Can You Be Too Gay? | Respectability Politics 

James Third I think what people are ciritisizing is the overly flamboyant men whose forged accent makes them sound like the male version of the california girl acccent. "Like! Oh my god!!" Its annoying because it's like theyre constantly trying to use their tone to say "I swear what Im saying is totally dramatic in the best way and worthy of everyone's attention". Its annoying when straight white girls do it and its annoying when gay men do it too.

I feel your comment. I'm a bisexual male that has been (and continue to be) accused of 'acting straight' or being 'half-closeted'. The most noteworthy experience was when I attended my first Pride to support my brother and his gay friends, and I got harrassed by a gaggle of campy gays for being ashamed and a fence sitter and that I should just drop all this masculine stuff and let my inner gay free. I was 'rescued' by a bunch of bears who were attending from the sidelines, because at that time the bear scene wasn't included in my local Pride. Ironically, it was chilling and drinking and relaxing with a small group of bear men that made me more confident, accepted and feel less of an outsider, rather than a parade of glitter, rainbows and fishnets.

Why do gay men tend to act more feminine?

@@sadman5916 Because they tend to be more in touch with the feminity that's inside of all men regardless of sexuality. Meaning feminine straight guys exists but are just less visible because of sexism and homophobia.

Human beings prefer to be around people who are similar to themselves. Shocking, right?

If we hit the goalposts... They'd move them.

One makes an effort to not look, small, and act like shit for themselves first and foremost. We're in real trouble, if this isn now considered to be problematic

thanks hun

glad I could help!

You shouldn't act any way to belong or be excluded from a group,

Your sexuality is big and encompassing: a major part of life. For your interests to be related to it isn‘t something that reduces you. It‘s very natural.

@@turmericchai9 Thank you for your kind words

That sucks! D': Although had no idea this was on reddit :')

I hope you’re feeling happy. I understand your situation and I hope you know it does get better and you do find people you don’t just accept you but love you.

Zoydberg The HIV crisis was a blow to gay rights and the gay community was treated absolutely horribly as they faced tragedy. being HIV+ still has a stigma associated with it although we have better treatment now

You're not the only straight man in the world. There are a lot of straight men who fetishise lesbians.

I personally don't have much of a problem with Blaire White.I thought her early videos were put together in a logical , well-research and not entirely one sided.But she has a disgusting tendency to throw other trans people under the bus in a quest to be seen as "normal" and has that common biased anti view of "If you care about social justice you are cancer and care about problems that don't exist".I think that's because I'm the type of person that values seeing things in shades of grey and likes when people are willing to hear out somebody on the different side of the political spectrum.Contrapoints has an interesting video about her. Milo is just an attention-seeking troll that will say anything to cause controversy and to get people to notice him.That's probably the reason he tours in American and not at home.

Not sure I'd agree with you entirely about her early videos, although granted they got worse as time went on - it remains to be seen whether she will turn a corner now that she is moving towards Laci Green. If she fell in with a different crowd I don't doubt this would influence her, although that might conflict with her current audience. From my perspective what was interesting about her, in fact the only interesting thing about her, is her personal perspective due to her identity. Other than this she brings nothing to the debate in terms of reference to studies, to inform etc She is there to entertain, to make anti Social Justice types and transphobes feel good about their views and for validation. And her need for validation is very strong and yet ironically enough she is utterly cruel and dismissive of others who are in the same boat or feel the same need, but express this need in a different way. Milo is more than just a troll. He also craves acceptance, whilst pretending to be a rebel and gets off on painting a black and white picture of life - unless it comes to pedophilia where the grey area starts to emerge for him. I too, see things as you do - there are many shades and we should attempt to treat each accordingly

We're not? I don't doubt there are subcultures within the community that are like that, but it's not a widespread phenomenon

Jane Smith Except that being vegan is nothing like being marginalised. Please don't compare your dietary choices to being oppressed. It's rude and minimalises actual struggles that people have to go through.

Yeah i'm sorry but this seems a bit inappropriate. I get that personal lifestyle choices can lead to people judging you, but this doesn't mean you face restricted rights or even have to fear for your life/ safety. It's one thing if your family thinks it's stupid to be vegan but a completely different one if they reject you as a person for being gay/trans/etc. Maybe this is not the right place for a comparison like that. I understand that it can be challenging to not be the person who drinks/smokes/eats meat or dairy or whatever but ye, you get my point

Cat Hitachiin Is it so difficult to distinguish between comparing and equating? Nowhere in her comment does Jane even remotely claim that her experince is equal to struggles of some other groups. Why can't a viewer take from a video what they find resonating with their own situation? I would argue it actually helps with empathy. Just because one group is opressed more, does it mean that others shouldn't talk about their own particular experiences?

You're right that there are major differences. For one, I chose to be vegan. I have also never felt that my life is in danger because of my veganism. Still, it was meaningful to me to hear Rowan talk about respectability politics and I wanted to express that.

I've had people at work bash Transfolk and Vegans in the same sentence; as some kind of defection from norm. Ironically, it was _their own respectability_ that was fragile.

Education on pronouns isn't difficult.

ok after watching i'm really confused, because you spend most of the video trying to police image, then there is a sentiment about how people shouldn't be judged because of their image. then it's like... actually some people are different and look different and that's okay. interesting topic of discussion but i didn't really know what to take away from it.

Where in the video am I policing image?

you're presenting us with and endorsing a philosophy in which public image and representation is criticised. "more normal" "more like them" "those lgbt people" in air quotes like it's shameful to be one of those groups, to want to represent yourself in a certain way. what's wrong with the word normal? just because something is not normal, doesn't mean it can't be okay. you seem to be speaking as though there is a fundamental 'gay' way to be, look like, act or speak. and that by mainstream social convention and fashion existing, it's oppressing, and 'closeting'. i'm going to speak about the associations of gay men, because that's where my experience comes from, being someone who was always told i was too straight acting/butch, not always accepted in these spaces. i think it's much more harmful that flamboyance/campness/openness is associated exclusively with gay culture in this way. i saw a lot of straight boys (and gay of course) growing up that spoke in a high pitched voice for example, and really adopted affectations that weren't natural to 'act straight'. and just being aggressive and rude to avoid being called gay. and on the other hand now grown up, how they're so clearly afraid to dress in certain clothing or like certain tv shows even. and i also know gay guys who can't stand being called 'fabulous'.... whatever. i'm sorry if you've covered this topic before. it just kind of got my gears turning. lgbt people are such a small percentage of the population, for there to be such a limiting of what is straight and what is gay in that regard, and the idea that you can see or hear the difference just needs to die. like the press conference example, that the character could just look around room and go 'oh there are all the gays'...... what? there were that many? i haven't seen the show so he may literally just know all these people. anyway sorry, have a nice weekend.

Leilu Furei Nahs Leilu Furei Nahs I think you misunderstood Rowan. when she said "those lgbt people," her tone implied that some people think badly of that group, but that thinking that way is dumb. also you mention an effect of toxic masculinity that is similar to respectability politics, but different. its a group that has power policing itself for signs of femininity or gayness and finally it would be nice if we didnt see difference, but we do, so we need to deal with that realistically

i am just so confused watching all of these conflicting conflated videos with ideas on gender and identity on youtube autoplay, i think it just got all too much.

Tomás Roma that’s not how it works

You are being dumb. Every bit of nuance in that video, you've just thrown away.