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> effeminate male > gay son This is a dangerous stereotype that is equally harmful to people of any sexuality, I'd encourage you to correct it. Most of the ga

> effeminate male > gay son This is a dangerous stereotype that is equally harmful to people of any sexuality, I'd encourage you to correct it. Most of the gay folk I know personally tend towards the athletic end of the spectrum

spodek 6y ago
Is there some law of the internet that when someone corrects someone, they often commit the error they're pointing out? Did you mean to imply that effeminate -- showing characteristics more associated with females than males -- was at the other end of a spectrum from athletic?
- jabberwcky 6y ago
  The inverse of effeminate by definition is butch, I purposefully avoided using it as it invokes yet more popular and inaccurate gay stereotypes that in no way capture the folk I was describing
- waterhouse 6y ago
  > Is there some law of the internet that when someone corrects someone, they often commit the error they're pointing out? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law
- filoleg 6y ago
  >Did you mean to imply that effeminate -- showing characteristics more associated with females than males -- was at the other end of a spectrum from athletic? Agreed, the terminology used by the parent comment was a bit strange, but I got the idea of what they meant. They were talking about an effeminate skinny type of a male compared to a very masculine athletic "macho man"-looking type. In terms of celebrities and purely their appearances, think of young David Bowie vs. Arnold Swarzenegger. I guess the parent comment simply conflated athleticism with masculinity, but that's just an aspect of it, and not all kinds of athleticism are inherently "masculine" (think yoga or acrobatics or figure skating).
tofery 6y ago
>This [gay males being effeminate] is a dangerous stereotype that is equally harmful to people of any sexuality Why do you assume that gay men being effeminate is unfounded (if you do think that, which I'm basing off of you calling it a stereotype), and why do you think it's harmful? Gay men, in common with straight women, want to have sex with men. That seems effeminate to me (another comment I made with a similar argument: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26073496 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26073496). As for the stereotype being harmful, is it? If society assumes gay men tend to be effeminate, what harm does that cause?
kepler1 6y ago
You're really swinging to the opposite end of credibility, bending over backwards to put on blinders and assert that gayness has absolutely no relation to some effeminate qualities. It goes against people's own ability to observe facts and undermines your position. Maybe it's not true for every gay male, but it is certainly an observable phenomenon.
- tomc1985 6y ago
  Curious as to whether we'd see a lot of effeminate straight men if social norms permitted it. My guess is yes
  - irrational 6y ago
    Definitely. I'm straight and I love watching Jane Austen, Anne of Green Gables, Musicals, Hallmark, Downton Abbey, Romcom, etc. movies with my wife. But I'd never let any of my male friends know.
    - KozmoNau7 6y ago
      Why wouldn't you let them know? One would think that standing by your choices and not trying to hide then away, would be the assertive and self-confident approach. If your friends are really so fickle as to think less of you based on the TV shows you watch and the love you show for your wife, are they really worth keeping around?
      - csin 6y ago
        Friends don't exactly grow on trees. My best friend died in his 20's. So, I have a cynical view on friendship. It's very time intensive to find new friends and filter out the one's that don't make the cut. Not to mention the awkwardness that comes with breaking up with the one's that don't make the cut.
        KozmoNau7 6y ago
rcoveson 6y ago
Isn’t “being attracted to males” a predominantly female characteristic in animals that reproduce sexually? On the “sexuality” dimension, do not gay men fall closer to the female cluster than the male cluster?
- drdeca 6y ago
  I assume you mean more in that direction than a typical male? Because I’m pretty sure that homosexual men aren’t overall more like heterosexual women than they are like heterosexual men, at least in terms of appearance.
  - rcoveson 6y ago
    By default, let’s assume that homosexual men have the same distribution of all other traits as heterosexual men. In N-dimensional space, they are biased slightly away from dead center of the male cluster towards the female cluster because of the female bias of the attracted-to-men trait. You could say the same thing about long-haired men. It doesn’t mean you’re implying that any other traits are more feminine, because the one trait in question is already biased female.
    - valarauko 6y ago
      I suppose this is true along the dimension labelled "attracted to dudes". There are probably many many more dimensions where homosexual men are not biased towards the female cluster, while many heterosexual men are. > By default, let’s assume that homosexual men have the same distribution of all other traits as heterosexual men In some ways, homosexual men might very well cluster away from females, even more so than heterosexual men.
      - rcoveson 6y ago
        > In some ways, homosexual men might very well cluster away from females, even more so than heterosexual men. Aren't we back to what the person I was originally replying to would describe as "dangerous stereotypes"? The point I was trying to make is that the only thing you can say about homosexual men without invoking stereotypes is that they are attracted to men. And in a statistical sense, that is a feminine characteristic.

spodek 6y ago

Is there some law of the internet that when someone corrects someone, they often commit the error they're pointing out? Did you mean to imply that effeminate -- showing characteristics more associated with females than males -- was at the other end of a spectrum from athletic?

jabberwcky 6y ago
The inverse of effeminate by definition is butch, I purposefully avoided using it as it invokes yet more popular and inaccurate gay stereotypes that in no way capture the folk I was describing
waterhouse 6y ago
> Is there some law of the internet that when someone corrects someone, they often commit the error they're pointing out? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry%27s_law
filoleg 6y ago
>Did you mean to imply that effeminate -- showing characteristics more associated with females than males -- was at the other end of a spectrum from athletic? Agreed, the terminology used by the parent comment was a bit strange, but I got the idea of what they meant. They were talking about an effeminate skinny type of a male compared to a very masculine athletic "macho man"-looking type. In terms of celebrities and purely their appearances, think of young David Bowie vs. Arnold Swarzenegger. I guess the parent comment simply conflated athleticism with masculinity, but that's just an aspect of it, and not all kinds of athleticism are inherently "masculine" (think yoga or acrobatics or figure skating).

tofery 6y ago

>This [gay males being effeminate] is a dangerous stereotype that is equally harmful to people of any sexuality Why do you assume that gay men being effeminate is unfounded (if you do think that, which I'm basing off of you calling it a stereotype), and why do you think it's harmful? Gay men, in common with straight women, want to have sex with men. That seems effeminate to me (another comment I made with a similar argument: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26073496 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26073496). As for the stereotype being harmful, is it? If society assumes gay men tend to be effeminate, what harm does that cause?

kepler1 6y ago

You're really swinging to the opposite end of credibility, bending over backwards to put on blinders and assert that gayness has absolutely no relation to some effeminate qualities. It goes against people's own ability to observe facts and undermines your position. Maybe it's not true for every gay male, but it is certainly an observable phenomenon.

tomc1985 6y ago
Curious as to whether we'd see a lot of effeminate straight men if social norms permitted it. My guess is yes
- irrational 6y ago
  Definitely. I'm straight and I love watching Jane Austen, Anne of Green Gables, Musicals, Hallmark, Downton Abbey, Romcom, etc. movies with my wife. But I'd never let any of my male friends know.
  - KozmoNau7 6y ago
    Why wouldn't you let them know? One would think that standing by your choices and not trying to hide then away, would be the assertive and self-confident approach. If your friends are really so fickle as to think less of you based on the TV shows you watch and the love you show for your wife, are they really worth keeping around?
    - csin 6y ago
      Friends don't exactly grow on trees. My best friend died in his 20's. So, I have a cynical view on friendship. It's very time intensive to find new friends and filter out the one's that don't make the cut. Not to mention the awkwardness that comes with breaking up with the one's that don't make the cut.
      - KozmoNau7 6y ago

rcoveson 6y ago

Isn’t “being attracted to males” a predominantly female characteristic in animals that reproduce sexually? On the “sexuality” dimension, do not gay men fall closer to the female cluster than the male cluster?

drdeca 6y ago
I assume you mean more in that direction than a typical male? Because I’m pretty sure that homosexual men aren’t overall more like heterosexual women than they are like heterosexual men, at least in terms of appearance.
- rcoveson 6y ago
  By default, let’s assume that homosexual men have the same distribution of all other traits as heterosexual men. In N-dimensional space, they are biased slightly away from dead center of the male cluster towards the female cluster because of the female bias of the attracted-to-men trait. You could say the same thing about long-haired men. It doesn’t mean you’re implying that any other traits are more feminine, because the one trait in question is already biased female.
  - valarauko 6y ago
    I suppose this is true along the dimension labelled "attracted to dudes". There are probably many many more dimensions where homosexual men are not biased towards the female cluster, while many heterosexual men are. > By default, let’s assume that homosexual men have the same distribution of all other traits as heterosexual men In some ways, homosexual men might very well cluster away from females, even more so than heterosexual men.
    - rcoveson 6y ago
      > In some ways, homosexual men might very well cluster away from females, even more so than heterosexual men. Aren't we back to what the person I was originally replying to would describe as "dangerous stereotypes"? The point I was trying to make is that the only thing you can say about homosexual men without invoking stereotypes is that they are attracted to men. And in a statistical sense, that is a feminine characteristic.