Your Call: Is My Boyfriend Secretly Gay?
We get a lot of advice questions coming in at EMandLO.com, but sadly, we just can’t answer them all. Which is why, once a week, we turn to you to decide how best to advise a reader. Make your call on the letter below by leaving your advice in the comments section.
Dear Em & Lo,
What are signs that your boyfriend may be secretly gay?
— Beardy
What should Beardy do? Leave your suggestions in the Comments section below.
Well I live in Paterson, NJ which is a few minutes drnivig distance from NYC and I go there at least once a week.In my experience, the most LGBT-friendly part of NYC is Greenwich Village (pronounced Gren-itch). Greenwich Village has the most LGBT people and it is in Greenwich Village where the Stonewall Inn is located. Still an LGBT bar, the Stonewall Inn was where the Stonewall Riots occured which jumpstarted the LGBT rights movement. So Greenwich Village had a lot of LGBT people before LGBT people even BEGAN to be accepted, even before San Francisco became an LGBT capital, before homosexuality was removed from the list of mental illnesses, before ANY state even decriminalized same-sex sexual behavior. Greenwich Village is in Manhatten by the way. So I definitely recommend Greenwich Village. If you cannot find a place in NYC, just a little further west right across the Hudson River, is New Jersey. NJ is pretty LGBT friendly. What NJ does, which NY does NOT do is accept transgendered people. The L’s G’s and the B’s are gaining acceptance, but the T’s still have some time to go. Just a few years ago, NJ became the first state to prohibit discrimination of Transgenders. Both NJ and NY prohibit discrimination of lesbians, gays, and bisexuals though so finding a job when you’re gay is never a problem in either one.Keep in mind, however, that NJ is cheaper than NYC.Sorry for the extra information, but I thought you’d wanna know!=) Was this answer helpful?
Look at his butt. If another man is sticking his penis in it, your boyfriend is gay.
First, I agree with Nikki – you need context. Without much more information, I doubt that you’re going to get much constructive advice.
Second, my understanding is that many (if not most) people are on a continuum between “straight” and “gay”. Someone may very well be predominately heterosexual (I’m going to assume that you are female and hetero for the purposes of this) but still enjoy gay fantasies/porn/etc. Where they are on that spectrum may be the difference from someone who loves and desires you but occasionally has gay fantasies compared to someone who is predominately homosexual and may not desire you in the way that you would like.
Last, what is your own context? I can imagine all sorts of reasons why someone would ask this question, from “I have found evidence that my partner is gay” to “I have read stories on the internet and I have begun to worry over this possibility with no clear evidence but perhaps a relationship that is unhealthy in some way” to “I am obsessively/unhealthily fixated on this possibility and will draw conclusions from shadows due to something in my past” . . .
Ultimately, beyond going over what evidence you have and your own intuition . . . might I suggest simply asking your partner and explaining why. If done with compassion, integrity, and sharing of your own feelings without being judgmental, you may find out what you really want to know. I’d also be curious if there is a question underneath the “is he gay” question, such as “am I a worthy partner” or something else deep seated.
Good luck!
Hmmm, I suspect there are two questions here. First, ‘Is he into me?’ and second, ‘Is he into guys?’ On the first, my hope would be that you could tell. I can’t help but have a prejudice with regard to women who felt blindsided by a husband who comes out as gay. My feeling is that either they were too accepting of certain problems in the relationship, or were in denial. If he IS into you, then the question should have been, ‘What are signs that my boyfriend may be secretly bisexual?’ I don’t know the answer to that, but it sounds like you have suspicions. Maybe you really wanted to ask, ‘Is my husband cheating on me with guys?’ There have been many articles written on the signs of cheating. But maybe he’s into gay hookup culture, which I don’t know everything about, but doesn’t seem like it requires much time or planning. I could imagine that the usual smoking guns wouldn’t be there. I’ve just been guessing, but do you really want to do what’s necessary to catch him going into a bath house?
What are we supposed to do with this? There’s no context. Should I send the LW my trusty copy of 101 Signs Your Boyfriend Is Secretly Gay?