Male Gaze/Headscratchers

• Male Gaze-type shots are supposed to be Fan Service for straight men, and "Female Gaze" (although not as it's used on this wiki) shots are supposed to be fanservice for gay men and straight women, right? We seem to be missing one very important group, here. Or are lesbians assumed to have Restraining Bolts that keep them from ogling another woman's breasts/ass/hips in this way. Because this is very much not the case.
  • Who says lesbians can't enjoy Male Gaze shots, just like gay men can enjoy "Female Gaze" shots? Sure, the shot was probably intended to please men, rather than the alternative, but boobs are boobs, right?
    • Because lesbians are not hetero males, and gay men are not hetero women. I'm obviously generalizing here, but contrary to what Skinemax and legions of heterosexual porn portrays, it generally takes more than the mere sight of boobs to get lesbians and bi women happy. What is often Fan Service for the average straight bro can be Squick or even Nightmare Fuel for us queer gals (case-in-point: the stupidly long fake nails "lesbians" in straight porn universally have. Think about it.). Not to mention the fact that queer women who are attracted to butch women, androgynous or genderqueer women do not ever get to ogle women in non-LGBT produced media because the Male Gaze inherently values traditionally femme-presenting women. The very things that make us, well, queer, don't ever get attention in mainstream hetero media, much less presented as sexy or desirable. As for gay men and the (laughably non-existent in the West but for daytime television and certain CW shows) female gaze? There's slightly more overlap here, but let's just say that actual gay men often take issue with things like yaoi manga and leave it at that.
    • Speak for yourself. One of my closest friends is a lesbian and part of what makes us so close is that we have a similar taste in women and enjoy female pans and zoom ins on breasts equally, (in fact she might enjoy them more than me and is quicker than me to demand tits in any given film). Don't try and stereotype an entire sexuality based on your personal preferences.
      • Indeed, this bi troper is both amused and annoyed by the fact that the post above yours linked to Unfortunate Implications when they're generalizing their own group. Hardy har.
  • So what does count as physical Fanservice for them? You just gave me a Logic Bomb.
    • When it comes to sex, gay men are still men, and lesbians are still women. What I mean by that is, on average, how they are each turned on is pretty much the same as their straight counterparts. Gay porn looks pretty similar to straight porn, with all the focus on looks, the money shots, and everything else, the only difference really being the woman has been replaced by another guy. Lesbians, like straight women, need more than just visual stimuli. What turns them on seems to be more cerebral, which is why they seem to gravitate more to visual and written erotica - you know, things with a plot and characterization. Just showing a naked female might not always do it. The reason I say "might" is because until recently study on female sexuality has been woefully neglected due to past gender bias.
    • To be honest, while I'm quite happy to accept that men and women (gay and straight) do have different reactions to different types of stimuli and do get turned on by different things, I do get slightly skeptical when the difference is boiled down to 'women need more cerebral stimulation than men do', because it sometimes just seems like yet another way of trying to make the hoary old claim that 'men are ruled by their dicks and women are smarter than them', and I don't think it can be boiled down that simply. I mean, the Chippendales are hardly that intellectual, and women still flock to see them. The Man Your Man Could Smell Like is a funny, clever idea, but he's also a hot, buff guy wearing a towel and / or a very tight pair of trousers, filmed in a way that emphasises this, which I think probably contributes to his popularity among women. Both examples that appeal to straight women, granted, but I'm sure that there's plenty of gay women who enjoy simply seeing other women (even -- or especially -- the type of woman most frequently favoured by the Male Gaze) naked or near-naked as well. I suspect that the issue is not necessarily that all or even most women need more 'intellectual' stimulation as much as simply that most media is made by straight men for other straight men, who either don't know or don't take into consideration anything which might attract other groups. I'm also sure that there's plenty of lesbians who do appreciate the women who are viewed by the traditional Male Gaze and how they are viewed, but they are probably only a secondary consideration if that.
  • Hi, I'm a bisexual female and I love Male Gaze. I prefer Male Gaze actually. I'm funny that way.
• Why, when this trope is gender-flipped, do the men in the audience flip out over the perceived Squick? If a woman watches "guy" movies/ plays video games/ hell, even watches an hour of TV or a commercial, she's 100% certain to see some Male Gaze scenes, and most women don't complain too much about that. So, why so much fuss over the opposite happening.
  • Double Standard in action, my friend.
  • I'd chalk it up to a widespread obsession with letting everyone know us guys are completely NOT enjoying that, man.
  • Not to mention the simple fact that Male Gaze is more common. A woman has to get used to it; she might roll her eyes, but she's not gonna freak out at all.
  • My ex-boyfriend was a hilarious aversion of this phenomenon. He totally did not even notice Female Gaze in like ... anything we watched together. He got jealous over me watching The Joker Blogs (because he was the jealous type and he knew I had a bit of a crush on Scott McClure - and apparently we could have an affair through the computer or something, idk) but he totally did not mind showing me naked Gerard Butler and other blatant female-oriented Fan Service (the deleted scene from Boondock Saints, naked Cilian Murphy in 28 Days Later, etc.) Probably because he thinks All Women Are Prudes while All Men Are Perverts, so a blatant close-up of a female butt, even clothed, is Fan Service but a blatant close-up of a male butt (even if it's Gerard Butler's butt and said butt is naked) is just another shot.
  • Homophobia (which is often more exaggerated in men than in women) can play a role too.
    • Elaborating on this, it's because our entire culture is built on the assumption that the default person is male. (That's why Male Gaze is so pervasive to begin with.) So when a man sees a sexy male image, he assumes on some level that it is intended for him, and that means the creator/publisher/producer is calling him gay! NOOOOOOOOO!!!