Economic and Demographic Approaches
While it can be difficult to identify all sexual minorities in any data source (Berg & Lien, 2006; Black et al., 2000, 2002; Cameron et al., 2009), researchers can now identify same-sex couples. Using population trends, scholars note that the geographic distribution of male same-sex couples is different from that of the general U.S. population (Black et al., 2000, 2002; Black et al., 2007). City amenities and the ability to congregate and socialize within a dense urban population appear related to gay locality patterns (Black et al., 2002).
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Whatever the reason for these locality differences, this research poses interesting questions about the demography and geography of male sex work, as we know very little about the population size, demographic characteristics, and geographic distribution of male sex workers in the U.S.
Early studies of male sex work focused on cities with large gay populations (McNamara, 1994), but more recent qualitative research reveals that a significant portion of male escorts’ clientele identifies heterosexually.
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Indeed, the “breastplate of righteousness” that Humphries (1970) saw in heterosexually identified men who took part in homosexual behavior has recently resurfaced in the public lexicon (Frankel, 2007; MacDonald, 2007). In the market for male sex work, such behavior is common. Male escorts note that a significant percentage of their clientele is heterosexually identified and many are married. Because these men are obscured from the most common analysis of sexual minorities, how their presence in the market influences market function and composition remains unexamined.
Simple economic models of locality, such as Hotelling’s (1929), suggest that escorts should locate close to their client base. Given that heterosexually identified men may have much to lose if their same-sex sexual behavior is exposed, it is expected that male escorts might be more likely to locate in places where there are fewer opportunities for these men to meet other men, such as neighborhoods and communities identified as predominantly heterosexual. Self-identified heterosexual men are unlikely to frequent gay bars, coffeehouses, or community groups where they might encounter gay men for socialization or sex. Male escort locations should thus differ from those of general gay-identified populations. Conversely, researchers note that gay communities do not attach the same level of stigma to sex work as heterosexuals do (Koken et al., 2009; Sadownick, 1996). Thus, if gay communities are seen as safe havens for sex workers, or if few customers are heterosexually identified, it would be expected that male sex workers’ geographic distribution would closely mirror that of the general gay population’s.
Sociological Approaches
Hegemonic Masculinity
Hegemonic masculinity is defined as “the configuration of gender practice which embodies the currently accepted answer to the problem of legitimacy of patriarchy” (Connell, 1995, p. 77). Hegemonic masculinity is about relations between and within genders.
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Hegemonically masculine practices ensure the dominant position of men over women, and of particular men over other men. These practices can take a number of forms; research usually stresses social traits such as drive, ambition, self-reliance, and aggressiveness, which legitimate the power of men over women. Within genders, there is the privileging or dominance of certain masculinities and the marginalization or subordination of others (Bird, 1996; Reeser, 2010; Schrock & Schwalbe, 2009). For example, gay masculinities are subordinated and marginalized so that patriarchy can be reproduced through heterosexuality. Connell (1995) describes how hegemonic masculinity is never influenced by non-hegemonic elements: elements of non-heterosexuality are seen as contradictions or weakness (Demetriou, 2001), thus diminishing the perceived power of these subjectivities.
Scholars note the limits of this conceptual binary between hegemonic and non-hegemonic masculinity (Anderson, 2002; Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005; Demetriou, 2001; Donaldson, 1993; Dowsett, 1993; Reeser, 2010). Demetriou (2001) and Reeser (2010), among others, suggest that rather than viewing it as binary, hegemonic masculinity should be viewed as a hybrid made up of practices and elements of heterosexual and homosexual masculinities, giving hegemonic masculinity the ability to change over time to meet historical circumstances with a different set of practices. In this conception, the practices of gay men, who are non-hegemonic, not only reinforce the patriarchal goal of hegemonic masculinity, but they help define the hegemonic ideal itself.
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Demetriou (2001), for example, notes the recent construction of the “metrosexual” as one example of gay masculinity influencing the construction of the hegemonic ideal.
While a binary approach views gay men in relation to the hegemonic ideal, a hybrid approach opens the possibility of analyzing how gay men define, subordinate, and marginalize masculinities among themselves. This within-subgroup construction might influence how hegemonic masculinity itself is defined. Donaldson (1993) and Connell (1992) note that gay men reify hegemonic norms; indeed, modern gay practices celebrate and exemplify hegemonic ideals such as bodybuilding and physical strength. This reification of masculine norms can create a situation where some gay masculinities are themselves subordinate to others. That is, among gay men themselves, there may be further refinement of the gay masculine norm along hegemonic lines. Donaldson (1993) raises the intriguing point that “it is not ‘gayness’ that is attractive to homosexual men, but ‘maleness.’ A man is lusted after not because he is homosexual but because he’s a man. How counter-hegemonic can this be?” (p. 649).
Scholars of masculinity have asserted that gay men critique hegemonic ideals through their counter-hegemony (Connell, 1992; Reeser, 2010), but it also could be the case that gay men overtly reify hegemonic ideals sexually. To the extent that this occurs, gay masculinities may be aligned with the hegemonic masculinity that marginalizes them. The question is the degree to which homosexual men are complicit in hegemonic masculine norms. In Demetriou’s (2001 language, to what degree do gay masculinities contain significant elements of hegemonic masculinities that legitimate patriarchy and may, in turn, influence hegemonic masculinity itself? In an explicitly sexual arena, hege-monic masculinity would extend to physical appearance (e.g., muscularity, body size, body hair, and height) and sexual behaviors (e.g., sexual dominance, sexual aggressiveness, and penetrative sexual position). To the extent that homosexual men conform to and reify hegemonic masculine norms, it is expected that the value of masculine traits and practices should have a direct effect on a given escort’s desirability and value. While such “manhood acts” usually elicit deference from other men and reinforce hegemonic masculinity (Bird, 1996; Schrock & Schwalbe, 2009), in an explicitly homosexual arena they may also elicit sexual desire and objectification.
The function of male sex work in gay communities may heighten such effects. In a market for sex work, clients are explicitly seeking sexual contact. Clients may choose escorts unlike the men they interact with socially but whom they do desire sexually. This may increase the value of certain masculine characteristics insofar as the hegemonic masculine archetype may be a driving force in purely sexual desire (Cameron et al., 1999; Green, 2008a; Pruitt, 2005; Weinberg & Williams 1974).
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In this market, is men’s lust consistent with hegemonic norms? Sexual desire for the hegemonic ideal could influence how hegemonic masculinity itself is constructed and reinforced among gay men. If this is the case, there may be limits to the binary view of hegemonic masculinity.
This type of hybrid hegemonic masculinity could have additional implications for gay male body image and gay men’s use of the body in constructing masculinity. Sadownick (1996) sees the gay liberation movement as a time when gay men began, en masse, to idealize hypermasculinity, muscles, and a hirsute body, turning on its head the “flight from masculinity” that Hacker (1957) observed in earlier generations of gay men. The physical ideal is typified by a muscular physique and other markers of hegemonic masculinity, such as height, body hair, whiteness, youth, and middle-class socioeconomic status (Atkins, 1998; Green, 2008b). This turn of events has molded the gay body into a political representation of masculinity. This partly subverts norms that question the compatibility of masculinity and homosexuality, but it also reinforces a quasi-hegemonic masculine ideal (Atkins, 1998; Connell, 1992). Compared with lesbians and heterosexuals, gay men show stronger tendencies to prefer particular body types, and this can lead to poor psychological and health outcomes for gay men who do not conform to gay standards of beauty (Atkins, 1998; Beren et al., 1996; Carpenter, 2003; Green 2008b; Herzog et al., 1991). In fact, attempts by some gay subcultures to subvert these beauty standards have been critiqued as being agents themselves of hegemonically masculine agendas (Hennen, 2005).
In many ways, rejection of large men and thin men can be seen as the rejection (subjugation) of feminizing features. For example, excess weight in a man visually minimizes the relative size of male genitals and produces larger (and, importantly, nonmuscular) male breasts; thin men may appear slight, waifish, and physically weak. These appearances emphasize feminizing traits that are actively discouraged in mainstream gay culture (Atkins, 1998; Hennen, 2005). In the market for male sex work, we expect clients to prize physical characteristics that mark hegemonic masculinity, such as muscular physiques, body hair, and height. We also expect feminizing features, such as excess weight and thinness, to be penalized.
The theory of hegemonic masculinity and the closely related literature on the body in gay communities suggest that clients of male sex workers are likely to prize masculine personas and body type. There are several reasons for this. First, numerous scholars assert that gay men’s relationships with effeminate behavior are complex—while celebrated in many aspects of gay culture (e.g., camp, drag shows, and diva worship), effeminate behavior is particularly stigmatized in sexual relationships and as an object of lust (Clarkson, 2006; Nardi, 2000; Ward, 2000). Second, some scholars note how the gay community has commoditized the “authentic” masculinity of self-identified heterosexual men who engage in sex with men (Ward, 2008). This has given rise to the distinction between masculine and effeminate gay men in gay communities (Clarkson, 2006; Connell, 1992; Pascoe, 2007). Construction of dual masculinities among gay men, and distinctions between the two, are used to legitimate the power of masculine gay men over effeminate gay men, a reproduction of patriarchy (Clarkson, 2006). We thus expect that men who are interacting primarily for sexual purposes likely place a premium on masculine practices (e.g., penetrative sexual position [topping], aggressive sexual behavior, and muscular physique) and penalize feminine practices (e.g., receptive sexual position [bottoming], submissiveness, large body size, and thinness) to the degree that they conform to hegemonic masculinity and to the construction of masculine gay identity among gay men.
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Intersectionality
Just as the theory of hegemonic masculinity has been critiqued for not considering how gay men can conform to and inform hegemonic masculinity, there is also a burgeoning literature that looks at ethnic variation in social values among gay men (Green, 2008a; Han, 2006; Nagel, 2000; Robinson, 2007). As intersectionality theory suggests, the intersection of these social categories is neither cumulative nor additive but independent (Collins, 1999, 2000; Reeser, 2010). The intersection of hegemonic masculinity with ethnic sexual stereotypes can create multiple forms of sexual objectification for particular groups of gay men. For example, the value of a top (the penetrative partner) is not uniform across all tops, and the value of a white top is not simply the addition of the value of whiteness and “topness” but an independent effect for men in that particular category, who in this instance embody the highest position in the racial and sexual behavior hierarchies among gay men. Markets for sex may reify these sexual stereotypes (what Cameron and colleagues [1999] call “ethnico-sexual stereotypes”) in explicitly monetary terms.
Baldwin (1985) notes that the American ideal of sexuality is rooted in the American ideal of masculinity, which he argues necessitates an inherently ethnic dimension. Historically, white men were to protect white women from black sexuality, and this supposed threat legitimated white men’s social control of white women (and whites social control over blacks). For homosexual white men, black men’s sexuality may become an object of desire because they are perceived to be sexually dominant and unrestrained—although still under the social control of whites due to their ethnicity—turning the hegemonic ideal on its head (Baldwin, 1985; Reeser, 2010). Robinson (2008), McBride (2005), Reid-Pharr (2001), Green (2008a), and others note how racial stereotypes interact with notions of masculinity to produce a desire for hypermasculine black men, particularly among white gay men.
The stereotype of the sexually dominant black man, rather than being an agent of fear, can lead to a celebration of his hypersexual behavior, appearance, and conduct. In this theory, the general level of social interaction between black and white gay men is relatively low and occurs chiefly over sex. Black men who demonstrate hypermasculine and sexually aggressive behavior are offered entry into white gay spaces, but this entry is limited to sexual liaisons. McBride (2005), for example, notes the limited range in which black men interact with whites in gay pornography, where the vast majority of black performers are tops and adopt an antisocial persona. Men who defy ethnic sexual stereotypes could face markedly lower values and become, in this particular instance, counter-hegemonic. Robinson (2008) finds that white gay men largely ignore and devalue black men who do not conform to the stereotype of the hypermasculine black male, suggesting that the penalties for nonconformity may be particularly harsh.