Eight words were all it took to kick off a lively Reddit conversation in the r/AskGayMen forum. That prompt: “What are the main advantages of being gay?”
As you might expect, some users in the thread took a hard turn toward misogyny. (You might be surprised by the number of “Ew, women, boo, hiss!” comments.) Other commenters, meanwhile, failed to take our trans brethren into account—posting, for example, unqualified “no risk of unexpected pregnancy” comments.
But there were many well-articulated, thought-provoking additions to the thread, many of which we’ve included below (after retouching them for readability, of course).
The societal
“Largely being exempt from stereotypical gender roles. Straight men are under a lot of pressure to do/not do/like/not like certain things because ‘that’s what men do.’ Gay men get to mostly opt out of that. It’s easier for us to choose stereotypically feminine jobs and hobbies if we want, and to be more in tune with our emotions.”
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“If you are a man, you are somehow obligated to get a beautiful girlfriend, marry her, have a bunch of kids, have a great job, earn a lot of money, buy a house, etc. Overall, a lot of demands from a family and society on men shoulders. When you are gay, most of them disappear. You are free to do whatever you want.”
“I feel like there’s lower family pressure to settle down and have kids. It’s a little higher now that we have marriage equality where I live, but it still feels like people are more ok with you not getting hitched and having kids by a certain age.”
Related: What are the unspoken rules of being a gay guy?
“As a cis gay man in the U.S., the only thing I’m qualified to speak on: 1. Knowing I was different gave me a growth experience in figuring out who I was. 2. That in turn gave me a better opportunity to envision a different and, in my opinion, better life. 3. Very unlikely to have unplanned children, which are a major cause of dropping out of school and multigenerational poverty. 4. Being free of assumptions of gender roles in relationships. 5. Getting along better with my spouse than 99% of hetero couples I see, because, to be honest, they don’t seem to like each other very much. 6. Having to come out as an ongoing process is character-building. 7. Feeling connected in any way to a heritage of amazing, creative, brave, and inspiring men. 8. Sharing some clothes with my spouse.”
“My favorite part is wherever you travel, gays exist, and there is an automatic sense of kinship and safety there. Even if it’s not publicly apparent in today’s very divided society, gay men (and the LGBT community) look out for each other. The gay mafia is a real thing.”
The sexy
“You get to have sex with men.”
“The quality and quantity of sex.”
“Double horny all the time.”
“Sex on demand like tap water”
Related: Gay bros list the body attributes guys shouldn’t feel insecure about
“Prostate stimulation.” (Though, as another commenter pointed out, “this ain’t only for gay men.”)
“Gotta be the d*cks. Amirite?”
The silly
“One underwear drawer!”
“Not being afraid of going to hell since we’re ‘allegedly’ already condemned.”
“The power to summon natural disasters and tear apart the fabric of society simply by existing.”
“M-m-m-men, p-p-p-pretty.”
Jaquelope
Sadly, some gay men do not have any/all of these so-called “advantages” due to their circumstances, and those who do have them need to consider themselves fortunate because we are NOT all in the same situations.
jt1990
Nonsense, gays have plenty of advantages if they use their brain. Affirmative action, special protection under hate crime laws, and no fear of unwanted pregnancies to name a few. And women wanting to “turn you straight,” although I guess only the bi men would see the benefit in that.
Den
Reddit is all too often idiotic.
Even asking a question like this implies that one has the option to weigh a “choice” to either be gay or straight. Is anybody other than right wingers still stupid enough to believe that?
The only “advantage” to being gay is that it gives one a potential outsider’s perspective from which to observe and criticize the majority culture. Though not all gay folks have the critical faculties to do that. And as (or IF given the current rise of the right wing) we become more enfranchised that perspective will become less important.
Beyond that, we are simply different in the focus of our sexual and affectional preferences. Like other minorities, we are prone to stresses not shared by the majority (thus our higher rates of alcohol and drug abuse). We may have easier access to recreational sex, but that is the reason we were (and still are) more likely to harbor HIV, and are currently the population in which the so-far rare monkeypox infection is spreading most quickly.
Personally I an glad I am gay, but it took years to arrive at that self-acceptance. In an ideal world everyone would see that we are no better or worse than any other group.
JJinAus
I have lived the “straight” life and came out later after a messy divorce. Not being conventionally attractive, I have had my share of rejections and nastiness. However, I have to say that I have had an enormous amount of fun as well. I see being gay as a unexpected bonus in later life that I could never have even dreamed of in the extremely conservative country I grew up in. Now in a decades long relationship, I have to say it’s better than the straight people I have known and still do. We do argue, but there are no gender roles to muddy the water. There are two jobs in our house, one that is done and one that needs to be done.
radiooutmike
I did the same thing JJinAus,
There was some nastiness and rejections, mostly because I was older and did not my hot body when I was, say, 28 instead of when I came out almost twenty years later.
I am not in decades long relationship with my partner (yet); but it is easily the best relationship I’ve been in.