A lot of guys like to be lulled to sleep by a man’s voice — including, it seems, some of our heterosexual counterparts.
Take the Redditor whose ASMR use apparently has him questioning his sexuality. (For those of you out of the auditory loop, ASMR stands for autonomous sensory meridian response, and it’s often characterized by a relaxed feeling brought on by whispering or other soft sounds.)
Related: So Gay ASMR is a thing now and guys are making bank offering “sound massages”
“Fellas… is it gay that listening to men whisper helps me sleep at night?” this Reddit user wonders in a recent post. “Have been pondering this question for a while. … Just to clarify, it specifically has to be a male voice for it to work.”
To illustrate his experience, the Redditor links to a YouTube video called “Sad Boyfriend Needs Your Love – ASMR Boyfriend Roleplay.” (Example dialogue, spoken in a quiet, downcast voice: “I guess I can always count on you to make me feel better, huh? When really, it should be me making youfeel better.”)
Related: Fantasy Whispers (ASMR) featuring Alaska & Katya
A commenter on the Reddit post says those ASMR videos don’t necessarily mean the guy is gay. “I like listening to men whisper in my ear as much as the next guy, but I’m not gay,” the commenter adds. (Another user, however, quips, “What if the ‘next guy’ is gay?”)
Another Reddit user writes, “I would say it doesn’t make you gay… but if you’re specifically listening to boyfriend roleplays and unsure then maybe you are into guys.”
And a third user had a rational explanation. “My ASMR triggers I think have a lot to do with how I was put to sleep as a kid. It could come from that,” that user wrote. “But if you’re wondering if you’re attracted to men — like, actually wondering — there are probably more indicators than just some ASMR.”
Besides, there are other straights who find male voices relaxing. “I am a male (with a female partner), but for the majority of the time, I only receive relaxation ‘tingles’ from male voices,” a Reddit user wrote back in 2015. “I too don’t understand why it happens.”
Hey, who are we to say who should give “tingles” to whom?
charlie_jackpot
Fred’s Voice ASMR made me gay
Donston
I mean, at least those dudes are acknowledging that orientation and love isn’t just about physical attractions, sexual behaviors and body parts. What type of voice and what type of moaning turns you on are a part of sexuality and orientation. What type of voice gives you security and triggers romantic passions are also a part of it. Voices and sounds are a part of the romantic, sexual, affection, emotional, commitment spectrum. Though there are many types of amsr’s and many different reasons some people listen to them. It does not have to be connected to orientation.
It does get really exhausting having to assuage male insecurities and general gay panic. I understand questioning and fluidity. And I understand how individual sexuality, orientation and the spectrum can be. But we shouldn’t be put in a position to to tell guys they ain’t “gay”.
Cam
Another gay panic article. Siiiiigh
Doug
Yup. Straight men are so fragile.
Donston
It’s a combination of identity politics, gay panic, people not understanding sexuality and orientation and the spectrum, and the general fragility of the male ego.
Queerty and most “queer publications” are not interested in investigating the complexities and politics of identity, questioning, gender, sexuality, the spectrum, love, relationships, etc. Instead, they’re only interested in promoting the idea that it’s our job to assure guys that they are indeed “straight” or at least “not gay”, that it’s our job to prop these guys up and make the “straight world” better for them (and maybe hook up with them sometimes). It’s lame and demeaning as fvck. And it doesn’t give real insight into anything or help educate anyone.
BoylesqueBubble
Are the “editors” of Queerty, that desperate for content that they need to use Reddit for material? How many phucking articles need to be posted about straight men and their worries on a Gay site because for one minute they: hugged a man, felt a penis or in this case.listening to someone guiding them through some “experience” for relaxation that is far from being sexual? Pretty pathetic when a supposed news site has to glean material from what amounts to a message board. So much going on in our community that needs light shed on, and Dan, David and the ever creepy Graham writes about sh*t like this obsessively.
Donston
It’s a rather shallow site built on gossip, sensationalism, sentimentality and fantasy. And that is how it’s always been. However, I don’t recall it being so redundant, toothless and completely lacking in journalism several years ago.
Cam
Story next week.
Headline: “Straight man wonders if not being attracted to women and loving having anal sex with men and kissing men and blowing men and getting blown by men and going out on romantic dates with men…..means he isn’t straight.”
witchboybrian
It does seem a little gay.
That he’s unsure enough that he needs to seek others to validate him makes him seem unsure of himself.
Some people are desperate to explain away their same sex attraction.
He is choosing to listen to a romantic role play and not just a man reading bedtime stories.
Dymension
Maybe it has something with yearning for a father figure who would come tuck you into bed each night.
woodroad34
I think it has something to do with the lower tonal register–a low ‘thrum’; there’s a sense of security and protection and your brain slows down. Delta and Theta brainwaves are slower brain waves usually causing sleep or as the result of (and helping) meditation (think of buddhists going “ohhhmmm” over and over again). You can get the same things from a woman if she speaks slowly in a lower register than her normal speaking voice–but it’s probably not as effective.
butchqueen
If he takes ten inches up the poop chute before going to sleep to that, then he is gay.
stuffedpuppy
Gosh Donston, RELAX!! I take Queerty for what it is: an entertaining and mildly informative medium.
If you find it so trashy why do you write your pseudo senior thesis (in a comment section) every day here???
Why is it that LGBTQ publications must always be so 1980s Advocate-style …so damn gloomy. Relax! Otherwise you have no right to use the word “gay”.