[Greta Christina] All Boy-Boy Action
The topic for today’s sermon:
Women who like gay male porn.
And people who are surprised by this.
We’ll start with the facts: There are some women who like gay male porn. I’m one of them. And I’m not the only one. Look at the widespread phenomenon of slash fanfic: erotic fiction about fictional characters, typically about two or more male characters, and typically written by and for straight women. (Kirk/Spock, anyone? Or are you more of a Snape/Draco girl?) And it isn’t just written porn: there are women who like gay male porn videos, photos, comics. There’s even an entire genre of Japanese comics and graphic novels, yaoi, devoted to gay male love and/or sex stories created for a female audience. (If you’re one of these gay- porn- lovin’ women, btw — please speak up in the comments! I know more or less what I get out of gay male porn, but I’d love to hear what you get out of it.)
It’s true that this desire hasn’t been reflected very much in the video porn industry — and video porn is what a lot of people default to when they think about “porn.” But “women don’t like gay porn” isn’t a very good explanation for this. (Some better ones: Women on average are more interested in written porn than videos. And the video porn industry can be idiots sometimes: they’re terrified of putting something on screen that might turn off straight guys; they largely ignore the potential of the women’s market; and even when they try to cater to women’s tastes in porn, they tend to get it laughably wrong.)
So those are the facts: Some women like gay male porn. Enough so that there are entire porn genres that cater to it.
And yet, many people seem deeply surprised by this. Many people assume that this phenomenon doesn’t exist, and will ponder the question of why women don’t like gay porn when so many guys love the girl-girl stuff And many people are entirely baffled when they hear about women who like all boy-boy action, wondering, “What on earth do they get out of it?”
So if you’re surprised by the fact that some women like to watch/ read about two men doing it, let me ask you this:
Are you surprised by the fact that some men like to watch/ read about two women doing it?
“Girl-girl action” is so common in heterosexual video porn, it’s not even considered a fetish. It’s a completely standard menu item, like fucking and sucking. As for all girl-girl videos, they’re all over the “hetero” porn market like a cheap suit. And nobody seems the least bit surprised by any of this.
So if you’re puzzled by why some women are into porn with two guys, ask yourself: Why are some men — indeed, a whole lotta men — so excited by porn with two girls?
The answers vary, of course. Some men like girl-girl porn because they’re not attracted to men. Some are actively turned off by the sight of men; others really just prefer to look at women. They get off on femaleness — and they like to see a lot of it, undiluted by the maleness that they’re just not that into.
Well, that’s true for some women, too. Some women like gay porn because they’re hot for guys, not girls, and guys are who they want to look at/ read about. They want to enjoy maleness, and male sexuality. And even those of us who appreciate both women and men in our porn sometimes like to enjoy just one or the other. I, for one, like lots of different kinds of porn — but one of them is definitely the kind that’s all about hard cocks and hard muscles. Undiluted by soft breasts and pussies.
Moving on: Some men like girl-girl porn because they like the fantasy of a three-way (or four-way, or five-way, or whatever) that includes them. They like to watch two (or more) women do it because then they can project themselves into the scene. They like to look at all this delightful female pulchritude . . . and then imagine themselves as the center of it all.
Well, that’s true for some women, too. Some women like to watch/ read about two or more guys . . . so they can imagine themselves as the center of a whole lot of hot male attention. The delicious meat in a Kirk/Spock sandwich, if you will.
And some men like girl-girl porn for the exact opposite reason: they like the alien-ness, the difference, of women, and of lesbians. They don’t want to project themselves into the scenario at all. They see women as excitingly mysterious, exotic even. They see lesbians in particular as enticingly out of reach. And they don’t want that mysterious allure tainted by the quotidian familiarity of men.
And again, that’s true for some women, too. For some women, gay male porn is alien, exotic. Forbidden fruit, even. It’s like the key to the secret garden; a keyhole peep into a world we’re not supposed to see.
I’ve read other explanations for why women like boy-boy porn — explanations as varied as the women themselves. Some women like the fact that gay porn features seriously good-looking guys, while straight porn all too often succumbs to the “ugly guys with big dicks” phenomenon. Some like kinky porn, and they’ve found gay kinky porn to be harder and kinkier. Some like kinky porn with male tops, but aren’t comfortable watching women they don’t know get beaten and humiliated. Some like to watch intense butt-sex, and gay porn has plenty to spare. Etc. Etc. Etc. (And yes, for the record: The reasons some men like to watch girl-girl porn are wildly varied as well.)
I’m not sure what my point is here. I think my point is just this:
Yes, Virginia, some women like boy-boy porn. Exclusively, primarily, or as one of many porny varieties. And this fact is entirely unsurprising. Or it should be. The fact that some women like boy-boy porn should be no more surprising that the fact that some men — okay, lots of men — like girl-girl porn.
And if our culture took female sexual desire seriously, nobody would blink an eye at it.
This entry was posted on Thursday, 17 December 2009 at 9:51 pm and is filed under Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
on Saturday, 19 December 2009 at 11:36 am Elisabeth wrote:
I’m a bisexual woman (currently leaning heavily towards the lesbian end of the spectrum) who likes gay male porn! In fact I don’t like heterosexual porn at all, much prefer both types of gay porn (MM and WW). I think I like the male version because, as you pointed out, I like the maleness of it with no female parts to distract; and because it feels taboo to me in some regard (not sure why).
on Sunday, 20 December 2009 at 1:15 am AnneS wrote:
*raises hand*
I’m definitely one of those many women who likes guy-on-guy action. I’ve been a slash fan ever since I got on the internet and discovered that other people liked it too, but my interest predates that. I first realised that I found the idea hot when I was about fourteen. At the time I thought I was a freak, so it was nice to discover that many other people felt the same way and spent their spare time writing/drawing/making music videos about the subject :-).
For me I think it does boil down to ‘one man good, two men better.’ As a straight woman I’m pretty indifferent to naked women. Not because I think women’s bodies are gross; it’s just that the only set of female body parts I’m really interested in are the ones connected to my brain with nerve endings. Women are not a turn-on for me, so gay porn tends to work better for me than straight porn. I’ve found some stuff aimed at gay men that I like, and it does tend to be on the kinky side of the spectrum.
After ten years in fandom, I am very tired of explaining my fondness for guy/guy porn to bewildered people. A few months ago after Robert Downey Junior revealed that his upcoming Sherlock Holmes movie was going to have homoeroticism between him and Jude Law, film critic Michael Medved had this to say:
“There’s not a seething, bubbling hunger to see straight stars impersonating homosexuals,” Medved told us. “I think they’re just trying to generate controversy … They know that making Holmes and Watson homosexual will take away two-thirds of their box office. Who is going to want to see Downey Jr. and Law make out? I don’t think it would be appealing to women.”
When I told my slash-loving fandom friends about this, we laughed and laughed. I, for one, do have a seething, bubbling hunger to watch RDJ and Jude Law make out, especially after seeing all those movie posters where Jude Law is holding a riding crop with the caption ‘crime will pay’ …
on Sunday, 20 December 2009 at 11:10 pm JV wrote:
Yes! I totally felt like a freak when I first watched boy-boy porn… and liked it. Especially because I was watching it as a joke with some friends who thought it was hilarious because I’m a lesbian (and why would a lesbian ever like gay male porn?!) o_0 But we do! Actually almost all my lez friends love the gayboy action, in print and on screen, and I feel like in queerland it’s becoming way less weird to talk about it (maybe this is just me in my sheltered, sheltered world?) Anyway, yes. Agreed.
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 12:15 am Greta Christina wrote:
AnneS: Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law make out in the Sherlock Holmes movie?
[drool]
Now I’m definitely going to see it. In fact, it just went from a “yeah, sure, that seems interesting if we have time” to an “absolute top of my viewing list.” Medved is an idiot if he thinks women don’t want to see that. (Medved is an idiot anyway.)
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 12:58 pm Mara wrote:
You are completely right ma’am! I’m a gentleman solidly interested in the ‘Yaoi’ section of guy/guy porn and I have to say over here it is more or less considered an all female interest. So much so that Gay men in Japan have created their own drawn erotica that caters more towards their tastes and called it Bara (literally rose) and both are just as interesting as the other to people of either gender.
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 1:06 pm Lacuna wrote:
I love MM action! I don’t care to watch a bunch of women fake their way through a porn movie. At least the guys seem more into it - and that appeals to me.
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 2:37 pm Zan wrote:
I am a bisexual who was heavily interested in male-male porn up until I began dating males. Although I liked men just fine I was always a little uncomfortable with them sexually because I didn’t know what I wanted, MM porn was a safe way for me to explore male sexuality and what I like about it without having a)guys picked for their dicks as opposed to their looks and b)females being boned by said men and looking very uncomfortable about it.
I still enjoy MM porn, but not as often or obsessively as I used to when dating only other women.
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 2:38 pm Ushas wrote:
I’m pretty open minded when it comes to fanfiction, as long as someone has recommended it to me, but I do tend towards the slash end of the spectrum. Partly this is because I am a closet enemy shipper, and rare are the male-female or female-female archnemeses in fandom. The more prominent reason, though, is that sexual and romantic tension between a male character and a female character tends to get worked out within the canon of the story, often as one of the main storylines. Fanfiction for such parings therefore tends to be a little…er…”and then they got married and had lots of babies”x5000, with little variation on the theme, because the actual show/book/whatever has often wrapped up all the loose ends. OTOH, rare is the show that will acknowledge any slashy subtext unless it’s for eyecandy, and then it’s usually the wimmins rather than the menfolk. So you get to play around with it more.
In terms of more porny porn, I’m firmly with Lacuna and Anne S. I like men and don’t have any particular fondness for women, and especially not half plastic, blonde women faking their way through sex they are obviously not enjoying at all. Plus they tend to be so damned skinny and flawless in the nethers that I start feelign insecure, even though I know it’s silly. I’d rather have my own self confidence than a mildly stimulating, but mostly uncomfortable, spot of titilation.
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 7:32 pm neosnowqueen wrote:
Written porn, I love it all. I tend to write more bisexual and lesbian women but tend to read more heterosexual women or gay men. I couldn’t tell you why I like m/m better in read fiction as opposed to f/f - maybe it’s the nouns and adjectives and their sounds. I love Snape/Harry, Snape/Lupin, Kirk/Spock, Kirk/McCoy, Angel/Spike (omg melt)… while Faith/Buffy and Willow/Tara are probably my only femme slash pairings that I definitely like. And if there’s threesomes, foursomes, moresomes, I love it. In writing, I feel more a part of the relationships, from all parties involved (male and female), so it’s basically like a one-person, multigendered orgy in my brain. Everyone’s invited!
Regarding visual porn, I much prefer m/m as opposed to f/f and especially f/m. In the latter two, I feel a lack of sincerity from the women (maybe because there’s less of a visual indication of arousal for women, so it’s easier for them to fake it). I also feel like I’m not the target audience, like I’m an unwelcome voyeur. I would like to like f/f visual porn, but too often I feel like their trying to do what men want them to like - I’m interested in trying female-audience f/f porn eventually, but it’s not as accessible online. I couldn’t explain why. But with m/m porn, I feel like more of the actors (not all of course) are more sincere, more open to being both rough and tender. And while I know their target is gay men, I don’t feel out of place watching. I don’t feel like I’m intruding on something where I’m not welcome, in spite of being a woman. Maybe I feel like it’s more queer-friendly in general.
I know that, to some degree, the appeal of m/m for this queer woman (closer to lesbian than bisexual … still working on my labels here) is that it is a safe way to enjoy male sexuality. Sure, I like het and femme for other reasons, but the reason I like m/m is because I am actually very scared of cock and penetration in real life. But when two men are focused on each other, I can enjoy their pleasure vicariously without feeling like a participant. I can imagine being a man rather than sometimes having a less-arousing encounter with my femme fear. It’s a safe way to enjoy penetration and men without actually being with men.
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 7:48 pm diluain wrote:
I’m a fan and writer of original m/m fiction. I’ve also written my share of f/f, though I don’t find it as sexually arousing as m/m. Why it’s titillating has pretty well been covered — “if one is good, two is better,” and seeing oneself in the mix are strong elements, for me.
As a writer, though, the appeal of writing same-sex romance is in exploring the dynamics. Hetero romance — and hetero sex scenes — have a slightly scripted feel to them, because when it comes to sexual relationships, women have a certain role they fit into and it’s very difficult to (convincingly) get them out of it. No matter how headstrong and untamed the female, she’s still a female and there’s no way around it. The same goes for the man — attempts to break him out of his assigned hetero role can very quickly push him into caricatures that are either overly dominant (a chauvinist bully) or overly submissive (a woman with the wrong parts).
Two men, however, can play a range of roles within the same relationship — and since the “default” state of two men is a sort of sexual equality, playing with their personalities and how they relate to each other, in and out of bed, is fascinating. I find the same fascination in writing relationships with two women. It’s almost as if each partner is more free to “be themselves” because they aren’t constricted by gender roles. The characters are truly blank canvases.
Add the element of the forbidden, unaccepted, and sometimes illegal nature of the relationships into the mix, and it’s just too much fun for a character-driven writer to resist.
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 9:53 pm AnneS wrote:
Greta: At this point, we don’t know for a fact that there is actually guy/guy kissing in the movie outside Michael Medved’s fevered imagination. (And my imagination. And the imagination of a whole lot of other people. I was highly amused that I saw this on more than one news website, and everywhere the comments were filled with people announcing that they would be in their bunks.)
However, the actors and director have stated that they’re playing up the homoerotic subtext between the characters, and their comments about this were what prompted Medved’s idiot remarks. This is enough to encourage me to see the film on opening day. I will be happy to report back on whether there is actual kissing or not :-).
on Monday, 21 December 2009 at 11:04 pm jo wrote:
sometimes i fantasize about 2 guys together for their first time, at least one of whom considers himself straight. For me it’s about someone being turned on against their will. Guys tend to be a lot less flexible and more protective of their sexuality in our culture, and physically display their arousal, so it’s easy to play up that angle.
on Tuesday, 22 December 2009 at 3:57 am Ola wrote:
I love m-m porn! Besides the reasons already listed (e.g. “one guy good, two guys better”), I like it because I can relate to both people in it — to feel their feelings. Women arouse me much less than men (I’m close to 100% straight), so I cannot identify with the straight guys/lesbians as easily. With gay men, I’m looking at two people who both feel exactly what I would feel and do to each other exactly what I would do. It feels great, such perfect understanding :-)
on Tuesday, 22 December 2009 at 12:00 pm Liz wrote:
I am a fan of MM porn. But I am a fan of hot naked people (the joys of being bi). I like homosexual porn more than hetero porn in general, I think largely because I don’t like the way women are portrayed in most hetero porn. But I also like the inherent naughtiness in mm porn, which I don’t feel in lesbian porn so much. I get off on the idea that what’s happening is forbidden as much as I do two really hot men being all sexy. So the idea that one or both parties is theoretically straight(or at least closeted) makes it even hotter for me. But somehow it’s all about being a voyeur. The idea of watching my boyfriend have a gay encounter makes my eyes roll back in my head and my toes curl. Whereas in my lesbian fantasies it’s all about me and the other girl, alone.
So, somehow, another part of what makes gay porn so great for me is that I’m not invited to that party. That frustration feeds into the hotness.
Also, it’s hard to parse out why something makes the instinctual part of my brain that reads for “sexy” go zing.
on Tuesday, 22 December 2009 at 1:27 pm Lynet wrote:
So far I’m not much for video porn, but as a Kinsey (almost) zero female, I have to admit I sort of like the idea of guy-on-guy action. I think I’d be even more turned on by it if they were (partially) just being gay for the sake of getting a girl’s attention, though, like girls who kiss each other to get male attention. It makes the fantasy that much more exciting.
on Wednesday, 23 December 2009 at 10:21 am Aiek wrote:
I’m part of the slightly younger generation of fanfiction writers, the ones that started writing when they saw Dragonball Z and Sailor Moon? And I have to say I was completely surprised to hear that some women don’t like gay porn. Seriously? I can’t believe it. It’s been forever and day since I’ve met a girl on the internet that wasn’t a yaoi fangirl. I guess the crazy Christan girls may not like it…But who let them on the internet anyway?
Since I got on the internet, I have liked yaoi. Though, I have to say that I am not a video porn watcher. It makes it seems grosser somehow to see actual people doing anything. Ha. But written smut? Lovely. And so much of it is so well written and interesting. I think I like yaoi because…Well…It’s the norm to like it. If I didn’t, I would be missing out on a lot of great stories. And my own amateur writing career would never have been created without being inspired by Sasuke, Naruto, and episode three of the anime Naruto.
I have to agree with diluain and Ushas the most. Two male characters just seem to have so much more to work with. They can want to kill each other and still love each other and that’s interesting to me. I like couples that can fight and argue without going all mushy towards the end or without one of them having to submit to the other.
And before I thought the Sherlock Holmes movie looked kind of cool and maybe I would watch it, just because it reminds me House (who is, of course, based off of Sherlock Holmes.) But now I have to say that there is no way I’m going to miss it. Not appealing to women my ass.
on Thursday, 24 December 2009 at 3:32 pm Timothy (TRiG) wrote:
Lynet, if you like the idea of boys kissing to attract girls, most of the “boys kissing” videos on YouTube are of that sort. And there’s one on DailyMotion that I love, because the lads start kissing on a dare from the girls, but seem to get into it as they go on. By the end, they’re clearly having great fun.
In terms of actual porn, I’m a gay guy, and I like gay porn: written and video. Written should be as realistic as possible, with believable characters. Video should have no storyline at all, please. The dialogue is always cringeworthy.
TRiG.
on Friday, 25 December 2009 at 6:36 pm CeeBee wrote:
I have to say that the written comments here with everyone’s reason for liking gay porn is as fascinating as the original post. My reasons for watching and reading gay porn/slash fiction is partly the “naughtiness” factor, with the forbidness of the relationship becoming a part of the slash, and partly for the pure hot sexiness of having two (or more) men on the screen. I think part of the reason it works for me too is that when I was growing up I felt an instant sympathy for gay men, as in the 70’s there was a lot of controversy about gay rights and stories about gays were in the news. My dad was blatantly homophobic, and I felt a kinship with the oppressed. ;) Plus I hated Anita Bryant with a passion. Anyway, it was partly a strong sympathy for the cause of gay rights and teh hotness. :D
on Saturday, 26 December 2009 at 2:00 pm e wrote:
I like written porn, not so into the visual stuff. I really enjoy gay porn and I put it down to a combination of the following things.
1. I like to feel like I know the characters, just reading about sex doesn’t do it for me - reading about people who are hot for each other does
2. If I can map my body to the characters body I get off too quickly - I don’t get into it
3. Inequality in relationships, a power imbalance, really turns me off. It’s not that straight sex stories can’t acheive this, or that gay sex stories always do; but stripping the gender roles away is an easy way to start off on the same level. (I am not turned on by gay stories where one man is much older than the other etc)
on Saturday, 26 December 2009 at 7:43 pm Quinapalus wrote:
I saw Sherlock Holmes yesterday. Schadenfreude is the last thing I would feel for an audience like you guys, but I would much rather deflate your hopes now than let you sit down in the theater with them: There is nothing overtly erotic in the relationship between Holmes and Watson. It remains in the subtext where Ritchie, Downey and Law (reportedly) said it was.
on Sunday, 27 December 2009 at 6:33 am jk wrote:
I’ve been a slash fan for years, as both a reader and writer. It’s definitely the “one hot guy good, two hot guys better” reason for me. Het romance does nothing for me. Aside from so many of the women in het romances being too stupid to live, women in sexual situations do nothing for me. As someone else said, the only female body parts that do anything for me are the ones attached to my nervous system. The likelihood of seeing equal partners is also much greater (as has been said in the comments) with members of the same sex is a terrific boon, too. Social gender inequality brings so much baggage into fiction that it’s easy to either bog down the story with all the caveats about why *this* couple doesn’t have the baggage or you end up with nothing but cliches. And then there’s the whole “why would I want to see a woman in a sexual situation anyway” thing. And then there’s the “other” aspect of reading and writing about men. Trying to get inside their heads (and what strange and wonderful places those are ;-) is great fun. I don’t see much visual porn, but the only ones I *have* seen that I enjoyed were m/m videos. Ooh, momma. :-) All those lovely naked men and not a single set of bulging breasts in sight. Gimme those broad shoulders, narrow waists, well-muscled butts, thighs and abs… and I’ll be in my bunk.
on Saturday, 2 January 2010 at 7:53 pm Adair wrote:
Even though I’m a bisexual female (well, XX-karyotyped genderqueer who lets everyone go along with the gender they assume from my body type), I don’t feel the emotional connection with women that I do with men (even one transman who I thought was a woman, oddly enough). Sometimes I say I’m more heteroromantic than biromantic, but anyway…
I also agree with Jo about the “being turned on against their will” aspect of male-male fantasies.
I form emotionally close bonds with males far more often than I do with females. I don’t know why or if it’s just coincidence, but it becomes a lot easier for me to imagine emotional intensity between males than between male and female or just female. I don’t perceive myself as female, so I can’t empathize with what a female might be feeling… and I also have mood and desire/arousal disorders, so I don’t have much experience of my own pleasure to even map to female body parts.
on Saturday, 9 January 2010 at 9:20 am jenergy wrote:
i think that part of the problem might be that most people — women as well as men — still tend to view sex from a heterosexual male perspective. look at advertising, movie trailers, music videos: if we’re supposed to get the idea that something is sexy, we’re invariably presented with female flesh to indicate that. it’s incredible to me that straight women don’t have more of a problem with this. to women who are attracted only to men, naked women are not sexy, they’re just naked. naked MEN, however, ARE. but since heterosexual men don’t want to see 2 men getting it on, they just assume that heterosexual women don’t, either, because they assume that we want what they want, because we don’t bitch when that’s all we’re presented with.
i, for one, bitch loudly. yes, i think naked women ARE sexy, but they’re not the ONLY version of sexy naked human. give me some man flesh! for dog’s sake, if men weren’t sexy to women, the human species would have died out long ago. and if i want to see a sexy, naked man, tossing his hard cock around, why on earth wouldn’t i want to see TWO sexy naken men, tossing their hard cocks around? plus, MM porn DOES usually sport much better-looking men than het porn, and it also manages to celebrate male sexuality without subjugating women, a thing i think het porn quit doing long ago, sadly.
on Saturday, 9 January 2010 at 11:05 am Goldy wrote:
I am a straight woman and I have to say Guy-Guy action is hot, there is no getting around it, I have been a fan for many years. There is just something about it, I have tried to explain it several times and can’t. It is almost animalistic, but that’s really not the word I’m looking for either.
on Tuesday, 2 February 2010 at 6:16 pm slash fan wrote:
Like some others commenting on this article, I’ve loved boy/boy action since I was a teen (which is many years ago). I love fantasizing about guy/guy sex and reading about it. I’m a fan of gay porn–on film (Bel Ami, Falcon, Lucas Kazan,…), written literature, and gay porn magazines (Unzipped, Men, Freshmen). I also love gay comics (Class Comics, especially Camili-Cat), and I’m especially a fan of slash (for me its Harry Potter slash–anyone for Lucius/Severus?). I don’t think there is anything hotter than two (or more) gorgeous guys going at it together. I never understood how anyone would be surprised that a straight woman would be turned on by men having sex with men. We all know that many straight men are turned on by women having sex with women. Why shouldn’t straight women enjoy the same? For myself I haven’t really analyzed why I enjoy guy/guy sex–I just fine it incredibly hot. While I do watch some boy/girl porn, I find I hate how many women appear (overly large fake breasts are a huge turnoff) and the men are often unattractive–sometimes to an extreme (just think about Ron Jeremy, and you’ll know what I mean). I’ve also found that many websites geared towards gay men (Unzipped.net for example) realize that their readership includes quite a few straight women, and they appreciate that fact.