Telegraph: Spot The Difference

In real life, although I am neither a glamorous oldster or into make-up and squealing confidences, I have always had happy relaxed friendships with gay men and never felt a squeak of misogyny. If anything, on a personal level it can be easier to have a friendship (certainly in single youth) when both sides are pretty certain that it needn’t lead anywhere more intimate, and that neither side hopes so. And since both groups have known hassle at work from stiff-necked harrumphing bosses and macho twits, that can create a bond, too. So there was something baffling about McGowan’s outburst; it is years since Stonewall and Outrage explicitly set their face against misogyny.

But looking back across the years, and outside the comfy media-liberal consensus, it must be admitted that there have been mutual hostilities, and that in a few stony unreconstructed hearts they may endure...

Libby Purves, Daily Telegraph.

And while it’s great that McGowan has such a nuanced insight to what gay men do and think about (take drugs and how much they hate women, respectively), I’m not sure how many more of us it will win round to the feminist cause. There’s a debate to be had about whether gay men should get more involved in this, though there’s also a difference between not actively campaigning for women’s rights and women-hating.

But I’ll say one thing for being accused of misogyny: it makes a change from the stereotype of the fluffy, harmless Gay Best Friend which is, somehow, still a thing in 2014. “Are gay men really misogynist?” asked one acquaintance, who shall remain anonymous, upon reading McGowan’s ill-judged comments. “I thought they loved women?”

Being told that all gay men hate women is wrong and offensive, but at least it moves us away from the truth universally acknowledged that a single gay man in possession of a fabulous wardrobe must be in want of a sassy girlfriend to talk about boy troubles, go shopping, order sushi with, etc. etc...

Theo Merz, Daily Telegraph. - a good piece, perhaps surprisingly.

Can we please stop pretending gay men are a uniform pink blob?