Straight culture is ruining gay relationships

“So who’s the man and who’s the woman in the relationship?”

It’s a question literally every same sex couple gets at least once in their life, probably many times more. It’s ridiculous, the whole point of a same sex relationship is that both people are the same sex, right? Well kind of.

There’s an issue plaguing the gay community at the moment, an issue centred around disappointment, depression and alienation. The problem is that, throughout our upbringing, LGBT people are surrounded by a culture obsessed with straight relationships. Music, books, film, advertising, even children’s television programmes are packed full of heterosexuality, and these straight relationships are often based on the idea of a man being macho and strong, and a woman being sensitive and caring.

Idk man, straight relationships look weird…

Admittedly, all types of relationship should move away from this ‘ideal’, but the impact of this culture on same-sex relationships can be particularly alienating.

With such little representation of LGBT dating in the media and such prominence of heterosexuality in everyday life, lots of same-sex couples are becoming obsessed with adopting a traditionally ‘straight’ approach to relationships. Smaller, more effeminate guys may look for more masculine guys to date, and femme lesbian/bi girls may look for their supposed ‘butch counterpart’ – all just to meet these societal ideals that have been engrained into us by straight culture.

The reality of this, of course, is very different. Feminine guys may fall in love with other feminine guys, and butch girls may fall for other butch girls.

Connor and Oliver from HTGAWM are all i’ve got…

The problem is that this ‘straight’ approach to dating leads to a lot of disappointment and alienation, as it can often mean people try to seek out others who don’t even share the same interests as them, or frankly, don’t even exist at all.

Certainly, within the gay/bi male community there’s a notion of ‘matching’. People will often put ‘bottom’ or ‘top’ on their Grindr profile to denote which role they would take in sex, but in reality it means much more than this. You’ll rarely find two bottoms on a date together – which is silly because, other than a bit of negotiation in the bedroom, they could be absolutely perfect for each other.

Equally, in the lesbian/bi girl community the fact that common labels such as ‘femme’ or ‘butch’ even exist notions a binary nature to relationships.

It all boils down the fact that we have to stop pretending that ‘gay relationships are just the same as straight relationships’. Lets look at the facts here: they’re not the same at all… and that’s okay! The love and commitment may be the same, but the relationship is very different.

Gay relationships are very different to straight relationships, but they’re just as cute

So to all of you out there looking for a same-sex relationship: stop pretending you’re straight and get those perfect haute-couture, perfume advert relationship ideals out of your head, because by being so ridiculously exclusive about what ‘kind’ of person you date, you’re only narrowing the field even further.

And to all you straight people out there: please don’t moan about how there doesn’t seem to be a TV show that doesn’t have a gay couple on there anymore. Representation of minorities is extremely important.

I’ve had to put up with your weird, gendered, heterosexual antics for nearly 21 years now, and the occasional gay kiss gives me just the tiniest glimpse of hope that one day someone will love me just the way I am and not the freakish, eroticised, Beast vs Belle way that they’ve seen in straight based Disney movies.