All Boy-Boy Action

Please note: This piece includes some references to my personal sex life, and specifically to my tastes in porn. Family members and others who don’t want to read about that, please don’t. This piece was originally published on the Blowfish Blog.

The topic for today’s sermon:

Women who like gay male porn.

And people who are surprised by this.

Kirk spock
We’ll start with the facts: There are some women who like gay male porn. I’m one of them. And I’m not the only one. Look at the widespread phenomenon of slash fanfic: erotic fiction about fictional characters, typically about two or more male characters, and typically written by and for straight women. (Kirk/Spock, anyone? Or are you more of a Snape/Draco girl?) And it isn’t just written porn: there are women who like gay male porn videos, photos, comics. There’s even an entire genre of Japanese comics and graphic novels, yaoi, devoted to gay male love and/or sex stories created for a female audience. (If you’re one of these gay- porn- lovin’ women, btw — please speak up in the comments! I know more or less what I get out of gay male porn, but I’d love to hear what you get out of it.)

It’s true that this desire hasn’t been reflected very much in the video porn industry — and video porn is what a lot of people default to when they think about “porn.” But “women don’t like gay porn” isn’t a very good explanation for this. (Some better ones: Women on average are more interested in written porn than videos. And the video porn industry can be idiots sometimes: they’re terrified of putting something on screen that might turn off straight guys; they largely ignore the potential of the women’s market; and even when they try to cater to women’s tastes in porn, they tend to get it laughably wrong.)

So those are the facts: Some women like gay male porn. Enough so that there are entire porn genres that cater to it.

And yet, many people seem deeply surprised by this. Many people assume that this phenomenon doesn’t exist, and will ponder the question of why women don’t like gay porn when so many guys love the girl-girl stuff And many people are entirely baffled when they hear about women who like all boy-boy action, wondering, “What on earth do they get out of it?”

So if you’re surprised by the fact that some women like to watch/ read about two men doing it, let me ask you this:

Are you surprised by the fact that some men like to watch/ read about two women doing it?

Where the boys arent 14
“Girl-girl action” is so common in heterosexual video porn, it’s not even considered a fetish. It’s a completely standard menu item, like fucking and sucking. As for all girl-girl videos, they’re all over the “hetero” porn market like a cheap suit. And nobody seems the least bit surprised by any of this.

So if you’re puzzled by why some women are into porn with two guys, ask yourself: Why are some men — indeed, a whole lotta men — so excited by porn with two girls?

The answers vary, of course. Some men like girl-girl porn because they’re not attracted to men. Some are actively turned off by the sight of men; others really just prefer to look at women. They get off on femaleness — and they like to see a lot of it, undiluted by the maleness that they’re just not that into.

Sticky1
Well, that’s true for some women, too. Some women like gay porn because they’re hot for guys, not girls, and guys are who they want to look at/ read about. They want to enjoy maleness, and male sexuality. And even those of us who appreciate both women and men in our porn sometimes like to enjoy just one or the other. I, for one, like lots of different kinds of porn — but one of them is definitely the kind that’s all about hard cocks and hard muscles. Undiluted by soft breasts and pussies.

Moving on: Some men like girl-girl porn because they like the fantasy of a three-way (or four-way, or five-way, or whatever) that includes them. They like to watch two (or more) women do it because then they can project themselves into the scene. They like to look at all this delightful female pulchritude… and then imagine themselves as the center of it all.

Mass appeal
Well, that’s true for some women, too. Some women like to watch/ read about two or more guys… so they can imagine themselves as the center of a whole lot of hot male attention. The delicious meat in a Kirk/Spock sandwich, if you will.

And some men like girl-girl porn for the exact opposite reason: they like the alien-ness, the difference, of women, and of lesbians. They don’t want to project themselves into the scenario at all. They see women as excitingly mysterious, exotic even. They see lesbians in particular as enticingly out of reach. And they don’t want that mysterious allure tainted by the quotidian familiarity of men.

Best gay erotica
And again, that’s true for some women, too. For some women, gay male porn is alien, exotic. Forbidden fruit, even. It’s like the key to the secret garden; a keyhole peep into a world we’re not supposed to see.

I’ve read other explanations for why women like boy-boy porn — explanations as varied as the women themselves. Some women like the fact that gay porn features seriously good-looking guys, while straight porn all too often succumbs to the “ugly guys with big dicks” phenomenon. Some like kinky porn, and they’ve found gay kinky porn to be harder and kinkier. Some like kinky porn with male tops, but aren’t comfortable watching women they don’t know get beaten and humiliated. Some like to watch intense butt-sex, and gay porn has plenty to spare. Etc. Etc. Etc. (And yes, for the record: The reasons some men like to watch girl-girl porn are wildly varied as well.)

I’m not sure what my point is here. I think my point is just this:

Yes, Virginia, some women like boy-boy porn. Exclusively, primarily, or as one of many porny varieties. And this fact is entirely unsurprising. Or it should be. The fact that some women like boy-boy porn should be no more surprising that the fact that some men — okay, lots of men — like girl-girl porn.

And if our culture took female sexual desire seriously, nobody would blink an eye at it.

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All Boy-Boy Action
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30 thoughts on “All Boy-Boy Action

  1. 1

    I’m a woman who likes visual man-man porn. I’m not so much into written porn of any kind. I like it primarily for one of the reasons you mentioned, which is that I’m sexually attracted to men, so man-man porn gives me twice as many men to ogle. I also tend to see man-man porn as more intimate, although I’m not sure if I could parse why that is. Perhaps because it’s more “forbidden”, so it “costs” the participants more. Perhaps it’s just because I find anal sex to be very intimate, and there’s plenty of that in man-man porn.

  2. 2

    Datapoint: I’m a male who tends toward heterosexuality (I believe “heteroflexible” is the term du jour) and am not kinky in the ways she tends to depict but Maria Beatty’s pornography is the only stuff I’ve ever found to do anything for me.

  3. 3

    Don’t be ridiculous…
    It’s Harry/Draco, all the way.
    Seriously though, I’m a gay leaning bisexual male who enjoys a lot of different varieties of porn: straight, gay, whatever. It’s probably one of the reasons I like Corbin Fisher. Hot guys fucking each other then the same guys fucking girls too. Yes, please.
    But I also really enjoy slash (especially my OTP mentioned above) even though most of it is written for and by women. It fulfills a more emotional niche instead of pure sex. It is also the only genre in Western literature where gay people get to be the heroes. Everywhere else, movies, TV, music, it’s straight couples constantly. Slash is nice since it’s couples dealing with a lot of issues that I can relate to.

  4. 5

    I’m bi and I watch porn across the board, but I love any type of queer romance or show with neat queer characters. I also mentally queer certain characters or want them to end up in polyamourous relationships (or orgies…). I just need more Torchwood right now, it’s such a fan service show. It gives me just what I want (except in regards to disability isssues, but that’s a different issue). I suggest that the two male characters should just start making out and they do and oh, the scene where the world is about to end Owen suggests an orgy in the meantime, priceless. And John Hart, the ultimate awesome bad queer, I love that character so much.
    I’m not a Harry Potter fan, but I got seriously vindicated when I read the Symposium and discovered that ancient Athenians saw Achilles as as much of a homo as I did when I read the Illiad. He habitually dresses in drag and shares a bed with a beautiful guy, and constantly spouts about how much he loves him and how much he grieves about his death. Honestly how can you not catch that one?

  5. 6

    yay! something to link to when people think i’m weird for thinking gay guy action is hot, or wanting a mmf threesome.
    for me one particularly erotic aspect is guys kissing. it does just seem so intimate. I think its partly that its taboo and partly guys aren’t meant to be affectionate so it seems more so when they are.
    Also is it just me or are blowjobs in gay porn better? in hetero porn its often more of a ‘lets shove this dick into this hole repeatedly’ which i hate and in gay porn its more often letting the person giving the blow job passionately engulf the guys dick.

  6. 7

    For the record, here’s at least one guy who is as baffled at guys liking girl-on-girl as he is at girls liking guy-on-guy. At least, before I talked to people openly about their tastes in porn and sex in general, and actually got some different perspective. Your points are particularly well-thought-out and succinct, Greta.
    . . . Still seems a bit odd to me though, simply due to the fact that girl-on-girl doesn’t work for me. All of the above reasons are perfectly understandable, they just don’t float my boat. I surmise that I need a body similar to mine to orient myself in the action. If a guy is particularly heavier than me, it’s similarly a turn-off. If the guy is considerably more muscular than me, I might watch and enjoy, but I find that having that sculpted body literally becomes part of the fantasy.

  7. vel
    8

    one reason I like slash fic is, I think, that I spent a lot of time pretending to be strong male characters when I was little and playing make-believe. They were the only heroes then. Then puberty hit and I wanted to be *and* wanted to have sex with such strong male characters.

  8. liz
    9

    I’m a lesbian likes lesbian porn and especially gay male porn; as Andrew said above, it’s a place where we can be heroes. But I also think I love slash because there’s intimacy without objectification or humiliation, maybe? I prefer written to visual porn, though I love drawn/illustrated instead of actors. Perhaps it’s the fantasy of it all…

  9. 10

    I find the portrayal of men in heteroporn much too “penis focused”. I am a bi female, but I am “just not that into” penises. The gay male porn I have seen seems much more holistic in its treatment of the male form. Also, (and I know how vague this sounds) the “energy” is better (for me). There just seems to be more virility flying around and not merely because the number of men present has multiplied. (Something to do with being people rather than battering rams? I suppose it could just be that the heteroporn I have seen is not very good).
    I adore slash and like Torchwood much better than I would if non hetero male heroes weren’t so disappointingly rare (the concept is SO sexy, there should be an army of them).

  10. 11

    One thing I like about gay porn is that it’s a lot easier to imagine that the guys are there doing it because they happen to like having sex with men. In straight porn, I feel like the unspoken assertion is that the women are fucking or sucking because, uh, that’s what women *do*. Even when they’re having extremely loud, over-the-top orgasms, it’s still because women *ought* to. And a male friend of mine with a fondness for girl-girl porn has expressed a similar attitude – girls together seem less like they’re just doing what women ought/have to do, but fucking for pleasure instead. Whether this is true or not is up for debate, of course, but the illusion is definitely easier.

  11. 12

    Straight males also like guy-guy sexuality – provided that violence is the motive of the contact.
    Think of wrestling in particular, which involves a lot of close contact and arms wrapped tightly about one another as each man gropes about the other’s intimate areas seeking an advantage. Because the object is for one contestant to dominate the other, how can one NOT think of fight sports as the perverse expression of repressed sexual attraction?
    Football is another such outlet for repressed male-male contact desires. Look at how these burly men grope and grasp each other while in very close proximity – and in ways they never would without the cover of athletic combat. Smacking each other on the butt after each scrimmage is an act deemed almost mandatory on the field, even if it is greatly frowned upon when off.
    So there is a lot more interest in male-male couplings than most of us realize. It just prefers metaphorical bayonets to real boners for insertion!

  12. 13

    I’m a gay male, so right now my interest in m/m porn (visual or written) should be somewhat obvious, but go back four years, and I was a proud upstanding member of the fag-hag-yaoi-slash-fan-girl crew, and one of the go-to woman in my school to find the really hardcore Stargate and Fruits Basket slash (and find out what archives you could past the school internet filter, and which wouldn’t make the librarians suspicious).
    Which I think used to slightly surprise people, giving that I was, to all other apparent standards, a lesbian. One theory often sighted by a good friend of mine was that I was just SO gay that I liked any gay erotica, regardless of the gender. Her other favourite was that I was really a gay man with girl bits that just disliked hetro-sex more than I disliked sex with women
 remarkably accurate assessment, now I think about it. (It’s true that whilst I wasn’t really all that attracted to women, the idea of being the female participant whilst sexing a man freaked me out immensely. Add to that the gender inferences connected to lesbianism, and my history of being letter of the LGBT at some point in my life is explained).
    And whilst I certainly did (and still do) find m/m porn arousing, I think my primary attraction to soft-core yaoi and slash fiction was satisfying the subconscious need for the emotional involvement with gay men (who I subconsciously identified with even then) without raising difficult but apt questions like ‘is there a reason a lesbian who spent their entire childhood wanting to be a boy now fancies gay men?’, as a good number of other queer women where my fellow fag-hag-yaoi-slash-fan-girls.
    As it is, whenever I’m asked, as a transman, whether I still feel links to the women’s community, I always have to answer that I was a crap woman, and an even crapper lesbian, but I still bare a great affinity with my sister fag-hag-yaoi-slash-fan-girls, even if I’m now a brother. After all, they’re the ones that first introduced me to gay men.
    There’s a point somewhere up there, but I’ve not got enough caffeine to work out what it is.

  13. 14

    @ToppHogg:
    Your assertion has often been made, but personally I think it’s hoggwash. It’s perfectly possible to grab people in a wrestling context in ways that are entirely non-sexual.
    Keep in mind that sex is to a very large extent in the minds of the participants. You might look at a pair of wrestling guys and interpret it as sexual, but that doesn’t make it so for them. If we assume, in support of your thesis, that “a lot of close contact and arms wrapped tightly about one another as each man gropes about the other’s intimate areas”—i.e., “intimate areas” equals sexual contact—then we must also suppose that gynecologists have a sexual relationship with their clients. And what of the confusing ways in which many other things can be or not be sexual, depending on context? Your local domme and your local chief of police might disagree on handcuffs. Let’s not even get started on whips

    Full disclosure: I practice judo and jiu-jitsu and so frequently roll around and grapple with people. I have also rolled around and grappled with people in erotically charged contexts. They remain completely separate things.

  14. Pen
    15

    One of the reasons I enjoy slash fiction is that I’m not in there. I find it easier to discover the erotic in kinds of behaviour that wouldn’t work for *me* if I’m already at a distance from the people in the scene. If they’re men, they are not-me.
    Reading – and writing – het sex scenes is difficult: if I’m writing, how much am I giving away about myself, about my own sexual behaviour? And how much am I prepared to give away? If I’m reading—what if the female in the scene is shown enjoying things that would turn me off? Cos generally, that throws me out of the mood. It’s not a risk with m/m, because I already expect the participants to experience things differently.
    I expect there are dozens of other reasons for me alone, but that’s a big one.

  15. 16

    @ Petter HÀggholm
    Methinks thou protesteth too much! I don’t recall including your name in my opinion, so why be so defensive? Do my thoughts hit too close to home for you? So sorry! Go back to your macho-stylized mortal combat games and leave adult topics to those who can discuss them without personalizing ideas you find disagreeable. You’ll feel ever so much better!

  16. 19

    Always preferred gay male porn, myself. They were my friends, it was my culture, and it was a little forbidden, too. (Okay, a LOT forbidden-I’m an old grandma).
    I’ve never physically measured up to the women in straight porn, so it’s difficult for me to enjoy it. It’s like a reminder that I’m only a bystander watching someone else have all this fun because of how fantastic they look by comparison to me. That is obviously not an issue with watching gay men.
    I also agree to an extent that the lesbian porn seems less fakey than the straight porn, I don’t know why, unless it’s because they don’t always use women who look like Barbie.
    I’ve always been the odd one, admitting I enjoy gay male porn. So when a friend sent me the link to your post, I was happy to find someone else who admits it! 😉

  17. 20

    Did someone say ‘gay male porn’~?!
    I think approximately 60% of my mind is taken up by hot men making love to each other, but I’ll try to examine it a bit.
    I first started reading slash fanfiction when I was hungry to see close affectionate relationships between male characters (I would try to avoid the sex stuff). Eventually, I started to tolerate the sex stuff…then I started to, um, like it. A lot.
    As for why…? I don’t know. It just Is. I personally like enjoying my two favorite male types go at it: the handsome, manly man, and the pretty young man. The best of both worlds.
    Another part of it may just be that I REALLY like men, so why mess things up by throwing a female into the mix?
    (I’m a rare breed: a Hagrid/Snape shipper!)

  18. 21

    Wow wow! Cool! Yay!
    I just commented previously that gay porn is my favourite – well, on par with seriously kink. Both together – I need more please!
    The why…my explainations have always been around “the energy”, “the male-ness”, that is seems more real. Some points others have made here like the guys tend to be hotter than in hetro porn is true too.
    Thanks for writing this article – a useful link to say seeee! I’m not the only one!

  19. 22

    I commented last time this piece was up, that, yeah, I too enjoy male gay porn a lot! 🙂
    There are many reasons I guess, there’s usually not only one reason. I like different kind of gay stuff, from sweet and cute to kinky. But I have a special preference for the rough stuff. I just love to see a man dominate another man, and the rougher the better.
    Why? Yeah, let me get back to you about that in ten years or so, and I might have figured it out myself…

  20. 23

    Girls who like homosexual male porn and erotic writing/comics should speak up! Looking at the hugeness of the slash fiction fandom should give us a clue that this is not a new or bizarre occurrence. I for one have been into “slash” fiction and male/male videos since I was a teenager. I’m twenty-four now and I am very much a straight woman who loves sex with men, but I also really like watching and thinking about two men getting it on. To me, it is a conglomerate of elements: firstly, that I am in love with the male form and like seeing it openly eroticized (not just utilized like in hetero porn where, like you cleverly pointed out, its ugly guys with big dicks). Where I focus the most with this interest is where I differ from most female gay porn fans: I like to focus almost entirely on the debasement of one man by another. So, I guess its a kink thing–I like a guy being made into a slut, and I like guy’s asses a lot and I guess gay writing and porn has a lot of that. I also dig the idea of a ‘straight’ guy getting turned on by homoerotic activities. I couldn’t really tell you how “involved” I am in the fantasy as I tend not to inject myself personally into the scenario. But what I love about this phenomenon, especially in the slash fiction fandom, is that girls cater to other girls’ gay male fantasies–so its a very interesting community of encouraging sexually-aware females writing perverse m/m fiction for each other. The majority of these women are straight, many are married or in relationships with men. It’s interesting and not very easy to explain–but then again, why do we need to explain it? You’re correct: if men are openly accepted for having lesbian fantasies, women should feel free to discuss and express their appreciation of gay male erotic works as well.

  21. 24

    I like watching men kiss. Particularly men I fancy. Torchwood will not be the same.
    I’m… not certain about the rest of it.
    I don’t tend to watch porn, and my reading has consisted mostly of potterfic, which brings its own issues.
    When I’ve seen m/m sex depicted in mainstream drama, it’s always been anal penetration, which totally squicks me out (yeah, I don’t even come with sprinkles); so I generally prefer to stop at the kissing.
    (Datapoint: almost certainly straight (but some women are egregiously attractive), mildly repressed, married and monogamous (specific decision rather than preference) for 18 years.)

  22. 25

    Heh. My Internet crashed while posting and I don’t have it in me so late (or so early) to write it all again, so I’ll stick to the gist.
    I’m bi and I like all kinds of
    porn. I’m not particular to the gender of the participants or the medium. I’m very picky when it comes to the quality. In the visuals I like a bit of mistery left – like in pin-up photos. In writing and movies I want a story to go with the sex. And a good writing style/directing. American QAF comes to mind.
    Although I cannot say why, I do seem to favour gay porn. In an ideal world, I wouldn’t have to wonder.
    And Snape/Harry (with a possible addition of Hermione) are the best possibe potterverse pairing. Even though I’ve read some brilliant Snape/McGonagall stories.
    CV
    PS. I’ve had an eureka moment. There is very little interesting, strong women characters in the books and series I like. And I always put my favourites into porn stories.

  23. 26

    I have just found your blog and think it’s lovely. It’s also reminded me that maybe most of the population doesn’t consider all of this common sense, and reminded me of a time when I was like that too 🙂
    I can’t remember the book title or author, but I did read once that another possible reason straight (or not) women like male-male porn is that they can take themselves completely out of the equation. They don’t have to / dont automatically project themselves into a role because there isn’t one.
    I think this reason rings the most true for me. I like that I *can* project myself into a role or a character or a situation, but that I don’t automitically feel compelled to. As someone who actually doesn’t really like any form of physical sex, this is the nicest.
    I also like that there don’t have to be any roles at all. The power balances can be anywhere you want them – I realise this is true for any type of sex, but it seems more inherent when there are no obvious gender roles. This is probably even more true of lesbian sex, but then there are girls again, and I can’t distance myself from the situation.
    P.S. Wow, Hagrid/Snape – that is an amazing OTP.
    Of course I’m Sirius/Remus all the way – the Shoebox Project canon of course 😉

  24. 27

    I am a human currently attached to a vagina and I only like gay male porn. I have always been into gay male porn. My first discovery of porn was through Harry Potter fanfic and I naturally found myself navigating straight(pun not intended) towards the slash. Now I watch gay male video porn and read yaoi manga, though sadly only the stuff I can find for free on the web.
    I like it because there is no woman in it. Just hot horny men. I love seeing a man be dominated and the ultimate for me is to see a man in complete submission getting fucked up the ass. I find the vagina completely un-arousing if not downright anti-arousing, seriously even my own. I only wish there were some way I could grow my own dick(as I imagine the strap-ons would not be fully…fulfilling) to fuck a guy with. But what the hell do I know about my sexuality? I’m just a 20-year old autistic virgin.

  25. 28

    No women are insulted or degraded in the making of gay male porn. That is a big plus to any feminist.
    The men in gay porn are a lot more varied and interesting than the men in str8 porn. The men in str8 porn often look like embarrassed nobodies willing to be filmed with their pants off. Str8 porn requires dick, but does not seem to require much else from the male.
    I know something about gay male porn, primarily because I am a defender of the American foreskin. Str8 porn, for some reason, seldom highlights the male foreskin. Women who watch str8 porn tend to remain ignorant about that part of male anatomy. Gay porn is totally different, because many North American gay men are foreskin worshipers.

  26. 29

    I’ve preferred male-male pairings since I was a teenager.
    Part of it was the emotional aspect– because it was forbidden, the guys would have to really want each other in some undeniable way. I also saw it as being more free of the sexual politics that tended to dominate M/F relationships in my time (I’m 47).
    But mainly, I find men hot and women… not. Women are a turnoff, men are a turnon.
    And there’s also the sense that most M/F porn is made for men, i.e., it’s about how the women are “servicing” the men or sluts who need endless fucking rather than ever being about the woman’s pleasure. Some people call that issue the “male gaze,” in how it affects books/movies/porn. For me, it ruins most M/F media-based (as opposed to Real Life) sex altogether.

  27. 30

    While I am a lesbian, I tend to prefer reading/watching M/M porn, gay male erotica and slash fiction.
    I don’t really want anything to do with a penis up close and personal (been there, done that … don’t really care much for it) – but I will readily admit to enjoying j/o videos or watching two guys fucking.
    Maybe it’s because if I want anything sexually involving another woman, I already have that in my own bedroom and my own life.

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