Do gay men influence straight men??

Well, there is a heck of a lot of products in the "health and beauty" section of stores marketed specifically towards men. It could be considered part of the whole "metrosexual" trend that's been happening for well over a decade where men can get more pampered and not be viewed any less "manly." This is compounded with the fact that multinational corporations (*cough* *cough* Unilever, Procter & Gamble, etc.) sure do love that and are willing to play along given that men are doing more of the shopping and were one of the last bastions whom to market health and beauty products (akin to how soft drink companies decided to sell "bottled water" after seeing that the soda market was mature and they needed more nascent product lines for growth). Now you see many such products have a "for men" equivalent.

I wouldn't really say it was a "gay" thing that made it more permissive for straight men to be "liberated," but a combination of capitalism, pop culture, and people willing to play along.

 

I don't follow each trend, but I do know men will wear clogs, of the bulkier, squarish nature, with jeans and a pullover, depending on the season and the part of the country. I do. They're so damn comfortable.

http://s.stpost.com/eccstorefront/product_images/10303/f_10303_1.1.jpg

Only the most uptight would consider this weird, but they periodically fetch a look or two.

 

I personally consider clogs a bit unsightly, but I have no right to say so because I still wear my ugly-as-hell Crocs.

 

Its like a more classy flip-flops :icon_bigg

 

Just my opinion but,
Clogs= only acceptable when river dancing.
Crocs=Only acceptable for kindling.

 

This is a really interesting question. Personally, I don't think it has anything, or at least much, to do with homosexual liberation, and if it does it's influence I should think would be minimal. I think it has more to do with the media and societal pressures to look a certain way that didn't really exist just a few decades ago. Now, it's virtually essential to be well coiffed and impeccably dressed to get ahead in life. And whether straight (or gay) guys like it or not, an environment has been created in which people are judged quite heavily on their appearance and how they present themselves, so naturally guys are going to spend a little more time choosing their outfits in the morning and perusing through the men's health aisles for moisturisers and hair products and all of the other things required to maintain a certain image.

 

I think all straight men are influenced by gay men. In that they do the exact opposite of the stereotypical gay man. Drive big trucks, go to the gym. And act super straight.

 

(Y)

I'm glad someone else said this before I had to.

 

No. I just think that more relaxed and less judgmental attitudes toward apparel have let men wear what comfortable or what they want more so than before. I've always tended to think of clogs as only something people in the medical field or hospital employees wore. Maybe it was the catalogs that made them ok. I don't know for sure.

However, when it comes to Speedos, we still make that assumption (lol), at least in the U.S.

 

I've read somewhere that if you wish to know what straight men will be doing in ten to twenty years, simply look towards what gay men are doing today, since a lot of trends started there first. Shaving bodily hair, for example, is becoming quite common in twenty first century heterosexual men. Same with the whole leather look.

Ironically, I think there's even MORE pressure to present as some all-masculine hunk in the gay community than the straight one; there seems to be a lot more diversity and acceptance of male forms. They have time and numbers on their side, so it's not really surprising when you think of it.