In my adolescence I was in denial about the fact that I was gay because I did not want to be a sassy queen. In fact, I could not stand people like that back then. Only when I realised that gay men can be masculine did I start to consider I was attracted to other men.

I think I know why some straight people want gay men to be effeminate. It’s because effeminate gay men are not threatening. Or at least perceived as not being threatening. They associate femininity with physical weakness, so they see effeminate gay men as not being a physical threat. But then they encounter a gay man who is masculine, or a gay man who is effeminate but also buff and capable of asskicking, it fries their brain. Sometimes even terrifies them, because deep down they scared of us. They are unfamiliar with us, except for what homophobes have told them, and people are naturally scared of whatever they’re unfamiliar with, so by default they perceive homosexual men as threatening until they know we’re not a threat. This is probably why a lot of gay rights activists pushed the myth that all gay men are effeminate even though only a minority of gay men are, because they thought that if most of society thinks gay men are effeminate, society would accept us faster. Maybe it worked, but certainly led to sectors of society believing that we’re unsuitable for military service or jobs that involve heavy lifting. It also made us easier targets for thugs who like beating up people, because these thugs think we can’t fight back. It also made a lot of gay male teenagers scared to come out, because those teens either wanted to be masculine or wanted to date masculine men, or both. And at the end of the day, a lot of people realised that effeminate men can still be threatening, especially after we found out about Jimmy Saville, so perpetuating this myth still didn’t work. What does help reduce homophobia, is showing that gay men, masculine or feminine, can be normal human beings.