The Legend of Fruit Fly
If you are a gay man, you have probably heard of her.
The Fruit Fly. The Fag Hag. The hetero female friend who draws in gay men like a magnet, collecting them one by one until they are too many to count. These women range from those too awkward to talk to hetero boys to those too emotionally unavailable to think about dating to those mysterious ones who, for whatever reason, simply prefer the company of queer dudes.
I realized a few weeks into my summer job with the Obama campaign that my boss was one of these women. She said so herself, and in the seven months I have now known her, she has rarely mentioned a friend who was not a gay man. It was no surprise that we became such fast friends; she was the only other single 20-something working for the campaign in Eugene, Oregon - the only person I could go out with and get crazy - and I was the only homo. It was a match made in heaven.
Except when it wasn't.
See, the first myth of Fruit Fly is that she is dependable. By her very nature, she is not. Like any fly, she buzzes around constantly. You cannot tame her or keep her still. This summer I wrote this off as a result of the strenuous campaign - canceled dinners and rescheduled drinks were understandable when the big bosses at Obama HQ could call at any moment and demand you be somewhere.
But this weekend, when my Fruit Fly was in town for inauguration, she had no such excuse. We were supposed to meet up on Friday afternoon for me to show her Georgetown and cook us a nice dinner. At 3pm, hourly text messages started that continued pushing back the plans a little at a time until it was 11pm and I had fallen asleep in my apartment. I hadn't eaten all day as I waited for her, and she apparently hadn't eaten, either - in fact, while my dinner sat untouched in the kitchen, Fruit Fly was somewhere across town, so famished that she became sick from low blood sugar. I would find this out the following day, via text message.
The second myth of Fruit Fly is that you are special. I thought that my Fruit Fly was as excited to see me as I was to see her, but the fact was while she is my only Fruit Fly, I am hardly her only fruit. Gay men - who often find themselves detached from their families, alienated from their hetero male peers, culturally divided from gay women, and entangled in cliquey homo circles - want someone who will listen to them, make them feel loved, and allow them to let down their guard. But though the Fruit Fly may make you feel like this is possible, they have more gay men than Meryl Streep has Oscar nods. You will never be special or important to her, because there are a hundred more gays lined up behind you for whenever she gets bored.
This usually leads to trouble in and of itself. The third myth of Fruit Fly is that she will decrease your drama. You want to believe that having her will keep you grounded in good company and advice. In fact, when you surround a woman with all those gay men, shit is bound to go down between them. They will fight, or they will fuck and then fight, and either way you are soon in an awkward situation. Fruit Fly will only make your life that much more complicated and screwed up.
But don't despair. The fourth myth of Fruit Fly is that you need her. Maybe it's because you feel a deep need to have a hetero woman in your life, a beard if you will - a straight girl who makes you look and feel straight. Maybe it's for all the reasons I mentioned above - the reasons that make us want to feel special to that one person. But Fruit Fly can't give you what you need. What you really want is another gay man to be there for you, to be your one-and-only. Fruit Fly may feel like a necessary part of life, as essential an accessory as a belt for pants that don't quite fit, but she's only keeping you from your goals. Fruit Fly is the illusion of intimacy, the facade of friendship, the urban legend of unrequited love.
And even more importantly, the last myth of Fruit Fly is that she exists at all. Believe me, she doesn't. She is here one minute but the next minute gone. Eventually, either she will find a hetero boy to settle down with or all of her gay boys will find mates themselves. She is but a fleeting moment, like the second before an orgasm or that first taste of summer.
But if you were at TNG's Inauguration Kick-Off at Solly's last week - if you saw us drinking and dancing, and jokingly flexing our biceps - if you were one of the dozens of gay men who came up to her and made her promise she'd call you the next time she was in town - you would have sworn she was real. You would have wondered how one woman could draw so many gay men to her side. But like all things legendary, she simply isn't real.
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20 comments:
Havinge been burned by the Fruit Fly, I know the pain they can cause. You think you are their only gay and it shakes you when you turn out to be a part of her collection
i understand your hurt. realizing you are not a priority to your friends is painful. in all fairness people are permitted to have multiple friends. straight gay whatever. there is a difference between being a good friend and a bad friend. learn to identify them and avoid those relationships.
maybe you should figure out that you have a poor quality friend instead of grouping all women who hang out with queer men as bad people.
Perhaps the secret is trying to determine who likes you for yourself and who likes you because you are a fun "gay minstrel" to them. Those genuine friends will be there for you when you need them.
I hate my roommate's fruit flies. I would like to take a can of raid to the entire nest of them. Why are they always loud and obnoxious? Can't the gays hang out with cool girls? I don't understand.
I'm completely with Anonymous #1: find people you like to hang out with who treat you right. The "fruit fly" categorization is inherently sexist and this kind of gross generalization can only cause ill will.
It drives me nuts in the opposite direction, too, when someone like Kathy Griffin refers to "the gays" or "her gays," like we're all some sort of anonymous, similar-acting herd.
In short: more treating people like individuals with all their quirks, and then choosing who to hang out with, and less group categorization. It's putting people in these boxes that leads to a host of social ills. Homophobia comes directly from straight society's inability to see gay men or lesbians as individuals.
If you can't talk in generalizations, then nothing will ever be done.
:)
Kathy Griffin would fall into the Fruit Fly category. Fruit Flies tend to marginalize gays.
Generalizations do come to play with any group. And there are always exceptions to the generalization. For example, gay men tend to be promiscious. As a gay man, I see it all the time, and I have seen many examples that do not fit that generalization.
Again, I do not think the author intended to be misogynistic. Most women do not fall into this category, but there are a few that do.
Some white people do the same thing with having token minority friends.
So all people can marginalize each other. You do not need to be female to do so.
this is in poor taste. the article bothered me because i hang out with gay men, but the photo crossed the line. does it make you feel better about your bad judgment in friends to exploit someone on the largest gay website in DC?
all anyone needed to do was click on the photos from the event to figure out who she was.
you are a bully my friend.
i am actually very disappointed in TNG for allowing this photo to be published. i have supported this site since the beginning. this is the first article that i think is over the line and i am considering not attending anymore tng events.
it is not a threat so much as a lack of opposition to this author's post.
it is not a good way to retain the already dwindling women's population by posting a misogynistic article such as this one.
i know many tng readers/authors do not agree with this man (or do you?)
do i want you taking my photo and scratching out my face to embarrass me in front of the whole dc gay community?
absolutely not.
this is an age where we should bond together.
get it together.
Anon #3,
I see your point about the picture.
I am somewhat agree with the article. But putting a picture of her on the article, even though, without her face, to me it's almost attacking her directly in public forum.
I have removed the photo from the article, but would also like to make the following comments.
(1) Other editors were consulted in the decision to use this photo, but none of our articles represent the views of all of our editors, writers, or readers. If you are looking for a site where everyone agrees with every opinion published, this is not that site.
(2) The piece was not designed to embarrass anyone. The person about whom this was written self-identified by this label, and furthermore is not a member of this community. The photo was not "scratched out" as a form of attack, but rather to not have the face shown on this site. All of our photos are indeed online and many are tagged. When people attend public events, sometimes photos are taken; we trust our readers to be responsible in all these cases and for people to be vigilant in protecting their own security.
(3) I would challenge you to actually address why you found the piece to be misogynistic. It is quite easy to hurl insults and yet another thing to defend your comments or to make a valuable contribution. From my perspective, I can critique a specific type of relationship between men and women and say that it is unhealthy and destructive towards both parties without being a misogynist. Because I feel that this situation is not a real identity but rather a false and inherently temporary image, as expressed at the end of the piece, the article is not even an attack on a group of people but rather a critique of a situation. If in this space we cannot be critical of anything without being labeled as hateful towards entire groups of people, we have destroyed any possibility of intelligent discussion, have created a system in which a fear of nonconformity controls the community, and have destroyed the purpose of this site.
As usual, The New Gay allows articles to be posted that further polarize the gay and heterosexual communities, and also serve to demonize heterosexuals. This article is misogynistic and inflammatory.
The really sad part is that I loved the idea of TNG when it started. For all of those over the rainbow. But it only advocates a very narrow definition of being gay that is some strange interpretation of straight hipster culture, and then is abusive to straight culture. TNG is decidedly NOT over the rainbow.
How is this post polarizing the gay and hetero communities? The misdeads of the shallow fruit flies are the real polarizing factors.
Bringing awareness to these potential issues and having an open and frank discussion on the issue of friendship between gay men and straight women should help us find better ways to UNITE the two communities. Not pull us apart.
This post reminds me a lot of another phenomenon, where straight folk befriend gay folk of the same sex and lead them on for an ego boost or an experiment, and then leave them flat when someone romantically interesting enters the picture.
These sorts of issues segregate the gay and straight communities. The author should be thanked for bringing this sort of behavior to light and providing an opportunity to have a good discussion about it.
to be frank, it sounds like the problem might be you as much as it is her. i mean, even if she WAS totally wrong in brushing you off, i don't think that's as egregious a slight as writing a bitter post about it on a blog that isn't even your personal one.
@ anonymous 1:08 posting:
i don't mean to pick on you, and since you're anonymous, i'm definitely not picking on you personally. i think your sentiments are similar to those of a lot of people who get upset with tng postings from time to time. the response here is to assume the worst motives on the part of the author and then announce how shitty tng is and that you're done participating in its community. why must we always assume the worst motives and implications? it's not an easy thing to do to write a post for a blog and perfectly express your opinions, let alone about topics that are potentially provocative. there are more productive ways to react to this if you ask me.
what i wish you would do instead of accusing the author of being misogynistic is offer a more thoughtful critique of what about his post seems misogynistic. it's really easy to call someone misogynistic without elaboration, but at least he has attempted to discuss something to which lots of people can relate. whether he has succeeded is a different matter. i imagine he might execute the post differently in hindsight. this is a blog. by its very (democratic) nature, it's a bit messy and haphazard. i think we can all be a bit more tolerant of that reality.
you mentioned that tng "advocates a very narrow definition of being gay that is some strange interpretation of straight hipster culture, and then is abusive to straight culture." now this is a provocative statement worthy of elaboration. why don't you write an essay about how "alternative" gay culture is really just a ripoff of straight hipster culture? as someone who detests the term "hipster," i'd be interested to hear more about this. as for "abusive to straight culture," this seems like a pretty hysterical blanket statement that you might take back in hindsight. i bring straight friends to tng parties from time to time and they have a great time. and what is straight culture? see, all these things that you could talk about in your very own tng post, but you'd rather attack someone who tries to write something thought-provoking, get pissed off about what he writes, and then stomp off with your toys and go home. how does that help anything?
My ex boyfriend had a whole herd of "fruit flies," some of whom used to get jealous of my presence, and seemed to try and sabotage our relationship at times. Then again, I know straight guys who have done the same with straight friends who fall in love. A few turned out to be false friends, who abandoned my ex bf---but several remain there for him when he needs them, true friends to the core. As many have pointed out here: everyone's different, and can't and shouldn't be catagorized. The trick is in finding those rare true friends, regardless of who they are - - - I have found some beautiful butterflies among the fruit flies!
This screed is wildly offensive. It purports to be some kind of sociological commentary, but it's really no more than a personal attack. Even if it does have something to say about a larger issue, what it has to say is dumb and misogynistic.
You're mad at this particular woman who didn't meet your expectations of friendship, and from that one situation you make sweeping assumptions about women who are friends with homosexual men.
If you really think you have something to say, you have failed to support your argument. The only thing you've proven is that you are vindictive and immature.
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