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Throughout the study, I encountered several gay men who had protected women from unwanted sexual contact, only to turn and blame those same women for their own victimization. Conversely, men I spoke with—whether bears (gay lingo for a stocky, hairy, stereotypically masculine guy) or twinks (lithe, boyish, and stereotypically feminine-presenting men), hypermasculine or feminine—frequently blamed men more effeminate than them for causing aggression in gay bars. Just as in straight bars, where women did not cause certain instances of aggression that they faced, gendered and sexist stereotypes were placed upon effeminate men.Feminine men were repeatedly described as acting like they were on soap operas; one masculine guy I interviewed hilariously told me that a slapping fight between two young twinks in the French Quarter was like watching "Gays of Our Lives." Others made reference to "pissy queens" and a disdain for feminine men so strong that they would rule out going to certain bars to avoid them. One bear I interviewed recalled threatening violence against a twink at one point for simply talking to his boyfriend. In both straight and gay bars, twinks and women were blamed for instances of aggression such as these that they did not directly provoke. That said, the extent to which I witnessed or observed actual aggression involving effeminate gay men, aside from narratives of verbal arguments or slapping fights, was zero.[It's] the infamous and supposed Madonna-Whore Complex (the idea some men "want to have sex with a 'slut' but not go out with one,") manifested as neatly and awfully between gay men as it is with straight.
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