GBF: Gay Best Friend

It's not often that an openly gay man will have crowds of women fighting over him... Unless they want him as their GBF, or Gay Best Friend.  Louis Vuitton and Gucci have nothing on the handbag that is a GBF.  Your girlfriends will turn green with envy as you rock up to Dome for coffee with this fabulous accessory.  It even feeds and cleans itself!  What I am really getting down to is the blurred lines that are forming between opposite sex friendships and 'fag-hags' using some gay men as nothing more than an accessory.  As a gay man I have countless female friends, many I joke with about being their handbag and all of who I'll call my 'fag-hags' but there is a difference.  I know these women love me and cherish my friendship.  When a lady finds out I am gay and one of their first statements is "yay someone to go shopping with", I will laugh and go along with the joke. I do after all have a sense of humour, but when they relentlessly stereotype me I know I am nothing more to them than their gay handbag!  Objectification is rampant within the gay scene.  Do we really need straight women treating us like objects?

Of course there are two sides to this story.  Some men like being the handbag friend, some love shopping and some seek to fit that stereotype of the GBF perfectly.  That is fine for them after all but like everything it comes at a price to the wider community.  How we present ourselves as individuals has the ability to reflect on all gay men and women.  Sadly society sees us a collective.  So when we objectify each other or allow others to objectify us it sets a standard for all gay-kind, and as long as this standard reaches popular culture we all must expect to be treated by it.

I for one hate shopping.  I have no comprehension of fashion.  I cannot do your make-up.  I do not wear salmon shirts.  I can't strut.  I only recently was told what a maxi dress actually was, not that I really care.  Despite this I am still surrounded by women who I love.  They're my silver lining.  They love me for me and I am not just some person to go shopping with.  I am not friends with the local mean girls, even though since coming out I've gone from that loser to that next accessory.  I am smart enough to know whats good for me and who is good for me.

So who started this trend?  We did, it was needed to achieve acceptance.  We became objects to powerful straight women.  It got us on the world stage and it pushed the world to realise we exist and we really aren't that bad.  Yet the evolution of gay culture and the merging with straight culture has somewhat ceased.  We still remain the object of the straight white woman.  Lady Gaga to Joan Rivers, who I have no doubt love us, still remain to objectify us and use us.  When a woman says "I love gay men" is she referring to all of us?  I'd hope not because there are some shitty gay men out there.  Sadly it seems that we are all just that.  We are all gay men, and we are all loved by these celebrities who are then idolised by other women and then we idolise them back.  We can't be Gaga's handbag so we will be someones who also idolises Gaga.  It is a confusing culture and it seems once you enter it you slowly lose your identity to the collective.

I am no object!  No human on this earth, straight gay, young or old is an object.  It's about time we set new standards for ourselves and fight for the recognition as the individuals we are.  It is time to be proud of ourselves!

Way to reinforce the twink stereotype!