In my opinion, the comfort that straight men feel being physically and verbally intimate in a satirical way with one another is rooted in the societal assumption of straightness coupled with the ever-persistent and, frankly, homophobic taboos associated with being a gay man.
There’s no time to be an ingenue when you’re an upperclassman. I’ve slowly come to the understanding that by the end of my first two years of college, I should’ve been out on weekends, flirting with cute guys and making my debut into the realm of dating and hookup apps. Now I’ve reached the final stages of undergrad only to realize that I damned myself for the first two years of college that I spent on weekend movie nights with my friends, drinking from the comfort of our home, dancing to our own music in our own rooms.
Because now, after meeting with a guy once or twice, there’s an underlying assumption that I’m supposed to be putting out. The courtship ritual shifts within a week from friendly texts and witty banter into late-night Snapchats that I don’t really want to open. After hanging out with a guy for a few hours one time in public, suddenly I’m at fault for not wanting to come over at 12 a.m. Everyone’s supposed to be on board with casual sex.
I just sprinted to Mann at the end of Spanish. I once again didn’t do the homework for that class, worsening my already abysmal grade in it. I need to pass it to graduate. I was going to email Katie and tell her that I just couldn’t turn in a column this week. But here I am sitting at this damn table writing this.