits Western salvation, Westerners perform masculinity through philanthropic treatment of Vietnamese sex workers. Accordingly, straight masculinities are constructed by men’s sociopolitical power in their daily interactions with women and other men.
Gay masculinity is expressed in a corporeal than sociopolitical manner. Gay clones eroticized masculinity by twisting straight machismo dressing styles (Cole, 2000). By wearing leather jacket and tight jeans, for instance, gay men made themselves indistinguishable by the straight but identifiable to other gay men. The newly forged gay dressing codes, based on straight masculinity, thus helped other gay men identify gay clones as not only “real men” but also “real gay men” (p. 129), by increasing one’s visibility in a subculture that shared commonly intelligible signifiers of identity. The overemphasis on corporeal expressions of masculinity demonstrate two important points. First, the masculinization of homosexuality does, to a limited extent, challenge heterosexual masculinity. Second, as Reddy (1998) argues, the primary concern behind this process is sexual liberalization, hence egotistical. The bodily transformation of masculinity, however, fails to challenge the core of heteronormative masculinity.
According to Green (2008), erotic worlds involve sexual field, “a socially stratified, institutionalized matrix of relations,” where erotic players collectively construct desires (p. 28). Within sexual fields, the masculinization of homosexuality becomes acutely problematic, for gay men’s desires are racialized, classed, and gendered. The collective pursuit of gay masculinity constitutes “structures of desire,” establishing masculinity as “a particular hegemonic currency of erotic capital in a given sexual field” (Green, 2008, p. 30). As a result, the failure to acquire masculine erotic capitals becomes inimical to a gay man’s erotic and social positions. Taywaditep (2002) argues that underlying many gay men’s preference for masculinity is “contempt and hostility toward effeminacy and effeminate men on sociopolitical and personal levels” (pp. 1-2). Gender non-conforming gay men have been suffering from double discrimination: they are discriminated by both straight for their gender performance and by masculine gay men who devalue effeminacy in gay sexual fields. Of course, desiring masculinity does not necessarily mean prejudicing against effeminacy, but several empirical studies show the connection between the two. For example, Clarkson’s (2007) analysis of StraightActing.com website reveals the demeaning comments on effeminate gay men by straight-acting gay men, which marginalizes a minority group in the gay community.
Gay masculinity and effeminacy are also racialized in sexual fields. Queer colonialism, which put sexual interactions in a lens of power disparities (Carrillo, 2018, pp. 32-34), can help clarify inequalities resulting from gay masculinity. Since the hegemonic masculinity in the United States is white-centric, Latino machismo (Carrillo, 2018) and black masculinity (Green, 2008) are eroticized and produce specific erotic capitals catering to white gay men’s sexual desires. In Green’s (2008) analysis of Manhattan’s gay clubs, erotic capitals are stratified and black gay men possess an objectified set of erotic capitals mainly because of their large genitals. On the contrary, Asian American gay men occupy a marginalized position in American sexual fields, because they are stereotypically portrayed as unattractive, effeminate, and submissive. Gay masculinity as erotic capitals thus forces some Asian American gay men to manage the stigma by adopting hypermasculinity (Han, 2009). In other words, while gay masculinity in the initial stage was constructive, the adherence to a hegemonic form of gay masculinity can be detrimental to the “others” in the gay community.
What previous gay activists may lament is contemporary gay men’s conformity to normative masculinity and the loss of distinguishable “gayness” of masculinity. The gradual convergence of homo- and hetero-masculinities leads one to ask the necessity of keeping this sexualized binarism. After being parodied by gay, straight men re-appropriated hypermasculinity through adopting and modifying gay clones’ aesthetics (Cole, 2000). Importantly, this interaction between straight and gay masculinities reminds us of the discursive power of heteronormative masculinity. Now almost five decades after the gay liberation movement, biological essentialism has become increasingly mainstream interpretation of human sexuality development, a discourse promoted by the scientists and LGBT activists (Ward, 2015). In the meanwhile, gay masculinity started copying working-class masculinity, influenced straight men’s aesthetic standards, and became assimilated by straight masculinity. Ironically, the modified straight masculinity now allows straight men to have sex with men, defending that it is “often necessary, patriotic, character-building, masculine-enhancing, and paradoxically, a means of inoculating oneself against authentic gayness” (Ward, 2015, p. 25).
References
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