Posted on 09/08/2015 10:23:53 AM PDT by Jan_Sobieski
A new study suggests that 'gaydar' -- the sixth sense by which many insist they can just tell that someone they meet isn't heterosexual -- is bad in two big ways. For starters, it doesn't work. But more importantly, the concept of gaydar may be pretty harmful. It may -- big surprise here, guys -- just be an excuse to revel in harmful stereotypes about LGBTQ people.
In a paper published in the Journal of Sex Research, University of Wisconsin-Madison psychologist William Cox argues that gaydar just isn't really a thing. "Imagine that 100 percent of gay men wear pink shirts all the time, and 10 percent of straight men wear pink shirts all the time. Even though all gay men wear pink shirts, there would still be twice as many straight men wearing pink shirts. So, even in this extreme example, people who rely on pink shirts as a stereotypic cue to assume men are gay will be wrong two-thirds of the time," Cox said in a statement.
Previous studies have come out claiming that gaydar is very real, and perhaps even based on cues as innate as facial shape. So a single study can't debunk all of those. It's possible there's some detectable difference that's common, if not inherent or universal, in people of different sexual orientations. But in his own team's studies, Cox found that any facial gaydar people seemed to have could be attributed to something pretty trivial: Photo quality...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Larry Craig!! Omg that pic is so funny. Is that guy still in the Senate? I figure he is still in the airport restrooms. What a joke he was. To come out and scream “I am NOT gay! I never HAVE been gay! I just have a wide stance!” Omg what a hilarious story that was.
Jewdar: totally useless re greeks and celts, as they are closely related (likewise arabs).
!
Jewdar is not totally useless with Greeks, celts, or Arabs. An experienced Jewdar still works. I can’t explain but it just does.
A man stranger who smiles at another man for no reason.
Touching another guy during conversation. Especially his hand or knee is a dead give away.
Telling another guy he is strong, handsome, smells good or he is really funny.
He listens to gay sounding music, has gay hobbies or he is a gosip.
He has been to in New Orleans, Austin, Key West and San Fran.
They had the look. I was waiting for them to say something. They did. Game, set, and match.
It's a headline writer's trick. It worked, didn't it? Got you to read the article? Of course, a scholarly article wouldn't be written that way, but this is popular throwaway journalism (like most of the stuff out there).
We are NOT relying on specific visual cues ie stereotypes - in fact, most of the time there is a gaydar alert when someone LACKS such cues and often when that person takes great pains to adopt heterosexual mannerisms, speech, dress, etc.
Well, that is "your 'gaydar'" and it's so specific that it may not be shared by very many other people. Just what people mean by "gaydar" is hard to say. It may not be one thing. For some people it certainly does mean identifying people as homosexuals because of some very specific stereotype signs.
Certainly it's not hard to identify a lot of people correctly as homosexuals. But many other guesses people make will be off, since there are so many false positives -- so many heterosexuals with mannerisms that make people think they're gay. The article's basic idea is more or less valid (so far as I know), but hardly earth-shattering.
The point is that gaydar is intuition in the face of counterintuitive information.
Once again, I'm not sure that's what everyone means by the term. There seems to be something almost supernatural in what you're talking about. Do all your intuitions pan out?
It also may not be that free from stereotypes. People have been "spotting" the quarterback or Bachelorette contestant that they think is gay for some time, whether through "stereotype" gay behavior or through little tics and quirks that they think reveal that the person is hiding something. But I'm not sure those guesses or "intuitions" based on supposed cracks in the facade are any closer to the mark on average than any others.
The whole Jared Subway story is a case in point. So many people heard that he was involved in an underage sex scandal said that they "knew all along" that he was gay, but it turned out not to be true.
I know that, but my argument tends to shut up the unbelievers.
whenever the abnormal people outnumber the normal people, then the normal people become abnormal ... and that's the truth ;^)
Why is that a requirement? Hell, if 25% of someone's intuitions were later confirmed despite superficial evidence that would be a remarkable success rate given the attempt to deceive.
The whole Jared Subway story is a case in point. So many people heard that he was involved in an underage sex scandal said that they "knew all along" that he was gay, but it turned out not to be true.
Erm, it's not a case in my point at all and therefore irrelevant.
My gaydar is right on.
Why is it that many of them dress like women? What is their obsession with trying to look and act like women? They only look like a parody of women. There is something that is obviously screwed up in their minds, something to do with identifying with the wrong sex. It can take different forms whether being attracted to the same sex, dressing and acting like the opposite sex or going all the way to physically alter their bodies to imitate the opposite sex. They even make a sick culture out of this.
They must go to gay bars.
But then, how was the first gay bar started? Who was the first gay to think of having a gay bar and how did he attract his gay clientele? He couldn’t very well put up a sign that said SAM’S GAY BAR. :^)
And of course their sexual practices are so much more healthy than heterosexuals.
Arabs are a little different due to customary inbreeding, etc. However Jews also outbred. That iconic hook nose? It’s not Jewish, it’s Hittite.
I can’t do the math here.
Democrats will criminalize abortion, then.
Starts in the brain in the womb? I’ve never heard that. Don’t believe it. That would make them “born that way”, which is not true.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.