Sexuality: Why do some straight women and lesbians watch gay porn?

After a few months writing this sex feature for  Out Front, I’ve feared that some LGBT readers wouldn’t trust a 20-something straight girl who’s been dating the same guy a while now to dig up stories about their sex lives. But I fall into a category you may be surprised is shared by many other straight, bi and lesbian women: We find gay male porn not only appealing, but also sexier than straight porn.

Yes, even some lesbians like it. This phenomenon isn’t limited to obscure subcultures. If you’ve seen the 2010 comedy film The Kids Are All Right, you’ll remember actresses Juliann Moore and Annette Bening depicting a lesbian couple who have a stash of gay porn videos to help them get off while in bed. In a memorable scene, the ladies are in bed together – lights dimmed and vibrators humming – and they put on a movie that they both mention they haven’t seen in a while. So while the audience is waiting for this luscious lesbian duo to flip on lesbian porn, the people who appear on the screen are none other than two hunky jean-clad men, ready to go for it.

After The Kids Are All Right came out, the discussion about women watching gay-male porn has been appearing more and more in the blogs and forums, and conversations amongst my friends.

It popped into a recent conversation I was having with a good friend who can only describe herself and her sexuality as “pansexual.” She asked me if I watch a lot of gay porn. Now I wouldn’t say I’ve watched what would amount to days of gay porn, but I have indulged in the occasional clip.

I found myself wondering again: What is it about gay male porn that is so enticing to women from all backgrounds and sexual orientations?

“I think the more gay porn you watch, the more you understand about male sexuality,” said my dear friend Annie Sugar. “Mostly because men are never really featured in heterosexual porn. Heterosexual porn is often garbage.”

Ginger Murray, a blogger for the San Francisco Weekly says women watch gay male porn because they are “simply turned off by how fake straight porn is.” And she’s right – the majority of straight videos on sites like Youporn or Pornhub are usually plagued by corny music and only capture men on screen from the bellybutton down.

Jacob Bernstein, a reporter for the Daily Beast, investigated the theory that women are turned off by the fakeness of straight porn, but added that lesbian porn often has the same problem. In an interview with an anonymous lesbian source, Bernstein uncovered that women often find that lesbian porn seems to be made for the pleasure of male viewers rather than women, not exactly “female friendly” or realistic.

“I love the term ‘female friendly’,” Sugar said. “As if somehow sex isn’t friendly to women. You wanna know what kind of porn most lesbians I know watch? Gay male porn. And they write it, too. Sexuality is complex, you can’t put that shit in a box.”

Murray offers another possible explanation for why women watch and enjoy gay male porn: Because hot men – and pure, unadulterated, hot sex – can turn us on. She argues that in gay porn there is a multitude of different types of men, from leather daddies to pretty boys. Furthermore, we may not necessarily be attracted to the men themselves, to the display of masculinity associated with gay porn.

A final explanation for why watching gay male porn is so exciting for women is that it offers a solution to take the feminist objection to objectification of women – and the women themselves – out of the equation.

Murray says that by watching gay male porn, she is able to enjoy the action and also be a part of the play, without actually being involved at all in the sex with the men. She says that gay porn offers her “voyeurism, neurotic fulfillment and hotness” all at once.

Along these lines, Bernstein interviewed a straight woman who had recently seen The Kids Are All Right, and said that “with gay porn, we can go there and not think about politics and sexism … there’s something about removing women from the equation that’s freeing.”

While so many women reveal that watching gay male porn is common, it’s still hard to pinpoint why any one woman (or man, for that matter) enjoys it. With all of these different ideas and testimonials, we can’t definitively say what turns one woman on and what another is repulsed by.

But the notion of women watching gay male porn is not only more socially-acceptable in this day in age, but more commonly talked about. While many people may not understand it, they don’t have to. Like Sugar said, sexuality is complex – and it doesn’t fit easily into a box.