this has been on my mind a lot. I follow some lesbian meme shitposting groups and there’s tons of memes that are just like “This girl looked at me and I died and then she smiled at me and I came back to life” and I just cannot think of any cishet men’s spaces that bring that have that level of absolutely dorky dysfunctional love for women. And, like, cishet men, their whole thing is supposed to be being in to women, and that just strikes me as really weird that there’s not an equivalent. Like the closest I can think of is wife guy memes but that’s just one wife, usually.
Do any spaces like that exist? Is it even possible given the way gender works in society?
I have a hard barrier around expressing anything like that, online or off. The inherent hetero power dynamics make it creepy even if it’s not a sexual impulse.
Word. I’m really careful about compliments. I never compliment someone’s body, it’s always something related to skill or taste - you make that dress look great, your makeup is on point, those boots look so cool. I always try to direct compliments towards something that acknowledges a person’s agency and the effort they put in to their appearance and presentation, to try to center and acknowledge them as a person rather than creating them as a body that exists for male perception and pleasure.
Cause, like, otherwise, you’re just saying “your body conforms to beauty standards in a way I find sexually appealing”. There’s nothing in that about the person, it’s dehumanizing, reducing someone to a social ideal instead of engaging with an individual.