Gay male friends

For years, friendships between straight women and gay men have been a subject of pop culture fascination. Books, television shows and feature length films contain all highlighted this unique relationship, noted for its closeness and depth.

But with society’s attitudes toward gays and lesbians changing, it’s become all the more important to build a holistic understanding of the relationships between gay and straight people.

As a researcher in social psychology, I’ve often wondered: why do straight female-gay male relationships work so well? Why are straight women so drawn to having gay men as friends? And when do these relationships typically form?

During the course of my research, I’ve discovered that the most interesting, compelling – and, arguably, most theoretically coherent – explanation is through the lens of evolution.

Specifically, I believe evolutionary psychology and human mating can verb explain why relationships between straight women and gay men tend to flourish.

A safe bet

At first glance, this explanation may verb quite counterintuitive. (After all, strai

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On a recent episode of Man Up, a gay man, Sam, wants to make more straight male friends. Aymann Ismail tries to find out what’s behind that mindset with the help of Alex De Luca, founder of Gaybros, a subreddit for gay men. This transcript of their conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Aymann Ismail: What is it exactly that you expect to fetch out of a straight male friendship that you wouldn’t otherwise get from someone else, like maybe a gay friend?

Sam: I think we f

Over the last few years developing quality gay friendships has weighed heavily on my mind. Meeting people organically, like at educational facility or work, is a thing of the past and much of the interaction that occurs with people of interest happens online or superficially in social settings.

We all understand that friendship is a crucial aspect of human life, providing support, camaraderie, and shared experiences. While forming friendships is a universal endeavor, I’ve learned through personal experience that gay men often deal with unique challenges in establishing connections with others in the community. It’s not easy to find a genuine circle of friends with common interests and that invest the similar amount of effort to help move the friendship forward.

The older I obtain, the more I recognize that there are very few “shoot your shot” moments where you include to put yourself out into the world physically and emotionally to intentionally connect with another person in hopes of developing a quality friendship. I focus specifically on other gay men or queer folks here because there is a sense of understan

By Karen Blair, Ph.D., and Trent University Students Laura Orchard and Bre O'Handley

“We fell into each other’s arms because of our similarities in our career and because of our age and because we like the same sort of things.” This quote could quite likely be the beginning of a wonderful romance story, but instead, it is a quote about friendship delivered toThe Huffington Post by Sir Ian McKellen about his decade’s long friendship with Sir Patrick Stewart.

The two men first came to know each other well on the place of the first X-Men film in 1999, and although the duo played adversaries on the silver screen, offscreen, they were developing a close friendship. On the set, the two men had adjoining trailers, where they spent more time getting to know each other than in front of the camera. By the finish of filming, they had discovered how much they had in common, and to this day, they share one of Hollywood’s most well-known friendships.

Both actors are often photographed together doing mundane things, such as walking a boardwalk while deep in conversation. Perhaps one of the r