Is it that difficult to find a parter or is it their choice? I came out recently and find many gay men are single in the community. Is there hope to find a companion who loves and understand me? Thanks for the advice in advance.
I want a companion as well and don't understand. I one day hope to be in a long term relationship such as marriage with another guy.
In high school there are many events to hook people up, male-to-female - dances, sporting events, fund raising etc. In the military there are many events that hook people up. Dances, social events, clubs, etc. The following are my thoughts. For the gay community, which has been shamed to oblivion, what is there? Of the venues that did rise up above gay shame, they appear seedy. So my thoughts are, there isn't processes in place to help out "regular" gay people.
One of the things I like to say is that LGBT people get an "extra serving" of baggage. We have all the family-of-origin and other issues of our straight counterparts, but we also get a ton of extra internalized homophobia and messages from society, media, religion, and other factors we're surrounded with growing up. That tends to create a lot of internalized shame which, in turn, really complicates the ability to have healthy relationships. This is a big part of why you see many gay men frequenting bathhouses, using hookup apps... and why drug use in the gay community is so much higher, as a percentage of population, than it is with the equivalent straight community. It's all about numbing the shame. So people are fearful of connection. By that i mean deep, authentic, vulnerable connnection. We may want it consciously, but unconsciously, the message is "I don't deserve / I'm not __________ enough (toned, cute, thin, tall, etc)... and so we unconsciously run from connection, because we're afraid we will lose it. That's a big part of the reason for hookup culture. The good news is... there is a lot less stigma to being gay in 2015 than there was even 5 years ago. And people are talking about shame and vulnerability more than they were, which is the biggest single thing we can do to heal it. Finding people is only a part of the battle. You can find gay guys pretty easily. The challenge is finding healthy ones, or ones that, if not healthy, at least know where their issues are and are actively working on them. And that's a lot more difficult. You almost never find that in clubs, bars, hookup apps, because those cultures are pretty much antithetical to wholehearted values. But that's where most people look. Another piece is... we attract what we think we deserve. So if we haven't done our own work, the people we'll attract will be what we (unconsciously) think we deserve... so for many of us, that means we'll attract the unhealthy people that don't feel worthy... which means the relationships won't work very well. I believe that the key is vulnerability and open communication. THe more you work on yourself, the more you'll attract healthier people to you... and when you find someone who's willing to be really open about their struggles, fears, difficulties with emotional closeness, that's the person you'll be able to really connect with.
I find that part of the issue is also that a lot of gay men are very picky, and that includes the ones who strictly only want to date masculine men no different to the ones who are put off by the same masculine type. You also often here the whole race dilemma “I’m only attracted to this type of race/guys” and what have you…How can such a marginalized group be so selective?
Seriously? Every gay person I know is in a relationship. :rolle: As for me - I'm single by choice. Just not my choice.
I have to say that a majority of the gay men I know are paired up too. If you are only finding perpetually single guys it may be a product of where you are looking.
I know plenty of paired up guys. However, I'm single and not actively looking for a relationship because I don't really want to. I feel like society expects us to pair up. To be monogamous and only have sex within relationships. I'd definitely like to do this in the future but, for now, I'm quite happy being single and don't really feel the need to make an effort. If I fall in love with someone then that will be my cue, but for now I'm not changing! Obviously I don't speak for everyone. I think if I was to decide to be in a relationship it would be pretty frustrating because of the reasons you've talked about.
Maybe it's because they're happy with their life right now and aren't really looking? I don't know. Personally, the gay guys that I know aren't with someone so I suspect that they aren't really looking for anyone right now.
