Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are challenging the ‘gaydar myth’ in a new paper published in the Journal of Sex Research saying it’s is not only inaccurate, it also promotes homophobic stereotypes. William Cox, (Cox! j/k) the lead author of the new study says;
“Most people think of stereotyping as inappropriate. But if you’re not calling it ‘stereotyping,’ if you’re giving it this other label and camouflaging it as ‘gaydar,’ it appears to be more socially and personally acceptable.”
Cox proved the theory by splitting the study’s participants into three groups. One was told that gaydar is real, another that gaydar is stereotyping, and gaydar was not defined at all for a third group. Then they were all shown photos of men with a statement about their interests.
The group that was led to believe gaydar is real were more like to make assumptions based on stereotypes, such as ‘he likes shopping.’
“If you tell people they have gaydar, it legitimizes the use of those stereotypes.”
Another reason gaydar is WRONG more often than not, Cox said, was because that gay people make up such a small percentage of the population – 5% or less in the US.
“Imagine that 100% of gay men wear pink shirts all the time, and 10% 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.”
So just throw out that “gayer” idea… is is permanently broken because NO one can tell who is gay, lesbian, bi or even transgender not these days, so why even try. It makes cruising more confusing, but life in general less judgmental and a lot more exciting! (via Gay Star News)
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