SHAME GAME

What Slut Shaming Really Says About The Gay Community

gay-pride-parade

The idea of a selfie-centric, skintastic Instagram account may make your eyes involuntarily roll as words like “narcissistic” and “conceited” travel to the tip of your tongue — and who knows, maybe there is narcissism at play  — but is that just a more socially acceptable form of slut shaming?

What is it about the way someone else uses social media or dating apps that’s able to get us so riled up?

Expressing sexuality is so deeply personal, it’s perfectly natural there are going to be a million different ways of doing it, and yes, the line between healthy and unhealthy practices can get blurry. But all we can really do is focus on our own authentic sexuality — throwing others’ under the bus gets us nowhere.

Do you have to watch and enjoy a video of a twink trying on revealing Halloween costumes? Of course not! It’s the internet, there are a billion other things to distract you at you office. Here’s Joseph Gordon-Levitt dancing to Janet Jackson to get you started.

Below, therapist Matthew Dempsy explores the topic of slut shaming, and what it actually says about how we’ve been taught to filter sex as something that’s deserving of judgment and moral high ground when really the major concern should just be safety:

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