Why Can’t You Just Butch Up? Gay Men, Effeminacy, and Our War with Ourselves

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“If I was attracted to feminine behavior, I’d be with a woman!”

Almost every gay or bisexual man has heard some form of this expression, just as we’ve all read online profiles that specify “straight-acting only” and “no fems.”

“For the most part, the gay community has a preference for masculine men,” says Brandon Mack, a sociologist at Texas A&M who is studying “effemiphobia” – the fear and hatred of effeminate behavior. When he made a comprehensive study of online dating profiles, he says he was surprised and shocked by how frequently negative, and sometimes very insulting, attitudes toward effeminate men were.

Spencer Windes, the director of the documentary Straight Acting, agrees:

There is a divide,” agrees  “And it’s something we don’t talk about. I think that some gay men overreact to the fact that they're gay by trying to be more masculine, because they're afraid of what people will think of them [if their gay identity is revealed]. They don't like to be around very effeminate gay men because they get classified with them. So they resent very effeminate gay men.

There’s no question that effeminate men confuse a lot of people, straight and gay. It’s one thing to be transgender – to feel that you were born into the “wrong” body. In one way, that’s a massive violation of social norms, but in another way, it’s not. For many transgender people, there’s still a “right” way for a man and a woman to behave.

But many effeminate men didn’t get the memo.

“I don't wish to be a girl,” said that teenage prom queen, Sergio Garcia. “I just wish to be myself."

But if he doesn’t wish to be a girl, why did he wish to be prom queen? Doesn’t he know how loaded and marginalizing the old stereotypes are, and how much time and energy the GLBT community has spent, for example, explaining the difference between “gay” and “transgender” – only to have folks like him come along on the evening news and push over the apple cart all over again? Couldn’t he at least try to fit in for the sake of the rest of us?

Sergio Garcia

But why? What’s in it for him? The swishy guy can try to butch it up, but he’ll never really measure up. And by going against his nature, he’ll just make himself miserable in the process.

“Most gay men want a seat at the table,” says Sissyphobia’s Tim Bergling. “But some people want to turn the table over. Some effeminate men, at least some very flamboyant ones, want to be outside the mainstream. They’ve been emotionally and physically abused by the mainstream all their lives. They’re always going to be outside the majority, because that’s how they define themselves.”

Resentment of such men is particularly strong among gay African American men, says Mack, who specializes in communities of color. But this makes sense, he says, since homophobia is often stronger in these communities; masculine black gay men have more to lose if they’re exposed as gay by an effeminate partner.

Brandon Mack, Darryl Stephens and Jensen Atwood from Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom

But the rejection of effeminate men is also more complicated than just a question of public embarrassment. Most gay men really do prefer a traditionally masculine man – something that’s obvious to anyone who’s ever watched gay porn.

And why wouldn’t they? We gay and bisexual men may eventually be excluded from much of society, but we still grow up in a culture that rejects us, adopting all its standards of beauty and exactly what it means to be a man.

Next Page! Is "effemiphobia" a form of homophobia? And what does Adam Lambert think?