Online Performance of Masculinity in the Gay Community

When conceptualizing homosexuality, one often characterizes the term as a relationship between a ‘man’ and a ‘man’. Although the gay community has increasingly embraced the term ‘Queer’ in an attempt to capture the spectrum of sexual orientation, it is important to recognize the gay community does not exist in a vacuum in relation to the heteronormative society, it internalizes the heterosexual understanding of masculinity and legitimizes the power hierarchy of masculinity over femininity. To uncover this heteronormative understanding of masculinity, we first and foremost need to recognize masculinity as a performance of gender-binary ideal. Judith Butler Gender Trouble conceptualizes gender as a verb, where one performs an action on that given understanding – the understanding of masculinity is first repeated, therefore normalized and institutionalized as a definition of male. Butler observes that the performance of masculinity – is grounded on a select set of socially constructed ‘attributes’ that are treated as a solidified, singular definition of masculinity. While a fixed 'masculinity' definition licenses certainties and secure stabilities for some individuals; it is however, an interplay of power that erases non-normative understanding of its hegemonic ideals.

Construction of a Masculine Body

In Lanzieri & Hildebrandt’s research, the authors center their analysis of masculine expression and homosexual attractiveness to gender orientation, where they argue that homosexual attraction is grounded in the physical attributes that resemble what the sociocultural defines as masculine. The socially constructed nature of masculinity highlighted in their work is an important premise to acknowledge in the discussion of masculinity expression: it is an arbitrary standard that the society has normalized. Yet in various discourses, it is a legitimized term treated as being both natural and real.

Because of its socially constructed nature, masculinity’s definition is thus fluid and changes by the social-cultural contexts that it is employed in. In the North American culture, concepts of masculinity construct men as less expressive of their emotional states and with a greater emphasis on physical components like muscular physique and fitness. Physical aesthetics thus becomes a vehicle to express one’s masculinity.

When tracing back for the historical conditions that shaped this association between masculinity and muscular body image - Burke in his analysis of gay culture offered an alternative explanation on the favourability of ‘muscular’ and ‘fit’ aesthetics within the gay community, where he cites this cultural shift as a response to the crippling symptoms associated with AIDs during the AIDs epidemic. During this social crisis, a large and muscular body type was interpreted as healthy and therefore a safe partner to engage in sexual activity with.

Taywaditep locates a similar cultural shift - where in the post-stonewall period, hyper-masculine men are exemplified by the macho look of ‘gay clones’ in social artifacts like 'magazines'. During this period, the gay machismo quickly turned into a nearly universal representation within gay communities, and effeminate males were marginalized because they reinforce heteronormative stereotypes of gay as emasculated males and thereby hindering the cause of gay liberation. Taywaditep argues not only was this an active effort to dispel effeminacy a clear attempt to redefine homosexuality through heteronormative masculinity, he further cites this phenomenon as an example of internalized homophobia –a subconscious homophobia that is fundamentally gendered to reject the presentation of femininity. Masculinity thus is a construct that changes through time along with certain cultural contexts – it is malleable rather than fixed.

Presentation of Masculinity on Grindr

GRINDR

When examining how gay individuals interact with each other on a platform like Grindr, scholars propose that 'masculinity consciousness' not only enable individuals themselves to align with a prescribed notion of masculine presentation, but also enact marginalization on individuals who don’t conform with its ideals. Taywaditep first and foremost defines masculinity consciousness as a psychological construct that describes men’s personal tendency to be concerned and preoccupied with masculinity in their public appearance. Taywaditep found that many gay men exhibit cues of gender nonconformity early on in their childhood; however, it is through gender socialization during adolescence age [13-17], when the majority of gender-nonconforming boys is defeminized and conform to the prescription of masculine performances. It is the individual’s responsibility to ensure they fit within the category. The reinforcement of these arbitrary characteristics by each individual actors create and shape a collective understanding of what a 'man' should be.

This concept is related to the performance of self in Conner’s research of Grindr users, where he argues that Grindr is a hierarchy based on body type, race, and age. Conner challenges the notion of individual agency in choosing their sexual partner - where he suggests the agency embedded in statements like '[sexual preference] just a preference' is actually the result of internalized stereotypes and stigma. Men see themselves as social objects with respect to masculinity, where they exercise self-control and self-presentation in order to conform to the prescription of masculine performance. This standard of masculinity is then actively used to evaluate another gay individual that one encounters. One may think that they are in control of their sexual preference, but Conner’s research suggests that internalized power dynamic from the social structure we occupy indeed shape our decision making at an individual level.

On Grindr, the performance of one’s sexual self is further related to the gay subculture that one self-identify with. Structurally, Grindr encourages its user to identify with a subculture: top, bottom, vers, etc. Conner argues the result of choosing a self-identified category often results in an exaggerated performance of presenting oneself as a perfect caricature. He further found a positive correlation between [hetero]masculine profiles and the use of stigmatizing language like: 'not into fems'. Masculine body; again, appears to be a desirable trait that offers more leverage and power over subordinated masculinities. Conner argues that by reducing individuals to shirtless images, this effectively promotes a culture prioritizing physical appearance over more substantive qualities like interests and personality. It is thus not homosexual ‘men’ that’ are stigmatized within the Gay Community, but rather queers who don’t conform to hetero-gendered expression.