RW Connell ch6-7

As most of you already know, there are many gays and lesbians in this world. People often have a perspective, that gays are attracted to their own sex, because their personality traits, features, and their background are feminine. Because they have feminine characteristics, they are attracted to the opposite. However, Connell's chapter 6 suggests that such widespread claim is not true. In the chapter, Connell interviews 8 gays of different backgrounds, ethnicites, and what not. Surprisingly, all eight interviewed gays had a similar trait: they were not feminine at all. In fact, some played sports, a heavily masculine feature. Some even married opposite sex. Why is it that despite their masculine characteristics, some decide to become gay?

Some people turn gay because they can not only feel affection with other men, but also discover more of themselves. Since they are loving and are involving themselves in sexual activities with others of same gender, they can things about themselves that they did not know of in the past. It takes a gradual progress for people to become gay. For example, a man who visited gay party for the first time does not become gay from that time. This chapter came as a total surprise for me. Like others, I thought that gays had feminine characteristics (probably because most gays I know of have feminine characteristics). However, I now know that there are more to the reasons people become gay.