Not that there's anything wrong with that

[prog]

[Poll #866806]

Comments

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

It might say something about how they think about sexual orientation, but the correlation with actual orientation is hazy at best (IMHO).

[dougo.livejournal.com]

Do gay people call it "straightdar"?

[prog.livejournal.com]

I am under the impression that the term originates from within the gay community, but I have carefully done no research at all on this, so.

[gemini6ice.livejournal.com]

For women, not really. For men, yes. The average straight man has no need to sense gay men, and so the use of "gaydar" would not be pertinent to him.

[chocorisu.livejournal.com]

I don't think you have to be gay to notice when a man grooms to attract men vs attracting women, just observant. Equally the way people act around the opposite sex. Maybe Real Manly Men aren't supposed to pay attention to things like that, but that speaks more about how homophobic american men are than anything else.

[prog.livejournal.com]

Oh, I think anyone is capable of learning to spot social cues, including these. I'm specifically asking about the application of the word "gaydar" to oneself.

[chocorisu.livejournal.com]

Ah... still, nah, I think it's just a funny word. If anything it speaks of a willingness to joke about sexuality rather than being insecure about it.

[chocorisu.livejournal.com]

Question is, does said person proceed to flirt and/or make out with people they have detected with said gaydar? I think that would be more of a telling clue.

[radtea.livejournal.com]

Just had to go and check your journal to try to figure out if you're male or female, because the idea that a single particular type of grooming is attractive to females is a concept I've only ever seen articulated by women. I can't actually tell from your journal which sex you are, which is kind of a funny instantiation of the original Turing Test, which was about determining sex rather than intelligence.

In any case, the idea that there is a "fact of the matter" that corresponds to "grooming to attract women" is I think badly mistaken, although it is one that almost every women believes.

After a few years of post-divorce dating I have observed that every woman is looking for a completely different type of man, but every woman believes that every other woman is looking for exactly the same type of man as she is. That is, women have a tendency to illegitmately universalize their own criteria for what makes a man attractive.

I don't think men do this to the same extent. Indeed, I've heard men argue at length over what they do and don't find attractive about women.

[chocorisu.livejournal.com]

I'm English, which by American male standards seems to mean I'm either gay or at least effeminate... :)

I think perhaps I made the wrong implication. It's not a case of all women want the same thing and all gay men want the same thing... it's more that *generally*, men respond to visual cues more than women, so there's a tendency for gay men to be better groomed, and groomed in a different way, than heterosexual men. After all, the whole point is to *deliberately* set off other gay men's gaydar, right?

Waffling a bit here, sorry. But yeah, I think there's a myth (actively spread by magazines like Cosmo and Maxim, which are written by the SAME PEOPLE, HMM) that all women want a certain kind of man, and all men want a certain kind of women. Sells more beauty products and fashion, after all.

[gemini6ice.livejournal.com]

I don't think men deliberately try to be attractive to males or to females. Gay men, however, can judge their own attractiveness and grooming in a different light. It's difficult for many people to judge attractiveness not holistically.

[chocorisu.livejournal.com]

Oh I don't know about that at all. They might be clueless at it, but they do try. I know for absolutely certain that I started dressing better and grooming more when I wanted to attract my wife. Perhaps it's just that most of them don't start out as disgusting nerds. :o)

[gemini6ice.livejournal.com]

I mean they don't deliberately aim for attractiveness geared to females or geared to males. They aim simply for "attractiveness."

[daerr.livejournal.com]

No, I think they aim for attractiveness towards females... it's just that heterocentrism makes this seem to be the only kind to them.

[radtea.livejournal.com]

I'm Canadian, which is why you being married to someone named "Megan" didn't conclusively demonstrate that you were male :-)

Here's a thought: if we accept the "well dressed gay" stereotype, gays today dress like straight men did fifty years ago, with a lot of attention to fashion and taste. Maybe straight men are so poorly dressed these days because of some obscure homophobic reflex that makes us want to clearly distinguish ourselves from gays?

[chocorisu.livejournal.com]

Would not surprise me one bit!

I dunno, maybe I'm just being judgemental. I'm so sick of homophobia and people calling everything "gay" that perhaps I'm exaggerating things in my mind.

Sorry for hijacking your comments page again, prog... :o)

[misuba.livejournal.com]

It really just carries an implication about how cool the speaker thinks he is or is not. What implication? Depends on context. (And the masculine pronoun is intended, thanks)

[toonhead-npl.livejournal.com]

I agree. Gaydar is one of the cooler superpowers that often come with homosexuality, and I think he just wants to show how with it he is. In fact gaydar is even cooler if you're straight.

[rserocki.livejournal.com]

Soooo...