20-something blogger Anthony Gilét recently found himself in what he felt was an awkward predicament.
One morning, he heard his older roommate, Matt, hooking up with his best friend, Mitch, who has a boyfriend, who also happens to be Matt’s ex. And all three of them–Matt, Mitch, and the boyfriend/ex-boyfriend–are friends.
Are you following?
In a new op-ed, Gilét writes:
Apparently Matt and his ex were on good terms. (Although not quite good enough to resist pounding his new man). Too close for comfort? Turns out Matt too has a boyfriend, with whom he adopts a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy when it comes to playing with other men. And apparently the four of them hang out together regularly. Can you EVEN?
When Gilét asked his roomie how he is able to have sex with his best friend, who happens to be his ex-boyfriend’s new boyfriend, and remain on OK terms, Matt replied: “I have a lot of friends that I’ve met on Scruff!”
Gilét says his mind was totally “boggled.”
Related: Find It Hard To Make Gay Friends? You’re Not Alone.
“I found it surprising that someone’s relationships–especially friendships–could be so sexually-driven,” he writes. “I’d encountered a number of gay men throughout the years who seemed only to have ‘friendships’ with former f*cks or failed flames. Was I missing something?”
Matt explained that hooking up with his friends was something they did “for fun,” but Gilét wondered if this was actually true. (Apparently, he’s completely unfamiliar with the concept of “friends with benefits.”)
“His excitement reminded me of somebody that had just discovered circuit parties and was still swept up in the facade of three-day benders.”
Sure, friendships are hard to form, but you have to at least try for them. It seemed that a lot of these ‘friendships’ revolved around drinking, drama and very little depth – and some men thrive off that. Don’t get me wrong, I’d watch that reality show for sure. But in real-life doesn’t that just bring aggravation?
After giving it some serious thought, Gilét says he couldn’t figure out “whether these guys were addicted to the drama, had deceived themselves that sex is more valuable than friendship, or were just out of options.”
Ultimately, he concluded the reason Matt and his friends all hook up with each other is their advanced age. (They’re all a few years older than Gilét.)
“To a certain extent, it’s hard to make friends whatever age, especially on the gay scene,” he pontificates. “Surely that difficulty only increases with age?”
Related: Is Your Friend With Benefits Boyfriend Material? This Handy Flowchart Will Tell You.
The “logical explanation” he came up with that the older one gets, the harder it is to meet friends, “so naturally men gravitated toward the likes of Scruff and Grindr for companionship and form friendships with their f*ck buddies.”
The remedy to this? Gilét says gay men need to see each other more “as brothers, rather than competition or conquests.” In doing so, “separating friendships and healthy loving relationships might be a little easier than it currently is.”
What do you think? Do gay men need to do a better job separating friends from lovers/hookups? Is age to blame for so many gay dudes having sex with their buddies? Can you have a “healthy, loving relationship” with a friend you have sex with? Share your thoughts in the comments below…
h/t: Attitude UK
DCguy
This is the same author who always writes about Straight men and most recently wrote about a straight man claiming a gay man sexually assaulted him.
Now he posts another article where gays are doing something wrong. Sounds like there’s some baggage or an agenda there.
Donston
That could be the case, but he does make a slight point here.
Donston
I’ve only hooked up with one friend and it turned into a relationship. I’ve always been pretty good at boundary building.
I agree that there does need to be less focus on sex and more focus on uplifting one another and non-shallow bonding. But that’s just not gonna become the norm. Not in this society. I hate to say it, but that’s part of the reason the majority of my male friends are straight.
The reality is is that there are no “gay rules”. Once you commit yourself to the “gay lifestyle” you’re kind of separating yourself from the core of society and making up the rules as you go. There are no built-in social standards and expectations, which is partially why so many homo and homo-dominant men spend so much of their lives drifting along, indulging self-destructive behaviors, contending with an uneasy ego, never fully self-accepting, etc. It is what it is. And I’m not sure much can be done about it, especially with the closet of society still being jam-packed.
radiooutmike
I came out after my divorce to my wife was final.
I rather like the idea of freedom. Because, if I in fact was straight and divorced, my life would be set out in front of me. Dating would be difficult, because women at my age don’t even want to chat much on dating sites. Rather they want to know, if by the 3rd date, if they are getting married. I wish that was not true, but it is. Especially since I do have children. What you don’t want to settle down with another wife, and have even more kids if she’s younger? This was obviously before I came in even.
I do admit feeling a bit lost with all this choice, and a lot things I don’t know about myself are still waiting to be discovered.
But I know there’s more to life than my former life, just with different sexes.
Me2
@Donston – To be fair, the current generation of gays who are 40 and over are learning as they go. This is the first generation to age into mid-life without the looming threat of death from HIV/AIDS. The generation before this one didn’t have that luxury and weren’t able to leave a blueprint. Yes, a good portion of this generation may be a bit pretentious and overly sexualized, but this is the result of many years of living in fear, being marginalized, and feeling like they were less than everyone else in society. So, it makes sense that some mistakes will be made as they continue to age and figure things out. I just hope that the younger generation learns from these mistakes and become the change that they want to see in others.
Luc
Somebody needs to mind his own beeswax
Spike
Yea, let’s all turn to a 20something blogger for the rules to live a happy life.
eireapparent
I’m sorry. Why are we paying attention to this naive and ageist twit?
PIEFOLK
We aren’t. Don’t worry.
jayjaybear
Step OFF, Heteronormative Harriet! Geez…ever since we went mainstream, these prudes have been leaping out of their closets to tell us how we’re supposed to live. It’s enough to push a former stall-crawler off the ledge…
Kangol
This Gilét person sounds 1) dumb as a post, heteronormative and homonormative, and far too concerned with other people’s business; 2) pretty ageist to consider someone in their late 20s or even 30s as “old”; and 3) completely unaware of gay liberation and the origins of the gay rights he enjoys as a millennial. Ignorance is not bliss.
bushwickfreddy
What you said!! And I’d like to add 4) FOLKS SHOULD MIND THEIR OWN BUSINESS….why does he feel the need to judge his friends’ choices if they don’t effect him?
o.codone
I’m so confused I’m just giving up on this one. I think that “friendship” is really just a gangbang.
ChuckF
Friends are often better sex than strangers because we know each other’s body and enjoy that connection. Anyone who thinks gay men are not sexual animals is fooling himself. We have libidos and power sex urges. Why deny them?
Dave in Northridge
MYOB, Mr. Millennial. After you’ve been in a committed relationship for 41 years that ended with the death of your partner, as I did, I’m guessing you’ll find comfort with your friends too.
ErikO
There’s some truth to this but really if a person who claims to be a friend wants to hook up with me that would make things awkward or possibly end our friendship.
Chris
As an older gay man, the very last thing I need or want is some youngster telling me how to live my life. Note to this blogger: it’s not our job to make sense to you. We live it a day at a time.
Rimminit
My philosophy if asked? Life if too short to pass up an opportunity to **** a nice ***!
jonnieangel
The author just couldn’t figure it out, so what did he do? He thought really, really hard. And came to a conclusion based on his own narrow view of the world.
Had he… oh, I don’t know… talked to his friend., or anyone older than himself. Or read a book. Or did a simple Google search… he might have seen that gay men 20 years older than himself came of age in a different era, with different challenges. Those days impacted our relationships, just like the author’s challenges impact his.
This is lazy writing at its worst. Shame on you for giving him a platform.
durable13
I read Mr. Gilét little article and it made me laugh. Let’s paraphrase.
Older guys sound like farm animals when they have sex.
I have a great face (see pic of me).
I have a great body (see next pic of me).
I have a great package (here’s another pic of me).
The reason young Anthony ‘can’t even’ is a function of his own inexperience, which he is forgivably too young to recognize. The success of these fluid relationships is mostly a result of sexual and emotional maturity.
Luke
It helps when people have clear, honest communication about this with their intimates and/ or playmates, and when people stop throwing shade (with very persnickety moralism) and shaming the people who consciously choose to set parameters around their relationships and play that don’t match their own.
There are a lot of huge problem assumptions operating in the article and in some of the comments. They have far less to do with some “natural” progression of relationships or with “normal” limits that are arbitrarily deemed healthy because they fit common pathologies, than they do with acculturation into a system that has major hangups about sex, and a stilted bourgeois sense of propriety.
But, were it not so, I would not be seeing so many folks — straight, gay, and otherwise — whose relationships are falling apart because they’re trying to follow those “norms” and “proprieties” and have no idea how to communicate about it.
A lot of this is very contextual. There are also far healthier worldviews, and far healthier ways to communicate and negotiate in relationships, and far healthier ways to make the choices that are right for you and your intimates and/or playmates, without all the judgmental shade-throwing on others who consciously and honestly choose parameters for themselves that don’t match the ones you’ve chosen.
doc and raider
The article is utterly laughable, but I do have to ask: in what universe are the two hotties in that photo “old”???
BartmanLA
I’m approaching 60 and am a white overweight gay man who’s found that most of my “hookups” have been with “twenty something” men, so don’t go telling me that I need to grow up, most of the time when I do get with someone (besides my husband) it’s because they’re chasing me down for the encounter. So don’t go telling me millennials are the mature relationship building holier than thou puritans that are going to make the LGBT world a better place! I’ve been find most of my adult life figuring out who to sleep with and who not to. Sounds like this twit is craving the drama he wants to project on other’s lives because he can’t handle it in his own!
linniejr
Let’s understand, that not all older gay men do what is being mentioned in this article. As a older gay man I don’t go behind what friends or relatives have had. When I was in my teens and early 20’s that may have been the case, but not now. Also you can’t blame the older guy without putting some blame on the ex.