Metrosexual, Pansexual, Bisexual, Omnisexual?
» Love and Lust
The video box of the UK Channel 4 series Metrosexuality was my first sighting of the word. Reading an Aussie newspaper I encountered the variant, metrosexual.
The Word Spy says metrosexual means:
(MET.roh.sek.shoo.ul) n. A dandyish narcissist in love with not only himself, but also his urban lifestyle.
—Metrosexuality n.
And continues quoting Mark Simpson who is credited with creating the word in 1994:
The typical metrosexual is a young man with money to spend, living in or within easy reach of a metropolis — because that's where all the best shops, clubs, gyms and hairdressers are. He might be officially gay, straight or bisexual, but this is utterly immaterial because he has clearly taken himself as his own love object and pleasure as his sexual preference. Particular professions, such as modeling, waiting tables, media, pop music and, nowadays, sport, seem to attract them but, truth be told, like male vanity products and herpes, they're pretty much everywhere.
More recently in an article by Warren St. John in the New York Time's Fashion & Style section.
Their heightened sense of aesthetics is very, very pronounced," Marian Salzman, chief strategy officer at Euro RSCG, who organized the gathering at Eleven Madison Park, said of metrosexuals. "They're the style makers. It doesn't mean your average Joe American is going to copy everything they do," she added. "But unless you study these guys you don't know where Joe American is heading."
Is metrosexual just a new way to say yuppie male? He’s grudged his pleasures and freedom since he isn’t writing indignant editorials and manufacturing babies.
Elsewhere I’ve seen the metrosexuals defined as straight men who enjoy nice clothes and pretty things in general, less given to macho pretensions. Say, someone that Carrie or Charlotte on Sex & the City might date. A straight man that matches the stereotypical upper-income urban gay man (and won’t need to appear on Queer Eye for a Straight Guy).
Interestingly the word is restricted to men. In Metrosexuality it was a group of diverse people (admittedly mostly gay men) living in the city and enjoying their freedoms. With its overall atmosphere of cheer I liked Metrosexuality better than either edition of Queer as folk. (Of course I’m going to favor a video featuring a pretty boy wearing blue eye shadow.)
Spriteboy says emphatically if not eloquently:
The pusling polysexual energy and unisex edge of New York City absolutely fuel my drive. What guy doesn't like looking good, being looked at, and knowing they've got options? I sure as hell do, and I'm totally reviewing and sampling the possibilities. With so much in front of me to choose from, I'm just loving the gray areas and the freedom to play with. At this point, why limit myself?
Be interesting to see if metrosexual and metrosexuality are nonce words or will be around ten years from now.
Neologisms usually annoy me but can accept these two; either as suggested by the TV series or denoting a trendy but more agreeable heterosexual male.
”I’m not defined by labels” is thoughtless sentiment repeated too often. The words are true enough (well, really, some small-souled, empty people are defined by their labels). The person is objecting to whatever word has been used to describe them. Often it is just their idiosyncratic sense of the word. They rarely object (maybe never seriously) if called generous, kind or insightful. Sorry, buster, the dictionary’s sway over those nouns and adjectives matters more than your cavils. And in writing and talking about you not everybody has the wit, time or inclination to sum you with nuanced care.
Bisexual, however little I used it, was a label I never liked. But I couldn’t see calling myself AC-DC, ambisextrous deserves its burial, and switch-hitter suggests a feckless disregard for your partner (where did “side saddle queen” come from? – probably some disapproving (disappointed?) drag queen). A factual enough word but as disagreeable sounding as homosexual.
Pansexual and pansexuality arrived handily enough for aesthetic and self-descriptive needs. Pansexual has been around long enough (a quick Google search says it was coined in 1926 – was that by a botanist?). When I first adopted pansexual, I didn’t know that its use was largely confined to the BDSM/WIITWD folks (not that I care). Aside from pan meaning ‘all’ it calls up images of the ancient Greek god of horniness. (Not that I’m your frolicking goat-god type of guy.) By the criterion of euphony it has the same failing as homosexual and bisexual.
Omnisexual, well, there’s a word I can’t abide. Omnisexuality has no suggestive power not already present in pansexuality. The extra syllable doesn’t add beauty. When I hear the word I always think of the hotel chain and the feeble magazine. Most omnisexuals are just trying to evade bisexual. They like both sexes but not necessarily crossdressers, transsexuals or even nelly gay guys.
The -sexual suffix makes all the words grate on the ear. I have no dispraise for my genitals but my tender regard is as valuable to me as the erection. Back in the days when there was a Gay Liberation movement the word homophile was often suggested as a replacement of homosexual. As a young man I always disparaged homophile, but by then we’d militantly claimed the word gay (and have since reclaimed queer from the homophobes). I was too harsh. It did seem a clunky formulation. Time would’ve fixed that and focusing on our love won’t have been the worst attempt at a little implicit propaganda.
If I couldn’t love women I might’ve gone with the old radical fairy. But I’m too unostentatious to fit the norm for a radical fairy (nothing unkind meant, I’ve never had the inclination for flamboyance – thankfully, since I don’t have the gift). And I’m an atheist. My common cause with them is my strong anti-assimilationist bias.
I almost forgot about Edmund White’s stepchild, post-gay. I write about my sexuality often in my weblog but isn’t something I think about much during the day. I’ve been gay for over thirty years, never once wishing that I weren’t. If it weren’t for my love of ‘sissy boys’ and ‘drag queens’ I might be willing to call myself post-gay.
Not that I’m worried about nomenclature. All of the above was just a way to pass the time.
One gay man says that "If this truly turns out to be a new breed and not a fad, we may be witnessing the beginning of the end of male homosexuality." See: Homosexuality is biological suicide. A dead-end.
Much later I define the word pansexual.
11/2/03: Howard Dean says he's a metrosexual too.
Comments
Hey, man. Thanks for the shout-out!
Incidentally, i have switched servers and all my files have been moved. If you’d like to link to my new METROSEXUALITY page directly, please feel free to do so by linking to http://www.spriteboyworld.com/metrosexuality.html
Thanks again. Great article!
Posted by: spriteboy | June 21, 2003 8:20 AM
we used to call them fops. now like yuppies i supppose we need a special acronym and a whole media wave of attention to cater to their already overblown , self-centered egos. a month of volunteering in their local hospital would do them good. swap anecdotes with a man in his fifties struggling with colon cancer and think how good you’ve got it…drive home and think how beautiful the trees and the sky are, when you’re not lanquishing in a hospital bed….makes your hairstyle seem pretty superficial doesn’t it?
Posted by: matthew trotter | August 3, 2003 1:54 AM
This website is so cool. I,a straight,socially-conscious,mid-western woman, find all these labels and talk very stimulating,considering I grew up going to a fundimentalist church. I have been defundimentalizing for years. LOL Anyway, I think Mr.Trotter underestimates today’s metrosexuals. Most college-educated, well-dressed guys I know are very committed to social change. Me thinks he is stereotyping a wee bit.
Posted by: Myra | August 17, 2003 1:15 AM
Some men will always feel threatened by new or different visions of maleness, male sexuality.
Posted by: Richard Evans Lee | August 21, 2003 10:18 AM
I don’t think upscale urban men who like pretty things are all that new. Or anything to fear.Gay men are becoming more like straight men all the time.Might as well work both ways.
Posted by: Mr. Queer | October 14, 2003 4:40 PM
Thanx for posting a link to my Biological Suicide livejournal entry. I updated the page with a link to the metrosexual entry.
A woman once told me “metrosexuals are the gayest straight guys I’ve ever known.”
I think she’s on to something. :)
Posted by: italiangm | October 14, 2003 8:54 PM
I think that the ‘Meterosexul’ is not a narcissist. My beautiful, meterosexual boyfriend, takes very good care of himself, but doesn’t put his groomng in front of the real importances in life, like love and happiness. Like all stereotypes, they are not exact definitions of a person.
Posted by: Little Miss | October 26, 2003 6:05 PM
One of the many possible interpretations of metrosexual is just that the guy wants to look nice, be healthy and enjoy nice things.
People love to moralize.
Posted by: Richard | October 26, 2003 7:31 PM
Another interesting Simpson quote you may have seen:
Posted by: Jerry | October 29, 2003 2:34 PM
GQ was certainly metrosexual before the word was coined. As Esquire would’ve been at least in some periods.
I was little surprised to see GQ selling at the local Food Lion a few years ago. But the increasing circulation explains that. I think men, even straight men are being allowed to, being forced to be more vain of their surface. Why not, the more pretty men the better.
His remarks about the magazines makes me think of Playgirl which has always pretended that its readership is just red-blooded American women (haven’t seen the magazine in years).
This Simpson character seems to have problems. Don’t know a thing about him except for his words on metrosexuality.
Posted by: Richard | October 29, 2003 5:09 PM
Oh, certainly, there’s something not quite right about him, but it’s hard to tell when he’s joking. His original salon.com adaptation from his book is a confusing read (for one, he maintains that only one of the original Village People are gay - I count four).
Posted by: Jerry | October 29, 2003 5:53 PM
It may or may not interest you to know that I’ve taken it upon myself to engage Mr. Simpson in a dialogue. Granted, the conversation was initially predicated on his (erroneous) assertion within his “Metrosexuality” essay that only one of the Village People was/is actually gay, where I count at least two who’ve been open about it since the death of Morali (whereas Felipe Rose was the only officially out member for a number of years).
I’ve had two replies from him thus far, and they don’t speak especially well of his attitude towards gays, but maybe I’m in a rush to judgement.
Posted by: Jerry | October 30, 2003 5:49 AM
I’d always assumed they were all gay. But I don’t know much about them (to me Go West is a Pet Shop Boys song). I probably have too negative an image of VP, thinking of them as sort of the queer evivalent of Uncle Toms.
Posted by: Richard | October 30, 2003 5:24 PM
And I’ll be interested to hear what comes of your dialogue with this Simpson character.
Posted by: Richard | October 30, 2003 5:26 PM
After I got fed up with the epidemic of “metrosexuality” and I wanted to find out what it REALLY was. Google led me here. Great essay.
Posted by: Icarus | October 31, 2003 3:52 PM
Icarus:
This was just my meditation on what the word suggested to me.
Thanks for the kind words.
Posted by: Richard | November 1, 2003 9:03 AM
Okay, it’s officially out of hand. Metrosexuals are attempting a palace coup of The Occult and the Divining Arts: The Metrosexual Tarot at — you guessed it — www.metrosexualtarot.com. Is nothing sacred anymore?
Posted by: Culture Mole | February 8, 2004 1:56 PM
Hiya! I was searching for what pansexual meant and this site popped up with better information than any of the other sites I’ve read. Though I’m still not sure I know the “for dumb people” definition of them. What is a person who is love-oriented. Just looking for love/companionship/sex/dating without regard for man, woman, crossdresser, transgendered, etc.? Cause bisexual doesn’t feel right for me. But it’s as close as I’ve found to a label. Even tho I hate labels. http://www.geocities.com/puckeylut or toilet paper troll on opendiary.com Thanks for all this great info!
Posted by: toilet paper troll | February 24, 2004 10:13 AM
Did you see my main entry on Pansexual?
I guess the shortest definition of pansexual is a person who can love and have sex with anyone regardless of gender or gender identity.
Labels can be a bitch but you need descriptive words, the tough trick is to use them carefully.
BTW, you cannot be found as “toilet paper troll” by anyone who doesn’t have an Open Diary. It will say that you don’t exist. You’d have to change your settings if you really want people from the rest of the web to be able to read it.
Posted by: Richard | February 24, 2004 2:21 PM
what does OMNISEXUAL mean?
Posted by: J Killa | August 13, 2004 8:47 AM
Omnisexual means you can enjoy sex with anyone. Since pansexual already exists and the prefixes omni and pan mean much the same thing I think it is uneeded and unappealing.
Posted by: Richard | August 13, 2004 3:52 PM