In the category of “What Does This Mean” comes a new report out of New York City that highlights the difficulties of self-identification.
Just as it seems that some persons that call themselves “ex-gay” may be attracted only to the same sex, so too may some men who call themselves straight only have sex with other men. And not just a few of them.
To better understand disease prevention, a survey was made of 4,193 male New Yorkers consisting of 130 questions including sexual identification and sexual behavior. They found that 91.3% identify as straight, 3.7% as gay, and the rest as bisexual (1.2%), unsure (1.7%) or declined to answer (2.1%). These numbers are not significantly different from those the CDC published last year.
However, these identifiers did not align closely with actual sexual activity. For example, 9.3% of respondents indicated that they had sex with only men in the past year. Initially, we might assume that these are the gay, bisexual, unsure, etc. men. Not so.
[the numbers reflect a slightly different population, the second eliminates bisexuals and those who were not sexually identifiable as straight or gay and those who had sex with both men and women]Of the straight-identified men, 9.4% reported having sexual intercourse with at least 1 man (and no women) in the year before the survey.
That seems like a large percentage of men who are “straight” but only doing it with guys. Our next assumption might be that these are men who don’t have an opportunity to have sex with a woman. Again, not so.
Approximately 70% of straight-identified men who have sex with men reported being married, which was substantially more than any other identity–behavior group: 54% of straight-identified men who have sex with women and only 0.2% of gay-identified men who have sex with men reported being married.
In other words, “straight” men who have sex with men (SMSM) are much more likely to be married than straight men who have sex with women.
Not surprising is that these SMSM were likely to be foreign born or part of an ethnic minority. Cultural taboos have long been understood to impact sexual orientation indentification. Just as an ex-gay may identify “as a Christian” believing that this excludes a gay identity, so too may a foreign born person identify as “a Jamaican” believing that this identity precludes being gay.
Other questions suggest that gay men had more sexual partners than SMSM and were more likely to have had an STD (although over 50% of sexually active gay men had only one partner in the past year). However SMSM were less likely to use a condom or get an HIV test.
This is an interesting study and is, of course, very important to those who seek disease prevention. But what do we make of it?
A couple of things to keep in mind in trying to understand this study are:
* This was a representative sample of NYC men, not of all men in the US or the world. NYC has both a larger gay population and a larger minority population than would be found outside of New York, which undoubtedly skews statistics. “In 2000, 36% of the population of New York City was born in countries other than the United States.”
* As we know from our ex-gay examples, being married is not an assumption of heterosexuality or of opposite-sex sexual activity. However, it is very unlikely that a significant percentage of SMSM are ex-gay and we should not assume that ex-gays are in any way reflected in the study.
* The tendency towards a single sexual partner among the SMSM studied may not be reflective of other localities. “This contrasts with findings from a convenience sample of men in Denver, Colorado, who frequented venues for anonymous sex; that study found that married men who reported having sex with men reported more partners per month than gay-identified or bisexually-identified men.”
* We don’t know if these SMSM were having lots of sex with the same guy (a form of monogamous relationship) or just having one encounter with an anonymous stranger. We know little about their spouses and whether they were aware of what was going on.
* We know little about what role these men played sexually or how they perceived themselves within the context of actual sexual action.
What we do know is that self-identifying as non-homosexual may have little correlation with attractions and/or behaviors when in a setting that strongly encourages a “straight” identity.
I am surprised Paul Cameron is not all over this.
Not.
Wow. Amazing. Something that nobody ever knew 🙂
So… you’re telling me that “10%” (rounded) are homosexually active? But less than half of them will publicaly identify thenself as gay?
Kinsey [1948]. Laumann et al [1994]… and the list goes on. They all, basically accurately, said the same.
I think this rightly draws attention to the ambiguousness of identity when it comes to sexual attraction.
Most measures of sexual identity are based upon self reports. This study clearly shows how underrepresented those with same sex attractions would be if careful questions were not asked.
What is interesting to me, also, is that this suggests that the members of churches have, potentially, a higher degree of men having sex with men than they think. That will be in the back of my mind in my next marital therapy session with a heterosexual couple.
Also, these SMSM are from multiple minority status, suggesting a great deal of risk of marginalization. These men may be more likely to seek support through their traditional religious beliefs…how are they going to reconcile all of this? Very difficult.
I don’t think that Kinsey’s 10% rule applies yet, although this is evidence of support. Tim points out that this is not a representative sample of the US, but of NYC.
I am particularly interested in the dilemma a new immigrant would have trying to fit into a new country, trying to live as a heteroseuxal, experiencing same sex attractions and trying to use their traditional faith system to help them cope.
“…that the members of churches have, potentially, a higher degree of men having sex with men than they think. That will be in the back of my mind in my next marital therapy session with a heterosexual couple.”
Huh???? Sorry David, that’s not making much sense. Have you leap from something else, to that?
And I doubt any religious conservative will concede Kinsey got it basically right. Well, not within a holding-my-breath timeframe 🙂 But Laumann’s study — using multiple measures — found roughly the same with a representative sample.
And hardly need mention, I hope, that the 1979 “cleaned” Kinsey data — excluding gaol populations etc — was barely different to the original.
Kinsey [1948]. Laumann et al [1994]…
That immediately crossed my mind the moment I saw those headlines myself.
And it isn’t just New York where the sample was taken. I was in Memphis recently and was talking to the manager of a tiny little gay book and gift store on Cooper Street, along the little gay friendly zone there. I asked him about the local gay scene and why there wasn’t more activism in a city that size, particularly regarding Love In Action which is located there. He told me that the “scene” such as it was there, was mostly married men who were having same sex affairs on the side. And I’ll bet most of them do not identify as gay, even privately to themselves.
Now that’s just anecdotal, but I reckon anyone who says the figures in this study are probably inflated because it’s New York needs a reality check. The closet is still a very powerful thing elsewhere in the country.
Not hard to get grantdale,
If a small, but significant segment of the NYC population of heterosexual married men are having sexual contact with men outside of their marriage; then it is reasonable to infer that this is going on in other communities as well. Reasonable for one to infer that it may be going on in many churches.
If a large portion of the SMSM are from recent immigration communities as the article suggests, it is important to consider the challenges associated with this population. The chief of which seems to be easy marginalization and poor access to community services.
I believe that recent immigrants are more likely to use religious affiliation to assist in the process of assimilation in a new culture. That can be an important part of identity that they organize their lives around. If they are married with Same Sex Attraction and religiously affiliated because that is of equal or more value to them, it leads to a number of conflicts I a sure you could be sympathetic to (churches are unlikely to discuss, let alone encourage safe sex practices).
Regarding labeling…it appears that the way one chooses to identify their population and where they collect their data determines the percentage. I think this article is helpful in one important way which Tim highlights, it separates out labels from behavior.
Behavior is a more reliable and quantifiable measure than self-descriptions. It also helps de-stigmatize the conversation.
Bruce, that’s my experience as well, coming from a small town in Southwestern Pennsylvania. There was no local gay community. You couldn’t find a self-identified gay man anywhere within 5 counties. But you could always find a happily-married straight man willing to fool around with the guys on any given night just by frequenting a number of porn shops.
Bruce and Robis, you make my point about SMSM being in all communities. This is especially important in church communities where they are unlikely to recieve decent safe sex information.
Tim rightly points out that the study shows that these SMSM are not practicing safe sex, posing risks to all their partners.
David – don’t piss us around. Really. The overall is not hard to get. Durh.
What we asked was why you would introduce “possible” homosexuality when working with a heterosexual couple.
Why would you do that? (and don’t give us a lot of cr** about NYC. Not even typical, let alone relevent.)
When our straight friends go through their usual, normal, typical expected streses…. we don’t ask “have you considered your husband may be Homosexual???” They’d laugh themselves stupid if we did.
David, how many gay couples do you count as friends?
Actually David, we just — unusually — noticed you were pulling the “race card” on this.
Who, specifically, are these “immigrants”???
I presume a number of these new arivals to NYC, for some unreasonable reason, decide to call you in Oregon?
How many?
Grantdale,
I believe the article itself and Tim refer to immigration as a prominent issue in the notion of SMSM. So any prominence this has in this discussion you would need to take up with the author or Tim.
Do you not agree that immigrants are an easily marginalized and exploited group?
As I see couples in counseling who struggle with a variety of issues (including same-sex infidelity), this is a relevant study to pass along to fellow colleagues and pastors who are genuinely concerned about the private lives of their clients and parishioners. The article implies that up to 10% of married men (potential parishioners) are having sex with men at least once a year.
Whether you are a Unitarian or a Baptist, that should effect the way you see your parishioners (not as cookie cut-outs of marital conformity). Hopefuly it effects you thoughtfully and compassionately.
We are Unitarian or a Baptist???
What. Planet. Are. You. On.
Don’t you listen ??? We are NEITHER. We never mentioned either. Good Lordy.
David — you said you would bring this issue up — the 10% — with a hetorosexual couple as a a therapist.
We asked why the heck why. You haven’t answered.
I’m only going to be this rude once, to you: BIOLA = woeful. Esp. regards a psychology “course” that pretends to “integrate” science and theology. Oh, snort. What a big fat fraud. As example: your bizarre jumping to placing us in some religious box. If it helps you make sense of the World dear, fine, but YOU ARE DEAD WRONG.
Do you do this with your clients too?
Again: and we are hoping to bypass any BIOLA qualifications nonsense: how many new immigrants call you from NYC, and how many gay couples to you count as fiends?
The facts, alone, will do David.
“fiends”
Maybe. But we meant “friends”.
Subtle. But important.
“Actually David, we just — unusually — noticed you were pulling the “race card” on this.
Who, specifically, are these “immigrants”???”
grantdale, I don’t think David was playing up race here.
The report indicated that these SMSM were mostly married (70%) men who were either born in another country or were part of an ethnic minority. I’m guessing that includes native blacks, latinos, asians, etc. as well as people of all races born elsewhere (e.g. white Lithuanians, Bulgarians, and Latvians).
In other words, they weren’t white guys born in Maryland of German descent. Those guys identified as gay and were not married to women.
I don’t know David’s practice or whether it includes a significant amount of minority or foreign born folk so I don’t know how relevant this study is to his future questions of married couples. I kinda doubt it, but who knows.
Also, I’m somewhat hesitant to automatically assume that these SMSM would, under other community circumstances, self identify as gay (though that is suggested by the racial breakdown). There may be other cultural factors coming into play.
For example, some cultures would consider sex with a woman other than a wife as adultery but would not consider sex with another man as “cheating”. Perhaps without that dynamic, the SMSM would never have sex with another man at all.
Also, sexual direction or dynamics also can play into self identity. Some cultures do not consider “dominant” sexual activity with another man as an indication of homosexuality – only
“passive” positions within sexual situations.
The really interesting part is not so much that these guys had sex with men, but that they also did not have sex with women.
All to say that I am not certain what I think this study says. I’m still letting it percolate.
grantdale,
breath 🙂
i think you may possibly be reading too much in.
I think David was suggesting that you personally were either Unitarian or Baptist but that a pastor, be s/he Unitarian or Baptist may want to consider the study.
I personally doubt it is much relevant to any pastor whose congregation is outside a major urban center or who do not have a large immigrant congregation. But that’s my opinion.
No probs Timothy. Heart beats haven’t moved. Up.
Perhaps we’re sounding too Aussie: too POV? We’d apologise for that, but we should not. Actually, we never will 🙂
You also know “we” (we, grantdale, not Oz generally) ask “questions” already knowing the answer… in ths case, we also do. 🙂
But we’ll back off. Point taken.
Re: validation of Kinsey and NYC skew
If you put all the numbers together, you come up with a good bit more than 10% of total NYC men who are having sex with men.
The study found 3.7% identified as gay and 1.2% identified as bisexual. Let’s count all of these as having sex with men–although we all know there ARE celibate gays. There’s 4.9% right there.
Then we have the straight men who have had sex with another man in the past year. That’s 9.4% of 91.3%, or 8.6% of the total men.
Put it altogether, and we’ve got 13.5% of all men in a large random sample of New York City males who engage in sex with other men.
Even assuming skew due to New York’s particular demographics, you can knock that number down and still be quite close to Kinsey’s famous 10%.
On the other hand, I don’t quite get why grantdale was so bothered by David Blakeslee’s comment about keeping this research in mind when counseling married couples. Seems to me that counselors should be aware that a relatively high number of married men do engage in sex with other men–and keep it secret from their wives.
Doesn’t mean you’d just pop out to every couple –“Have you considered that he might be having sex with men on the side?” But certainly if the wife is complaining that the husband is uninterested in sex, and he spends all his time at the gym, and he comes home with his skin wrinkled from so many hours in the steam room–well, then this research might give the counselor a clue to what’s going on.
I am aware that I would likely differ from David Blakeslee in how to view and counsel those situations. But I don’t see any harm in him keeping in mind that some of the unhappiness he sees in his practice could be the result of people feeling they have to deny and hide their homosexuality.
At the risk of opening a large can of worms, I wonder if similar stats or studies have been done with SWSW? Might it reveal a bigger percentage given cultural perceptions of WSW not being adultery?
Sharon,
Probably no research on WSW as this is being done primarily for HIV prevention.
Another thing to consider is that all research I’ve seen indicates that women report higher levels of bisexuality which could also impact SWSW, though I don’t know if higher or lower.
Nick C,
actually the numbers don’t quite work out that way – it’s hard to explain but has to do with eliminating certain demographics – you have to check the report.
The actual raw numbers were:
“Of men who answered the questions regarding the number and sex of their sex partners, 70.6% reported having sex with only women, 9.3% reported having sex with only men, 0.8% reported having sex with men and women, and 19.3% reported no sexual activity during the past year.”
The numbers of interest were in the weighted population analysis:
“The remaining analysis focused on straight-identified men who have sex with women (concordant identity–behavior), straight-identified men who have sex with men (discordant identity–behavior), and gay-identified men who have sex with men (concordant identity–behavior). Of the men in these 3 weighted groups, 96.6% identified as straight and 3.4% identified as gay. Of the straight-identified men, 9.4% reported having sexual intercourse with at least 1 man (and no women) in the year before the survey. Thus, 87.5% of men in the 3 groups exhibited exclusively heterosexual behavior and 12.5% demonstrated exclusively homosexual behavior. Among men who have sex with men, 72.8% identified as straight.”
I hope that cleared things up rather than make them more confusing.
Actually, Timothy, that made things more confusing for me. Nick’s figures come out to 13.5%. Your figures come out to 12.5%. so the difference between the two seems to be a mere 1%.
Is it the way Nick comes up with that number? Or are you saying that neither 13.5% or 12.5% is really all that meaningful of a number?
Since none of us have access to the raw data, any attempt to slice and dice the numbers will likely be inaccurate.
However, my 13.5% percent isn’t necessarily different than Timothy’s 12.5%. He quotes the study as saying that 12.5% “demonstrated EXCLUSIVELY homosexual” behavior (emphasis added). I was trying to combine numbers to estimate the total engaging in ANY level of homosexual behavior.
Just add in the 1.2% of respondents who identified as bisexual and we’re back over 13%
(Although having just said that, I note that Timothy’s quote says 87.5% exhibited exclusively heterosexual behavior and 12.5% exclusively homosexual. That’s 100% right there. Was there not even respondent who had sex with both men and women in the previous year? What were all those bisexuals doing?)
Whatever the exact percentage, my real point was simply that the number of respondents engaging in homosexual behavior in this NYC study was a good bit over 10%. So someone could adjust these findings downward to account for various skews in the NYC population–more gays, more immigrants, etc–and possibly still confirm Kinsey’s famous (or infamous, depending on your perspective) finding that 10% of all American men engage in some level of homosexual behavior.
“But certainly if the wife is complaining that the husband is uninterested in sex, and he spends all his time at the gym, and he comes home with his skin wrinkled from so many hours in the steam room–well, then this research might give the counselor a clue to what’s going on.”
Let me see if I can wade into this thoughtfully.
Nick C. has me right in this instance. What has struck me in my practice in the last several years, and why I became a member of NARTH was that several of my Christian marital clients presented after it was discovered that the husband was SMSM. These couples sought to preserve their relationship and restore marital fidelity.
In each case (prior to referral) heterosexual activity continued, like the study suggests, in the midst of homosexual activity. Since these referrals came from devout religious settings it seems to illustrate the concerns I initially voiced above…that pastors would underestimate the number of SMSM sitting in their pews.
None of my referrals are recent immigrants; but since this was included in the study as a demographic and it turned out to be significant, it reminded me of a study which demonstrated that first generation immigrants are much more likely to depend on religious institutions for social support and meaning than later generations of immigrants (sorry, can’t remember the source and I have looked around, I’ll let you know if I find it).
I am trying to make the point that if recent immigrants are strongly religiously affiliated and a marginal population and engaging is sexual relations with men there are several very important problems looming for them. First, they are unlikely to easily recieve accurate information about safe sex practices from their churches (probably their only, but certainly a primary source of social support). Second, being a dual minority, they can be easily coerced and manipulated by those who may discover their sexual behavior (employers could discharge them, or pay them an even lower substandard wage, or threaten to deport them).
David,
good points.
Robis and Nick C.
Guys, the numbers aren’t mine. Rather than add stuff up, go back to the link at the top of the thread and read the report. I think it will help you understand the differences between the two sets of numbers and percentages. Trying to recreate information without reading the report is only going to be confusing.
Timothy, I’m not trying to argue the issue or anything, I just didn’t see that what you were saying in response to Nick was all that different than what Nick was saying. I thought maybe I was missing something.