Originally published by Ladybud Magazine

Living in San Francisco, it seems antiquated to think so many homosexual men and women are still in the closet. Our city prides itself in street festivals full of wrinkly old men walking around with their balls strangled in cock rings for all to see, admire and stare at in awkward confusion. We live in an amazing city, but it’s still part of the greater United States of America.

And the reality is at least 4-10% of the American population is gay. We can’t really know how many gay people are out there because ‘gay’ comes in a spectrum, its gray more than it is black and white. There is no better evidence of this than the growing acronym used to describe the gay communities: LGBTQQIA. That’s a mouth full of something, isn’t it? There are so many different types of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, Transgendered, Queer, Questioning, Intersex and Asexual peoples that you never know, there may be some sort of gay lurking around the corner, in front of you at the grocery line, or gasp! In your church pews on Sundays.

It’s a slippery slope my friends, from watching two wasted chicks at the dive bar taking shots off of each other’s belly buttons and playing with each other’s tits (for an audience of course) to being bent over and taking it in the ass from another man– and liking it. Perhaps that’s why so many gay people have to live in the closet to, you know, protect other people from discovering they too like gay sex. Unfortunately, there are two reasons people live in the closet: self-preservation and self-denial. This is an important distinction.

“It’s a slippery slope my friends, from watching two wasted chicks at the dive bar taking shots off of each other’s belly buttons and playing with each other’s tits (for an audience of course) to being bent over and taking it in the ass from another man– and liking it.”

Self-preservation is knowing the very real threat of family disownment or bodily harm that could result from living gay outside the closet. So many Americans deny to others their sexual preferences just to do essential every day things, like hold a job.

Self-denial is my friend, Mother Posterior’s, flavor-of-the-week Butt Boy Ben. Ben claims he is 100% straight and has made up a laundry list of ground rules to preserve his straightness while Mother Posterior rams him up the ass with his gigantic black cock. See, men more often than women are stigmatized to believe they are either 100% gay or 100% straight. Women are more likely to experiment with other women and still not identify solely as lesbians.

BB Ben, a man in his early 20s, claims that if he doesn’t look a male partner in the face, doesn’t get hard, doesn’t cum and doesn’t suck dick (unless ‘forced’ of course) then he’s just not gay, never mind the dick in his ass. Even worse, Ben has a girlfriend who has no idea that after he drops her off at class he has belligerent drunken sex with men. Ben is not preserving anyone’s dignity; he is lying to himself and hurting other people in the process.

Perhaps BB Ben wouldn’t be afraid of identifying as gay, or even bisexual, if he were the top.

BB Ben is a bottom, and ashamed of it. Bottoms like to get fucked in the ass, which is in every way anatomically normal for men to enjoy—they have the prostate, a gland that when hit by a large penis, a dildo or a finger can feel really good for a man. There is nothing ‘gay’ about enjoying physical pleasure, whether it is by prostate stimulation, satisfying your partner, connecting with your partner or satisfying yourself.

See, even within each letter of that crazy acronym is yet another spectrum of peoples who identify themselves differently. Gay men can be tops, bottoms, versatiles, bears, twinks, butch, effeminate and more. Lesbians can be diesel dykes, lipstick lesbians, butches, bitches… hell isn’t this straight people too? Do we really have to determine our self-worth by who is pitching and who is catching?

 ”Do we really have to determine our self-worth by who is pitching and who is catching?”

Unfortunately we do, and let me get feminist on you yet again. Why are men so afraid of being gay? Because it makes them like women.  In traditional, missionary, this-is-how-you-were-conceived sex, men are always the pitchers and women are always the catchers. It is masculine to dominate and feminine to submit. This mentality has nothing to do with pleasing one another and everything to do with people accepting their own letter in the sexual acronym line up. I am going to go ahead and add an S for Straight, LGBTQQIAS. An even bigger mouthful.

Because straight people who have good sex with each other do all kinds of other stuff besides missionary, so it really doesn’t matter who is taking a dick. Its about mutual pleasure, not domination (I mean, unless that’s what you want it to be).

Ben will continue to tell himself that he can only either be a straight man or gay man and he can only be straight because he is no goddamn woman. He even may enjoy sleeping with his poor girlfriend, who is clearly living in the dark herself. Society told Ben he had to pick a letter so he forewent happiness and chose misery because that’s better than people thinking you are like a woman, right?

While men wear their dicks on the outside, they tend to wear their emotions on the inside. It’s ok to be feminine, it’s ok to be butch, it’s ok to be whatever makes you feel good, and your partner—male or female—will only respect you as much as you respect yourself. So to all you Butt Boy Bens out there, sometimes you just need to loosen up your asshole and take it like a man.