25-08-15 Convince him I could pass as gay

[wi1dfire]

But it seems to me that the difference is between "Doing something that I don't really mind with someone who I might not like very much if I knew him better" (comedy) and "Doing something that contradicts my core emotional self-image" (traumatic).

You're making not just one, but several assumptions with this. Number one, "doing something I wouldn't really mind" does not necessarily apply, and it also isn't necessarily ruled out just because one of them is fully heterosexual. As I said up thread, it is possible to have sex with someone you aren't attracted to. To go further, it is even possible to enjoy that sex and still not be attracted to the person you're having sex with. I didn't actually think these were secrets, but live and learn.

That said, it can have consequences. I mean, it doesn't for me, not anymore, but for other people it can. That's where your second assumption is coming into play. You are positing that having sex with someone that has the correct genitals won't have the second, traumatic, consequence. I am here to tell you that it can. Just because, if the circumstances were right or with a different person, you might choose to engage in an act, doesn't make feeling like you were forced into the act any more tolerable. To paraphrase a meme: "If I'm told to do something I was planning on doing anyways, the odds of me doing it drop to zero." It's the being forced that is traumatic, not the act itself.

As to my crack about gay panic, I'll unpack it for you. Bear in mind, I am about to throw around the phrase "heterosexual male" like its a swear; please know in advance I am not actually accusing you personally, or anyone else on this board, of anything, since I can't actually read everyone's mind. For a certain segment of heterosexual men, one of the worst things they can conceive of happening to them is having gay sex. Not necessarily being forced to have gay sex, just having it is a terrifying concept in and of itself, so bad that it precludes any ability for them to choose to do so willingly, however unenthusiasticly. One of the few things worse is the thought of someone else finding out about it, and thinking that the heterosexual male liked it. For that segment, anything approaching either of these situations is expected to be reacted to with violence, or at least vehement disagreement. Its considered weird when it isn't, even when it involves fictitious characters, and even though literally every other combination of gender and sexuality is currently expected to dabble in something that crosses over into something they aren't interested in, if for no other reason than to test to see if they're REALLY what they say they are. Asexuals and pansexuals are not exempt from that, by the way. I assume heterosexual women aren't expected to test themselves, but they aren't expected to get bent out of shape over it either.

So yeah, no, I can and will look askance at a heterosexual male being expected to be more traumatized by Nathan hitting on him than Yvann hitting on Zi, simply because of their relative sexualities. Zii is less traumatized because she's much less hung up about sex than most people anyways, because she chose to be in that situation, and because knew how to get herself out of it. A lot of that applies to Ray in this situation as well, which is why I don't think he'd be very traumatized, even if he turned out to be straight as a ruler. It can be traumatic, yes, but its not the guaranteed thing you seem to be assuming it will be.

[Spidrift]

You're making not just one, but several assumptions with this.

Probably.

Number one, "doing something I wouldn't really mind" does not necessarily apply, and it also isn't necessarily ruled out just because one of them is fully heterosexual. As I said up thread, it is possible to have sex with someone you aren't attracted to. To go further, it is even possible to enjoy that sex and still not be attracted to the person you're having sex with. I didn't actually think these were secrets, but live and learn.

We're in severe danger of getting into definitional nit-picking here. Sure, I'll believe that it's probably mechanically possible to have sex with anyone (or anything), regardless of inclinations. But if someone actually enjoys the process, for a meaningful definition of "enjoys", and this is accomplished without something desperate like strenuously closing one's eyes and thinking of Angelina/Brad, then I would define that someone as (sexually) attracted to the other party, for any useful definition of "attracted". And if a man is sexually attracted to other men, I'll define him as homosexual or bisexual.

Maybe it's an unduly materialistic set of definitions, but I do define myself as a materialist...

That said, it can have consequences. I mean, it doesn't for me, not anymore, but for other people it can. That's where your second assumption is coming into play. You are positing that having sex with someone that has the correct genitals won't have the second, traumatic, consequence. I am here to tell you that it can. Just because, if the circumstances were right or with a different person, you might choose to engage in an act, doesn't make feeling like you were forced into the act any more tolerable. To paraphrase a meme: "If I'm told to do something I was planning on doing anyways, the odds of me doing it drop to zero." It's the being forced that is traumatic, not the act itself.

Where did the idea of anyone being forced into something suddenly come from? Of course it's traumatic to be compelled to do anything as intimate as sex, with anyone. However, nobody is being compelled in the specific (fictional) case in point.

If Ray was actually heterosexual, by any useful definition, him having gay sex might well be a matter of compulsion, either from Nathan or in a certain sense from himself ("I really want this job"), which is why it would very likely be traumatic. If he was bi or gay, but showed a strong aversion to Nathan specifically, the same would apply. But, well, he actually seems quite cool with the whole process. He's actually bi (whatever he calls himself), he's not disgusted by Nathan, he's convinced himself that this whole business is morally okay; hence, he's not traumatised.

For a certain segment of heterosexual men, one of the worst things they can conceive of happening to them is having gay sex. Not necessarily being forced to have gay sex, just having it is a terrifying concept in and of itself, so bad that it precludes any ability for them to choose to do so willingly, however unenthusiasticly.

I think that you're conflating "protection of self-image" with "phobic panic". If someone's core self-image is attacked, they'll tend to be traumatised; that doesn't mean that they suffer from panic, it means that they have a personality. Force someone to act contrary to their moral standards (in a way that has nothing to do with sex), or render them helpless to defend someone or something that they love, and they'll be traumatised - and sexual identity is often just as fundamental. Some people feel irrationally terrified by possible threats to their self-image, but others just avoid them as calmly as possible.

I'd put myself in that category when it comes to gay sex. If I try to imagine myself having sex with another man, I just end up thinking "Umm, no thanks, why would I want to do that?". The idea is mildly disturbing, in that it would involve me in a degree and type of intimacy with someone who I just don't want to be that sort of intimate with (and also mildly squicky, in the sense that it involves doing stuff with my tender portions that I just don't want to do), but it's not irrationally frightening. I just can't be bothered with that sort of macho paranoia. (It may help that I was a bit of a geek before being a geek was cool. I've never been able to do macho with a straight face.) If I want to frighten myself, I can imagine hanging off a cliff face or falling into deep water - stuff that's actually dangerous.

But all this is highly hypothetical, of course. It's just possible that if I found myself confronted with the actual possibility of gay sex, through some implausible chain of circumstances, that I'd panic. (Or maybe I'd find myself strangely turned on. Who knows?) If I had to go through with it, I think that I'd be weirded out to the point of trauma, because of the intimacy issue. But it's all very low on my list of things to be scared about. And while there are a lot of men with macho hang-ups out there, god knows, I don't think that I'm entirely unique.

(Okay, Ray's response to having enjoyed his first kiss with Dillon did involve panic. Yeah, he's a bit too macho.)

[Mackus]

I don't know if Ray is bi. Probably yes, since only reason he can think of to not have sex with Dillion was "that would be gay!". And actually somehow regrets it!

I wonder if Dillon could convince Ray "its not gay if balls don't touch"?
Or just point out he that when he did it with Nathan, Nathan said it wasn't gay for him.

I wouldn't be surprised if it worked, since all evidence suggests Ray is complete idiot.

[Spidrift]

Dillon deduced that Ray was bi, because Ray (who is very comfortable sexually with women - just ask Amber) felt a surge of desire after kissing Dillon. Now, Ray has not only endured sex with Nathan, he seems quite relaxed about it.

He has had sex with both men and women in the recent past, and appears to be fully capable of enjoying it with both. At this point, defining Ray as anything other than "bi" would require either that Ray has engaged in a series of very strange mental contortions, or a brutal assault on the English language. Occam's razor applies.

[Fluffy]

But had he enjoyed it with Nathan, or did he just see it as part of the audition (meaning, he remained emotionally/physically detached from it)?

There's no telling one way or the other, as only Nathan was heard enjoying himself and Ray says nothing of it other than why he had gone through with it.

Calling him 'bi' when he himself doesn't identify as such isn't right. Right now, Ray is just a very confused (and arguably idiotic) heterosexual.

[Spidrift]

I know that it's considered polite to call people what they self-identify as, but there's politeness and there's enabling idiocy...

Aside from his tolerating what Nathan did, Ray enjoyed being kissed by Dillon, to the point where he worried that he was turning gay, and now he's saying that he'd be willing to have sex with Dillon if Dillon didn't identify as gay, and he regrets the fact that he can't. In other words, his reactions to the prospect of gay sex range from willing to enthusiastic, and he's also willingly engaged in gay sex. Heck, he never contradicted Dillon when Dillon said he was bi; one could say that he's accepted that identification.

I'm for keeping it simple. He walks like a duck, and he quacks like a duck.

(Or we can stick firmly to the self-identification rule, and declare that Sonya is heterosexual.)

[wiseguy]

and the only bi is Angel/Angela?

or is that 2 different people?

one is homosexual and the other is straight? (both want males)