If you dig deeper, this is also a story about the internet’s deeply intertwined relationship with irony.
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Falsely portraying this young girl and child star as a raging homicidal bigot is heinous, and Brown deleting her Twitter to avoid this maelstrom is a logical response to the internet’s festering orgy of toilet humor. On the surface, the meme is shocking and in poor taste. These claims are part of the #TakeDownMillieBobbyBrown meme, which consists of low-effort pictures - usually screengrabs from Brown’s Snapchat - pasted over with absurdly homophobic statements. Just like no one honestly believes that Millie Bobby Brown bullies gay men by sliding into their texts and dropping f-bombs (the one that rhymes with maggots).īut what people don’t believe doesn’t really matter, as Millie Bobby Brown, the 14-year-old star of Netflix’s Stranger Things, deactivated her Twitter account this week, reportedly in response to assertions like these. Just like no one honestly believes Millie Bobby Brown throws piping hot McCafés at people who wear pride T-shirts at McDonald’s. It’s because we refuse to learn.No one honestly believes Millie Bobby Brown runs over gay men with new cars. But if gay men don’t evolve past their own misogyny, it’s not because our sexuality gives us a pass. We can all benefit from a little education, and instead of brushing off accusations of sexism or, worse, gaslighting or female friends, we should just listen. Explain that it might be fun for him, but it’s not for her. Draw attention to their words-what they really mean, how they make her feel. I told Anna that if her male customers use language like that again, she should call them out. (Just look at all the “no femme” profiles on Grindr.) When a gay man is beaten up, or taunted as a “faggot,” it’s because he’s viewed as being like a woman. It’s an insult to walk, throw, or talk like a girl. Gay men are stereotyped as feminine because we have sex with men, and society has a negative association with femininity. Because misogyny is at the root of homophobia. Sexism among gay men persists because many of us don’t feel the need to change, especially when the hierarchy that glorifies maleness seems to benefit us.īut misogyny hurts gay men, too. We’re not immune to the cultural conditioning that comes with growing up in a society that views femininity as “weak” and “lesser.” Even if your best friends are women, that programming is difficult to break. Not all of us are gay Donald Trumps, grabbing at every woman with impunity, but enough are.īecause gay men, first and foremost, are men.
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Then there are the guys who think its fine to drunkenly toggle a woman’s breasts in a bar because he’s not attracted to her. We all know someone who loudly proclaims how grossed out he is by vaginas. Misogyny among gay men has become a major topic recently: In 2014, Rose McGowan claimed that “gay men are as misogynistic as straight men, if not more so.” Some thoughtful responses called the comparison into question, but didn’t dispute her overall premise: When it comes to treating women like whole people, not objects or accessories, a lot of queer men have work to do. These things happen so often, in fact, that she wasn’t sure if it was normal or something more insidious. “I feel bad for being so desensitized to it.” “I’ve been in the industry ten years, and I can think of tons of situations like that,” Anna explained. It’s cool, they insist, because they’re gay.
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When Anna brought up the incident to her female coworkers, they told her the guys who come in frequently often call them “bitch” and “c*nt,” and get defensive when women say they don’t like it. A customer had come in, and, when she offered assistance, he replied, “Honey, I don’t need help from you. A few weeks ago an old friend reached out to me on Facebook with a problem: Anna (not her real name) works at a high-end cosmetics store, where she regularly interacts with gay male customers, many of whom are buying eyeshadow or blush for their latest drag look.