Not Being Gay

[luka]

wtf

 

[Mr. Tea]

Ooh, one that goes back a while to when I was living in London. I nipped into the Costcutter (I think it is) on Dalston Lane and asked for a lighter, a simple enough transaction that led to a bizarre exchange, when he said "What colour?" and I said "I don't care" and then he kinda smiled cunningly and said "What, even pink?" and I said "Yes, I really don't mind what colour" and then he sort of took a pink lighter in slow-motion and passed it towards me really slowly, calling my bluff but giving me a chance to shout "No! Not the pink one" and I'm just sort of muttering under my breath "Gimme the fucking lighter you twat" and eventually, to his consternation, I took the lighter and then as I left he was sort of going "Aha I tricked you into buying a pink lighter".

So in London there is a definite thing about pink lighters and masculinity, and I've realized here that whenever I buy a lighter even in the cafe below my flat rub my little old ladies, they ask what colour. I can't imagine they care but I'm realizing that people they sell to obviously do care, and so that's why they are always mildly relieved that I'm so simple to deal with.

My old housemate Alex told me once that he was queueing in the shop of the petrol station across the road and the guy in front of him asked for a lighter, upon which the hapless assistant carelessly picked up a pink lighter - not deliberately, I think, it was just the first one his hand landed on - thus triggering an enraged tirade along the lines of "ARE YOU SAYING IM A BATTY-BOY?!?!?"

Basically the exact opposite of your anecdote, in other words.

 

[Mr. Tea]

The most simultaneously hilarious and depressing example of this sort of thing I've heard of is men going around all day with a shitty arsehole because either wiping your arse properly after you've done a shit or washing it properly in the shower counts as 'ass-play' and is therefore 'gay.'

 

[martin]

Has the world gone even more mad than before or was this always there and I just never noticed?

Think you just never noticed. My early-to-mid teen boy peer group regularly pronounced things 'gay', including yoghurt, having an earring in the right ear (or was it the left? can't remember), wearing all black, having too-long hair, having too-short shorts, smoking Silk Cut (or any type of menthol cig), skincare, holding a girl's hand in public, etc. Sound ludicrous but they took it deathly seriously - anyone pulling out a pink lighter would have been a target. Even saying "Gays don't bother me" meant you were suspect.

 

[Mr. Tea]

holding a girl's hand in public

 

[martin]

Also, about 5 years ago, I was in a steakhouse in Germany with a co-worker, and he wanted dessert...so he asked the waitress how big it was, and she said "Would you like to share?" and he got defensive and said "No! It looks gay...two men sharing dessert..."

I tried to tell him she probably meant we could split it 50/50 instead of dipping our forks into the same plate and gazing into each other's eyes, but he wasn't having it. Though, seeing as he'd spent about five minutes looking the dessert menu over and verbally pondering "should I...shouldn't I...", I think he'd already crossed that rubicon ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[WashYourHands]

it was "sus" if two men went to the cinema together.

@sus

 

[Mr. Tea]

You'd be surprised how many 100% straight men don't know that any statement or act, no matter how ostensibly gay, can instantly be rendered un-gay through the simple expedient of immediately saying "no homo."

 

[shakahislop]

my afghan mate thought it was absolutely hilarious any time anyone ate a banana, he'd have this massive grin on his face and try to hold it in but ultimately explode with laughter

 

[sufi]

my afghan mate thought it was absolutely hilarious any time anyone ate a banana, he'd have this massive grin on his face and try to hold it in but ultimately explode with laughter

I ha e been growing melons in the allotment, its continuously hilarious

 

[version]

You could have picked a better title.

 

[ghost]

the general model you should have of these memes is Charlie Brown trying to kick the football

the humor is in the double-bind—if one of these applies to you, and you fall for the bait and try to alter your behavior, that is itself seen as unmasculine, because you lack confidence in your vision.

 

[linebaugh]

When I was a child I thought the bigger the burger I ate the more of a man I was. Id always order the biggest burger possible and then show it off to the table.

 

[ghost]

When I was a child I thought the bigger the burger I ate the more of a man I was. Id always order the biggest burger possible and then show it off to the table.

"Hey everyone, look how much meat I can eat!"

 

[linebaugh]

When I worked at the sandwhich shop and a group of relatively normie looking men in their twenties would come in and the first one ordered a large sandwhich (a great big circle bun nearly a foot in diameter) the rest of the crew would always order a large too. You could sense the apprehension of some of them as they ordered it, that they probably would have ordered a medium, but the pressure was too much. This happened all the time

 

[version]

@IdleRich wait til you hear about “the ick”

Oh yeah that's a word I've seen a lot. At first I thought it was just a word that worked well, but it comes up so often I began to wonder if it had since kind of official status... can you enlarge upon it for us @dilbert1?

It's the term for some innocuous thing a man does that puts off a woman, like that example you mentioned about typing in lower case. It's something girls and women talk about on TikTok.

A lot of it's clearly people taking the piss. I saw one where a woman said she got the ick from her boyfriend's pained, strangulated noise when he crashed their car... 😂

 

[version]

You could have picked a better title.

On a serious note, I do think it's a stupid title. The forum's already a bit grim given what some people were saying in Padraig's thread and now we've got one on the front page called "Not Being Gay"...

 

[Mr. Tea]

When I was a child I thought the bigger the burger I ate the more of a man I was. Id always order the biggest burger possible and then show it off to the table.

I hope you haven't changed your opinion, because you were absolutely correct.

 

[IdleRich]

The most simultaneously hilarious and depressing example of this sort of thing I've heard of is men going around all day with a shitty arsehole because either wiping your arse properly after you've done a shit or washing it properly in the shower counts as 'ass-play' and is therefore 'gay.'

I mentioned having heard that... but is it true? Surely not... surely.

 

[IdleRich]

Think you just never noticed. My early-to-mid teen boy peer group regularly pronounced things 'gay', including yoghurt, having an earring in the right ear (or was it the left? can't remember), wearing all black, having too-long hair, having too-short shorts, smoking Silk Cut (or any type of menthol cig), skincare, holding a girl's hand in public, etc. Sound ludicrous but they took it deathly seriously - anyone pulling out a pink lighter would have been a target. Even saying "Gays don't bother me" meant you were suspect.

As kids yeah sure, but actual grown men?