Guy gay
Rise of the sides: how Grindr finally recognized queer men who aren’t tops or bottoms
Every month, nearly 11 million gay men around the world proceed on the Grindr app to look for sex with other men. Once there, they can scroll through an endless stream of guys, from handsome to homely, bear to twink. Yet when it comes to choosing positions for sex – a crucial criterion for most gay men – the possibilities have long been simply top and bottom. The only other decision available toggles between those roles: verse (for versatile).
“Not fitting those roles has made it really tough to find someone,” said Jeremiah Hein, 38, of Long Beach, California. “There’s no category to select from.”
“Whenever I’d look at those choices I’d consider, ‘I’m none of those things,’” said Shai Davidi, 51, of Tel Aviv, Israel. “I felt there must be something false with me.”
Last month, however, that finally changed. In mid-May, Grindr added a position called side, a designation that upends the binary that has historically dominated gay male identity. Sides are men who find fulfillment in every kind of sexual do except anal penetration. Instead, a broad range of oral, manual and frictional body techniques provide
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