I have to have a great body or I'll be useless and I won't find love: appearance requirements are crushing gay men and causing them many health problems
Body image is now a term widely used to describe how we think about our bodies and how we feel about them. All of these thoughts about our bodies can affect us throughout our lives and also influence (positively or negatively) our mental health and well-being. However, forming a positive body image is much more difficult than one might assume, and this is doubly true for gay men. So many gay men are mired in the belief that they will never be sexy unless they have sculpted abs, strong arms and broad shoulders. And it's no wonder, they're actually being reinforced from all sides every day - all they have to do is sign up for Grindr and they're already subjected to a myriad of requirements that they have to meet in order for anyone to be interested in them. "No fat and nothing that's femme", "just gym-fit", "I work out and you should too " - gay dating sites are teeming with similar descriptions (and demands).
So while appearance per se is obviously not a common mental health issue, as scientists have shown, higher body dissatisfaction is associated with poorer quality of life, psychological distress or risk of unhealthy eating. And gay men are exposed to all of these problems at a much higher rate than men in the majority population. Incidentally, according to a 2017 survey by gay magazine Attitude, 84% of respondents felt under intense pressure to have what is considered a "great body". And with each onset of a new year, this pressure grows even stronger - and is supported by a society-wide wave of (slimming) New Year's resolutions.
Great looks = great life
Due to a combination of low self-esteem and a myriad of stressful life experiences, LGBT people are generally one of the groups most at risk of developing mental health and eating disorders. Yes, it is not uncommon for young LGBT people to face bullying, harassment or feelings of social exclusion after coming out. But they also face media content that continually presents them with a picture of exactly what they (or their bodies) should look like.
Of course, media content affects all of its consumers, but LGBT people in particular are much more at risk of negative effects (stress and anxiety about their body image) due to the "predispositions" described above. And which effects are these? On a health level, it has already been shown that gay men who do not fulfil body ideals also purposely avoid sex, feel stigmatised and isolated.
According to a report by the Mental Health Foundation, LGBT people also face so-called minority stress resulting from stigma and prejudice, but it can also be linked to body image. And, as many related studies suggest, gay and bisexual men are also much more likely to struggle with eating disorders - they are more likely to fast, vomit, take laxatives or weight loss drugs, all for one purpose: to control their weight. And according to this research, what is a common trigger that can cause the development of various eating disorders? The inability to meet body image ideals in some LGBTQ cultural contexts...
Zdroj: Giphy
Food as a scourge
Another study then pointed to the connection between how gay men view their bodies, how they approach food, and how culture and social norms enter into the whole process. Those who took part then chronicled their struggles with body image through their own photographs, as well as the ways in which they tried to overcome the problems associated with the (futile) pursuit of the perfect body. They also discussed how the media has influenced their views on food. And the conclusion? According to the study's authors , "societal demands placed on gay men to eat healthy and achieve the perfect body are associated with anxiety and depression and have serious consequences in terms of mental health."
Unfortunately, within gay culture, other criteria, such as age, are not infrequently added on top of the requirement of a flashy body. The moment it comes to buying them, one actually finds oneself in a no-win situation. "When I was younger and came out, I was told I was too fat," says the now 35-year-old gay man, adding that the only way out was to lose weight. But now, with a few more years, he feels that even that is not enough in a community that values toned and flexible bodies. "Suddenly you have to be bigger, you have to lift weights and have abs, and that's much harder to achieve," he says.
But is there a way out of this vicious circle? It's hardly something that can be said unequivocally. Body image problems are a society-wide problem, which is reinforced with every new photo published of a muscular, exercising man (and woman), with every new dating site user who makes it clear that no one has a chance with him without a six-pack abs...
And although the pressure on body image is much greater for gay men compared to straight men, that doesn't mean that everyone else is immune to the gnawing feeling that their body isn't good enough. So many of those who share their dazzling gym photos are plagued by their own body image demons. So perhaps the first step to change might be to simply not pay attention to such content and, above all, not create it.
