Big mahalos to Professor Fatology. Having heard you lecture back in my college days was profound, and even more so now to know we share some commonalities.
I was curious though to know more about the "mapmaking" you mentioned earlier in this string. One very vivid experience happened in high school in gym wrestling.
Without revisiting something I posted on this site in a fictional story, suffice it to say I was (am still) skinny, and he was husky. I still remember his name, how he smelled, the types of clothes he wore, etc. I was electrified and I doubt he knew who I was. I seem to be a late-bloomer in general, and didn't come-out to myself until about 17. Your post didn't give a specific age when 'pieces' of the map are laid,but you said it was early. Is it possible for it to happen so late?
Question(s) 2: At the risk of sounding Darwinist, has anyone ever examined (on an academic level) the idea that seeing a big belly on your mate has some kind of primordial root? Beyond the idea of a husky partner not starving, I've heard more than one straight man being turned on my the site of his pregnant wife's belly. Maybe some reptilian part of our brain says we're successful if our partner is plump or pregnant. How many times have I seen a caption on a photo on one of these sites where the man is depicted as pregnant? In this same category is an idea I'm surprised hasn't been addressed here yet; that of masculine attraction. In above responses, some men say they feel more masculine, but maybe some (myself included) are attracted to the masculine attributes of love handles, etc.
Question(s) 3 (for you or anyone to answer): Is there any kind of data on how many gay men are attracted to huskier men than themselves? It would be liberating for all involved if we truly knew (vs. what the media tries to program us into liking/being attracted to) how many skinny men like big men and vice versa. I've only 'met' a few big guys on-line who admit to liking skinny ones. Is it a 'circle the wagons issue', or do sites like this just naturally attract the men who only want other big guys? Are big guys who like lighter men shy to admit this here? I have had great difficulty meeting men who I find sexy, yet like their own bodies, or who at least accept that my initial attraction to them is their build.
(Sorry, that's beginning to sound like a desperate letter to an love-advice columnist. "Help me Lovelorn, I'm turned-on by hot husky men. How can I prove I'm sincere...?)
But seriously...I've just seen the movie "Kinsey." Much more humanizing than the PBS piece on him.Glad to see others delving into the human/sexual questions he could not / would not go into. But I did like the central point of the film wether or not he ever said it: No two humans are alike in their sexuality.
Keep dancin'
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Well, I would have responded earlier, but I was back home on our reservation for our big annual powwow and my sister's memorial. My only disappointment was that this is the first time in years we didn't have the "fluffy contest" (it's what's called a "special" and there were 3 other "specials" so there was no time for the "fluffy" (a special is a dance or performance inbetween the contest dancing. ) It used to be called the Fatman's contest, but was later renamed ("I'm not fat--I'm fluffy"). A dance competition (American Indian dancing) is held between guys over 200 pounds. A lot of the participants were contest dancers a 100 pounds or more earlier have been real biggies. Sigh---hopefully the Fluffy Contest will be back on next year.I should be preparing my presentation for the Mayo Clinic on Thursday…but no—here’s another opportunity for distraction…jeez—I feel like I’m doing my Ph.D. orals…too bad the committee wouldn’t ask me this kind of question—ok, here’s my two cents…
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I was curious though to know more about the "mapmaking" you mentioned earlier in this string. One very vivid experience happened in high school in gym wrestling.
Without revisiting something I posted on this site in a fictional story, suffice it to say I was (am still) skinny, and he was husky. I still remember his name, how he smelled, the types of clothes he wore, etc. I was electrified and I doubt he knew who I was. I seem to be a late-bloomer in general, and didn't come-out to myself until about 17. Your post didn't give a specific age when 'pieces' of the map are laid, but you said it was early. Is it possible for it to happen so late?
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Ok—we know a lot more about what goes “wrong” than we do with how “standard” sexuality forms and is shaped, which means we’re forced to take some educated guesses (but when we publish, we call these “theory” and “hypothesis”—btw, upon re-reading before submitting, I thought I’d add a comment about “Theory” in the context of science. While I was attempting humor, the truth is that in science we use the term Theory, even when we believe it to be truth at this point in time. If you just “believe” something is truth without questioning it, then we call that “faith.”
The difference is that if new information forces us to modify our Theory or replace it, then we simply do so. People operating within a strict Faith framework tend not to feel comfortable questioning it, and tend not to abandon or modify it if evidence contradicts something. This is why a lot of creationists get bent out of shape when scientists refer to the “theory of evolution", with the idea it must not be “true,” or it wouldn’t be called a theory. Scientists are overwhelmingly in support of the theory of evolution—but they’re not going to change its name to the “Fact of evolution.” In the case of the Love Map, there is quite a bit of evidence that supports it.). A lot of research points out a significant part of the Love Map appears to be set before the age of 8. For example a boy was caught masturbating by his mother, who held him down on the kitchen floor with his pants down, and had his older sister hold his legs down. She held a butcher knife to his erect penis, and told him, “If I ever catch you doing this again, I’ll cut it off.” This is a “classic” case, where we see the arousal bonded (classic conditioning/stimulus-response—ring the bell, feed the dog stuff) with a knife. As an adult, his paraphilia was being only able to have an erection in the presence of a knife. Can you guess his profession? (He’s a surgeon…)
Anyway, on to your question—it would seem as if for a significant number of people, the basic “outline” is drawn on their love map early on, but it can be “colored” in and refined at a later age (and this may be what’s happened to you). For example, in 1989, Breslow published a piece suggesting a social learning connection, where there would be a gradual acquisition of sexual arousal to an unusual object or activity (a big belly? Being bloated? Popping the button on one’s jeans?)through its incorporation in masturbatory fantasies, which then re-enforces the object of activity by orgasm. The arousal is then repeatedly used as a masturbatory aid, further strengthening the erotic bond. Your Love Map might have been “outlined” with a “generic” husky model (and as suggested before, this might have been because a “husky” male play-wrestled with you when you were a young child, or perhaps a husky male relative hugged or cuddled you (I again emphasize this did not necessarily have a sexual context at all on the part of the “other” male—this isn’t a pedophilic issue (although, of course, in some cases, it’s exactly a pedophilic issue)—the male relative may well have just been behaving in a loving and supportively playful manner. The “trigger” seems to be that there was something “going on” with the child…perhaps a moment before he was physically stimulating himself to the point of arousal when all of a sudden, cousin Ed grabs him and throws him up in the air and he falls down on Ed’s soft belly. Little you is paddling in front of the jets in the pool, enjoying the physical sensation against his groin, when Uncle Paul comes behind you and pulls you next to his 55inch waist.
When you’re 17, and Huskywrestler (isn’t that a screenname on Beefyfrat?lol) pulls you close in exactly the same manner of cousin Ed or Uncle Paul. In psychology, we use a term called “anchor” or “trigger.” The way I try to teach my students is that an anchor is like a “file name” with a computer.—it allows you to access a specific emotional or mental state that is already “stored” on to your mental hard drive. An anchor can be something you see, something you hear, something you feel, something you smell, something you taste. Just so, if a couple are together long enough, they will usually have “Our Song….” And when they hear “Our Song…” they get all warm and fuzzy. The smell of fresh baked bread may trigger wonderful memories of grandma’s kitchen. If you’ve been in the gay community long enough, you know of folks who get aroused by smelling a jockstrap, or stinky feet. On the downside, as a therapist I’ll run into a couple where one was sexually abused, and when the loving partner reaches out and holds the other one the way the abuser did, it triggers all sorts of awful responses. The two of them can’t figure out why the loving and caring advances of the other one elicits such terrible responses.
On a personal disclosure note, I was puzzled as to why some of my (older) partners had a thing for wanting me to wear tight white bvds (Not my personal choice) until an older friend pointed out that people of his age grew up with Sears catalogs they used as masturbatory aids while looking at the male models in tightywhities…which then made perfect sense in terms of the Love Map theory.
So—maybe you were already “primed” in terms of being attracted to Huskywrestler, who then held you in the same way as cousin Ed or Uncle Paul, and then an anchor was “triggered” that linked the arousal with your earlier experience. In other words, it’s not so much that you were a late bloomer to use your term, but perhaps that at a specific age, all the ingredients finally came together.
Question(s) 2: At the risk of sounding Darwinist, has anyone ever examined (on an academic level) the idea that seeing a big belly on your mate has some kind of primordial root? Beyond the idea of a husky partner not starving, I've heard more than one straight man being turned on my the site of his pregnant wife's belly.
Maybe some reptilian part of our brain says we're sucessful if our partner is plump or pregnant. How many times have I seen a caption on a photo on one of these sites where the man is depicted as pregnant? In this same category is an idea I'm surprised hasn't been addressed here yet; that of masculine attraction. In above responses, some men say they feel more masculine, but maybe some (myself included) are attracted to the masculine attributes of love handles, etc.
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Sorry sweetie, but this topic doesn’t seem to be a pressing one in mainstream research lol. There are certainly mentions in cross-cultural work about the connection of being a good provider (the alpha male) and having a well fed partner/family. There’s also a great thing called couvade, which can include the husband gaining weight like his pregnant wife (the usual definition refers to cultures where the husband is treated like the pregnant wife, even being put to bed when she goes into labor, as if he is an “echo.” However, you’ll sometimes see this in the psychological literature where the father-to-be gets a pregnant look. On a practical level, this is probably related to the wife’s increased food intake, and the husband sharing in the increased calories. There’s also a guy who posted in some of “our” sites and used variations of “NewdadAlex” (or something like that) who shared what a turn on it was for him to have gained while his wife was gaining, and how he wanted to continue putting on weight, with the hope of looking pregnant.
I’ve personally been curious if there is, on some level, a sense of “impregnating” a male partner by having him look pregnant—would that make another male feel “hypermasculine” like “topping a top?” More research needs to be done. I suspect for some people there is an aspect of this, but probably for more folks, it may more likely be connected to the “anchor” stuff I mentioned before…the pregnant male look has associations with pleasure or love, or arousal, etc. I think this is also why in earlier postings from others, you start to get variations—(I want a dumpling soft young jock boy—I want a hardbelly daddybear—I want….etc.)
Question 3 (for you or anyone to answer): Is there any kind of data on how many gay men are attracted to huskier men than themselves? It would be libeating for all involved if we truely knew (vs. what the media tries to program us into liking/being attracted to) how many skinny men like big men and vice versa. I've only 'met' a few big guys on-line who admit to liking skinny ones. Is it a 'circle the wagons issue', or do sites like this just naturally attract the men who only want other big guys? Are big guys who like lighter men shy to admit this here? I have had great difficulty meeting men who I find sexy, yet like their own bodies, or who at least accept that my initial attraction to them is their build.
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Well, as an American Indian, I have certain personal issues about the phrase “circle the wagons…”
Ok—here’s some comments—in my own sex research on inter-racial same-sex couples, one of the questions I asked was what ethnic group a person found the most erotic. To my surprise, it was almost never the ethnicity of the person the individual was with (in other words—if you told me your most erotically attractiveethnic group was African American, I would then find you’ve been in a relationship with an Asian-American for the last 15 years. My “theory” about this is that while you might find a particular ethnic group to be the most erotically charged for you, eroticism alone may not be what sustains a long term relationship (in my study, I would only work with couples who had been together a minimum of one year. The average couple had been together an average of 3-5 years). This was consistent in terms of the white partner’s attitude towards his or her partner of color. It was fairly standard that the person of color’s erotic standard was a white person. Of the over 450 couples in my study, there were only 2 couples who a “couple of color” and both were African-American/Latino. This certainly doesn’t mean there aren’t other combinations—it’s just what I got in terms of the couples I studied. I’m trying to make a distinction here between your question about being attracted and being involved in a relationship. What pulls you together for what the Brits(well, ok, in the movie with the Beatles from what—the 60’s? It was in black and white)—a “slap and tickle,” may not be what keeps you together.
In other postings, we’ve also seen mention of the idea not all big boys are “into gaining,” or have any awareness of the scene. Some big boys aren’t happy with their size, and are confused when someone praises them for their bellybuilding success. I want to again push the idea of a continuum of gainers and admirers and encouragers—with different motivations and different responses. In the same sex inter-racial couples study of mine, if you’re a person of color, it’s statistically easier to find a white partner, because they’re just so many more white people than there are people of color. Interestingly enough, as more and more of people in First World countries pork up into the level of obesity, it’s easier for those of us turned on by fat to have a much wider menu to choose from…but it doesn’t mean that those who are gifted with fat are going to be interested in us or our preferences…
Again, on a personal disclosure level, as many of you know, I have very long hair(which I usually wear in braids—remember—American Indian?) and there are some gay guys out there with a “thing” for long hair. Having long hair isn’t a turn-on for me…I don’t find it erotic in and of itself. My hair has a spiritual and cultural significance for me. In the few times I’ve “met” (only on-line) guys into long hair, it’s certainly “good” for them, but I’m not getting much out of it…the focus isn’t on “me”—it’s on an aspect of “me.” The objectification is around my hair—I’m just something attached to the hair. Not exactly ego-stroking for me…or sexually arousing, while the other guy is getting off, I’m wondering what it is I’m supposed to be doing. I suspect that some well-bellied men can feel this way, where they may feel your interest (or mine) in their fab flab isn’t about them but just a body part of them.
Like the partners of color in my own studies, you have to look at the stats…you set the perimeters for say, a certain age, a certain ethnicity, a certain range of behavior(Butch? Femme?), a range of education, a range of social class, perhaps a certain spirituality…with each “set” you start narrowing down the choices available in the general population. Now add geography, where no matter where you live, all the gainers or encouragers seem to live at least one time zone away from where you are. I think it must not be so different for trying to find a gainer or a fat guy who is also “in” to this. You have to get the geography right, the age range, the size or potential size, and then expecting them to also be gay or bisexual means you’ve cut the available population down to less than 10 percent of what’s out there. Ouch. No wonder we have such problems connecting. And as a therapist who specializes in couples and families…the truth is that there are some folks out there who are, shall we say, socially challenged. That’s something that cuts across all categories, so you’ll encounter a specific percentage of gainers or encouragers who really aren’t folks you’re going to want to hang out with, regardless of how turned on they are by you.
Ramble ramble…time to finish the Mayo Clinic stuff. Hope Rochester isn’t too hot and muggy tomorrow…and I should probably mention the idea of "limerance" but I don't have the time now...
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Thanks for such a thoughtful reply during such a busy time...
Sorry to hear about your sister and good luck on the presentation at the Mayo. Uhh... yikes about the surgeon. Let's hope that his passions translate to perfection in the operating theater. And sorry about the wagons ref. Just re-using a phraseused earlier in the string... (is there an on-line symbol for feeling sheepish?). Back to the map: come to think of it, Dad was then then the build I love now, though I don't recall wrestling too often and we certainly didn't have anything crossing the lines. But all the women in the family are big...You're right, I look first at the eyes and try not to objectify. (hey, I had locker-room training in seeing without looking just like any other gay boy in high school). I guess I'm just having trouble getting past hello once the bellied guys notice I don't have one. I like going shirtless on a hot dance floor, but I've taken to keeping it on so as to not scare off those with the opposite build I love. I'll grant I'm not the most socially adept, but never fear, my pick-up line is not: "Hi, my name is____ and you have the gut of a god."
You should visiit the islands sometime. Seeing large Hawaiian men shirtless dancing auana hula or kahiko hula will teach the eyes new things about how large bellied men can move their hips if motivated. Then again, its always heaven/hell here asbig guys try to cool off during warm days by lifting over the arch or going totally without. Off topic, but if you're into science, biology, and therefore sexual evolution, etc. I can't help but recomed some reads (you've likely seen these but others may enjoy):
Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation (on loan to a collegue and forgot the author's name but that's the real title). A rompus ride surveying sexual behaviors in other animals besides, yet including humans, written in advice columnist style.Burying beetles, hermaphroditic sea slugs, etc. And yes, the gay thing is covered often... (Professor Fatology: The author is the evolutionary biologist, Olivia Judson)Less fun to read, but more thorough:
Joan Roughgarden's Evolution's Rainbow; Diversity, Gender, and Sexuality in Nature and People (a little defensive and academic, but I'm working through it) and Biological Exuberance; Animal Homosexuality and Natural Diversity by Bruce Bagemihl, PhD. (an exaustive review of all things bent and living on the planet)
And as long as I'm title-dropping, one of my all time fav novels: The Man Who Fell In Love With the Moon by Tom Spanbauer, a straight, white, NorWester, but hell, the whole 'killdear' thing is brilliant. All this to offer some kind of thanks for being such a great resource to this community.
Mahalo nui loa
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