'Til men do us part

By Adam Kuhn
Posted Friday, August 10, 2007

Recently, my string of thoughts has been revolving around one particular subject. Why gay men are more interested in getting laid than getting involved. Over a very dignified ‘taco-night’ with some fabulous friends of mine some evenings ago, the topic of two of our friends getting married came up. The groom-to-be, up until several months ago, took pride in identifying as gay. Now, at 24, he’s getting married to a woman.

When they announced their engagement, everyone was quick to make snooty comments about how the relationship would never work and how he would be back on the man-market in no time. I, on the other hand, took a more analytical approach to the arrangement.

In a nutshell, I had argued that gay men don’t want to be in relationships. Gay men want to have their fun and never see you again, and straight men are womanizers interested in not much more than the same thing. Argue if you will, but if this isn’t true, wouldn’t we all be with the one by now?

Here lies the incentive for the two of them to be with each other. He was tired of meaninglessly fooling around and she was tired of feeling like a doormat. Essentially, they were both tired of being used and abused. My ultimate point was that gay men don’t treat straight women the way straight men treat straight women, and straight women don’t treat gay men the way gay men treat gay men.

Whether or not they followed the same criteria of an ordinary relationship, they were happy together. And now that they had the bond they wanted all along, they were holding on to it like a rent-controlled apartment.

Another friend of mine may have followed the same footsteps. At 21, he’s always identified as straight, even though his behavior and mannerisms are enough alone to out him. When we met, he was in a somewhat developed relationship with a girl. Then he and I became friends. It’s not what you think.

They broke up shortly after we began working on a project together. As time went on, he eventually confided in me a secret fling he was having with a certain mystery man. Every few days, he would update me on how things were going and ask advice about his next move.

The girl he was dating, another friend of mine, relatively unaffected by the break up, would sometimes bring up her theory behind their split. Her belief was, of course, that he was finally coming out. She was genuinely happy for his self-discovery.

Come the later weeks, the mystery man broke it off because “he just wanted to fool around, and [my friend] wanted something more.” What a surprise ending. Soon after this happened, our project reached completion and we lost touch. Recently, however, I ran into him somewhere in town, back with his girlfriend.

No matter the demeaning comments people made about these couples, their feelings were no less substantial than anyone else’s. Instead of generalizing, I was much more interested in asking questions. What was going on in these guys’ heads? Even more critically, what were these girls thinking? Were they setting themselves up for a fall? Or were these four unlikely partners tired of the run-around and just ready to settle down?

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