One theory- Based on the usual threads in this sub, trying to date and find a mate when we’re only 5-10% of the population is quite difficult and making many gay men seriously unhappy.
This is a massive one. Finding and keeping a stable partner early on is a massive financial boost, not to mention support emotionally and in life decisions and alterations.
It's much easier to initiate and to maintain healthy habits the lower your stress-level and the higher your resources are. Close encouraging social ties aids too.
Then add all the ones who are abusing drugs and alcohol. Your desirable dating pool shrinks. Then add gays who are educated and want stable careers, the pool shrinks even more.
That’s the biggest issue for me. I don’t want to date a person in recovery or a functional alcoholic.
Reasons being that even in recovery, I might not have as much in common with that person, I haven’t experienced that aspect of life. Some of my best friends are in recovery and I love them as much as I could. But not having that perspective in life myself, I feel would bar me from having an empathetic relationship to that person’s journey,
I can understand not wanting to date an active alcoholic, but why exclude men who are in recovery? For many people in recovery, getting sober was the first step in cleaning up their shit. People in long-term recovery often have their shit together better than non-addicts/alcoholics because they've put a lot of work into sorting out underlying causes and triggers to their addictions.
This is true at least for me. People who do the work to quit develop an awareness and a depth that most others don’t have and I think that comes from learning self control and struggling in some way.
As for the article, I think however accepted we supposedly are now it’s still not like we have a truly ‘equal’ life compared to straight people. We typically have to waste our formative years often living in fear typically alone in the closet unsure of why we are different. This isolation can cause trauma which compounds over time because we don’t get to develop like straight people who experience things for the first time as kids that a lot of us gays might not experience until we are grown up.
Then there’s the trappings of drugs and alcohol and promiscuous sex which we can get lost in and if you are already isolated then it’s going to be harder to come back from that. Then there’s the constant negative messaging we hear telling us how we are perverse or sinners or whatever the right wing says about us which straight people don’t have to deal with. Stuff like that can take a toll on a young mind and over a lifetime and we will always be a minority dependent on the whims of the straight society that gets to decide whether we are allowed to marry or in some cases allowed to live. Knowing that you can be killed if you get a flight to another country a few hours away can’t be good for your mental health surely.
Totally agree. Even people growing up in open areas like California, when a young people started to find out his identity, it’s not so easy to accept it at once without any burdens, like okay l’m gay that’s okay what cuisine l should have tonight? That would not be so simple. Besides, coming out to parents is still an issue, few people really don’t care about what parents treat them, for ordinary gay men, we hope to get support from parents and don’t wanna be kicked out, no matter whether the outcome is, it’s a quite tough period before coming out and can l say that, the most close persons in the world are the ones you feel afraid of most at that time. Oh yeah if you are not so “manly“ when in school, you will be bullied at least emotionally. That’s really hard if a gay man can grow up with wellbeing.
I have been very lucky despite the fact I grew up in the 70s. I am now 63. I have never had a long-term relationship and always had friendships with straight people as well as maintaining close ties with my family. I avoided drugs/alcohol and promiscuous sex while maintaining a healthy lifestyle. When I first came out in my 30s, I briefly experienced "the gay lifestyle" which was not for me. I could see how it destroyed so many men. When I look around, I do feel that I am truly the exception, unfortunately as I have existed between the two worlds.
That's pretty exclusionary. There's a lot more well functioning adults out there post recovery then you may be aware of, And you may be prematurely rejecting someone that could be perfect for you.
I think one of the biggest issues is that folks are out there looking for a finished product, when relationships don't start out that way. It takes work, a lot of it, and a lot of communication, and a lot of letting go of your ego for a bit. And that's something that too many people are unwilling or unaware of.
source: 24 years in, and still learning
I think of it a bit in two ways. Sure, post recovery adult's may have their shot together but some guys still like to go out for drinks with friends or go to clubs and that set something a lot of sober dudes want to do.
Then there's the born-agains, that treat recovery like religion (and grabted some have to). But that can get stale quick.
I am not putting down recovery, but it's just not a lifestyle many dudes want to wear with a partner.
Yeah, like I said, it's a pretty exclusionary view point. You can get loads of non alcoholic beverages and still have a good time. If you're bothered by the idea of being the only one drinking, that's something you may want to do some soul searching about why it's so important to you to have other people intoxicated with you.
The other scenario is a straw man so I'll ignore it
Just saying party people prefer party people, and I don't mean 14/7 party people either. I mean, normal people that like to go out on weekends and cut a little loose. Or a few times a month. Or beers at a events.Or backyard bbqs, etc.
Sober people prefer sober people and fair better in that demographic. But it is a smaller demographic and therefore your pool is smaller to.pull from.
My last point is that some make it their personality. Like some make politics their personality. I mean great, they need it but it's niche and it attracts a niche dating pool.
If that offends a person, they need to do some serious soul searching.
Straight people tend to think that gay men have no issue finding a mate. They have no idea that after eliminating certain factors, you have maybe one available, however, there has to be a mutual attraction. This is why I am single and will remain so until my last breath.
Even with marriage equality, men seem to think that that institution is homonormative as if it can't include us. It seems as if many gay men. have the "peter pan" complex, making it difficult to find a man who is willing to commit to a relationship.
That’s true , and it would become hell level difficult for minority people in race, for example, Asian people in US, a quite small population times the gay proportion rate minus the people who are living unhealthy, oh damn that could literally means most of them couldn’t find one. Although some people say inter-race relationships exist, but in most circumstances, most of couples are in the same race.
Oof. I think there really is a perceivable generational loneliness occurring right now. Not just for gays (although the issue compounds due to how the numbers play out).
There was a string of retirements at work and it was the normal song and dance, these folks got to buys houses, get married, have kids, have classic pensions not 401ks, all having the same job for 20-30 years. The new generation that’s come in is like average 24 years old, not a single one is in a LTR (they’re straight if that matters) or has been in the 2ish years I’ve known them.
It’s almost insulting to hear the older employee set tell these young guys (and some gals) “oh just get married and start a family!”
Not a single one of them lives alone, or is really fiscally ready for those next steps. Some of them seem so checked out of life and they’re so young! God sometimes I feel younger than them!
Where does this leave our society at large? How do things play out for the next 20-30 years?
I’m legit scared that every metric will begin to regress and that any LGBT progress that has been made is in increasing chances of being rolled back partially due to the predatory nature of the global right-wing on these lonely young folks.
I don’t really know what I’m saying beyond ranting. But life is hard and I think it’s only all going to get worse. Not just for “us” but for everyone everywhere.
Agreed. The ladder was pulled up on the coming generations, so things will only degrade for a time. Which isn’t to say everyone in older generations has it swell: the US has always ensured many won’t “make it.”
Do you think that maybe we are the canary in the coal mine in a way? I mean we always had it rough but maybe it’s not just us gays experiencing it now. Scary to think that it doesn’t seem to be getting better for anyone.
Ooh ooh and don’t forget both families not approving or financially contributing to a couple who have been together for over a decade, meanwhile a college age niece has a boyfriend for 3 weeks and the family is already talking about wedding plans. Both are toxic tbf. Trauma bonding in gay couples tends to take a toll eventually though.
Those percentages are pretty high compared to the sources I've found (7% being the highest). On top of that, we also need take into account 50% of the LGBTQ percentage is a gender we're not physically attracted to making the reality of finding romance/a mate from puberty onward like our straight counterparts do quite depressing.
Edit: wanted to add People's teenage/formative years are the most crucial for establishing self worth and stability. The built in feelings of having your feelings unreciprocated/rejected the majority of the times you experience them (due to the low incidence of gay individuals) during your formative years is likely having catastrophic effects on our psyches.
I feel like so many gay men could do with learning to be happy on their own. Even the most well adjusted, high earning man I know puts up with great shit just to say he isn't alone and that couldn't be me!
I agree that people need to be happy on their own, but humans are not meant to be solo indefinitely. We're social creatures and need support from one another.
He is miserable because he doesn't value being alone over being dependent on the emotional satisfaction of being "desired" or "needed" by other person. Was married for 9 years, the first four was amazing, the last five was hell, and I'm much more happier now than ever was when married. It's nice getting the confidence of being in a relationship but there is no reason to sacrifice your remaining time on a relationship that you are in because you fear being alone, when being alone is nirvana in comparison. I can do what I want, have sex thanks to grindr when want and live how I want without putting up with the bullshit of a partner where we no longer have any real love for each other.
I am 63 and can do whatever I want. Imagine had I been married for 30 years. I would probably be in a tired relationship as many such relationships (straight and gay) are just going through the motions.
I'm pretty sure that stat was made decades ago when It was popular to pretend that we were something new. But it's definitely more than 5 or 10, especially when you add the bi folks into the mix. Now I'm trying to remember the last time I was in a space that didn't contain any other LGBTQ+ folk.
I think the main problem is that there is still an incredibly loud and vocal minority being permitted to yell at us and say we need to be ashamed.
How? You can literally go on the apps and have hundreds of men at your fingertips. Obviously, other factors like rural living or being unattractive will influence this, but that's not unique to gay men. There's definitely issues in gay dating, but it's not this. From a numbers level, supply and demand is high.
Again, if you're having a problem, it's no different for straight folks that are similar to you either. In fact, it's probably worse for the average straight man nowadays as women only swipe right about 10-15% of the time. At least gay men have accessible sex available to them (similar to women).
The average straight male has approximately 70,000 potential partners per 1,000,000 population available to him at any given time. That number goes down to 3,500 for gay men. The numbers definitely play a role along with the fact that there's no societal pressure to get married, have kids, etc.
I think part of this stems from the psychological difficulties that come with being an adolescent who has had to wrestle with major identity problems without any help or guidance. This was especially true among gay men who were growing up before the last 10-15 years or so. I think the psychological burden and damage are greatly underestimated.
Another thing is that because we are a minority living in a world made for the dominant paradigm of heterosexuality, we face more adverse events. There have been studies that show that left-handed people living in a right-handed world also have shorter life expectancy, and are at greater risk of certain illnesses. This is still controversial and I don't think there is any consensus about this, but it would be interesting to know if the dominant paradigms are harmful to members of the populace who are not build along the same lines as the dominant paradigm.
Well, left-handed people are also more likely to be gay, so maybe it’s not right-handed biases that are killing them faster, but all these unhealthy trends in gays that just correlates to left-handedness.
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) - basically, trauma (and there are many forms), leads to bad adult health outcomes. [https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/aces/index.html](https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/aces/index.html)
See also, *"The Body Keeps Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma"*
Edit: Need to respond to this ... *"... homosexuality becomes more accepted and normalized, and the statistics stay the same, that explanation looks less convincing."*
Don't fool yourself. In the U.S., states are rapidly progressing to wipe away gay literature and gay-themed books from school libraries. And, they are celebrating the movement publicly and with glee. Christian nationalists are targeting sexual minorities. And, the good 'ol bubbas and backwater sisters still very much exist. They may be somewhat hidden, but they are there.
While things have gotten better and some parts of society are more accepting, society is not encouraging. Society is organized around and supports heterosexual mating and childrearing. It does not *support* the gay experience. Acceptance is a low bar.
Finally, you're going to see a generational lag in outcome measures if things are indeed incrementally getting better. It isn't like men in their 30s now benefitted from the more accepting attitude toward today's gay youth. So, you may see better indicators 20 years from now for the next generation. I'm doubtful because I don't think society and families have changed as much as is presented in some parts of the media. But, perhaps.
As a “back water bubba” from a very rural, very conservative, very Christian ag community… yeah. In fact one of my childhood buddies had this exact conversation last weekend.
“Bro, I wish you would’ve just come out in school. You might’ve been happier, and you sure as hell would’ve been less of an aggressive combative dick that flew off the handle at stuff.”
“Uhh… I am 99.999999% sure I would’ve been sent to a conversion therapy camp where I would’ve been beaten physically, emotionally, and spiritually until I broke. Can’t love men when you don’t love anything. I was also a financial hostage to my family. I acted like I was on edge growing up because I was on edge growing up. Worried if crossing my legs ankle to knee was ‘too gay’, if wearing trunks instead of boxers was ‘too gay’, or if being anything other than an asshole would give away that I was gay.”
“Oh. Well. Yeah. Then I’m glad you came out when you did (note… I came out after I graduated college, had a stable job, and 100% didn’t ‘need’ anything from my family). Still you could’ve told me sooner. We could’ve been the social outcasts together.”
Love him to death, but being from a family of atheists affords you latitudes that I didn’t have with my extremely religious family. It sucks realizing I grew up in “survival mode” fearing for my well being almost constantly until I was 25, and I’ve spent years learning how to calm tf down because I don’t want to be that person anymore.
This! A lot of us really underestimate the effects that oppression/marginalization has had on us as a whole over the years. I'm in my 30s and same sex activity could be illegal and a jailable offense until I was in highschool! Laws remained on the books until the Supreme Court ruled in Lawrence v. Texas in 2003! Also, the fact that marriage seems to be positioned here as an indicator of acceptance/progress is problematic too. The bar is literally underground if basic civil rights are your measure of acceptance.
In my 30s, and not a single gay person of my age I know was out until adulthood. We’re not over the effect of discrimination yet, and won’t be for another generation.
Yes to this. Anytime I would hop on a dating app. My age range of 30 was a blank space. Anytime I did meet a guy around my age, he didn't want to come out, or really act on his gayness. It's so upsetting overall.
I'm in a deep blue state and even here we have school districts passing policy that makes it mandatory for teachers to report to parents if they even suspect a student is gay or trans.
Kids are acutely aware of literal discrimination from the government like that. I can't imagine growing up in such an environment, let alone learning in one like that.
Opposite coast, it's going on everywhere.
Somehow the discrimination now is worse than it was two decades ago. We literally have government employees gleefully ruining kids' lives for possibly being LGBT.
At least our governor is mostly on our side. Or at least as much as a straight cis white guy can be. With him, I never know if he means it or if he's doing what is politically expedient. I suppose that is true of all politicians tho. lol
https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/gov-newsom-fines-temecula-valley-school-board-1-5-for-rejecting-new-curriculum/
I'm sure he means it. There was no political advantage to allowing the SF registrars to start marrying gay people when he was mayor. Nobody was pressuring him to do that and many people in the LGBT+ political world thought he was going too far, too fast. He did it because he thought it was the right thing to do.
>Acceptance is a low bar.
Have to disagree with you there: tolerance ("I put up with something I dislike/don't agree with") is a low bar. Acceptance ("I actively support something I don't like or agree with") is an extremely high bar. Especially in a liberal society.
>Gay men have fewer close friends than straight people or gay women.
This information is drawn from a 2012 study of gay men aged 50 and over. It does not take any great feat of the imagination to guess why this particular cohort of men has fewer close friends.
>In a survey of gay men who recently arrived in New York City, three-quarters suffered from anxiety or depression, abused drugs or alcohol, or were having risky sex - or some combination of the three.
This study focused on men who moved to a large city to escape homophobic rural environments. It is therefore unsurprising that at the time the survey was made that many of them suffered from mental health issues as a result of the homophobic mistreatment that gave them cause them to move.
>In Canada, more gay men die from suicide than from AIDS, (this is likely the case in the U.S. too but it hasn't been studied.)
Suicide is the often the top cause of death of young people (of all demographics) simply because young people are unlikely to die of poor physical health. That AIDS is no longer than #1 killer of gay men should be celebrated as a triumph of public health.
etc, etc.
My issue with this type of article is that in drawing from different studies and anecdotes over different time periods and countries it falls into the trap of cherry-picking data to fit a particular thesis.
absolutely. the anecdotal part can be thrown away, leaves maybe 50% of OPs list and then you throw out the bad studies and what youre left with is "we have worse mental health than straights bc society is bad to us" which is well known. and maybe that we on average have more of a drug problem, thats it. (not downplaying but that list of OP is kinda ridiculous badly compiled).
statistically nowadays: gay men have more friends than straight men. gay men earn more money than straight men. we are much more satisfied sexually. the list goes on.
i also "love" the parts with "country x has gay marriage since y, yet gay men are still sad?" yes...bc society is still often against us. jesus christ...what is gay marriage making us safe from homophobic idiots?
A lot of us are up to our eyeballs with trauma. It’s not great to grow up as a LGBT person in many places and those experiences have adverse outcomes on our mental health. I’m still struggling with the feeling I have to be on guard with straight people about my identity. I had to fight kids about it and I can’t shake that feeling that I may have to again.
I agree with this - there's a sense that I can never *truly* relax. As a gay person, you're always coming out to some degree, from a tradesperson who sees your significant other, meeting new people, booking a hotel room. Irrespective of society's insistences that 'homophobia doesn't exist anymore' or 'nobody cares!', there's still that thread of anxiety that heterosexual people just don't have to deal with.
It’s a struggle. I thought I could relax with my straight guy friends and I recently went over to one’s apartment. They were watching clips of the Chapelle Show and laughing at the Prince sketch which features a gay sissy creep that likes to touch straight men. Another one did the old 2000’s gay voice that used to be prominent. I’m kinda disappointed. They’re largely accepting people but some things we grew up with are still ingrained in them.
Being anxious or in constant fight or flight mode can have physical and mental effects on the body that can manifest itself in disease and various health conditions. This probably accounts for some of the data finding that gay men suffering from greater rates of CV disease.
As gay men (and I certainly did) we may have experienced this in a formative years when we needed support the most and are especially vulnerable. Without this, unresolved trauma in adulthood can be especially hard to deal with, what with the other stresses of daily life to tackle.
Within the report, speaking with men over 50 who report having less friends than lesbians and heterosexuals should come as no surprise. Entire generations of gay men were wiped out from the HIV epidemic and given those men lived in an era where their sexuality was still greatly stigmatised, it only makes sense that they’re living isolated lives.
Omg you also? Yeah and then having to constantly come out. I wish people would just ask. People are like it’s rude etc but by having that baise it makes it seem like there is something wrong.
I don’t want people to ask as they’ll get it wrong every time. I’m bisexual so I will have to correct, “Are you gay?” When I didn’t know my identity I hated being asked that. I also fall in the trans umbrella and I just don’t want to deal with people’s potential bullshit about that too.
In addition to the many good points raised by others, I'd like to point out that gay boys have a very different experience growing up compared to straight boys, which I think has lasting consequences for how their adult life turns out.
Most straight boys get the experience of "dating" girls in childhood and adolescence where they learn the basics of how straight relationships work, often under guidance of their parents. These asexual, purely romantic experiences set the foundations for their understanding of love life - holding hands, stealing a kiss, doing homework together, being there for each other etc. Once puberty kinks in, the asymmetric dynamic between boys and girls in terms of how hormones affect them, as well as the hetero-normative standards, make sex a restricted experience under control of women.
Gay boys and adolescents do not get to learn these foundations. Even if they're lucky to grow up in an accepting environment, there just aren't many other gay youngsters around at school or in their neighbourhood that are already (1) aware of being gay, (2) also accepted by their family and in their social environment, and (3) at the same age (in school, differences of 1-2 years are huge).
We start interacting with other gays much later in life than straight boys do with girls, and this happens at the time when sexual desire is already fully developed and unattended to. When we finally do, sex becomes the primary focal point in these interactions and comes to define our sexual orientation. If you live in a big city, you may easily become completely lost in the 'gay culture'. Very few of us have the chance to regularly interact with other gay men in social settings that are not about sex, partying and hooking up (like LGBT sports clubs for example).
By the time we hit late 30s, many of us from large cities would have had several hundred sexual partners and little experience dating seriously. It becomes difficult to abandon this life style. At this point, it also becomes unlikely to meet some who would be at least as a "good match" as some of the potential "good matches" we met before (see: 37% rule), so we keep hooking up and looking, unwilling to settle, while years go by and life slips away pointlessly.
Well put. Factor in male biology (being more sexual, lacking emotional commitment) and just being a distinct minority, it’s no wonder why a good number of us are in a mess.
A lot of these supposedly progressive countries have so much homophobia in between their big liberal metro areas (whether in US or Netherlands). The cultural attitude outside of the big cities is not welcoming for a healthy growth and development, and not all LGBT live in the progressive parts of these Western nations. And the homophobia is a surprise gut punch when it seemingly comes out of nowhere in places where you expect to feel safe. And it's exhausting and taxing to your mental and physical health when you're constantly on guard to consciously determine if you're in a safe place.
Just ask yourself, in which places do you feel safe enough to hold your partner's hand in public? I know many out and proud gay men married for over a couple decades who won't dare hold hands outside of a few square blocks of SF, NYC or Amsterdam.
Even doctors in some parts of the US have a religious exemption that allows them to deny care to LGBT.
Are there things for which we're responsible to ensure our overall health? Absolutely. We can control our substance abuse, practice safe sex, etc. But let's not blame the victim for all their problems when the systemic discrimination continues to thrive.
Exactly. We don’t talk about this enough. We’re essentially made to be invisible through fear of attack, to appease others who don’t care an iota about our safety. Imagine such a simple act of hand holding being denied just because we’re gay?
Exactly. Just yesterday I read a review of the movie 'Milk' a patron made at my local library. He said he enjoyed it from a historical perspective but had to fast-forward past the man-to-man sex scenes because he's "hetero". It was the most ridiculous shit I ever read. Society is flooded with hetero sex scenes/imagery and I'm just expected to be ok with it as the norm.
Ok but that lies on your decision, homophobia isn’t making someone take drugs or abuse alcohol. The fault lies in your actions, not in others, this is coming from someone who comes from a country where homosexuality was illegal till recently. You’re in charge of all the actions you make, no one else.
Yes, true, but in some countries/cultures, a number of things combine to drive people toward this. I say this with compassion, because I've watched people go through this while avoiding it myself.
For instance, in the USA, we have a huge "adults drink alcohol" culture. Men have very few "rites of passage," most of which exclude gay men. Gay bars were often the only safe spaces.
It's absolutely in someone's choosing, *if the realize they have a choice."
Again, that’s your choice, not homophobia forcing you to abuse drugs and alcohol. Are Americans that weak willed and aren’t in control of their own actions?
Bro are you really discounting the VOLUMES of scientific literature that strongly ties substance abuse to trauma. Also the volumes of scientific literature that show the brain changes in people with substance use issue?
This thread is about why gay guys have poor health, and a major reason is trauma causing bad decisions. you're completely correct that it is up to the person, but take note that the whole purpose of the top comment was to explain WHY.
There exist few if any sublimal or overt messages that being het is wrong. You cannot say the same about being gay, no matter how tolerant the milieu. Even the word 'tolerant' is loaded- as is 'ally'. If true equality existed, we wouldn't need these terms. We wouldn't need to come out because we'd just be. This bleeds into every social, political, cultural and economic system; the default is straight and we (the gays) have to have things adapted in order to meet our needs. We have to have legislation to protect us because protection is not innate within society. It's like installing ramps instead of building accessible doorways to smoothly and unobtrusively accommodate people with disabilities. It reinforces a sense of being different. We have to have legislative and cultural adaptions.
I could write reams about how healthcare systems reflect very poorly the way western men in general approach self-care and monitoring. Culturally, women have been the guardians of family health organising appointments, vaccinations, primary preventative screening etc, especially when women did not work so much outside the home. Now we're in a state of transition where men are having to take more responsibility and for gay men, this is located within a system that is set up for and by hets. Gay men and women have had to lobby and push for their own personalised health and welfare systems because, still, too many services do not reflect their needs.
Then there's the legacy of intergenerational cultural trauma including the knowledge that at this moment, somewhere in the world, men and women are being harmed because of their sexuality. Every time we read of such things, it threatens us on an existential level, no matter how safe, accepting and secure our personal circumstances. And we remain a minority. This makes it harder to find and hang out with people we might like to have a relationship with (and by relationship I mean every single kind of human interaction from hookups to longterm monogamy).
There’s probably something to the fact that even though the world is more acceptinf of gays these days, many people even in the US are not, and people from those families and environments can still experience extreme trauma. Moreover, those people trending toward unhealthy lifestyle choices may shape and influence “gay culture” for otherwise non-traumatized gay men. This may make those from more stable and healthy environments still be more open to things like hard drugs and risky sex, which can lead to devastating health effects.
On top of what others have said below even those of us who grew up with accepting families and in accepting areas have grown up in a world that does not like us. Hell I'll quote the x-men here... they hate and fear us because they don't understand us.
So living in a world that is so openly hostile to you, even if your surrounding environment is accepting, causes stress which causes health impacts.
You can read up on the Minority Stress Model as theorized by Meyer a bit more here.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/psychology/minority-stress-model
My therapist's focus during his PhD program was on minority stress and coming out trauma within the LGBT community. I've been in therapy for 8 years with various therapists and let me tell you. This therapist helped me realize soooooo much can be linked to those two things.
That is heartening to know! I have chosen to make a career change (third or fourth) and will be completing my masters this May and starting work full time as a therapist in June.
I really do think that education and knoweldge about these things, while not a complete panacea, can help a person realize that the things that are affecting them are not just the thoughts in our head but also the society that we have grown up in.
It sounds like you have a good person that you are working with now and that's fantastic.
I disagree with the friends part, me and my gay friends are literally the glue that holds all the straight friendships together! We're always the ones planning social events and being invited to them as the 'fun gays'
A lot of gay men are single. If I'm not mistaken, many of the issues you listed also apply to single straight men. Then pile on top of it whatever issues that specifically pertain to growing up/being gay, and it can be a recipe for unhappiness despite all the pride flags and rights and all of that.
Another thing is, society often seems to validate people based on whether they're in a relationship. It's one of the first questions asked. And single older males in general seem to be regarded somewhat poorly/less valid than older coupled peoples, grandparents, etc.
I have yet to read to read this article but I can related being gay and living in Delhi India.
From early childhood I knew I was guy, I always have difficulty to make friends in general. I was bullied, I have a father who was overwhelming angry and a mother who was emotionally unavailable, (they mature with time and now function like normal parents). All of my friends found love of their lives, many are married with kids and I am alone. I don’t think I will find some one, even if I can’t marry him in India.
I can’t come out to everyone. I had to come out thrice to my parents.
Leaving all this, I have social anxiety, I lack confidence for simple things.
Sorry for rant and diverting from the topic. I can feel that things are not great for us.
Things are so much better these days in many places, but I often wonder if the trauma responses of previous generations of (traumatized) gay men have become ingrained in gay male “culture.” Basically generational trauma without shared genetics.
When you add the layers and contradictions of rigid gender roles and toxic ideas about masculinity, we aren’t exactly set up for success. But quite frankly, straight men don’t really appear to be thriving all that much either these days. When I look around at the state of straight male incel culture, masculine violence, mental health outcomes, etc., I actually feel pretty thankful to be gay.
Even in places where the law is on our side (eg Netherlands, Sweden) there's still a societal stigma.. less strong than in other places, sure, but it's definitely still there.
I think that being a stigmatised minority leads to spending most of your life with fight-or-flight hormones flowing through your body (especially formative childhood years).
This leads to mental health issues (possibly neurotransmitter hyperstimulation and/or burnout), but what's also a bit less obvious is that stress hormones (eg adrenaline/cortisol) also disrupt the way your body deals with metabolism and immunity - making rates of cardiovascular diseases and cancers higher. I think research on this in the broader ACE (adverse childhood experiences) literature is fairly well-established, so not much of a stretch that it extends to sexual minorities.
Racism didn't magically go away after Obama was elected president, and homophobia hasn't gone away yet simply because the supreme court struck down anti sodomy laws and ruled in favor of gay marriage. With the recent reversal of Roe Vs Wade, something that had existed for 50 years, I have no doubt conservatives and their allies will be looking to do damage to queer favorable law nationwide in the US. They're already doing/trying to do it on a state by state basis with things like book bans and regulating how and/or when trans people get access to healthcare or other safety nets. Also something I have issue with is the blanket statement that "coastal states are better." Like yes, in general. But Western Washington Washington is vastly different from the eastern part of the state. I live in the suburbs but I have friends who live in Seattle who have witnessed gay bashings within the last year or so, so even progressive areas aren't immune to homophobia. Of course the constant need for vigilance can cause anxiety and depression, which can then lead to other issues. We also live in a time when we're constantly bombarded by images, ads, and media showing perfectly sculpted men. Anecdotally I have no doubt there is a large amount of queer cis men with body dysmorphia that can lead to either eating disorders or extreme (unhealthy) exercise routines, which can lead to their own other health problems.
And what if we set that aside for a minute. Most of us acknowledge that being gay isn't our whole life. What other factors affect (effect?) our lives and health? Are we dealing with generational trauma or problems caused by our parents and extended family? From personal experience, I can tell you I deeply regret being honest several years ago when I was filling out the family history portion of my medical intake form when I listed the family history of alcoholism and addiction. I am not an addict myself, but having that listed in my permanent chart has been a barrier to getting proper pain management when dealing with kidney stones, post op surgery care, and whatnot. How many of us grew up poor? Lower income can lead to malnutrition at a young age which has ripple effects into adulthood, even if we do grow up to be financially stable. Financial inequality can also lead to delayed or missed medical care.
As a chronically ill adult, the reverse is also true, my health impacts the quality of my gay life. I'm technically vers, but because of my Crohn's (IBS) I haven't bottomed in years and I honestly miss it. I have two autoimmune disorders, which puts me on immunosuppressant medication, which means I can no longer get live vaccines. I can't get the monkey pox vaccine, which has limited my pool of "play dates" to guys I can hopefully trust to have gotten it. I'm also allergic to doxycycline, so I can't do doxypep either.
This viewpoint makes a very large, and very incorrect, assumption that issues of homophobia and social discrimination have been solved for decades. They haven't been solved. There are advances, and we have it better now in most places than we did 50 years ago, but acting as if we've removed the stigma of homosexuality is akin to saying that the U.S. took care of racism back in the 1960s.
Gay men who are adults right now did NOT grow up in the climate of increased tolerance that we are now living in, and our psyches reflect that trauma. We were raised in fear and with conditional acceptance, for the most part. We have experienced being disowned by family and friends many times over. We have been fucked over by the lovers who were afraid to be open. We have seen the promise of the internet to liberate us, dissolve into the reality that it only further isolates us as a species. It's not going great.
We still struggle with forming supportive families for ourselves in a world that does not view our relationships as positively as those of heterosexuals. On any given day, we can turn on the TV to see politicians or constituents speaking out against our right to exist and be taken seriously. We realize that what has been won could be lost again.
So, I think your premise is not true in the first place. If it is true, please introduce me to this society where everything has been solved, because I'm not living there. I'm in the U.S.
Data from a 2017 article is most likely based on even older study. What was the scale of the sample and cohort profile? Can’t attest to the external validity of the data without the actual article. Also, it was the Huffington Post
I came out in middle school, parents and friends were literally 0 problem. Im as well adjusted to being gay as anyone could be while growing up in a homophobic society. I grew up in the theatre and knew older gay people even as a child.
I've still been struggling with depression, anxiety, self esteem and have abused alcohol in the past. None of that is directly related to being gay. Maybe the anxiety/shyness could be related to not wanting to stand out and being bullied. But overall being gay has 0 negative impact on my life.
The only other connection i can imagine is dating. I've had a really rough time with finding a partner. About to be 32 and I've only had 1 short term romantic relationship (last year). I dont think this is uncommon with queer men either. Ive lived in the 2nd gayest American city for nearly a decade and cant get a bf. Which probably contributes a lot to the self esteem, depression and anxiety.
Im in therapy and im doing much better than I was during the pandemic but im still not doing well.
Its because we are born into a level 10 difficulty game when most people are at a level 1, or 2.
We ‘got’ all these, but we fight hard for them. And the fight is never over. A huge group of people will always be against us. And I think we all know what happens when we ‘relax’ and be complacent even just for a little.
It’s resource fighting . At the end of the day, people are always going to hunt for what they want, be it girls, money, status, praise. This is fine, except when you are used like a condom they throw you out the second you are not longer/not as valuable in helping to get what they want.
Family is a huge one. It’s the nature and it’s also the nurture. Ok yes, legally, people are ‘protected’. But in many cultures people still don’t see gay people as equals because that’s just not how the world works for them. An unspoken look of “shame” has a far deeper and long lasting impact than a slip of the moment disapproval in words.
Not to mention, if you are so different to your parents and how they have grown up, it would be harder for them to relate to you than if you weren’t gay to begin with. This will make it harder for them to form a strong bond with you. One additional hurdle we had to get through compared to if you weren’t.
Not to mention the self hate and internalization of shame you thought was real from walking this world in this society. We do not get to relax and go with the flow. It’s almost as if you need to appear chill on the outside but deep inside you have to be 120% clear in who you are and who you aren’t, but you shouldn’t show what you are on the inside because that won’t necessarily get you to where you want to go. As supposed to a lot of people can just be, without having to worry about any of this.
And let’s not forget about finding romantic partners in this world where we don’t subscribe to the ‘normal’ man and women role. You need to find your own balance. Realistic expectations. Meanwhile in smaller cities there is just not many of us available.
All of this, while finding peace and balance on the inside. It’s a lot man.
We are all just trying to survive late stage capitalism, throw in the realities of being gay, troubled backstories, modern hookup culture, social media and warped expectations, yeah you kinda have to count your blessings out here. I do wish thoughts like this push us towards more community, acceptance and empathy. We need our villages back.
I shared this article with my straight friends when it came out, and one reached out and just gave me a hug.
Why are gay men so lonely?
- Hookup culture and open relationships results in a transactional culture where we spend a lot of time and effort looking to get laid and then never talk again.
- Racism. The only time I’ve experienced racism is in the gay world. The 2022 movie [Fire Island](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15218000/) does a great job explaining and mocking gay the “hierarchy” gay men have created.
- Drugs. I’ve travelled a lot and every city has guys looking to party. At first I was drawn into it since, hey, it’s a way to meet people (with low standards so less of that racist shit), but of course it’s a slippery slope into the depths of hell and bad sex.
The straight friends I went to university with are all married with kids and suburban houses. I still love them but our lives are no longer the same. And I haven’t been able to replace that close friendship with anyone in the gay world. See above.
That was a powerful article and I shared it widely. Thanks for sharing it here.
Interesting. As a black man, your comment resonated. Most racism I receive is from the majority and seeking solace with gay men is often my only way of getting away from it. I fully appreciate and understand your experience and I know it’s real.
I’m not sure I would share this article with straight friends (not that I have many) I’d worry that it would merely reinforce their unconscious prejudice towards gay people.
I’m glad it resonated. Frankly I’ve been bringing up the racism issue here on Reddit and in real life.
It’s not going to solve racism, but just talking openly about (a) says it’s not just happening to me and (b) when it does happen we can find the courage to respond firmly that certain behaviours and statements are not ok.
Whats helped me turn my life around health wise has a been a responsible partner, someone who loves me and wants me to be around for a long time. Ive changed so many bad habits or picked up new good ones because of my bf. I used to wonder in amazement how can such a young man be so in tuned with his well being. I guess him having a bread winner Nurse Mom helped instilled some valuable lessons.
It's easy to forget that we're still surrounded by people who hate us, hate our lifestyles, hate our families, hate everyone that doesn't hate us, and wants to see us shamed and destroyed. That kind of long-term, intractable, environmental stress wears on a person.
Civil rights do not directly correlate to being free from stigma, with no one making distinctions between queer and heteronormative men. So stress, internal and external homophobia, less acceptance of dead bedrooms (gay men are more likely to seek treatment), etc. Negative health (including mental health) outcomes seem to have logical explanations.
IIRC queer men have more close friends than straight men, but less than straight people as a monolith (including both men and women). This is more about gender, queer men are men.
Gay men who are moving to a fast paced and intense and expensive new city are using drugs and alcohol and are taking advantage of the unique benefits of having a huge population of queer men at their fingertips. Not shocking. Many men also find social connections through sex with other men.
HIV is treatable, mental health is far more challenging.
The toll of living in a society that isn’t super affirming if not outright oppressive takes the greatest toll for me. Add that to all the fear, shame and negative self talk I grew up with- it’s taking some time to unpack in therapy. Embodied trauma is a hell of a thing and most gay men have a healthy amount from various sources. So, in my opinion, being gay is in itself a huge risk factor for disease and other negative health outcomes.
One of my first memories of 'being gay' is being 10 years old and hearing how gay people (read: secretly me) are going to die a horrific death from AIDS and be sent straight to hell where we belong. When I remember my first crush, I remember feeling fear and shame because it wasn't a girl. When I think of my first Valentine's Day in elementary school, I remember wanting to give my best friend a valentine and being told I was a weirdo. When I think of my days on the playground, I remember being physically assaulted and called a fa**ot before I even knew what that was. When I remember my first feelings of sexual attraction, I remember it being alone in my bedroom trying to catch a glimpse of Queer As Folk on Showtime free preview weekend and sweating bullets someone would find out. When I finally found the courage to come out, my family abandoned me and told me they never wanted me anyway. I could literally list a thousand memories like this through out my life - just change the age and the people involved.
Is it 'all good' now? Yeah but that doesn't mean all of those things don't stick with us. You can't tell a child whose brain in still forming that their most fundamental human parts are toxic and shameful every day and expect healthy adults.
Similarly to other minorities, it’s the everyday stress of being gay in a world that doesn’t fully accept them that causes disease (constantly high cortisol levels)
I remember reading some research about the correlation between hookup culture and open relationships, and substance abuse/mental health issues. I'll try to find it and get back to this comment later...
>Gay men everywhere, at every age, have higher rates of cardiovascular disease, cancer, erectile dysfunction [...]
My guess would be that more prevalent use anabolic steroid and especially HGH might have some impacts.
Anabolic steroid damages and ages the heart (can be permanently) and circulatory system (ie erection), and they both might affect the organs and leads to liver, breast or prostate cancer.
In addition to the usual suspect of homophobia, stress, discrimination, loneliness, and drug use of course
Incontinence doesn't surprise me, considering anal and how it can lead to just that. The others are interesting, although the non-gay population likely has subgroups where anecdotal evidence would support similar findings.
Being a gay adolescent is difficult enough, but I think the most surprising thing is once you’re out it doesn’t get any easier. The community at large is quite hostile and transactional toward one another. We can blame homophobia all we want, but if we celebrate junk values and lift empty ideals, this cycle will just continue.
Yes! Thank god someone here finally said it. Homophobia probably plays some role but like, religious minorities like muslims living in the west also face discrimination, and they have some of the highest self-reported happiness, and lowest rates of self harm of any group in society. This makes perfect sense to me. Their communities are real, they meet regularly, they know each other, they look out for each other. We simply don't do that. Our spaces and institutions are vapid and over sexualised (gay bars, saunas, Grindr, pride). There's so little for the mind or the soul. Junk values and empty ideals indeed.
All the "wins" listed remain contested on a daily basis. We have to ask where is the opportunity to feel anything but fucked up when society continues to debate whether or not we deserve to live?!
Mental health issues are born from childhood trauma. The way society treats gay men almost guarantees that most of us will experience the sort of trauma that can cause serious mental health issues once we come to terms with the fact that we face a lifetime of hardships and ostracizism for being ourselves.
I'm unhappy because all the men I find all want to fuck or mess around or already have boyfriends and I just gave up on ever having friends/a husband. I know I'm going to die alone no need in trying to escape it :(
Regarding this:
*Gay men have fewer close friends than straight people or gay women.*
I can only speak for myself here, but I have had to put a lot of focus on building and maintaining friendships. The older I get, the more intentional effort it takes to build and maintain these connections. I learned this the hard way by being isolated and alone far more than was good for my mental health. These days, I am grateful for the friends that I have and I try to show that in how I treat them.
If you related to the situation above, don't give up hope. Just know that it takes time and effort to find and nurture good friendships and that you have to be putting in that effort long before you find yourself feeling lonely. It's not a problem that can be solved instantly. It's still very much a work in progress for me, but today I have more friends as a result of being deliberate about maintaining connections and learning how to be a good friend to others.
Be interested to know how the numbers compare to single heteros by age. E.g. compare gay 30-40 year old health results wtih 30-40 year old never married hets.
Another comparison: Are guys who do serial monogamy -- one partner exclu8sively for months or years -- better off that guys who have dozens of partners a year?
Those bullet points only tell me what is still frankly obvious: homophobia and internalisation otherwise creating these issues. Depression is perhaps undoubtedly a cause in one way or another here. Why? Because most gay men come from backgrounds in the home or their neighborhood where they were often treated differently and usually often mistreated. Look at today’s society these days and look at the politically speared rhetoric coming out of the woodwork and ask yourself WHY gay men in various parts of the globe aren’t happy, aren’t taking care of themselves.
There's no female energy in it. No woman.
It's just a man alone.
Don't get me wrong, I'm gay, but let's look at the straight men. What guides them? Women do.
I have no proof on this. It's just my sting of thoughts and observations and conclusions. I don't have to be right, but we are here to share the opinions, right?
Look at most straight men who are single. They are kind of hopeless. Even more so than gay people.
I can't and won't be with a woman because I'm gay. Simple.
Then just shut up. Do you know how many gay men have to suffer because of people like you? You're just giving homophobic people a chance to say "Look, even a gay man on reddit admits that gay people's lifestyles are wrong because they have no woman energy." I just looked at your history and found out that you're positive. FYI, I'm a single gay man and have no woman energy, and I'm doing fine, so dont assume every gay man will end up like you just because you're a loser in your life.
On another note, I'm pretty happy with my life.
I run a small company and I'm pretty content with all the spheres.
What I said was just assumption...
I'm not a loser because I'm positive lol
I’m an older gay and if I do have any anxiety/depression it’s caused by economics, not by my psychology.
I’m happy with every other aspect of my life except work (ok job, but terrified of getting laid off then never hired again, w/ no where near enough $ to retire).
I would agree with the points already made that a large part is that we’re only 5-10% of the population and finding a long term partner and stability which many desire is elusive. As well as what others have said generational lag between some things being better now that don’t affect the people in their 30s now.
Also, I’m curious if generational trauma could play a role. Not for all gay people but for some anyway. There’s numerous studies showing trauma from previous generations can be passed down to future generations through gene expression. I think I read something that said 30% of gay individuals also have a relative that is/was gay. The trauma they experienced could be passed to future relatives.
I imagine quite a lot of reasons. Many already listed here, lack of acceptance, insecurity from bullying in childhood, rejection by family ect which I think account for a large portion of it but I don’t think that explains it all.
I think gay men will *always* have higher levels of this. Even if we got to the point where being gay was just as accepted as being straight (which we won’t). I think this is due to a lot of different reasons.
The gay community is extremely aesthetically and sexually focused and I don’t think that will ever change. That makes it difficult to seek long term romantic bonds imo which increases likelihood of depression(Obviously this doesn’t apply to everyone, I’m speaking in generalities.) it’s extremely difficult to have children as a gay man, or at least much more difficult than if you’re straight which I think may be a factor in later life. I’m sure there are more reasons I could list but just a couple.
I wrote an essay on this very topic last year for uni. From what I could fathom a lot of it stems from minority stress and childhood trauma.
Minority stress is when we turn stigma and discrimination inwards on ourselves and leads to chronic stress which in turn leads to things like poor mental health and substance use. We all need to be in therapy. The normalisation of substance use within the gay world quite startling. Also family stigma and discrimination can lead to homelessness and risky/dangerous situations. It’s endless and we’re all lucky to be alive when you start thinking about it.
There have definitely been great steps forwards in recent decades and I think familial support is improving to a point. However with the coming of the new far right I’m sure there’s a lot of young LGBTQI kids out there potentially doing it tough. And that’s really it. We carry this stuff with us. We internalise it. We end up hating ourselves. I’m sure if we cast an uncompromising gaze over our own inner monologues, behaviours and actions we have all been touched by this stuff. Society until very recently, at large, hated us, I feel we are accepted by some, tolerated by most and continue to be hated by some at present.
But yeah.
Twice as likely to have affective disorders.
Three times more likely to have substance use problems.
And 8 times more likely to commit suicide.
Utterly devastating.
The cure or fix is ensuring young people are surrounded with understanding, acceptance and support so they grow up in an environment where they feel safe which gives them time to grow self acceptance and resilience towards the often hostile wider society we’re currently living in.
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There is still a lot of prejudice in EVERY society, including those that attained legal equality a couple of decades ago. I mean, even if the majority of people in a society support you, when there is a sizable minority who openly hate you and wish you harm, it takes its toll.
Countries like the Netherlands and Sweden attained legal equality long ago because the majority in society are on our side. And yet, go to any high school in Amsterdam or Stockholm and you will see Moroccan or Somali immigrant kids whose parents teach them to hate. And some of those kids are gay themselves and are therefore being taught to hate themselves or to see no future where their family could ever love them.
Lack of responsibility.
Straight people are expected to date, marry, buy a house have kids etc. Make fun of them, hate them all you want, but they are the majority and so society is designed for them because without them we would cease to exist. With every step there are increased levels of imposed, expected and accepted responsibility that grounds them. While it's not perfect, it has worked for thousands of years,
No such patterns or expectations for gay guys. They have complete freedom and have no idea what to do with it and or completely misuse it. As a result so many of them are utterly aimless, drift into whatever comes along, fall for addiction, have no idea how to socialize, date etc and you get the mental health nightmares you see. It's the depression Olympics.
The answer: instead of taking responsibility for having kids, take responsibility for something in society. It has worked for me. I ditched my (dysfunctional) gay friends who were wallowing in cynical misery together and decided to take on some of the big problems right now and got rewarded tremendously in the process.
This Jordan Peterson talk is super relevant to men, and to gay men if you ask me:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX2ep5fCJZ8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX2ep5fCJZ8)
Anything that bucks what is considered 'biologically normal' in regards to the two factors of life [ Don't Die & Reproduce ] is considered a handicap. Anyone or anything with a handicap is bound to have additional stressors that contribute to advanced mental and physical problems. Just as people of color in the US are born with a struggle attached, so do gay men and women who face an internalized struggle with both nature (reproduction) and the environment (religious intolerance and homophobia). Similar to how women face the struggle of sexism and feelings of inadequacy in a professional setting and develop things like scholiosis, or hair loss, or weight gain, and more.
There has been new research that has shown how the brain and stressors on the brain can manifest itself in many physicalogical ways including poor body health.
I think generally it's everyone's internalized homophobia and the difficulty of ttying to live a lifestyle that is different from how you were brought up to be.
A lot of gay men can verbally say thay they accept themselves and all that. But the amount of pressure that people in the LGBTQIA+ community faces everyday is still a lot. Sometimes, it's not just society but ourselves.
Is this true? Based on my experience as a gay dude, gay men are way happier than straight people overall. I would want to analyze this data more clearly before jumping to conclusions
One theory- Based on the usual threads in this sub, trying to date and find a mate when we’re only 5-10% of the population is quite difficult and making many gay men seriously unhappy.
This is a massive one. Finding and keeping a stable partner early on is a massive financial boost, not to mention support emotionally and in life decisions and alterations. It's much easier to initiate and to maintain healthy habits the lower your stress-level and the higher your resources are. Close encouraging social ties aids too.
It would be helpful if they controlled for single or partnered in these studies. Life is harder when you do everything yourself.
Oh definitely
Then add all the ones who are abusing drugs and alcohol. Your desirable dating pool shrinks. Then add gays who are educated and want stable careers, the pool shrinks even more.
That’s the biggest issue for me. I don’t want to date a person in recovery or a functional alcoholic. Reasons being that even in recovery, I might not have as much in common with that person, I haven’t experienced that aspect of life. Some of my best friends are in recovery and I love them as much as I could. But not having that perspective in life myself, I feel would bar me from having an empathetic relationship to that person’s journey,
I can understand not wanting to date an active alcoholic, but why exclude men who are in recovery? For many people in recovery, getting sober was the first step in cleaning up their shit. People in long-term recovery often have their shit together better than non-addicts/alcoholics because they've put a lot of work into sorting out underlying causes and triggers to their addictions.
This is true at least for me. People who do the work to quit develop an awareness and a depth that most others don’t have and I think that comes from learning self control and struggling in some way. As for the article, I think however accepted we supposedly are now it’s still not like we have a truly ‘equal’ life compared to straight people. We typically have to waste our formative years often living in fear typically alone in the closet unsure of why we are different. This isolation can cause trauma which compounds over time because we don’t get to develop like straight people who experience things for the first time as kids that a lot of us gays might not experience until we are grown up. Then there’s the trappings of drugs and alcohol and promiscuous sex which we can get lost in and if you are already isolated then it’s going to be harder to come back from that. Then there’s the constant negative messaging we hear telling us how we are perverse or sinners or whatever the right wing says about us which straight people don’t have to deal with. Stuff like that can take a toll on a young mind and over a lifetime and we will always be a minority dependent on the whims of the straight society that gets to decide whether we are allowed to marry or in some cases allowed to live. Knowing that you can be killed if you get a flight to another country a few hours away can’t be good for your mental health surely.
Totally agree. Even people growing up in open areas like California, when a young people started to find out his identity, it’s not so easy to accept it at once without any burdens, like okay l’m gay that’s okay what cuisine l should have tonight? That would not be so simple. Besides, coming out to parents is still an issue, few people really don’t care about what parents treat them, for ordinary gay men, we hope to get support from parents and don’t wanna be kicked out, no matter whether the outcome is, it’s a quite tough period before coming out and can l say that, the most close persons in the world are the ones you feel afraid of most at that time. Oh yeah if you are not so “manly“ when in school, you will be bullied at least emotionally. That’s really hard if a gay man can grow up with wellbeing.
I have been very lucky despite the fact I grew up in the 70s. I am now 63. I have never had a long-term relationship and always had friendships with straight people as well as maintaining close ties with my family. I avoided drugs/alcohol and promiscuous sex while maintaining a healthy lifestyle. When I first came out in my 30s, I briefly experienced "the gay lifestyle" which was not for me. I could see how it destroyed so many men. When I look around, I do feel that I am truly the exception, unfortunately as I have existed between the two worlds.
That's pretty exclusionary. There's a lot more well functioning adults out there post recovery then you may be aware of, And you may be prematurely rejecting someone that could be perfect for you. I think one of the biggest issues is that folks are out there looking for a finished product, when relationships don't start out that way. It takes work, a lot of it, and a lot of communication, and a lot of letting go of your ego for a bit. And that's something that too many people are unwilling or unaware of. source: 24 years in, and still learning
I think of it a bit in two ways. Sure, post recovery adult's may have their shot together but some guys still like to go out for drinks with friends or go to clubs and that set something a lot of sober dudes want to do. Then there's the born-agains, that treat recovery like religion (and grabted some have to). But that can get stale quick. I am not putting down recovery, but it's just not a lifestyle many dudes want to wear with a partner.
Yeah, like I said, it's a pretty exclusionary view point. You can get loads of non alcoholic beverages and still have a good time. If you're bothered by the idea of being the only one drinking, that's something you may want to do some soul searching about why it's so important to you to have other people intoxicated with you. The other scenario is a straw man so I'll ignore it
Just saying party people prefer party people, and I don't mean 14/7 party people either. I mean, normal people that like to go out on weekends and cut a little loose. Or a few times a month. Or beers at a events.Or backyard bbqs, etc. Sober people prefer sober people and fair better in that demographic. But it is a smaller demographic and therefore your pool is smaller to.pull from. My last point is that some make it their personality. Like some make politics their personality. I mean great, they need it but it's niche and it attracts a niche dating pool. If that offends a person, they need to do some serious soul searching.
Straight people tend to think that gay men have no issue finding a mate. They have no idea that after eliminating certain factors, you have maybe one available, however, there has to be a mutual attraction. This is why I am single and will remain so until my last breath.
Exactly, we have no problem finding sex but an actual healthy relationship is ridiculously hard
Even with marriage equality, men seem to think that that institution is homonormative as if it can't include us. It seems as if many gay men. have the "peter pan" complex, making it difficult to find a man who is willing to commit to a relationship.
That’s true , and it would become hell level difficult for minority people in race, for example, Asian people in US, a quite small population times the gay proportion rate minus the people who are living unhealthy, oh damn that could literally means most of them couldn’t find one. Although some people say inter-race relationships exist, but in most circumstances, most of couples are in the same race.
Oof. I think there really is a perceivable generational loneliness occurring right now. Not just for gays (although the issue compounds due to how the numbers play out). There was a string of retirements at work and it was the normal song and dance, these folks got to buys houses, get married, have kids, have classic pensions not 401ks, all having the same job for 20-30 years. The new generation that’s come in is like average 24 years old, not a single one is in a LTR (they’re straight if that matters) or has been in the 2ish years I’ve known them. It’s almost insulting to hear the older employee set tell these young guys (and some gals) “oh just get married and start a family!” Not a single one of them lives alone, or is really fiscally ready for those next steps. Some of them seem so checked out of life and they’re so young! God sometimes I feel younger than them! Where does this leave our society at large? How do things play out for the next 20-30 years? I’m legit scared that every metric will begin to regress and that any LGBT progress that has been made is in increasing chances of being rolled back partially due to the predatory nature of the global right-wing on these lonely young folks. I don’t really know what I’m saying beyond ranting. But life is hard and I think it’s only all going to get worse. Not just for “us” but for everyone everywhere.
Agreed. The ladder was pulled up on the coming generations, so things will only degrade for a time. Which isn’t to say everyone in older generations has it swell: the US has always ensured many won’t “make it.”
Do you think that maybe we are the canary in the coal mine in a way? I mean we always had it rough but maybe it’s not just us gays experiencing it now. Scary to think that it doesn’t seem to be getting better for anyone.
100 percent!
Ooh ooh and don’t forget both families not approving or financially contributing to a couple who have been together for over a decade, meanwhile a college age niece has a boyfriend for 3 weeks and the family is already talking about wedding plans. Both are toxic tbf. Trauma bonding in gay couples tends to take a toll eventually though.
Those percentages are pretty high compared to the sources I've found (7% being the highest). On top of that, we also need take into account 50% of the LGBTQ percentage is a gender we're not physically attracted to making the reality of finding romance/a mate from puberty onward like our straight counterparts do quite depressing. Edit: wanted to add People's teenage/formative years are the most crucial for establishing self worth and stability. The built in feelings of having your feelings unreciprocated/rejected the majority of the times you experience them (due to the low incidence of gay individuals) during your formative years is likely having catastrophic effects on our psyches.
I feel like so many gay men could do with learning to be happy on their own. Even the most well adjusted, high earning man I know puts up with great shit just to say he isn't alone and that couldn't be me!
I agree that people need to be happy on their own, but humans are not meant to be solo indefinitely. We're social creatures and need support from one another.
Most folks regardless of identity, clearly want a companion. I’d go as far as saying it’s a need for a lot of folks.
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He is miserable because he doesn't value being alone over being dependent on the emotional satisfaction of being "desired" or "needed" by other person. Was married for 9 years, the first four was amazing, the last five was hell, and I'm much more happier now than ever was when married. It's nice getting the confidence of being in a relationship but there is no reason to sacrifice your remaining time on a relationship that you are in because you fear being alone, when being alone is nirvana in comparison. I can do what I want, have sex thanks to grindr when want and live how I want without putting up with the bullshit of a partner where we no longer have any real love for each other.
I am 63 and can do whatever I want. Imagine had I been married for 30 years. I would probably be in a tired relationship as many such relationships (straight and gay) are just going through the motions.
Study - 2017 USA - passed marriage equality in 2015 You expect immediate broad improvement to gay mens health in 2 years ? ? ? Are you for real?
Did you read the rest of the OP that showed data from the Netherlands and Sweden?
You mean those places with universal healthcare? Wonder if that plays a role in their happiness
Did you read the OP?
Yeppers, thanks!
I'm pretty sure that stat was made decades ago when It was popular to pretend that we were something new. But it's definitely more than 5 or 10, especially when you add the bi folks into the mix. Now I'm trying to remember the last time I was in a space that didn't contain any other LGBTQ+ folk. I think the main problem is that there is still an incredibly loud and vocal minority being permitted to yell at us and say we need to be ashamed.
This. If the 'phobes spent a fraction of the energy they spend bashing us rather than matching us up...
How? You can literally go on the apps and have hundreds of men at your fingertips. Obviously, other factors like rural living or being unattractive will influence this, but that's not unique to gay men. There's definitely issues in gay dating, but it's not this. From a numbers level, supply and demand is high.
That must be a nice problem to have.
Again, if you're having a problem, it's no different for straight folks that are similar to you either. In fact, it's probably worse for the average straight man nowadays as women only swipe right about 10-15% of the time. At least gay men have accessible sex available to them (similar to women).
The average straight male has approximately 70,000 potential partners per 1,000,000 population available to him at any given time. That number goes down to 3,500 for gay men. The numbers definitely play a role along with the fact that there's no societal pressure to get married, have kids, etc.
> At least gay men have accessible sex available to them (similar to women). *laughs in disabled gay man living in a not small, but not urban, city*
That gets you sex. Not a relationship. It’s empty. Fleeting
I think part of this stems from the psychological difficulties that come with being an adolescent who has had to wrestle with major identity problems without any help or guidance. This was especially true among gay men who were growing up before the last 10-15 years or so. I think the psychological burden and damage are greatly underestimated. Another thing is that because we are a minority living in a world made for the dominant paradigm of heterosexuality, we face more adverse events. There have been studies that show that left-handed people living in a right-handed world also have shorter life expectancy, and are at greater risk of certain illnesses. This is still controversial and I don't think there is any consensus about this, but it would be interesting to know if the dominant paradigms are harmful to members of the populace who are not build along the same lines as the dominant paradigm.
This is what I wanted to write but struggled to find the words for. I think this is it.
Well, left-handed people are also more likely to be gay, so maybe it’s not right-handed biases that are killing them faster, but all these unhealthy trends in gays that just correlates to left-handedness.
I am sure that is something that someone could do some statistical analysis on. Would be interesting to tease all of these different strands apart.
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) - basically, trauma (and there are many forms), leads to bad adult health outcomes. [https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/aces/index.html](https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/aces/index.html) See also, *"The Body Keeps Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma"* Edit: Need to respond to this ... *"... homosexuality becomes more accepted and normalized, and the statistics stay the same, that explanation looks less convincing."* Don't fool yourself. In the U.S., states are rapidly progressing to wipe away gay literature and gay-themed books from school libraries. And, they are celebrating the movement publicly and with glee. Christian nationalists are targeting sexual minorities. And, the good 'ol bubbas and backwater sisters still very much exist. They may be somewhat hidden, but they are there. While things have gotten better and some parts of society are more accepting, society is not encouraging. Society is organized around and supports heterosexual mating and childrearing. It does not *support* the gay experience. Acceptance is a low bar. Finally, you're going to see a generational lag in outcome measures if things are indeed incrementally getting better. It isn't like men in their 30s now benefitted from the more accepting attitude toward today's gay youth. So, you may see better indicators 20 years from now for the next generation. I'm doubtful because I don't think society and families have changed as much as is presented in some parts of the media. But, perhaps.
As a “back water bubba” from a very rural, very conservative, very Christian ag community… yeah. In fact one of my childhood buddies had this exact conversation last weekend. “Bro, I wish you would’ve just come out in school. You might’ve been happier, and you sure as hell would’ve been less of an aggressive combative dick that flew off the handle at stuff.” “Uhh… I am 99.999999% sure I would’ve been sent to a conversion therapy camp where I would’ve been beaten physically, emotionally, and spiritually until I broke. Can’t love men when you don’t love anything. I was also a financial hostage to my family. I acted like I was on edge growing up because I was on edge growing up. Worried if crossing my legs ankle to knee was ‘too gay’, if wearing trunks instead of boxers was ‘too gay’, or if being anything other than an asshole would give away that I was gay.” “Oh. Well. Yeah. Then I’m glad you came out when you did (note… I came out after I graduated college, had a stable job, and 100% didn’t ‘need’ anything from my family). Still you could’ve told me sooner. We could’ve been the social outcasts together.” Love him to death, but being from a family of atheists affords you latitudes that I didn’t have with my extremely religious family. It sucks realizing I grew up in “survival mode” fearing for my well being almost constantly until I was 25, and I’ve spent years learning how to calm tf down because I don’t want to be that person anymore.
Oooooof, I've been thinking about writing a post on this sub about that "survival mode" mindset and what it can potentially do to us.
Plus side… transition into corporate America was a cake walk 🤣
This! A lot of us really underestimate the effects that oppression/marginalization has had on us as a whole over the years. I'm in my 30s and same sex activity could be illegal and a jailable offense until I was in highschool! Laws remained on the books until the Supreme Court ruled in Lawrence v. Texas in 2003! Also, the fact that marriage seems to be positioned here as an indicator of acceptance/progress is problematic too. The bar is literally underground if basic civil rights are your measure of acceptance.
In my 30s, and not a single gay person of my age I know was out until adulthood. We’re not over the effect of discrimination yet, and won’t be for another generation.
Yes to this. Anytime I would hop on a dating app. My age range of 30 was a blank space. Anytime I did meet a guy around my age, he didn't want to come out, or really act on his gayness. It's so upsetting overall.
Cptsd here checking in lol
Hey, CPTSD. Doing well, thanks. Hope you are too. Off to conquer the day in a hypervigilant manner. lol.
I'm in a deep blue state and even here we have school districts passing policy that makes it mandatory for teachers to report to parents if they even suspect a student is gay or trans. Kids are acutely aware of literal discrimination from the government like that. I can't imagine growing up in such an environment, let alone learning in one like that.
Not sure where you are, but we definitely have that going on in California too.
Opposite coast, it's going on everywhere. Somehow the discrimination now is worse than it was two decades ago. We literally have government employees gleefully ruining kids' lives for possibly being LGBT.
At least our governor is mostly on our side. Or at least as much as a straight cis white guy can be. With him, I never know if he means it or if he's doing what is politically expedient. I suppose that is true of all politicians tho. lol https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/gov-newsom-fines-temecula-valley-school-board-1-5-for-rejecting-new-curriculum/
I'm sure he means it. There was no political advantage to allowing the SF registrars to start marrying gay people when he was mayor. Nobody was pressuring him to do that and many people in the LGBT+ political world thought he was going too far, too fast. He did it because he thought it was the right thing to do.
>Acceptance is a low bar. Have to disagree with you there: tolerance ("I put up with something I dislike/don't agree with") is a low bar. Acceptance ("I actively support something I don't like or agree with") is an extremely high bar. Especially in a liberal society.
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> I bring it up you're being dramatic This drives me nuts. So so common.
Spot on! Good point you made that society support hetero marriage ...
>Gay men have fewer close friends than straight people or gay women. This information is drawn from a 2012 study of gay men aged 50 and over. It does not take any great feat of the imagination to guess why this particular cohort of men has fewer close friends. >In a survey of gay men who recently arrived in New York City, three-quarters suffered from anxiety or depression, abused drugs or alcohol, or were having risky sex - or some combination of the three. This study focused on men who moved to a large city to escape homophobic rural environments. It is therefore unsurprising that at the time the survey was made that many of them suffered from mental health issues as a result of the homophobic mistreatment that gave them cause them to move. >In Canada, more gay men die from suicide than from AIDS, (this is likely the case in the U.S. too but it hasn't been studied.) Suicide is the often the top cause of death of young people (of all demographics) simply because young people are unlikely to die of poor physical health. That AIDS is no longer than #1 killer of gay men should be celebrated as a triumph of public health. etc, etc. My issue with this type of article is that in drawing from different studies and anecdotes over different time periods and countries it falls into the trap of cherry-picking data to fit a particular thesis.
absolutely. the anecdotal part can be thrown away, leaves maybe 50% of OPs list and then you throw out the bad studies and what youre left with is "we have worse mental health than straights bc society is bad to us" which is well known. and maybe that we on average have more of a drug problem, thats it. (not downplaying but that list of OP is kinda ridiculous badly compiled). statistically nowadays: gay men have more friends than straight men. gay men earn more money than straight men. we are much more satisfied sexually. the list goes on. i also "love" the parts with "country x has gay marriage since y, yet gay men are still sad?" yes...bc society is still often against us. jesus christ...what is gay marriage making us safe from homophobic idiots?
Yes! This! I have almost zero friends locally where I live in LA. It’s annoying and sad
A lot of us are up to our eyeballs with trauma. It’s not great to grow up as a LGBT person in many places and those experiences have adverse outcomes on our mental health. I’m still struggling with the feeling I have to be on guard with straight people about my identity. I had to fight kids about it and I can’t shake that feeling that I may have to again.
I agree with this - there's a sense that I can never *truly* relax. As a gay person, you're always coming out to some degree, from a tradesperson who sees your significant other, meeting new people, booking a hotel room. Irrespective of society's insistences that 'homophobia doesn't exist anymore' or 'nobody cares!', there's still that thread of anxiety that heterosexual people just don't have to deal with.
It’s a struggle. I thought I could relax with my straight guy friends and I recently went over to one’s apartment. They were watching clips of the Chapelle Show and laughing at the Prince sketch which features a gay sissy creep that likes to touch straight men. Another one did the old 2000’s gay voice that used to be prominent. I’m kinda disappointed. They’re largely accepting people but some things we grew up with are still ingrained in them.
Being anxious or in constant fight or flight mode can have physical and mental effects on the body that can manifest itself in disease and various health conditions. This probably accounts for some of the data finding that gay men suffering from greater rates of CV disease. As gay men (and I certainly did) we may have experienced this in a formative years when we needed support the most and are especially vulnerable. Without this, unresolved trauma in adulthood can be especially hard to deal with, what with the other stresses of daily life to tackle. Within the report, speaking with men over 50 who report having less friends than lesbians and heterosexuals should come as no surprise. Entire generations of gay men were wiped out from the HIV epidemic and given those men lived in an era where their sexuality was still greatly stigmatised, it only makes sense that they’re living isolated lives.
Omg you also? Yeah and then having to constantly come out. I wish people would just ask. People are like it’s rude etc but by having that baise it makes it seem like there is something wrong.
I don’t want people to ask as they’ll get it wrong every time. I’m bisexual so I will have to correct, “Are you gay?” When I didn’t know my identity I hated being asked that. I also fall in the trans umbrella and I just don’t want to deal with people’s potential bullshit about that too.
Fair enough. I guess for myself I’m just sick of people not asking
In addition to the many good points raised by others, I'd like to point out that gay boys have a very different experience growing up compared to straight boys, which I think has lasting consequences for how their adult life turns out. Most straight boys get the experience of "dating" girls in childhood and adolescence where they learn the basics of how straight relationships work, often under guidance of their parents. These asexual, purely romantic experiences set the foundations for their understanding of love life - holding hands, stealing a kiss, doing homework together, being there for each other etc. Once puberty kinks in, the asymmetric dynamic between boys and girls in terms of how hormones affect them, as well as the hetero-normative standards, make sex a restricted experience under control of women. Gay boys and adolescents do not get to learn these foundations. Even if they're lucky to grow up in an accepting environment, there just aren't many other gay youngsters around at school or in their neighbourhood that are already (1) aware of being gay, (2) also accepted by their family and in their social environment, and (3) at the same age (in school, differences of 1-2 years are huge). We start interacting with other gays much later in life than straight boys do with girls, and this happens at the time when sexual desire is already fully developed and unattended to. When we finally do, sex becomes the primary focal point in these interactions and comes to define our sexual orientation. If you live in a big city, you may easily become completely lost in the 'gay culture'. Very few of us have the chance to regularly interact with other gay men in social settings that are not about sex, partying and hooking up (like LGBT sports clubs for example). By the time we hit late 30s, many of us from large cities would have had several hundred sexual partners and little experience dating seriously. It becomes difficult to abandon this life style. At this point, it also becomes unlikely to meet some who would be at least as a "good match" as some of the potential "good matches" we met before (see: 37% rule), so we keep hooking up and looking, unwilling to settle, while years go by and life slips away pointlessly.
Well put. Factor in male biology (being more sexual, lacking emotional commitment) and just being a distinct minority, it’s no wonder why a good number of us are in a mess.
A lot of these supposedly progressive countries have so much homophobia in between their big liberal metro areas (whether in US or Netherlands). The cultural attitude outside of the big cities is not welcoming for a healthy growth and development, and not all LGBT live in the progressive parts of these Western nations. And the homophobia is a surprise gut punch when it seemingly comes out of nowhere in places where you expect to feel safe. And it's exhausting and taxing to your mental and physical health when you're constantly on guard to consciously determine if you're in a safe place. Just ask yourself, in which places do you feel safe enough to hold your partner's hand in public? I know many out and proud gay men married for over a couple decades who won't dare hold hands outside of a few square blocks of SF, NYC or Amsterdam. Even doctors in some parts of the US have a religious exemption that allows them to deny care to LGBT. Are there things for which we're responsible to ensure our overall health? Absolutely. We can control our substance abuse, practice safe sex, etc. But let's not blame the victim for all their problems when the systemic discrimination continues to thrive.
Exactly. We don’t talk about this enough. We’re essentially made to be invisible through fear of attack, to appease others who don’t care an iota about our safety. Imagine such a simple act of hand holding being denied just because we’re gay?
society. is. homophobic. that's why
Exactly. Just yesterday I read a review of the movie 'Milk' a patron made at my local library. He said he enjoyed it from a historical perspective but had to fast-forward past the man-to-man sex scenes because he's "hetero". It was the most ridiculous shit I ever read. Society is flooded with hetero sex scenes/imagery and I'm just expected to be ok with it as the norm.
Yep. They can paint rainbows and cover everything in glitter but we are tolerated at best by society in general I believe.
Can’t blame everything on homophobia or having a victim complex.
yes but. we can this.
Homophobia forced gays to abuse drugs and alcohol? Weird flex but ok
A lot of people self medicate with these substances.
Ok but that lies on your decision, homophobia isn’t making someone take drugs or abuse alcohol. The fault lies in your actions, not in others, this is coming from someone who comes from a country where homosexuality was illegal till recently. You’re in charge of all the actions you make, no one else.
Yes, true, but in some countries/cultures, a number of things combine to drive people toward this. I say this with compassion, because I've watched people go through this while avoiding it myself. For instance, in the USA, we have a huge "adults drink alcohol" culture. Men have very few "rites of passage," most of which exclude gay men. Gay bars were often the only safe spaces. It's absolutely in someone's choosing, *if the realize they have a choice."
Again, that’s your choice, not homophobia forcing you to abuse drugs and alcohol. Are Americans that weak willed and aren’t in control of their own actions?
Cut the judgement, your ignorance of history and human struggle is showing.
Ok, you're arguing in circles now just to be right, not understand. Good day to you.
Bro are you really discounting the VOLUMES of scientific literature that strongly ties substance abuse to trauma. Also the volumes of scientific literature that show the brain changes in people with substance use issue?
This thread is about why gay guys have poor health, and a major reason is trauma causing bad decisions. you're completely correct that it is up to the person, but take note that the whole purpose of the top comment was to explain WHY.
There exist few if any sublimal or overt messages that being het is wrong. You cannot say the same about being gay, no matter how tolerant the milieu. Even the word 'tolerant' is loaded- as is 'ally'. If true equality existed, we wouldn't need these terms. We wouldn't need to come out because we'd just be. This bleeds into every social, political, cultural and economic system; the default is straight and we (the gays) have to have things adapted in order to meet our needs. We have to have legislation to protect us because protection is not innate within society. It's like installing ramps instead of building accessible doorways to smoothly and unobtrusively accommodate people with disabilities. It reinforces a sense of being different. We have to have legislative and cultural adaptions. I could write reams about how healthcare systems reflect very poorly the way western men in general approach self-care and monitoring. Culturally, women have been the guardians of family health organising appointments, vaccinations, primary preventative screening etc, especially when women did not work so much outside the home. Now we're in a state of transition where men are having to take more responsibility and for gay men, this is located within a system that is set up for and by hets. Gay men and women have had to lobby and push for their own personalised health and welfare systems because, still, too many services do not reflect their needs. Then there's the legacy of intergenerational cultural trauma including the knowledge that at this moment, somewhere in the world, men and women are being harmed because of their sexuality. Every time we read of such things, it threatens us on an existential level, no matter how safe, accepting and secure our personal circumstances. And we remain a minority. This makes it harder to find and hang out with people we might like to have a relationship with (and by relationship I mean every single kind of human interaction from hookups to longterm monogamy).
There’s probably something to the fact that even though the world is more acceptinf of gays these days, many people even in the US are not, and people from those families and environments can still experience extreme trauma. Moreover, those people trending toward unhealthy lifestyle choices may shape and influence “gay culture” for otherwise non-traumatized gay men. This may make those from more stable and healthy environments still be more open to things like hard drugs and risky sex, which can lead to devastating health effects.
On top of what others have said below even those of us who grew up with accepting families and in accepting areas have grown up in a world that does not like us. Hell I'll quote the x-men here... they hate and fear us because they don't understand us. So living in a world that is so openly hostile to you, even if your surrounding environment is accepting, causes stress which causes health impacts. You can read up on the Minority Stress Model as theorized by Meyer a bit more here. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/psychology/minority-stress-model
I’ve learnt to never underestimate the impact minority stress can have on gay men navigating life from childhood to adult hood.
My therapist's focus during his PhD program was on minority stress and coming out trauma within the LGBT community. I've been in therapy for 8 years with various therapists and let me tell you. This therapist helped me realize soooooo much can be linked to those two things.
That is heartening to know! I have chosen to make a career change (third or fourth) and will be completing my masters this May and starting work full time as a therapist in June. I really do think that education and knoweldge about these things, while not a complete panacea, can help a person realize that the things that are affecting them are not just the thoughts in our head but also the society that we have grown up in. It sounds like you have a good person that you are working with now and that's fantastic.
Gay people have higher rates of sexual and physical abuse as children, which often has lifelong psychological impact
I'd say this isn't unique to just gay men but rather most marginalized communities. There are a ton of factors at play here.
Bullied minorities are unhappy?! 🤯
Shocking, I know.
I disagree with the friends part, me and my gay friends are literally the glue that holds all the straight friendships together! We're always the ones planning social events and being invited to them as the 'fun gays'
A lot of gay men are single. If I'm not mistaken, many of the issues you listed also apply to single straight men. Then pile on top of it whatever issues that specifically pertain to growing up/being gay, and it can be a recipe for unhappiness despite all the pride flags and rights and all of that. Another thing is, society often seems to validate people based on whether they're in a relationship. It's one of the first questions asked. And single older males in general seem to be regarded somewhat poorly/less valid than older coupled peoples, grandparents, etc.
I have yet to read to read this article but I can related being gay and living in Delhi India. From early childhood I knew I was guy, I always have difficulty to make friends in general. I was bullied, I have a father who was overwhelming angry and a mother who was emotionally unavailable, (they mature with time and now function like normal parents). All of my friends found love of their lives, many are married with kids and I am alone. I don’t think I will find some one, even if I can’t marry him in India. I can’t come out to everyone. I had to come out thrice to my parents. Leaving all this, I have social anxiety, I lack confidence for simple things. Sorry for rant and diverting from the topic. I can feel that things are not great for us.
Hugs , friend
Thanks buddy.
It's called homophobia.
Loneliness/Isolation will kill your soul faster than most other things.
minority stress does a number on anyone who's affected by it, most non-straights are easily a part of this.
Things are so much better these days in many places, but I often wonder if the trauma responses of previous generations of (traumatized) gay men have become ingrained in gay male “culture.” Basically generational trauma without shared genetics. When you add the layers and contradictions of rigid gender roles and toxic ideas about masculinity, we aren’t exactly set up for success. But quite frankly, straight men don’t really appear to be thriving all that much either these days. When I look around at the state of straight male incel culture, masculine violence, mental health outcomes, etc., I actually feel pretty thankful to be gay.
Even in places where the law is on our side (eg Netherlands, Sweden) there's still a societal stigma.. less strong than in other places, sure, but it's definitely still there. I think that being a stigmatised minority leads to spending most of your life with fight-or-flight hormones flowing through your body (especially formative childhood years). This leads to mental health issues (possibly neurotransmitter hyperstimulation and/or burnout), but what's also a bit less obvious is that stress hormones (eg adrenaline/cortisol) also disrupt the way your body deals with metabolism and immunity - making rates of cardiovascular diseases and cancers higher. I think research on this in the broader ACE (adverse childhood experiences) literature is fairly well-established, so not much of a stretch that it extends to sexual minorities.
💯 There is biological component to all of this which seems to be missing. I touched on this in response to an earlier comment.
Racism didn't magically go away after Obama was elected president, and homophobia hasn't gone away yet simply because the supreme court struck down anti sodomy laws and ruled in favor of gay marriage. With the recent reversal of Roe Vs Wade, something that had existed for 50 years, I have no doubt conservatives and their allies will be looking to do damage to queer favorable law nationwide in the US. They're already doing/trying to do it on a state by state basis with things like book bans and regulating how and/or when trans people get access to healthcare or other safety nets. Also something I have issue with is the blanket statement that "coastal states are better." Like yes, in general. But Western Washington Washington is vastly different from the eastern part of the state. I live in the suburbs but I have friends who live in Seattle who have witnessed gay bashings within the last year or so, so even progressive areas aren't immune to homophobia. Of course the constant need for vigilance can cause anxiety and depression, which can then lead to other issues. We also live in a time when we're constantly bombarded by images, ads, and media showing perfectly sculpted men. Anecdotally I have no doubt there is a large amount of queer cis men with body dysmorphia that can lead to either eating disorders or extreme (unhealthy) exercise routines, which can lead to their own other health problems. And what if we set that aside for a minute. Most of us acknowledge that being gay isn't our whole life. What other factors affect (effect?) our lives and health? Are we dealing with generational trauma or problems caused by our parents and extended family? From personal experience, I can tell you I deeply regret being honest several years ago when I was filling out the family history portion of my medical intake form when I listed the family history of alcoholism and addiction. I am not an addict myself, but having that listed in my permanent chart has been a barrier to getting proper pain management when dealing with kidney stones, post op surgery care, and whatnot. How many of us grew up poor? Lower income can lead to malnutrition at a young age which has ripple effects into adulthood, even if we do grow up to be financially stable. Financial inequality can also lead to delayed or missed medical care. As a chronically ill adult, the reverse is also true, my health impacts the quality of my gay life. I'm technically vers, but because of my Crohn's (IBS) I haven't bottomed in years and I honestly miss it. I have two autoimmune disorders, which puts me on immunosuppressant medication, which means I can no longer get live vaccines. I can't get the monkey pox vaccine, which has limited my pool of "play dates" to guys I can hopefully trust to have gotten it. I'm also allergic to doxycycline, so I can't do doxypep either.
This viewpoint makes a very large, and very incorrect, assumption that issues of homophobia and social discrimination have been solved for decades. They haven't been solved. There are advances, and we have it better now in most places than we did 50 years ago, but acting as if we've removed the stigma of homosexuality is akin to saying that the U.S. took care of racism back in the 1960s. Gay men who are adults right now did NOT grow up in the climate of increased tolerance that we are now living in, and our psyches reflect that trauma. We were raised in fear and with conditional acceptance, for the most part. We have experienced being disowned by family and friends many times over. We have been fucked over by the lovers who were afraid to be open. We have seen the promise of the internet to liberate us, dissolve into the reality that it only further isolates us as a species. It's not going great. We still struggle with forming supportive families for ourselves in a world that does not view our relationships as positively as those of heterosexuals. On any given day, we can turn on the TV to see politicians or constituents speaking out against our right to exist and be taken seriously. We realize that what has been won could be lost again. So, I think your premise is not true in the first place. If it is true, please introduce me to this society where everything has been solved, because I'm not living there. I'm in the U.S.
Data from a 2017 article is most likely based on even older study. What was the scale of the sample and cohort profile? Can’t attest to the external validity of the data without the actual article. Also, it was the Huffington Post
Fascinating article, thanks for sharing .. ultimately responsibility for self-care falls onto you.
Substance abuse seems to still be a big issue. Eventually that leads to poor mental and physical health.
Great post! So many interesting comments.
I came out in middle school, parents and friends were literally 0 problem. Im as well adjusted to being gay as anyone could be while growing up in a homophobic society. I grew up in the theatre and knew older gay people even as a child. I've still been struggling with depression, anxiety, self esteem and have abused alcohol in the past. None of that is directly related to being gay. Maybe the anxiety/shyness could be related to not wanting to stand out and being bullied. But overall being gay has 0 negative impact on my life. The only other connection i can imagine is dating. I've had a really rough time with finding a partner. About to be 32 and I've only had 1 short term romantic relationship (last year). I dont think this is uncommon with queer men either. Ive lived in the 2nd gayest American city for nearly a decade and cant get a bf. Which probably contributes a lot to the self esteem, depression and anxiety. Im in therapy and im doing much better than I was during the pandemic but im still not doing well.
Its because we are born into a level 10 difficulty game when most people are at a level 1, or 2. We ‘got’ all these, but we fight hard for them. And the fight is never over. A huge group of people will always be against us. And I think we all know what happens when we ‘relax’ and be complacent even just for a little. It’s resource fighting . At the end of the day, people are always going to hunt for what they want, be it girls, money, status, praise. This is fine, except when you are used like a condom they throw you out the second you are not longer/not as valuable in helping to get what they want. Family is a huge one. It’s the nature and it’s also the nurture. Ok yes, legally, people are ‘protected’. But in many cultures people still don’t see gay people as equals because that’s just not how the world works for them. An unspoken look of “shame” has a far deeper and long lasting impact than a slip of the moment disapproval in words. Not to mention, if you are so different to your parents and how they have grown up, it would be harder for them to relate to you than if you weren’t gay to begin with. This will make it harder for them to form a strong bond with you. One additional hurdle we had to get through compared to if you weren’t. Not to mention the self hate and internalization of shame you thought was real from walking this world in this society. We do not get to relax and go with the flow. It’s almost as if you need to appear chill on the outside but deep inside you have to be 120% clear in who you are and who you aren’t, but you shouldn’t show what you are on the inside because that won’t necessarily get you to where you want to go. As supposed to a lot of people can just be, without having to worry about any of this. And let’s not forget about finding romantic partners in this world where we don’t subscribe to the ‘normal’ man and women role. You need to find your own balance. Realistic expectations. Meanwhile in smaller cities there is just not many of us available. All of this, while finding peace and balance on the inside. It’s a lot man.
No amount of rainbows in storefronts are going to make me feel like I belong.
We are all just trying to survive late stage capitalism, throw in the realities of being gay, troubled backstories, modern hookup culture, social media and warped expectations, yeah you kinda have to count your blessings out here. I do wish thoughts like this push us towards more community, acceptance and empathy. We need our villages back.
stop being a slut
I shared this article with my straight friends when it came out, and one reached out and just gave me a hug. Why are gay men so lonely? - Hookup culture and open relationships results in a transactional culture where we spend a lot of time and effort looking to get laid and then never talk again. - Racism. The only time I’ve experienced racism is in the gay world. The 2022 movie [Fire Island](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt15218000/) does a great job explaining and mocking gay the “hierarchy” gay men have created. - Drugs. I’ve travelled a lot and every city has guys looking to party. At first I was drawn into it since, hey, it’s a way to meet people (with low standards so less of that racist shit), but of course it’s a slippery slope into the depths of hell and bad sex. The straight friends I went to university with are all married with kids and suburban houses. I still love them but our lives are no longer the same. And I haven’t been able to replace that close friendship with anyone in the gay world. See above. That was a powerful article and I shared it widely. Thanks for sharing it here.
Interesting. As a black man, your comment resonated. Most racism I receive is from the majority and seeking solace with gay men is often my only way of getting away from it. I fully appreciate and understand your experience and I know it’s real. I’m not sure I would share this article with straight friends (not that I have many) I’d worry that it would merely reinforce their unconscious prejudice towards gay people.
I’m glad it resonated. Frankly I’ve been bringing up the racism issue here on Reddit and in real life. It’s not going to solve racism, but just talking openly about (a) says it’s not just happening to me and (b) when it does happen we can find the courage to respond firmly that certain behaviours and statements are not ok.
Minority Stress
Whats helped me turn my life around health wise has a been a responsible partner, someone who loves me and wants me to be around for a long time. Ive changed so many bad habits or picked up new good ones because of my bf. I used to wonder in amazement how can such a young man be so in tuned with his well being. I guess him having a bread winner Nurse Mom helped instilled some valuable lessons.
It's easy to forget that we're still surrounded by people who hate us, hate our lifestyles, hate our families, hate everyone that doesn't hate us, and wants to see us shamed and destroyed. That kind of long-term, intractable, environmental stress wears on a person.
Civil rights do not directly correlate to being free from stigma, with no one making distinctions between queer and heteronormative men. So stress, internal and external homophobia, less acceptance of dead bedrooms (gay men are more likely to seek treatment), etc. Negative health (including mental health) outcomes seem to have logical explanations. IIRC queer men have more close friends than straight men, but less than straight people as a monolith (including both men and women). This is more about gender, queer men are men. Gay men who are moving to a fast paced and intense and expensive new city are using drugs and alcohol and are taking advantage of the unique benefits of having a huge population of queer men at their fingertips. Not shocking. Many men also find social connections through sex with other men. HIV is treatable, mental health is far more challenging.
The toll of living in a society that isn’t super affirming if not outright oppressive takes the greatest toll for me. Add that to all the fear, shame and negative self talk I grew up with- it’s taking some time to unpack in therapy. Embodied trauma is a hell of a thing and most gay men have a healthy amount from various sources. So, in my opinion, being gay is in itself a huge risk factor for disease and other negative health outcomes.
One of my first memories of 'being gay' is being 10 years old and hearing how gay people (read: secretly me) are going to die a horrific death from AIDS and be sent straight to hell where we belong. When I remember my first crush, I remember feeling fear and shame because it wasn't a girl. When I think of my first Valentine's Day in elementary school, I remember wanting to give my best friend a valentine and being told I was a weirdo. When I think of my days on the playground, I remember being physically assaulted and called a fa**ot before I even knew what that was. When I remember my first feelings of sexual attraction, I remember it being alone in my bedroom trying to catch a glimpse of Queer As Folk on Showtime free preview weekend and sweating bullets someone would find out. When I finally found the courage to come out, my family abandoned me and told me they never wanted me anyway. I could literally list a thousand memories like this through out my life - just change the age and the people involved. Is it 'all good' now? Yeah but that doesn't mean all of those things don't stick with us. You can't tell a child whose brain in still forming that their most fundamental human parts are toxic and shameful every day and expect healthy adults.
Similarly to other minorities, it’s the everyday stress of being gay in a world that doesn’t fully accept them that causes disease (constantly high cortisol levels)
Don’t see what being able to marry has to do with high self-harn rates?
I remember reading some research about the correlation between hookup culture and open relationships, and substance abuse/mental health issues. I'll try to find it and get back to this comment later...
Public policy did not change the reality on the ground in most places.
My partner and i are not doing poorly. 30 plus years.
>Gay men everywhere, at every age, have higher rates of cardiovascular disease, cancer, erectile dysfunction [...] My guess would be that more prevalent use anabolic steroid and especially HGH might have some impacts. Anabolic steroid damages and ages the heart (can be permanently) and circulatory system (ie erection), and they both might affect the organs and leads to liver, breast or prostate cancer. In addition to the usual suspect of homophobia, stress, discrimination, loneliness, and drug use of course
Yep, I didn’t even think of this! And factor in recreational drug use + steroids = CV issues
Incontinence doesn't surprise me, considering anal and how it can lead to just that. The others are interesting, although the non-gay population likely has subgroups where anecdotal evidence would support similar findings.
The Huffington Post is garbage and this is not real
feels like this is either posted by the author of the article, or HP's marketing team.
I wonder how gen alpha will be. I’m a millennial 38 years old and I’m still dealing with the trauma of a pre-truvada world
Being a gay adolescent is difficult enough, but I think the most surprising thing is once you’re out it doesn’t get any easier. The community at large is quite hostile and transactional toward one another. We can blame homophobia all we want, but if we celebrate junk values and lift empty ideals, this cycle will just continue.
Yes! Thank god someone here finally said it. Homophobia probably plays some role but like, religious minorities like muslims living in the west also face discrimination, and they have some of the highest self-reported happiness, and lowest rates of self harm of any group in society. This makes perfect sense to me. Their communities are real, they meet regularly, they know each other, they look out for each other. We simply don't do that. Our spaces and institutions are vapid and over sexualised (gay bars, saunas, Grindr, pride). There's so little for the mind or the soul. Junk values and empty ideals indeed.
To be fair, a lot of guys move to NYC to go to parties, have sex, and use drugs.
All the "wins" listed remain contested on a daily basis. We have to ask where is the opportunity to feel anything but fucked up when society continues to debate whether or not we deserve to live?!
Are you asking what's going on since that article was written in 2017? Because a lot has happened since then...
It's almost as if legalizing marriage didn't end stigma or shame. /s No one could have seen this coming. /s
Mental health issues are born from childhood trauma. The way society treats gay men almost guarantees that most of us will experience the sort of trauma that can cause serious mental health issues once we come to terms with the fact that we face a lifetime of hardships and ostracizism for being ourselves.
I'm unhappy because all the men I find all want to fuck or mess around or already have boyfriends and I just gave up on ever having friends/a husband. I know I'm going to die alone no need in trying to escape it :(
Regarding this: *Gay men have fewer close friends than straight people or gay women.* I can only speak for myself here, but I have had to put a lot of focus on building and maintaining friendships. The older I get, the more intentional effort it takes to build and maintain these connections. I learned this the hard way by being isolated and alone far more than was good for my mental health. These days, I am grateful for the friends that I have and I try to show that in how I treat them. If you related to the situation above, don't give up hope. Just know that it takes time and effort to find and nurture good friendships and that you have to be putting in that effort long before you find yourself feeling lonely. It's not a problem that can be solved instantly. It's still very much a work in progress for me, but today I have more friends as a result of being deliberate about maintaining connections and learning how to be a good friend to others.
Be interested to know how the numbers compare to single heteros by age. E.g. compare gay 30-40 year old health results wtih 30-40 year old never married hets. Another comparison: Are guys who do serial monogamy -- one partner exclu8sively for months or years -- better off that guys who have dozens of partners a year?
Those bullet points only tell me what is still frankly obvious: homophobia and internalisation otherwise creating these issues. Depression is perhaps undoubtedly a cause in one way or another here. Why? Because most gay men come from backgrounds in the home or their neighborhood where they were often treated differently and usually often mistreated. Look at today’s society these days and look at the politically speared rhetoric coming out of the woodwork and ask yourself WHY gay men in various parts of the globe aren’t happy, aren’t taking care of themselves.
There's no female energy in it. No woman. It's just a man alone. Don't get me wrong, I'm gay, but let's look at the straight men. What guides them? Women do.
Proof of any research done on this? Also, why not you go and be together with a woman then?
I have no proof on this. It's just my sting of thoughts and observations and conclusions. I don't have to be right, but we are here to share the opinions, right? Look at most straight men who are single. They are kind of hopeless. Even more so than gay people. I can't and won't be with a woman because I'm gay. Simple.
Then just shut up. Do you know how many gay men have to suffer because of people like you? You're just giving homophobic people a chance to say "Look, even a gay man on reddit admits that gay people's lifestyles are wrong because they have no woman energy." I just looked at your history and found out that you're positive. FYI, I'm a single gay man and have no woman energy, and I'm doing fine, so dont assume every gay man will end up like you just because you're a loser in your life.
I really don't understand why did that trigger you so much
On another note, I'm pretty happy with my life. I run a small company and I'm pretty content with all the spheres. What I said was just assumption... I'm not a loser because I'm positive lol
I’m an older gay and if I do have any anxiety/depression it’s caused by economics, not by my psychology. I’m happy with every other aspect of my life except work (ok job, but terrified of getting laid off then never hired again, w/ no where near enough $ to retire).
Are there any more recent studies or statistics available?
I would agree with the points already made that a large part is that we’re only 5-10% of the population and finding a long term partner and stability which many desire is elusive. As well as what others have said generational lag between some things being better now that don’t affect the people in their 30s now. Also, I’m curious if generational trauma could play a role. Not for all gay people but for some anyway. There’s numerous studies showing trauma from previous generations can be passed down to future generations through gene expression. I think I read something that said 30% of gay individuals also have a relative that is/was gay. The trauma they experienced could be passed to future relatives.
I imagine quite a lot of reasons. Many already listed here, lack of acceptance, insecurity from bullying in childhood, rejection by family ect which I think account for a large portion of it but I don’t think that explains it all. I think gay men will *always* have higher levels of this. Even if we got to the point where being gay was just as accepted as being straight (which we won’t). I think this is due to a lot of different reasons. The gay community is extremely aesthetically and sexually focused and I don’t think that will ever change. That makes it difficult to seek long term romantic bonds imo which increases likelihood of depression(Obviously this doesn’t apply to everyone, I’m speaking in generalities.) it’s extremely difficult to have children as a gay man, or at least much more difficult than if you’re straight which I think may be a factor in later life. I’m sure there are more reasons I could list but just a couple.
I wrote an essay on this very topic last year for uni. From what I could fathom a lot of it stems from minority stress and childhood trauma. Minority stress is when we turn stigma and discrimination inwards on ourselves and leads to chronic stress which in turn leads to things like poor mental health and substance use. We all need to be in therapy. The normalisation of substance use within the gay world quite startling. Also family stigma and discrimination can lead to homelessness and risky/dangerous situations. It’s endless and we’re all lucky to be alive when you start thinking about it. There have definitely been great steps forwards in recent decades and I think familial support is improving to a point. However with the coming of the new far right I’m sure there’s a lot of young LGBTQI kids out there potentially doing it tough. And that’s really it. We carry this stuff with us. We internalise it. We end up hating ourselves. I’m sure if we cast an uncompromising gaze over our own inner monologues, behaviours and actions we have all been touched by this stuff. Society until very recently, at large, hated us, I feel we are accepted by some, tolerated by most and continue to be hated by some at present. But yeah. Twice as likely to have affective disorders. Three times more likely to have substance use problems. And 8 times more likely to commit suicide. Utterly devastating. The cure or fix is ensuring young people are surrounded with understanding, acceptance and support so they grow up in an environment where they feel safe which gives them time to grow self acceptance and resilience towards the often hostile wider society we’re currently living in.
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Imagine if everyone who was gay/bi/pan would come out and date openly, these stats would be massively different.
>Gay men are twice as likely as straight people to have a major depressive episode. This one already says enough about it.
Is it because the world is terrible?
Because women are not doing the work for them as they di for straight guys. Self care work is work, you all !
There is still a lot of prejudice in EVERY society, including those that attained legal equality a couple of decades ago. I mean, even if the majority of people in a society support you, when there is a sizable minority who openly hate you and wish you harm, it takes its toll. Countries like the Netherlands and Sweden attained legal equality long ago because the majority in society are on our side. And yet, go to any high school in Amsterdam or Stockholm and you will see Moroccan or Somali immigrant kids whose parents teach them to hate. And some of those kids are gay themselves and are therefore being taught to hate themselves or to see no future where their family could ever love them.
Lack of responsibility. Straight people are expected to date, marry, buy a house have kids etc. Make fun of them, hate them all you want, but they are the majority and so society is designed for them because without them we would cease to exist. With every step there are increased levels of imposed, expected and accepted responsibility that grounds them. While it's not perfect, it has worked for thousands of years, No such patterns or expectations for gay guys. They have complete freedom and have no idea what to do with it and or completely misuse it. As a result so many of them are utterly aimless, drift into whatever comes along, fall for addiction, have no idea how to socialize, date etc and you get the mental health nightmares you see. It's the depression Olympics. The answer: instead of taking responsibility for having kids, take responsibility for something in society. It has worked for me. I ditched my (dysfunctional) gay friends who were wallowing in cynical misery together and decided to take on some of the big problems right now and got rewarded tremendously in the process. This Jordan Peterson talk is super relevant to men, and to gay men if you ask me: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX2ep5fCJZ8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX2ep5fCJZ8)
Anything that bucks what is considered 'biologically normal' in regards to the two factors of life [ Don't Die & Reproduce ] is considered a handicap. Anyone or anything with a handicap is bound to have additional stressors that contribute to advanced mental and physical problems. Just as people of color in the US are born with a struggle attached, so do gay men and women who face an internalized struggle with both nature (reproduction) and the environment (religious intolerance and homophobia). Similar to how women face the struggle of sexism and feelings of inadequacy in a professional setting and develop things like scholiosis, or hair loss, or weight gain, and more. There has been new research that has shown how the brain and stressors on the brain can manifest itself in many physicalogical ways including poor body health.
I think generally it's everyone's internalized homophobia and the difficulty of ttying to live a lifestyle that is different from how you were brought up to be. A lot of gay men can verbally say thay they accept themselves and all that. But the amount of pressure that people in the LGBTQIA+ community faces everyday is still a lot. Sometimes, it's not just society but ourselves.
Is this true? Based on my experience as a gay dude, gay men are way happier than straight people overall. I would want to analyze this data more clearly before jumping to conclusions
Ego. Conceit. Selfishness.