To be shocked by my friend's observation that boys brought up by single mums are effeminate?

[MsBrown]

Had my friend round earlier for a pizza and catch up. We got chatting about school days and it lead on to boys we went to school with who are now openly gay.

My friend made the observation that of 6 of these boys (now men), 5 of them were brought up by their single mums. She seems to think that this somehow influenced their sexuality!

I told her i think people are born either gay or straight. But she said she knows other young boys/men being brought up by single mums and are effeminate. Making the point that these boys/men have/had no contact with their fathers.

Am i being unreasonable to be really angry with her and to have cut our 'pizza night' short?

Being effeminate and being gay are two totally different things anyway and certainly don't always go hand in hand.

Lots of boys brought up by single mothers during and after the war - as far as I know no huge spike in gay men 10 years later!

It was illegal to come out 10 years after the war.

And a sure fire way to a ruined career or an asylum or including a spell in pentonville etc etc.

I suppose it depends on how good a friend she is. I have some friends that read the DM, vote tory and think the royal family is sacristanct. I don't believe any of these things but enjoy and benefit from their friendship on the level we have it. I sometimes question their (imo) weird points of view but I accept them for the shared friendship we have and I find that challenging without judgement often leads to a discussion/debate that leads on to an agreement and an about-turn.

I dunno, I think that if your friend was truely a friend OP (ie has been there for you in your life at times when you needed her, however small) then this is not worth losing her over. If she is more of an acquaintance then, sod it , ditch her.

Good point Novack - so in fact there may well have been a huge spike in gay men of single mothers. OP - your friend may be right after all.

I certainly do not agree, and as Worra said, effeminate is not gay.

I was just pointing out that many homosexual men of the 40's 50's to 70's etc all ended up in marriages because to have come out would have meant the end of their professional lives etc. so they were forced to conform with society in marriages of convenience etc.

novackngood makes a good point.
I mean, 'coming out' wasn't really an option post-war, was it?
In my mother's generation, she had at least one friend who married a gay man without realising what was what.....
and those who were 'out' apparently wore green ties to identify themselves. She had one colleague who wore a green tie, and he was engaged to be married, to keep his parents happy....well he committed suicide rather than go through with it. One of my mother's older colleagues had to take her aside and explain...my mum had never heard of such a thing (was about 28 at the time)
anyway, rambling on, I am single mum to a boy, and he does feel free to express his feminine side in a way that would definitely not happen if his dad was still around (his dad would have gone mad)...I even believe he may have 'snogged' a boy...he was 'gay' for a couple of weeks...'bi' for a month or two...now is quite sure he is into girls...
well at least he has felt free to go through it with me.....

As Robert Graves said many boys were amorous but rarely were they erotic.

IS she usually so stupid ?

MY husband and his brother were brought up by a single mother in the 70s and 80s they are not effiminate I dont even know why im mentioning that
so its the mums fault men are gay then

NOvack it was illegal to be homosexual up until the late 60s thats why men didnt come out nothing to do with their professions they would be put in prison

I know, that was the pint I was making and it also remained that way in the services until the 90's and for those who signed the official secrets act etc. or worked at the ministry it certainly was not the thing to do.

as worra wrote effeminate and gay are not the same thing.

I read that boys tbat are closer to tjeir Mothets regardless of their family set.up are more comfortble about coming out of the closet.

Also that bisexual women are so because their Motbers were cold towards them and affection from a woman is what tney crave.

Sometimes not always..second statement.

In what century was that book written solesource??

I would be happy if my DS, DD didn't feel they had to hide their sexuality fromme. As a bisexual woman who had a cold fish of a Mother I do not believe the second statement.

My nephew is gay. He is also one of the 'blokiest blokes' I have every met, a real man's man - obviously in more ways than one.

His partner is the same. My DS's love their house, the unchecked testosterone is a sight to behold.

Gay does not equal effiminate and effiminate does not equal gay and there is nothing wrong with either so even if this was the case (and I am not agreeing that it is), who cares?

My little brother spent his entire life dressed as a girl by me while our single mother and I asked him to pop to the shop for tampons.

Seems to be straight now.

Actually almost without exception all my gay friends come from two-parent homes.

YABU - it may seem a silly thing to cut a night short over to some people, but I jut hate lazy homophobia that people don't even acknowledge is homophobia. I'd have probably been infuriated and done the same thing.

Your friend isn't the brightest crayon in the box is she?

If we are going to continue her line of thought (based on social stereotypes), presumably young males who get involved in crime 'because' they come from broken homes and lack a strong father figure, are actually trying to deal with their repressed sexuality?

Your friend is clearly a moron.
I'm more interested to see the views of the people answering this thread.
There are already some posters agreeing there might be something in this!

Just to add to the pile my brother isn't gay and I'm not either and we have a single mum.

What if it turned out to be true, that sons brought up just by their mum were more likely to be (openly) gay? Might it not just mean, as several posters have suggested already, that they felt more able to come out than boys in some 2-parent families?

Fwiw I believe that you are born with your sexuality, just that your upbringing helps determine whether you accept your sexuality or repress it.

However is it actually homophobic to believe that sexuality is due to nurture rather than nature? And if so, why?

Was your friend saying what she did in a homophobic way (ie. Single mothers have gay sons and this is a bad thing) or was she merely pondering?

Being effeminate has nothing to do with being gay.

Some gay men are effeminate, not all effeminate men are gay.

All the gay people (men and women) I know come from 2 parent families.

And given that 'gay' isn't a bad thing, what does it matter anyway!

As other have said, being gay was illegal until relatively recently and could damage/destroy/was illegal in certain careers until recently.

WorraLiberty Fri 24-Aug-12 23:07:22
Being effeminate and being gay are two totally different things anyway and certainly don't always go hand in hand.

aw, but if they did they'd make a lovely couple

OP, sack this eejit off - what a bloody ignorant thing to say (but you know that anyway)