(and on bro-buddies, so there will be some quoted plain talk about man-on-man sex — warning for the wary)
From the arena of masculinity studies, some postings on this blog on male friendship (and on bromances, Biffs, and bro-jobs)
— 1/1/12: “The many faces of male friendship” (link):
three e-card takes on male friendship:
We’re total fucking bad asses. (defiant, swaggering companionship)
I will be your friend no matter what you put inside your anus. (supportive friendship)
Thanks for being my bitch. (main man + sidekick relationship)
— 3/8/15: “Bromancing the Bone” (link)
A bromance is a close, emotionally-intense, non-sexual bond between two (or more) men. It is an exceptionally tight affectional, homosocial male bonding relationship that exceeds that of usual friendship”
“The various “bromancing the bone” sites are all over the map. Some are about batebuds, buddies in masturbation — either jacking off together or jacking each other off. Some are about buddies in fellatio. Some are about buddies in anal intercourse; the commercial gay porn Bromancing the Bone DVDs seem to be “amateur” anally oriented videos; amateur videos feature non-professional actors presented as straight guys having sex with one another”
— 11/16/15: “Male friendships” (link)
“(1) the relationships (which I would characterize as basic close male friendships) between the central character Nick Burkhardt in the series Grimm (set in Portland OR) and his partner in police work Hank Griffin and also his personal friend (and in a sense collaborator) Monroe (the series posted about here);
(2) the relationship (which I would describe as a “best buddy” relationship) between team leader Greg Parker and team member Ed Lane on the crisis response unit drama Flashpoint (set in Toronto ON) (the series posted about here);
and (3) the relationship (which I would characterize as brotherly, incorporating the common competitiveness and rivalry between brothers) between team commander Steve McGarrett and his partner Danno Williams in the state police force drama Hawaii Five-0 (set in Honolulu HI) (the series posted about here).”
— 12/12/15: “Sex between straight men: bro-jobs” (link):
“bro-job (or brojob or bro job), to refer to fellatio involving two men who identify as straight.”
” On the sexual practices, check out my my 8/12/15 posting on “Tearooms and their features”, where I cited Jane Ward’s recent book Not Gay: Sex Between Straight White Men, which focused on motivations (including boosting a man’s identity as a straight white man) for sexual acts between men who identify as straight, in college fraternities, military units, prisons, sports teams, online personals ads from men seeking other men to masturbate with, and, yes, in tearooms / t-rooms (men’s rooms where men have sex, of various sorts, in public).”
— 12/29/16: “Wally Cox” (link):
‘[Physical horseplay between Wally Cox and the young Marlon Brando] like this — in combination with Cox’s rather prissy Mister Peepers character, a widespread belief that nerdiness correlates with queerness, and a widespread belief that close friendships necessarily have a component of sexual attraction (an idea that surely has its roots in beliefs about close friendships between men and women) — no doubt gave rise to the silly rumors about Cox’s (and Brando’s) sexuality.”
— 4/17/17: “Chub and chums in the morning” (link):
“a set of relational Ns of friendship in informal English, in particular:
(R) mate, pal, chum, buddy
These Ns denote ‘friend of s.o.’, where the related friend is canonically expressed as a possessor of N: a definite determiner, in NP’s N (his pal, Frank’s chum, etc.); or a possessive object of of in an indefinite nominal, in a N of NP’s (a mate of mine, some buddy of Frank’s, etc.). Canonically, the relationships are male-male”
— 12/28/17: “Bromance for Biffs” (link):
” the real-life (intense but non-sexual) bromance between [Teen Wolf‘s Dylan] O’Brien and [Tyler] Hoechlin as Biffs (bffs < best friends forever).”
“Biffs are emotionally attuned to one another, and they’re also physically close — engaging not only in the usual contact rituals of male buddies (buddy hugs, buddy pats, putting their arms around one another, doing such horseplay as mock combat and carrying one another around), but also snuggling up together, touching each other freely, maybe play-kissing. A fair number of men, both gay and straight, simply cannot believe that these physical displays aren’t sexual, but they aren’t: nobody gets a hard-on, nobody’s pressing on towards dick-rubbing, hand jobs, blow jobs, or fucking.”
with many examples, plus some of gay-straight friendships
— 6/4/18 “Bromuniqués” (link):
“The “bros before hoes” expression is generally regarded as the “golden rule” of male friendship, and it has been common slang at least since 2001.”
— 8/28/20: “Daniel Goddard” (link):
supportive male friendship in The Beastmaster
— 9/3/20: “wingman, winger” (link):
“Wingman. A piece of the American sociocultural world that combines two different sets of practices: the conventions of close male friendship (buddies, in the vernacular); and those of the heterosexual marketplace, in which young men compete for sexual access to or romantic attachment to young women.”
— 10/15/20: “No offense (intended)” (link):
on the tv show Emergency!: “the show was actually quite good at depicting male friendship, male competition, the sexual marketplace, and symbolic displays of masculinity, all with some subtlety and good humor.”
— 10/29/21: “Seven faces” (link):
confounding of male friendship with homoerotic desire
— 2/17/22: “Vincent Price and his sushi at the Boulevard” (link):
on a Zippy strip: “Male friendship. Griffy and Zippy spend a lot of time together in the strip, hanging out and sharing their enjoyment of the passing scene. Diverging hugely in personality type, they nevertheless share a number of passions — demotic food, roadside institutions, art over an immense range — and while disputing over small stuff the way buddies will do, their friendship is surprisingly free of ritualized aggression and competition, but shows a lot of genuine respect for one another’s peculiarities.”
— 3/23/22: “Touch my pouch, liquid buddy” (link):
from a Daily Jocks ad: on buddy-sex and buddy-love
— 4/25/22: “Meze: male friendship in fiction” (link):
“9 Fictional Friendships that Explore Male Intimacy” on the Electric Literature site
Leave a Reply