Of course, it's not "the female role" if a guy is playing it, and the willingness for feminists to trot out the "female role" stereotype to describe any role which involves submission in sex, pornography, etc is something that I find a bit worrying, because it's like feminists are confirming that females are submissive by assigning these roles to situations, even situations where there are no women. This then reconfirms the status quo of "female=weak, submissive", something which I didn't think feminists would be that interested in doing. If I'm submissive when I'm involved in gay sex (just for example, I'm not actually gay), I'm not "playing the female role", I'm just "being submissive". By not calling it what it is, it's like feminists are willfully putting a barrier in front of their own enjoyment of sex, porn etc. There's power relations of some kind of another in even the most vanilla of sexual transactions, and they can all be overanalysed to the hilt, but what does it prove? I believe power in sex is not a gender thing, it's just a human thing, and I think it's a mistake to use "dominant=male/submissive=female", bring in the whole virgin/whore thing, etc. I do understand those concepts quite well (I'm more well-read on feminism than a lot of feminists are) but I don't think they belong in the sexual arena, because once you do put them there, you can just write off any change in the program with a cynical "oh, he's being 'the woman' now because he took a cucumber in his ass" or "she's now 'the virgin' because she left her underwear on" or whatever. Maybe he just really liked the feel of the cucumber? Maybe she didn't take her underwear off because it was just a hassle?Labyrinth said:Ever watched any? I have. The same gender roles are played out in a different manner. The person on the 'bottom'[footnote]Stereotyped roles, obviously.[/footnote] (being penetrated, giving head, etc) plays the female role, the submissive role, makes all the noise and is focused on. The person on 'top' (penetrating, getting head), is stoic, silent, and it's their pleasure that is focused on.BonsaiK said:Two words for this thread for the OP to consider: gay porn.
I'll do a longer response in a few hours.