Why Do Gay Men Sound Gay?

Well, not all gay men talk like that. There are more effeminate one's than others, usually those are self-described within the gay community as Twinks. Others are very machismo and you would never know they are gay.As to how it developed, I don't know, but the continuation of it is probably the same as it is with accents. You speak how you are spoken to since people gravitate towards things they know.

I imagine it is something similar to how the prototypical "Valley Girl" (like, OMG!) mode of speech began, and more importantly, how it perpetuated. There are noticeable inflections and intonations when hearing Valley Girl speech. And people living abroad often pick up the accents for certain words. Obviously not uncommon.My best educated guess as to how Camp first developed was likely because gay adolescent boys first had an affinity for girls as platonic friends long before they fully sexually matured. Girls tend to be much more animated in their speech by using lots of facial expressions, hand movements, and inflections for certain words. It's very expressive. So since they spent so much time talking to females, it seems that they might have picked up tendencies commonly associated with females.The inverse tendencies could likely be said of butch-type lesbians. But this is definitely not the case with all lesbians or all gay men.

For what it's worth, she sounded genuinely interested. You have to remember that she probably doesn't have much association with gay people because of their [to use Faith's words] "lifestyle." I don't think calling her a vile bigot when she's not acting like a vile bigot (at the moment) is going to help the walls come down... it'll probably actually build them up quicker and reinforce her beliefs. Just give her a little bit... After all, I'm sure there will be plenty of things to legitimately scorn her about at a later time! But for now, she seems genuinely interested. I think it might be a good opportunity to extend an olive branch, not a hand grenade.

How is "gay" a pejorative? And most everybody else seems to understand what it means to "sound gay," even you, otherwise you'd have nothing to complain about. The fact of the matter is that a lot of gay people do speak like that, and actually it would seem that you're the one implying that there's something wrong with it. That's the irony about this whole thing!

Wait, so, that's not why white people are white and black people black?

I work nights, so my circadian rhythm is all jacked up!!!

What if no one has attempted to conduct a comprehensive study? Does that mean that it doesn't follow a pattern or does it mean that no one has yet to prove that it does? Just because something hasn't been empirically proven, especially in the case of lacking the attempt to do so, does not negate its existence necessarily. All scientific inquiry first starts with a basic hypothesis, and that hypothesis is often first based on some observation that acts as the antecedent. Everyone here, including EvC's resident homosexuals, all understand what is colloquially framed as the "gay voice," and no one seems offended by it. Although a comprehensive study is yet to be performed, I think I can safely speak for most of us here by saying that we are a little mystified why you're so miffed about it. Sure, it's not exclusive to gays, but I'm sure they are the exception versus the rule. I'm sure you could find a non-Asian who speaks with an Asian accent somewhere on the planet. We wouldn't conclude that they must therefore be Asian, rather we would instead simply conclude that they speak with an Asian accent. And we certainly wouldn't pretend that there's no such thing as an Asian accent just because somewhere on planet earth a non-Asian also has the accent.Strangely, the latter is what you seem to be doing... Pretending that there's no such thing as an Asian accent.... err, gay voice.I know this is not your intent, but it sounds as if you're saying that having a "gay voice" is somehow a bad thing and it's wrong to assume someone is gay because they speak with it. It's one of those things where even though you are defending gay people, you still sound a little condescending to gay people in the process! Again, I know that is not your intent, but...