Wednesday, October 22
Porn Amongst Men
The other night a programme was on Channel 5 called “Who wants to be a Centrefold?” God bless you Channel 5. This was the second episode of a two-part series, the first of which we (me and my housemates) stumbled across last Monday night whilst flicking through the channels. We checked the TV listings, and sure enough this Monday was the second episode.
To whet the viewers’ appetites, at the very end of the first episode there was mention of the nude shoots taking place in the second episode. Nude, hurrah! We had been building up to this programme for most of the evening, thinking it was going to be ‘Wick’ (more on that word in another post, maybe at another time). What a letdown it was that there wasn’t even a nipple in sight. I feel violated. They even blurred the chests out whenever there was a vaguely non-opaque top on one of the girls. A complete and utter sham.
Anyway, that isn’t my main point here. What amused me is the subconscious element amongst all of us, in that we live in a house of 7 guys, but we must prove to each other that we’re not gay by watching this programme (together!?) and at various points commenting on the ladies on screen. It just struck me as funny that this happened.
“We’re men. We live together. We see each other half-naked a lot. But we’re not gay. Look, we watch (ultra) soft-porn. How can we be gay? I’m not gay. Are you?”
Now, I’m not suggesting for a moment that any of my housemates are gay. That could lead to very sticky situations (geddit?!?!?!)… However, I do quite enjoy the way that straight guys feel the need to demonstrate their heterosexuality when around other straight guys. Be it in the sphere of sport, consumption of alcohol or a how large your porn collection is, we all feel the need to promote our absolute non-gayness. Rejoice in the testosterone (heterosexual testosterone, that is)!
What a strange state of affairs we live in today.
