Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
4 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,817 Year: 3,074/9,624 Month: 919/1,588 Week: 102/223 Day: 0/13 Hour: 0/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Why Do Gay Men Sound Gay?
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 76 of 165 (779484)
03-04-2016 5:24 PM
Reply to: Message 74 by Theodoric
03-04-2016 3:42 PM


Re: The harm of stereotypes
There also seems to be a group that thinks that since they self identify as being part of the gay community that they should be the arbiter of if the "gay voice" stereotype is true or ok.
Tackle what I said directly, rather than with innuendo please. You patronized me about the harm of stereotypes. I pointed out I tick three big boxes for being victimized by stereotypes as a means to mock your condescending tone:
quote:
Obviously the point about the harm of stereotypes is lost on you and others in this thread.
I have also been challenged to present scientific evidence about the "gay voice" stereotype. Studies have shown that they "gay voice" is more or less a myth.
Read the whole article.
I did. It seems to be providing evidence that is more or less in line with my views The Smythe study cited is about studying what characteristics 'sound gay' in people's view.
quote:
This article describes the development of a data bank of 25 male voices spanning the range from very gay-sounding to very straight-sounding, according to listener ratings. These ratings allowed the researchers to examine the effects of different discourse types (scientific, dramatic, and spontaneous) and listener groups (gay males vs. a mix of males and females of unknown sexual orientation) on how listeners perceived the voices.
What do the authors say? University of Toronto:
quote:
In the study Rogers and Smyth asked 47 people to listen to taped recordings of 25 men, 17 of whom were gay. In 62 per cent of the cases, the listeners correctly identified the speakers as gay.
There are two common stereotypes when it comes to gay-sounding voices, Rogers says. One is that people can recognize gay men by the way they speak and the second is that they sound effeminate. We wanted to find out if these stereotypes are true.
Not all gay men sound gay, perhaps fewer than half, Rogers says. It was interesting that the straightest-sounding voice in the study was in fact a gay man and the sixth gayest-sounding voice was a straight man. It’s quite ordinary for gay men not to sound gay and every now and then you find a straight man who sounds gay.
I'd say a little under 50% of a group 'sounding gay' is pretty significant, it seems higher than I would have thought. Since 'gay men' is a relatively small group - it wouldn't take very much prevalence of 'gay sounding' voices in straight men to make it impossible to predict from voice to sexuality. It goes on to discuss code switching, something I raised without the jargon earlier:
quote:
Linguists have long observed that people code-switch — slip into a different accent or way of speaking when they’re talking to different groups of people, sometimes without even realizing it. If you've ever found yourself talking to someone with a different accent and gradually emulating them, you're familiar with the idea.
For gay men, adopting what's called "camp" -- a theatrical gay accent, like an old-school starlet -- can be a way of embracing their identity. As a freshly minted gay man, I learned how camping it up could be liberating, Thorpe says in the film.
Then it talks about giving 'gay mannerisms' to evil cartoon characters. A thing that only makes sense if there is a pre-existing association in people's minds because the characters aren't actually engaging in gay relationships. And yes, taking stereotypes and tying them to evil in the media is awful. The word 'psychotic' is still used synonymously with 'ruthless and violent'.
Ultimately, it's a difficult and infuriatingly circular field to study.
Now lets look at the idea being put forward here that stereotypes are ok as long as they are not "bad" stereotypes. Nope.
Well I wouldn't make that argument. I'd argue they serve a cognitive purpose, and we have to learn how to tame the beast because killing it is fundamentally impossible: it's part of the operating system.
quote:
Stereotypes can help make sense of the world. They are a form of categorization that helps to simplify and systematize information. Thus, information is more easily identified, recalled, predicted, and reacted to.[13] Stereotypes are categories of objects or people. Between stereotypes, objects or people are as different from each other as possible.[1] Within stereotypes, objects or people are as similar to each other as possible.[1]
Gordon Allport has suggested possible answers to why people find it easier to understand categorized information.[22] First, people can consult a category to identify response patterns. Second, categorized information is more specific than non-categorized information, as categorization accentuates properties that are shared by all members of a group. Third, people can readily describe object in a category because objects in the same category have distinct characteristics. Finally, people can take for granted the characteristics of a particular category because the category itself may be an arbitrary grouping.
A complementary perspective theorizes how stereotypes function as time- and energy-savers that allow people to act more efficiently.[1] Yet another perspective suggests that stereotypes are people's biased perceptions of their social contexts.[1] In this view, people use stereotypes as shortcuts to make sense of their social contexts, and this makes a person's task of understanding his or her world less cognitively demanding.[1]
There is plenty of science to support this too, if any of you are so inclined to do the research.
I'm aware of the harm stereotypes can cause, even 'positive' ones.
quote:
Have any of you figured out yet that the whole OP is just an attempt by Faith to troll and express homophobic views?
Have you figured out that you are one of the only ones that got trolled?
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 74 by Theodoric, posted 03-04-2016 3:42 PM Theodoric has not replied

  
coffee_addict
Member (Idle past 477 days)
Posts: 3645
From: Indianapolis, IN
Joined: 03-29-2004


(2)
Message 77 of 165 (779487)
03-04-2016 6:18 PM
Reply to: Message 75 by Jon
03-04-2016 4:15 PM


Re: some odds and ends
It's a problem for both sides to come up with an explanation.
Let's not kid ourselves. The homophobic side always seems to arrive at the conclusion that a person is gay because he was abused or morally corrupt. The non-homophobic side always try to explain it away by the person being born that way.
Personally, I find both sides pretty naive.
Not everything needs to be assigned a moral value. And that's the goal of both sides, to assign a moral value to being gay.
Personally, I stopped investing so much into this debate a while back when I figured out that the non-homophobic side was just as naive as the homophobic side.

If you say the word "gullible" slowly, it sounds like oranges. Go ahead and try it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 75 by Jon, posted 03-04-2016 4:15 PM Jon has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 79 by NoNukes, posted 03-04-2016 7:08 PM coffee_addict has not replied
 Message 84 by Jon, posted 03-05-2016 9:53 AM coffee_addict has replied

  
coffee_addict
Member (Idle past 477 days)
Posts: 3645
From: Indianapolis, IN
Joined: 03-29-2004


Message 78 of 165 (779488)
03-04-2016 6:24 PM
Reply to: Message 72 by Faith
03-04-2016 2:35 PM


Re: some odds and ends
Faith writes:
I'm surprised you say it can be a choice...
Meh, a lot of people are surprised about a lot of things I say.
I'll tell you this. I find the politically correct side just as abhorrent as people such as yourself. I'm not even sure they care about us anymore.

If you say the word "gullible" slowly, it sounds like oranges. Go ahead and try it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 72 by Faith, posted 03-04-2016 2:35 PM Faith has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 81 by jar, posted 03-04-2016 7:59 PM coffee_addict has not replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 79 of 165 (779489)
03-04-2016 7:08 PM
Reply to: Message 77 by coffee_addict
03-04-2016 6:18 PM


Re: some odds and ends
The non-homophobic side always try to explain it away by the person being born that way.
This is completely wrong. Nobody can clearly say why people are gay and most people know that there is no evidence of any gay gene. I suspect that most people I agree with would dispute that personal choice is involved, but plenty of those people really don't care whether gays choose their life style or not. They would afford the same rights to gays regardless.
If you aren't in any better touch with the issues than this, please don't guess. Look stuff up.
ABE:
Or at least don't try to claim what people always say or think. Seriously.
Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people. Martin Luther King
If there are no stupid questions, then what kind of questions do stupid people ask? Do they get smart just in time to ask questions? Scott Adams

This message is a reply to:
 Message 77 by coffee_addict, posted 03-04-2016 6:18 PM coffee_addict has not replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 80 of 165 (779490)
03-04-2016 7:33 PM
Reply to: Message 74 by Theodoric
03-04-2016 3:42 PM


Re: The harm of stereotypes
There seems to be a feeling on this forum that stereotypes are ok if they are not a perceived bad stereotypes.
No. That is not what people are saying.
Faith's initial post could indeed be read as a statement that gays typically speak in a gay voice. Many of us responded to Faith by assuming ignorance and correcting her impression, and then possibly addressing the question of where that voice came from.
I've taken some issue with specific assumptions underlying Faith's ignorance, particularly her apparent belief that she should not be talked out of her ignorance. But I don't think Faith had any intent to be malicious.
voices that were higher and more melodious were more often labelled gay.
I don't think your evidence is quite so relevant. The camp gay voice is not about pitch at all. If people believe that higher pitches voices are gayer, then they are understandably going to be wrong. I am not at all surprised by the conclusion that people have stereotypes about what gays sound like.
The camp gay voice can be delivered at any pitch. For example, the gay brother in Orphan Black is gay, uses the camp voice, but in a pitch that is completely adult male average.
Now it is completely true that even people who judge gayness by the camp voice are going to have lots of false positives and false negatives. But probably way, way more false negatives. At least that's what my experience tells me. But being able to detect gays has never been high on my priority list.
Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.
Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people. Martin Luther King
If there are no stupid questions, then what kind of questions do stupid people ask? Do they get smart just in time to ask questions? Scott Adams

This message is a reply to:
 Message 74 by Theodoric, posted 03-04-2016 3:42 PM Theodoric has not replied

  
jar
Member (Idle past 394 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


(4)
Message 81 of 165 (779491)
03-04-2016 7:59 PM
Reply to: Message 78 by coffee_addict
03-04-2016 6:24 PM


'taint none of my business
Lammy writes:
Faith writes:
I'm surprised you say it can be a choice...
Meh, a lot of people are surprised about a lot of things I say.
I'll tell you this. I find the politically correct side just as abhorrent as people such as yourself. I'm not even sure they care about us anymore.
I'm continually amazed that such questions and issues even come up. When peoples acts or beliefs or behavior or dress or intonation has absolutely no effect on my beliefs, behavior, dress or intonation why would or should I care whether it is a matter of choice, genetics or some combination of both.
Edited by jar, : fix sub-title

Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 78 by coffee_addict, posted 03-04-2016 6:24 PM coffee_addict has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 91 by Blue Jay, posted 03-05-2016 12:49 PM jar has not replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1445 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


(1)
Message 82 of 165 (779508)
03-05-2016 9:46 AM
Reply to: Message 63 by Theodoric
03-03-2016 5:59 PM


Faith used the term Sound Gay as a pejorative.
I used the term Sound Gay as a simple matter of fact.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 63 by Theodoric, posted 03-03-2016 5:59 PM Theodoric has not replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1445 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 83 of 165 (779509)
03-05-2016 9:52 AM
Reply to: Message 71 by coffee_addict
03-04-2016 1:34 PM


Re: some odds and ends
Here's the thing with Faith's theory. My ex had a sister and 2 brothers. His dad and two brothers were very masculine when we visited them. As far as I could tell, the dad was just as nurturing as the mom.
Relationships in families aren't all that obvious. "Masculine" and "nurturing" are way too broad to begin to get at the subtleties in family relationships, differences in attitude toward different children can be subtle but crucial. Differences in personality make huge differences in relationships.
So... let's leave the attempts at coming up with explanations to the experts who do studies, shall we?
No.
Too many studies are politically correct in spite of themselves. If for instance you define a family in broad terms like "masculine" and "nurturing" you aren't going to find out anything worth knowing.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 71 by coffee_addict, posted 03-04-2016 1:34 PM coffee_addict has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 85 by coffee_addict, posted 03-05-2016 9:55 AM Faith has replied

  
Jon
Inactive Member


Message 84 of 165 (779510)
03-05-2016 9:53 AM
Reply to: Message 77 by coffee_addict
03-04-2016 6:18 PM


Re: some odds and ends
It's a problem for both sides to come up with an explanation.
Why?

Love your enemies!

This message is a reply to:
 Message 77 by coffee_addict, posted 03-04-2016 6:18 PM coffee_addict has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 86 by coffee_addict, posted 03-05-2016 9:56 AM Jon has not replied

  
coffee_addict
Member (Idle past 477 days)
Posts: 3645
From: Indianapolis, IN
Joined: 03-29-2004


Message 85 of 165 (779511)
03-05-2016 9:55 AM
Reply to: Message 83 by Faith
03-05-2016 9:52 AM


Re: some odds and ends
I dated him for 2 years. I attended many of his family dinners and events.
Ever considered the possibility that this is a public forum and I don't feel like giving you every little detail?
Are you going to claim that you know about my ex and his family more than me?

If you say the word "gullible" slowly, it sounds like oranges. Go ahead and try it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 83 by Faith, posted 03-05-2016 9:52 AM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 87 by Faith, posted 03-05-2016 9:57 AM coffee_addict has replied

  
coffee_addict
Member (Idle past 477 days)
Posts: 3645
From: Indianapolis, IN
Joined: 03-29-2004


Message 86 of 165 (779512)
03-05-2016 9:56 AM
Reply to: Message 84 by Jon
03-05-2016 9:53 AM


Re: some odds and ends
Because whatever explanation that either side comes up with is pure BS.
1 side is looking for every reason to hate gay people and the other is looking for every reason to tolerate them. Neither bases their opinion on facts.
Again, leave it to the experts.

If you say the word "gullible" slowly, it sounds like oranges. Go ahead and try it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 84 by Jon, posted 03-05-2016 9:53 AM Jon has not replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1445 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 87 of 165 (779513)
03-05-2016 9:57 AM
Reply to: Message 85 by coffee_addict
03-05-2016 9:55 AM


Re: some odds and ends
I'm sorry I'm putting you on the spot and I'm happy to end the conversation.
But in my experience the observations people make about family relationships are really really obtuse. If you'd like to stop judging my opinions, I'll stop judging yours.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 85 by coffee_addict, posted 03-05-2016 9:55 AM coffee_addict has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 88 by coffee_addict, posted 03-05-2016 10:17 AM Faith has replied

  
coffee_addict
Member (Idle past 477 days)
Posts: 3645
From: Indianapolis, IN
Joined: 03-29-2004


Message 88 of 165 (779515)
03-05-2016 10:17 AM
Reply to: Message 87 by Faith
03-05-2016 9:57 AM


Re: some odds and ends
Put me on the spot? I wasn't aware I was being put on the spot.
I'm just telling you that it's a Saturday morning and we're just lounging around so I don't feel like sharing on a public forum too much detail about my personal life or my ex's. I just find it incredibly unfair that you're trying to psychoanalyze me from the few to nill details I've given you. I didn't know anyone's life could be boiled down to 2 words.
Trust me, over the years I have heard every theory regarding my sexual orientation or why some (gay) men are feminine from both sides. I've found them to be wildly inaccurate and usually just serve to reinforce preconceived biases (yes, from both sides).
All I'm saying is the world would be a much better place if we leave the coming up with explanations to the experts.

If you say the word "gullible" slowly, it sounds like oranges. Go ahead and try it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 87 by Faith, posted 03-05-2016 9:57 AM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 89 by Faith, posted 03-05-2016 10:21 AM coffee_addict has replied

  
Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1445 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 89 of 165 (779516)
03-05-2016 10:21 AM
Reply to: Message 88 by coffee_addict
03-05-2016 10:17 AM


Re: some odds and ends
That's your opinion and I disagree. OK? As a matter of fact I don't recall saying anything about you, let alone psychoanalyzing you. I've been talking in generalities.
Also, calling me a hater and a homophobe doesn't give you much credibility in my eyes. Both are lies.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 88 by coffee_addict, posted 03-05-2016 10:17 AM coffee_addict has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 90 by coffee_addict, posted 03-05-2016 10:55 AM Faith has replied

  
coffee_addict
Member (Idle past 477 days)
Posts: 3645
From: Indianapolis, IN
Joined: 03-29-2004


Message 90 of 165 (779519)
03-05-2016 10:55 AM
Reply to: Message 89 by Faith
03-05-2016 10:21 AM


Re: some odds and ends
Ok, I'm sorry for having called you that.
All I'm saying is we should all refrain from trying to come up with explanations for what we observe.
It's ok to ask. It's ok to offer an explanation with a question mark at the end.
The reason I dispute your attempt at explaining why some gay men sound gay is because I happen to know for a fact that my ex would hate your explanation.
We dated for 2 years. I was invited and attended his family events many times. Saw plenty of pictures. It's a traditional southern family. Dad, mom, 3 sons, and a daughter. My ex was the middle son. Their dad took all 3 sons out to hunting trips all the time. In fact, they invited me to one of their hunting trips but I declined. I'm simply not a hunter.
They always treated me like a part of the family and was always happy we were together. He always told me he had an awesome childhood. He played baseball just like both his brothers.
There was never any indication that he was neglected by his dad or over-mothered by his mom anymore than his brothers.
So... I'm not quite sure where he would fit in with your explanation as to why some gay men sound... gay.

If you say the word "gullible" slowly, it sounds like oranges. Go ahead and try it.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 89 by Faith, posted 03-05-2016 10:21 AM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 93 by Jon, posted 03-05-2016 1:06 PM coffee_addict has replied
 Message 94 by NoNukes, posted 03-05-2016 1:42 PM coffee_addict has replied
 Message 104 by Faith, posted 03-05-2016 4:45 PM coffee_addict has not replied

  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024