Shirtless, gym-built lookalike gay groups of social media

It's not just gay men who does this though. Straight men do this on instagram all the time. It's fine in doses but if that's ALL your instagram is, you are boring.

I have mixed emotions. My gay life would have been different and easier in some ways had I been gifted with a body that conformed or been able to conquer the body I had and maintain it. An uphill struggle in what was a losing battle all my life. So I envy them, yes, and I hate the idea I am less than. But now I'm old too, so if physique doesn't get you, sag and gravity will. I will say, observing from the fringes, I'm puzzled by the enduring vacuousness of it. Men in their thirties and forties carrying on (or clinging on) to the life of twenty year olds (and often the conversations.) What does it matter? You make your life in the place you occupy, I guess.

I’m an erotic photographer.

I have to say from my experience of trying to find talent, I think a lot of muscular men have a “chubby boy complex”.

Henry Cavill is the best example. He was a chubby kid, got muscular, and is a complete introvert who has refused to do sex scenes and take his shirt off.

I think with gays, it’s a little bit of beaten down by homophobia instead of just the chubby complex. And they flock like hens or make a mean girls table together to make a circle they didn’t have growing up.

But at the end of the day, their insecurities are really noticeable.

I mostly think that I am looking at a vacation photo and the men are happy. I have a very good eye so I don't see clones. This applies to straight, bi and gay.

I am sorry you have such torturous thoughts about strangers and yourself in relation to strangers, and bodies, and politics, and yada yada yada. Is your life difficult to live being so up in your head all the time? Sometimes a picture of shirtless guys is like a tray of attractive desserts, or a flower bed. Nothing to analyse like you are Sigmund Fucking Freud and Rosalind Krauss rolled into one overheated and underfucked mess.

You certainly sound relaxed about it, R4. I appreciate your dispassion.

R3 I think that's the basis of the subculture, too, along with gay men being men, which means they are always trolling for sex.

But the question was: How do you FEEL when you see these images? Do you have any visceral reaction, or do you just ruminate on the rationale?

On the other side of the coin, continuing to my post at R3.

It’s very easy for women to buy beauty to stand out. Whether it’s makeup or sexy clothes or plastic surgery.

Muscles are the best way for men to stand out. Sometimes porn stars and OnlyFans models show their transformations and they go from a 5 to a 9 once they added on muscles.

Son I feel like men shouldn’t be criticized for wanting to fit beauty standards because it’s way harder work to build muscle than it is to get your tits and ass done and pile on makeup.

I also appreciate R4's attitude; however, I do see standardization and near-cloneness in the photo.

Five of the six guys have remarkably similar builds with no body hair on their torsos, remarkably similar haircuts, remarkably similar stubble.

There is one outlier in the photo, and he is the one pushed to the back of the group.

You think a lot OP.

R4 seems very touchy.

R9 I always assumed everyone thinks constantly. I have read that some people have no interior dialogue at all and I cannot grasp that conceptually in any way. I don't know how anyone could function in life without thinking in dialogue terms.

They do not have the same faces though, and their musculature varies, as does their vibe. They vary in attractiveness considerably, and that can be said both on my "objective" and "subjective" filtering system. And finally I wouldn't say there is a facial 8-10 among them. So they are hardly A-list beauties. I see 3 sexy 7s, a charming 6 (beard), a 5 and a dorky 4. They look happy together, and not clones of each other. Big jaw might be an 8. Hard to say from just one pic. I like the look of the one with the necklace and the one with the beard the most.

These type of photos don't make me feel a particular way. I always imagine the least attractive, slightly pudgy one of the group is always forced to take the pic so he won't ruin the aesthetic. 😆

Big jaw doesn't even go to the gym. He looks like a tall natural jock, perhaps.

I’m not remotely attracted to guys who look like this and when I see photos like this I feel misanthropy

The guys in OP's photo look hetero.

The one with the inward slanting teeth and the tiny forehead is cute but hardly gym body perfect, nor is the dork.

R11 Let me try again, sorry.

You OVERthink a lot OP. And what do you know, you did it again!

I don't feel envious or self conscious. Because: 1: I just know that if I met those people it's very highly unlikely we'd have anything meaningful to talk about. 2: I'm not gym built or gorgeous but I think I look more than OK and I get decent male attention. That's enough.

OP you have what we in the medical field call "diarrhea of the keyboard."

Just remember you're only seeing a still photo. As soon as they speak, walk or move their hands, the illusion will be shattered.

Console yourself with this thought: they won't look like this 40 years from now.

The only guys who are actually hot here are the one in the cap and the guy at the bottom foreground. The rest of them are just average guys who are young, so they’re bodies are working with them; in a few years, their bodies will turn against them, and they’ll suffer the same fate as Leslie Jordan.

I have been around groups like that. I won't say part of as I have never had a good body. Solid but not gay "good". I have found that many gay men had crappy childhoods/adolescences. Picked on and not part of the in-crowd. So when they get the chance as adults to have a group and feel accepted and "cool" it is like a powerful drug. They'll do anything to stay in the group. From working out to clothes to trendy haircuts to party drugs. Finally fitting in feels good to them. I can't be around people like that though. It wears me down because I don't give a shit about any of that stuff. I was never ostracized and always had tons of friends my whole life. Never bullied. Never called names. Always invited. These days, I spend more energy trying to get out of social obligations. I'm lucky in some ways. I've never needed or wanted that kind of gay validation from peers. It looks excruciating.

I think it's more interesting - and more telling - that there is never an "unattractive" one in the group. They only "hang" with other objectively good-looking men. It's a club, and you can join only if you have the right face and body.

That's not accidental.

Everyone can decide for themselves what that says about the people in such pictures.

People forget that relationships are all about proximity. These guys go to the gym, so they meet other people at the gym and form friendships there.

I never met any friends at the gym. I'm there to workout and get out. But I am super picky about who I spend time with because my job has always taken so much of my time what is left over is too precious to squander on people I don't vibe with.

Someone says they were gifted with those bodies- well they've worked hard on getting those physiques, so more power to them.

Good for them. We need to bring back beauty. We need to bring back standards for what's admirable. Handsome, not overly tattooed, seemingly classy men. Love it.

[quote]Handsome, not overly tattooed, seemingly classy men.

LOL. Sky high, that one.

I looked like that in my 20’s except maybe not quite so cute. I haven’t for years. They should enjoy that short window.

I find it psychotic.

These gays have zero perception that every photo posted is just endless attention seeking narcissism! I mean, take a look and mix it up a little, Mary! To be blind to the impression one is giving is both hilarious and depressing to me.

No one is denying they work hard for those bodies. Seems a bit obsessive to some of us. But it's currency, and it's considered valuable in the gay world, so more power to them.

But after awhile, they all look alike. Same bodies. Same faces, Same hair. Same poses.

It obviously works for some people - certainly they themselves - but not everyone shares the opinion that they're the epitome of hot men and desirability.

OP: "In the late '90s, pride celebrations felt important and exciting and political"

I thought they felt like an open air bathhouse, which they were.

How old and fat are you Helen Kellers? To "see" they all have the same face and body?

It’s a nice picture of a group of fit guys. That’s what it is. Why should it make me angry or sad? It’s not hard to be fit, but it takes effort and devotion. It’s healthy and it looks good too!

R34 Not to me. I was treated really cruelly throughout middle and high school, and I graduated in 1996.

Within a couple of years, I went to DC Pride and it was much, much smaller than it is today.

There were some floats advertising bars with gogo boys or whatever, but not many.

What I remember is the festival part. There were all kinds of vendors of all sorts that were there to show support of gay people, including a few companies recruiting.

The entertainment was activist entertainment.

The crowd was a wildly mixed group of mostly gay people—not a lot of straight people or families at the time—and there definitely was no overwhelming 'hot naked gays' vibe as Pride events are all designed around now. Lots of men and women of all ages in jeans and flannel shirts, etc., not shirtless with leather harnesses framing their chests and cockring necklaces.

That's my memory of it, anyway.

The original post just asks how seeing photos like that makes people *feel.*

It doesn't imply that anyone *should* feel any particular way. It just asks if you have any kind of immediate emotional response.

It also doesn't ask for cultural analyses. It just asks how seeing pictures like that make you feel, if anything at all.

Are those comments meant to be clarifying? For whom? We're grown ups. The assigned task was clear, hunny.

Their physiques are inspiring and make me work harder in the gym.

Fat and flabby bodies are depressing.

I used to look like them. Now i don't. I don't care and it's the guys with the extra meat on them that attract me.

My initial reaction is boredom but only because I don't enjoy the smooth and shiny look. If they had a different kind of look I'd probably be interested.

I don't use social media and I'm a reclusive freak

They look like the kind of douchebags who would sneer at me in the gym and send sneaky snapchats of my flabby, pasty ass. In other words, they look like your typical high school bullies. Except, we're all adults and most of us have grown up and learnt to accept and appreciate others based on more than superficial attributes.

If it's just how we feel, I feel bored. I've seen hotter guys and more... I don't know... energetic looking guys. These just look like oatmeal on holiday.

If you were casting a hot guys on holiday movie, these guys would be background extras.

R44 Yes, I used to work with a gay guy like that. He went to Vida, the gym in DC mandatory for mean girls gays, and he did make fun of people who went there who he felt were below his standards. He made fun of an old woman in the office, he made fun of other gay men. I went to a party at another coworker's home, and he and another gay guy were sneering about a gay couple who they said was "mismatched" because one looked like a gym bro and the other was more average looking, and they were speculating about whether the one guy was a sugar daddy (The couple looked to be the same age as one another.) or what asset he must have been using to buy the other guy's company.

I really despise people like that and they are common among the gay community in DC.

It's all the damage from growing up gay. It can't be avoided, but some people never try to sort themselves out. Sad but real.

For realz R44?

To me they look like a bunch of bitchy queens in okay shape, the kind of instantly lose any shred of masculinity once they open their mouths and purses fly out.

When I was in my 20s and one of them would hit on me, I'd be sure to make some p-a comment like "it takes a while for your biceps to really show any definition" which would usually send them spiraling into a frenzy of self-doubt.

But trust me, they were the victims of the bullies you mention. Not their clones.

I have no feelings towards people like the guys in picture. Then again, I’m black so white people tend to blend into the background for me. But generally think that the people in the picture are harmless. They’re just trying to live their lives.

I find woke/liberal gay guys or men that identify as queer to be annoying. But the guys in the picture are harmless and tend to hang amongst themselves. So kudos to them.

I’m enjoying the childhood trauma by the weak willed that is on display in this thread

Some people get triggered just by seeing groups of hot bros

[quote]and I hate the idea I am less than.

But you're not. Not by a long shot.

Not in my opinion.

[quote]it's the guys with the extra meat on them that attract me.

Heyyyy.

NGL, I do feel a little envious, but I think that has more to do with their youth than their bodies necessarily.

I'm not envious of their bodies b/c I look hot shirtless. I am envious of having a tight knit gay circle of friends who seem like minded. I've never had that.

I have a few friends that look like that (I'm not one of them) who travel in circles like that, attend weekend circuit parties, etc. They're all pretty decent people, but definitely have a lot of body issues tied in with major insecurities. They work hard for what they've got, and they seem to be always having a hell of a time.

They will not admit to having a lousy time.

They may not be bright enough to understand they're having a lousy time.

The extra delusion of fat unfuckable eldergays pronouncing that young fit fuckable gay guys, fucking on holiday, are too stupid to realise there's nothing fun about it.

Maybe we just like body hair and individuality?

R60 has got to be the sentence of a stop young fit fuckable gay guy?

Help me out here.

I used to be like them in my 20s and early 30s. Now I have two kids to raise , I don’t really have time to workout hours everyday . When you grow older, the focus of life changes.

Honest question r63: with global warming and the incipient collapse of human civilization, how do you have kids when they’re just going to be killed and eaten by other humans when the food system breaks down? Where you straight before?

I see a group of young men in the prime of their life smiling.

How very dare you, R65!

How very dare they not open their group to a bunch of obese BIPOCs, until those new members turned every conversation into one about race, then weeded them out one-by-one with public cancellation for saying something “slightly off” when they were drunk. How very dare they, that wouldn’t be fun for them? Guess they’re racist!

“I hate all gay white cis men! They’re disgusting racists. Can’t stand them!”

Internal dialogue: “Damn! I want all that white dick! Yum, Yum, Yum! Give it to me know! Hand over that white cum!”

Cause we all know the one thing that a trans and/or POC person screaming about cliquey whites won’t do is… fuck another trans and/or POC person. Funny how that always works.

4 of 6 have a wonky eye

I just wonder what each of their net worths and annual incomes are. How much are in their retirement accounts, taxable brokerage accounts? Do they rent or own? Do they own rental properties? What insurance policies do they have? When is their planned retirement age? Etc...

Oh brother, R70. I hope you're not serious.

100% serious. It was among my first reactions upon seeing OP's pic, almost reflexively.

They’re living their best, authentic lives!

OP I just assume all of them are femme and it makes me feel better.

When they’re all out together and they encounter a hot top, how do they decide who gets the first load? Do they draw straws or something?

They hiss and tear each other to shreds fighting for the hot top. Once dick is involved, all bets are off and friendships are tossed out the window.

Sizzle

♬Send in the clones…♬

Mean Girls.

To be honest, I’m not jealous of them at all. However, it does increase my self loathing as I feel like this the pinnacle and what I have to look forward. I’m the black guy from R50.

As a black guy, I could have been a church goer and married with kids. But alas all I do is stare at white guy men with disgust and self loathing. No, I don’t want white cock.

I just think is this all there is and weep.

Still don’t hate and envy the white gay clique. Just sad that it’s my view.

I hope they're tearing up each others' mussies.

Make hay while the sun shines, gurls!

Am I jealous of the nearly nude hot ones? Yes. But they're tiresome and, let's face it, the hottest guys are the ones who look built and sexy dressed (preferably wearing glasses). The guys who constantly post shirtless gym pics are boring.

R80, I hear what you saying, but why are you focused on measuring yourself to others? Is it that you too want to be one of the hot gym bros, or want to attract them? Why not just be happy being the best version of who you are and appreciate people who value you? Maybe I was just raised with a strong sense of self, but I don’t get why people get upset others are considered hot or successful

Yes, that dwarf at R77 is most definitely NOT overcompensating for at least 2 or 3 deficiencies! 🙄

In answer to OP's question, probably turned on, maybe a little envious on ocassion, nothing much beyond that. The guy on the right is cute. I admire that they seem to have some commitment to looking after their health, thats a good thing not just for them but wider society. Its unlikely they have got those physiques without some considerable work, I respect that

Honestly I dont get bothered by what other people do or how they live their lives as long as they arent raging cunts to other people.

Bump

People need to realise how much work and fasting (and steroids) it takes to look like a fitness influencer. A guy with defined muscles and a six pack is not just working out, he’s hungry most of the time and probably juicing.

So when I see a pack of guys that look like that … honestly good for them, but holy shit, that is a lot of time and effort that could be going into something else.

Love them. I love seeing people who take care of themselves and have pride in their appearance.

A 'fitness influencer' is a tangent from the average gaggle of shirtless gay guys shown in the OP photo, but we may as well discuss them...

Most of the steroidal hardbodied male 'influencers' now also are sex workers who make most of their money fucking or jerking off for subscription money.

That's their right. If anyone wants to pay to sponsor someone just for looking how they look when there's a world of free porn out there, well, lucky guys.

My worry is what will happen to the ones who become rich and then age out of being a professional broadcast slut.

One example is this Jake Andrich guy. Nice to look at. Supposedly, he has amassed $5 million already in his early 20s for stripping down and ejaculating—his right, and guys choose to transfer their wealth to him.

My concern is that I came across him on TikTok doing a livestream and he seems as smart as a chicken, he's clearly not well educated, he's a product of Interner La-La Land, so who knows if he can discern QAnon from reality, and he just continues to amass money. And he has opinions.

So let's say he 'retires' against his will in 10 years, his early 30s, and he has earned $10m or $50m by waving his dick around. He will need to do something to fill his time. He will be known to many. Where might that lead? Politics? Podcast/talk radio extremist, Joe Rogan style? It's definitely going to be a lazy narcissistic type of work that keeps his ego fed in the public eye, and without an education and with such a grandiose idea of who he is thanks to people making him a one percenter because of his dick and body, and thanks to his insane assets, he could do some real damage.

I do worry 'influencers' who've become rich are going to make some real messes when they can no longer rake in cash for jacking off or fucking online. They're likely to be empty-shell egos full of resentment toward the world for rejecting them, empowered with millions of dollars.

Oh what ever will he do with his free time and millions? 🤷🏽‍♂️

I think it speaks to the malignant narcissism, vapidity, and racism infecting young gays.

People like hot people

Qual è il problema?

I've known so many such guys. Those who engage with these narcissitic group ego-stroking groups are always puddle-deep, and deeply bourgeois. They also choose men just like them: who all look similar and think similar. So they cut themselves out of a lot of fabulous people, including alternative lifestyle gay men, deeper thinkers. They're often at the top of their careers and raking in the dough, with fabulous houses, but they also live in very competitive peer groups, and are constantly comparing themselves. Anyone who slips due to mental issues or career failure is often dropped from the social circle. One such gay couple I know – they have multi-million dollars homes in two countries, are planning a big international wedding this summer, and friends of mine have been laughing themselves sick at the grandiose planning details, including, who is and who isn't invited; and who is, and who hasn't had their airtickets and accommodation paid for by them. The grand Instagramable banality of it all is beyond beyond.

I was jacked in the 80s when I was in my twenties. Not a star, but I played the big 3 (bb, fb and bball) it made me stand out and I got more attention than I deserved.

When I see groups like this I just wonder if they throw like a nancy boy.

OP- You forgot to post a photo of that VAPID QWEEN

Matthew Dempsey

One other thing: there's layers and layers of these 'A Gay' guys. You have the gym-bunny, Instawhore at the bottom of the rung. Then the CEO-CFO corporate crew. You then have the techie-millionaires. (e.g. I used to go with a smoking hot blond German who was one of the top coders in the world, and thought nothing of doing stuff like jetting off to Victorian Falls in Africa for the weekend.) Then there's the international decorator-landscaper-art & antiquey crowd. Then the old and recent money, and obscure money set. And you have the merchant banker-legal-hedgie funder set who are generally as a group the richest of them all. There's also a sprinkling of super rich arabs, asians and indians, but they're mostly fucked up by their families. The staple-gun queens (if one wants to be bitchy) are generally the most widely educated (self or otherwise) and least boring. But it can be very dodgy, with absolute ego monsters everywhere.

There are only 1.5 attractive men in the photo, hardly worth obsessing over

Just to reminder, these 'gay groups' although usually are gay, some of them have orgies with FTM trannies, it's like a dirty secret because they never post about these trannies at all, but the trannie post about it.

I never get why so many care so much. Sure, these guys have youth and great bodies. Other gays have brains, wisdom, etc. (Yes, sometimes there is a crossover, but not usually if we are talking about the types that choose to roam in packs and are obsessed with Insta. I'm not suggesting that one can't be the total package.) They do their thing. I do mine. It's a big world.

Just an example.

This 'gay' couple '@Greatcanadians' (They even have a thread here), are banging this ftm trannie, but they never post about it.

So?

R89, you’ve really put a lot of thought into this, haven’t you?

I don't follow or pay attention to anyone involved in a group like this. But it's definitely off-putting. I can appreciate and even celebrate artifice. But not when artifice is all there is.

These friend groups will not last for long. I could write an essay as to why.

R99 how do you know this? Where are you getting this information?

I’ve struggled with bulimia so I block this shit

R106 Just looking in FTM porn whores instagram.

You have no idea how much of these 'gay' groups fuck pussy off screen, the more they are linked to pornstars, more likely they are fucking trannies.

Goals

Cocaine is a hell of a drug, R99.

R80

Black gay guy, this was sad to read. Not quite sure why you feel "this is all there is" when you look at a group of white shirtless gay guys who blend into the background for you, as you said.

Can you explain?