We’re so gay that on the Kinsey scale—the one that places human sexuality on a continuum from “0” (totes hetero) to “6” (mega-super-awesome-gay)—we dip into the triple digits.
But we’re comfortable enough with our sexuality to have a good giggle over author/screenwriter Paul Rudnick’s cheeky essay in The New Yorker, in which “owing to changing cultural boundaries and advanced research,” he expands the scale.
Here are some choice numbers:
A Kinsey 2: So heterosexual that the thought of two people of the same sex having intercourse doesn’t disgust you; it confuses you—”Wait a minute, if they’re both girls, which one falls asleep immediately afterward while the other one keeps babbling about her day?”A Kinsey 6: Heterosexual, yet still able to wear colors other than brown, olive green, and navy blue (but never pink or yellow, because you’re not some goddamn circus clown).A Kinsey 11: Heterosexual, but while on business trips will frequently have intercourse with same-sex partners, primarily because they know the best local restaurants.A Kinsey 17: Homosexual, but occasionally attracted to the opposite gender, just to get your mom’s hopes up.A Kinsey 23: So exclusively homosexual that you made an “It Gets Better” video aimed at kids who were raised in homes without stacks of coffee-table books.
Image via RBowen
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bagooka
Lol.
iDavid
In his attached article he kept brining up two women I had never heard of. Oh yeah, I forgot, Paul Rudnick is a lesbian. Shoulda had a V8.
adam
I read this in the New Yorker, and it IS funny, but one should also calibrate
the scale for different generations. I neither know nor care who Mandy Patinkin
and Patti LuPone are, which, in my book, doesn’t make me any less gay.
geoff
@adam: No, young one, of course not. Just less informed. But keep reading the New Yorker- those names have been there before and they will be there again.
Zane
@adam: If you don’t know who Patti LuPone or Mandy Patinkin are, and why they matter to you as a gay man, you need to go straight to Amazon.com and order the Original Broadway Cast Recording of Evita 😉
Jeff
The major flaw with this so called essay is that Rudnick is being biphobic, practicing bisexual erasure, and completely ignorant of the actual Kinsey scale where 0 is straight and 6 is gay or lesbian, and everything inbetween 1 through 5 equals bisexuality in its many forms.
Panserbjorne
@Jeff: It’s _comedy_ Jeff–you know, ha ha, not to be taken seriously, just for fun, wink-wink-nudge-nudge and all that sorta thing? It’s concentrating on stereotypes and quirks of bi-polar sexuality for a laugh, not attempting to erase everything between the two extremes. Here’s a hint to help if it still makes no sense: It’s NOT a REAL attempt to re-write the Kinsey scale. It’s a droll, satirical “expansion” of the original intentionally based upon oversimplification.
Thankfully, I wasn’t offended as I’m a totally heterosexual-acting homosexual man and not one of you both/and/or/neither bisexuals. [That was a JOKE, Jeff. A self-reflexive, ironic joke. So don’t stroke out on us, okay?]