Understanding Gay Negativity

Negativity is often a tendency to be pessimistic or skeptical about things. It can show up in thoughts, attitudes, and feelings in a way that focuses on the worst aspect of a situation, like wearing a pair of super dim, dark glasses that never let you see anything that’s bright or positive.

A negative mindset can influence wellbeing, relationships, and your overall outlook on life. It can also be persistent, pervasive, and hard to shake. So how does it come to wield so much power?

Negativity Bias

First (unfortunately), everyone as human being is already naturally inclined toward negativity. It’s called negativity bias.

I used to sometimes wonder what was wrong with me because I always seemed to dwell on the negative.

For example, if someone criticized me about something I would ruminate on it for days. Or, if there was one little thing in my performance review that I needed to work on, I would beat myself up over it and turn a really positive review into something negative.

Everyone is actually wired to pay more attention to the bad more than the good as a self-protective measure! It’s like an early warning system or a highly defined filter whose sole purpose is to protect us from bad or dangerous things.

Personal Experiences

Loss, failure, rejection, or trauma are some ways a negative outlook can find its way into a person’s life. Family dynamics, especially ones where parents, caregivers, or siblings continually demonstrated negative attitudes are easily learned and adapted when you’re growing up, continuing on into adulthood.

Unsupportive workplaces, especially ones prone to inequity, discrimination, or bullying, can lead to increased negativity.

Likewise, difficulties finding friends or relationships can, overtime, create feelings of bitterness and pessimism. Exposure to negative-leaning or toxic people in the gay community, whether friends or acquaintances, can affect your own attitudes after a while.

Cultural and Societal Influences

A constant stream of negative news and reports can wear you down as it is, but coupled with ongoing criticism and commentary about the LGBTQ community can be especially taxing.

Feeling stigmatized or singled out by governments, religious institutions, and societal or cultural groups can sadly seep in and shape a host of negative beliefs and attitudes, whether you want it to or not.

Life Situations

Things happen that are sometimes just out of your control. Layoffs, illness, aging, breakups, loss of loved ones.

Changes and transitions are hard. Sometimes they’re spaced out enough to enable you to cope. Other times they come right after the other with no end in sight. The latter can be particularly difficult, leading negativity become a twisted form of dealing with the heartache.

Effects of Gay Negativity

Negativity can affect your life a number of ways, creating issues that make it hard to love yourself, foster connections, or enjoy a fulfilling life.

Internalized Homophobia

Sometimes negativity is rooted in a type of self-hatred known as internalized homophobia.

Laws, culture, and religion lead many gay men to feel conflicted about their sexual orientation. In reaction, internalized negative attitudes and beliefs develop, causing men to turn against ourselves in an attempt to hide what feels shameful, pushing gay feelings down and out of sight.

B.R. Simon Rosser, PhD, MPH, of the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, shares how these types of inner conflicts ultimately affect the mental and sexual health of gay men:

Internalized homophobia can lead to low self-esteem, feelings of inferiority, and negative perceptions of what being gay means and what the future holds.

How Negativity Plays Out

When you consider all that gets thrown our way as gay men, in terms of systems and beliefs — purposefully designed to tell us we are wrong, need to be “repaired” and are undeserving of basic rights — then add a whole host of inner turmoil, anger and self-hatred because of it, and layer on top of that a natural tendency toward dwelling on the negative?

It’s not so hard to understand why so many gay men walk around with a chip on their shoulder!

Negativity in Gay Dating

Let’s use gay dating as an example.

When you’re fresh off the bus and brand new to the scene like I was many years ago, you don’t have loads of negative gay experiences in your “reference library” to pull up.

You’ll walk into everything with wide-eyed wonder.

You’re confident, assured, and good-looking (in your estimation). Piece of cake.

You approach a guy confidently online, on an app, at the bar, or wherever.

Then let’s say the other guy totally blows you off. Doesn’t give you the time of day whatsoever. Ouch.

Say he had this story going on in his head:

“I don’t trust any guy who’s nice to me. Gay men are pigs and this one wants something from me, I know it. Besides, I’m ugly. What’s wrong with him? He must be desperate. Walking away from this one.”

He leans into negativity to protect himself from getting hurt.

And here’s what you’re thinking:

You dated women for a long time because your family told you being gay was wrong. You come out and now you’re legit looking to find love and happiness as a gay man.

But no matter who you approach the experience is the same.

They ghost, play games, sneer, ignore, are no-shows.

Maybe your family was right. Gay guys suck. You hate being gay.

Over time you build up your own library of negative gay experiences.

You find yourself zeroing in on little things, strikes against the other guy (or even strikes against yourself) to keep yourself from getting hurt.

Pretty soon you become cynical, hardened and bitter. Negativity becomes part of your identity. You don’t like life and you don’t like yourself.

You either become mean and bitchy or you retreat from the community altogether because it’s obvious that “they” are the “problem.”

Dealing with Your Gay Negativity Bias

That gay dating example was of course super simplified. It takes years and all kinds of experiences to get you to the point where you’re jaded, bitter and copping a bad attitude whenever anyone is simply being nice or complimentary toward you.

While there is no quick fix to handling negativity, there are ways to manage it so it doesn’t pull you under in its torrent.

It’s good to work through it in the moment rather than nurse it over a lifetime. Bitter, whiney and negative gay men are hard to be around. They also glom together, and in groups the effect is even worse.

Here are a couple thoughts to get you started…

Develop a Habit of Mindfulness

There are so many people walking around totally oblivious to themselves and their surroundings.

They’re out of touch and unaware of how they’re feeling, especially the cause and effect of things that happen to them.

Think about how often you go through your day on autopilot, rarely noticing what’s going on around you.

Make it a practice to check in with yourself on the regular. So many of our negative reactions to things are lightning fast and purely reflexive.

Set an alarm on your phone that reminds you to ask how you’re feeling. You might realize that you’re sad, numb, lonely, or angry when you otherwise would have gone the entire day not noticing.

You can also use mindfulness to ground yourself in the present vs. living out a past trauma or a future fear.

Over time you’ll get better at turning off the autopilot so you can pay more attention to the how and why of your negative reactions.

Reframe Negative Events & Scenarios

It’s easy to get swept away by our feelings. Negative emotions stimulate an area of the brain called the amygdala, which in turn plays a hand in how we respond to our emotions.

Reframing is such a powerful way to get a handle on the incoming stimuli we would be tempted to think negatively about.

Let’s go back to the dating example. Instead of personalizing the situation (“I’m ugly, why would that guy approach me?” or “Why does every guy play games with me?”), look at it from a different angle or have a set phrase you tell yourself.

I once heard a speaker talk about how he dealt with jerks when he was in sales. He never took it personally. He’d always just say, “Isn’t that interesting?”

For the longest time I pretended I was performing social experiments to study human nature. Every situation, bad or good, became part of my research.

My therapist talks about imagining life as a weather system. One day it’s bright, sunny and warm. The next, the wind changes direction and it gets colder. Later it starts to rain.

It’s weather. It just is.

Reframing is an effective way to diffuse a runaway train of negative emotions.

Like I mentioned, it’s way better to get a handle on negativity early and often, rather than let it stockpile into toxic, unhappy mess of an attitude.

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Disclaimer: The information and perspectives shared in my posts, articles, and videos are based on my personal experiences and reflections. I am not a licensed therapist, counselor, or medical professional, and this content should not be considered a substitute for professional advice. If you are experiencing distress, depression, or mental health challenges, please reach out to a qualified professional who can provide the help you need. For immediate support, contact a mental health provider or, if you are in crisis, please call the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 (available in the U.S.) or your local emergency number.