By: Dina Bounine, SFU Student
Imagine, you’re on the bus and you see a guy (ew). He’s got a good mullet (as in one you would see scrolling on Pinterest instead of on a hockey player). His mustache is straight out of an ‘80s porno. He’s wearing the tightest tank top paired with some nice baggy highrise jeans and a singular earring. Five years ago you could’ve bet your limited-edition brat vinyl that this guy is one of them queers. Now you find yourself wondering whether he works out to impress other men in a gay way or in a manosphere gymbro way, and whether his canvas tote bag contains poppers (the one thing straight people will never steal), or an unread book on feminism he’s going to poorly mansplain to a woman he wants to sleep with later.
Or what about that shredded lady with a good mullet at your rock-climbing gym (who you definitely don’t have a crush on)? She drives a Subaru, wears her keys on a carabiner, and a flannel around her waist. She’s always going on about her “partner.” She has a naked woman tattooed on her arm. But when you ask if she listens to girl in red, she says she tried women in college before meeting her husband and it just wasn’t for her. Another L for the lesbian community.
Our society has been besieged by an epidemic. As they say, “they’re putting chemicals in the water to turn the frickin’ frogs gay.” I don’t see more gay people (or gay frogs), but I do see our fashion everywhere. Especially our good mullets (seriously, when did they figure that out)? Queers are reeling as our once semi-reliable gaydar is now leading us astray.
Straight men have so long tried to avoid looking gay and now they’re following straight women into gay clubs and getting angry when they get hit on. Buddy, that yellow hanky in your right back pocket means something specific here so don’t be surprised if someone asks to pee on you.
This problem is so severe that the gays have been forced to abandon everything we hold dear. The gay men are tragically getting buzzcuts and shaving their mustaches. The femme lesbians have been forced to abandon the cottagecore aesthetic lest they be mistaken for trad wives. The butches? Well the butches still dress like Adam Sandler . . . but unfortunately jorts are trendy too now.
Perhaps even more problematic than the heterosexual assault on our eyes is the stream of nonsense the straights are hitting our ears with. I do not want to hear how your incredibly basic outfit is “giving clock it house down boots” or how your average boyfriend is “DL trade.” This is the gay “chai tea.” I’m embarrassed for you.
In truth maybe this is partially a good thing. This is a sign that rigid rules around gender and self expression are loosening and association with our identities is less taboo. At the same time I will crash out if one more combat boot, funky earring-wearing woman I hit on is straight.
