BENJAMIN RILEY
Increasingly, I find excuses not to go to the plethora of indie queer nights sprouting throughout the northern suburbs. Each one seems to be run by a friend of a friend of a fuck buddy who once put their MP3 player on shuffle at a party and had their best friend say the lounge room was totally pumping for about half an hour there. I seem to have a good time when I actually go along, but more often than not the prospect of lying in bed with a plate of soysages and a season of New Girl keeps me from leaving the house.
Still, I try to make it to Melbourne鈥檚 Midsumma Carnival every year. Aside from the chance to pick up more free condoms and lube than I鈥檒l ever use, the open-air, family friendly event is an opportunity to be reminded that, at least sometimes, you can be whoever you want in queer community.
I felt the same way this year, at least until I saw the Manhunt stall. One of many commercial enterprises with a presence at Carnival, the online hookup site made its presence felt with a huge banner, dominated by the image of a tanned, chiselled torso with just enough body hair to confirm the viewer鈥檚 suspicion: he鈥檚 a man鈥檚 man.
Manhunt were far from the only company to advertise themselves with such an unattainable vision of hyper-masculine sexuality 鈥� underwear brands peddled sex just as brazenly, and a wall of DNA magazine covers promised a ripped, naked white guy for every month of the year.
Both Manhunt and DNA are sponsors of the festival. While Midsumma should be congratulated for a diverse, un-airbrushed marketing campaign, I find it hard to reconcile any sense of diversity and community with a constant bombardment by these messages, telling us to all be the same.
This is nothing new. Commercial interests in the gay community have been borrowing the 鈥渟ex sells鈥� tactics of hetero-targeted marketing for a long time now. But we should be better than that. If we want a safe, accepting community, we can鈥檛 keep selling such a damaging ideal of beauty.
The Star Observer is one of Midsumma鈥檚 media partners.
