“There’s also a strong correlation between the ‘no fats’ sentiment and profiles that now express interest in outdoor activities.” In that same vein, Camilo sees “only interested in athletic guys” and “I’m active, you be too” being used in an attempt to ward off fat users. “The most straightforward example of this is a shift in phrasing from ‘NO FATS NO FEMMES’ to ‘masc4masc’,” they tell me.
#Chubby chubby gay men code#
Sean concurs, telling me that anti-fat bias is now met with such backlash on Twitter that “all of a sudden Chrissy Teigen is dunking on one guy in Hertfordshire who has 12 followers.”īut while the language and etiquette around fat shaming may be changing, Dani, a 26-year-old educator in New Zealand, tells me that queer dating app users now just code their discrimination more subtly. “Hot dudes with abs get ripped to shreds for posting a thirst trap with shit like, ‘Feeling fat today,’ as the caption.” He also thinks that body acceptance is very important on certain social media platforms such as Twitter. “It very much depends on what crowd you’re with,” he explains. Luke, a 27-year-old writer in London, echoes this point. “In fact, quite often, I see stuff like, ‘Fats and femmes welcome!’ and, ‘No fatphobes no femmephobes’ on the apps.” He adds, though, that this might be more of “a reflection on where I live, and how I really only look at the profiles of guys with a similar age and mindset to me.” “These discussions always use as a locus point, when I’ve never seen it said, anywhere,” says Sean, a 23-year-old charity worker based in London. That said, several of my sources believe that blatant discrimination is becoming passé, and that the “NO FATS NO FEMMES” dictate is no longer as prevalent as it once was. “But someone who combines the three is at the very bottom of desirability.” “Anyone who is the opposite is already not a ‘preferred’ type,” Camilo continues. “The moment your belly exits your waistline, you’re now ‘gay fat.’” He tells me that discrimination against fat people exists in every demographic, but that there’s “definitely an expectation among gay men to be fit” and that gay clubs are “very much sectioned by body type,” with the idealized figure being that of a white, fit, masculine guy. “There’s definitely a different standard when it comes to gay men’s body types,” explains Camilo, a 28-year-old filmmaker based in Northern California. We’re three years on from 2016, though, so I asked Arthur and four other gay men and non-binary people to discuss what it means to be “gay fat” in 2019. There’s some supporting data, too: A 2016 study found that a third of the gay men surveyed had directly experienced anti-fat bias even though most of them weren’t overweight, and that gay men were more likely than straight men to expect a fat man to be “blatantly ignored, treated rudely or mocked behind his back if he approached an attractive potential romantic partner.” (Making him, essentially, unfuckable.)
The term “gay fat” - describing the way in which men who are considered “chubby” or even “average” in heteronormative spaces are deemed “fat” in gay communities - received mainstream attention in a 2010 episode of American Dad!, in which character Greg Corbin describes himself as “straight thin, but gay fat.” That gay men are especially “ fat wary ” is a topic that receives fairly regular media attention, especially since the notorious “ NO FATS NO FEMMES NO BLACKS NO ASIANS ” Grindr dictate permeated mainstream consciousness. “We’re talking ‘gay fat,’ so not even fat as most people would define it. “ still wouldn’t be acceptable even if it was an extreme catfish situation where I was secretly huge, but I was a 21-year-old kid who didn’t have a flat stomach,” he continues. “It ruined my self-esteem for years.”Īrthur now understands that the man represented an “extreme example” of body negativity, but the situation still baffles him - especially because he wasn’t fat in any real sense of the word. “I ended up crying in Washington Square Park ,” Arthur continues. After a while, he messaged me to say it was because I was too fat for him,” he says, showing me screenshots of the man calling Arthur “incredibly overweight” and chewing him out at length for having “strategically cropped” and “misleading” photos.
“I had a guy ghost me after we’d dated online for several weeks and then finally met in New York. Arthur, a 24-year-old waiter in Melbourne who has asked to be identified by his middle name, is recounting his most brutal rejection.