Captain America Looks Like a Twink

On the misogyny of homophobia

Marvel Comics is introducing a new Captain America to its universe of superheroes. Starting this Pride Month, the fictional Aaron Fischer will join a cadre of other heroes who assume the Captain America identity to fight for justice and stand up for the oppressed.

Marvel writer Joshua Trujillo says he based Fischer on real-life “heroes of the queer community: activists, leaders and everyday folks pushing for a better life.” Marvel says Fischer is a gay teen who stands up for youth rejected by family and struggling with homelessness. In publicity images, he looks like he’s struggling. He’s gritty, not very well dressed, and reminds me of the real homeless youth who represent a hidden crisis on America’s streets.

Conservative critics are already lashing out, many with overt homophobia. On Wednesday, Dave Landau hosted popular YouTuber Steven Crowder’s controversial Louder with Crowder podcast. Landau, a nationally renowned comedian featured on Comedy Central and network television, attacked Marvel’s move.

First, and bizarrely out of context, he attacked trans icon Elliot Page, continuously misgendering him in a sneering tone and saying his “breasts will be auctioned off on eBay.” Perhaps he figured a little trans bashing would warm his audience up?

Then he went after Fischer, asserting the Marvel character will eventually contract AIDS, mocking him by observing that he “looks like a twink.”

On Twinks, homophobia, and misogyny

What is a twink? It’s in-group slang used by gay men for a certain “type” of guy, often in terms of sexual compatibility. If you aren’t queer, you should probably be careful using it to describe somebody. It’s one of those words that can skate a line of offensiveness.

Why? That’s where things get interesting!

Before I get into definitions, let me say I used to be a twink. Well into my 20s, people often assumed I was a teenager. I was slim with wispy blond hair and couldn’t grow a real beard until I was almost 30. Puberty hadn’t elongated my face as much as in some men. I looked boyish, which read effeminate to many people.

Despite lifting weights several times a week at the McBurney YMCA of Village People fame, I sometimes felt ashamed to be seen shirtless. I had neither chest hair nor popping pecs, which I internalized as a lack of masculinity.

Since gay men idealize masculinity at least in stereotype, I thought something was wrong with me. All my life I’d struggled with my worth as a man, going so far as to join the Marine Corps Reserves to pay for college — just to prove something to myself.

Twinks aren’t quite men

The usage and definition of twink is evolving rapidly, and you can see that in various definitions from Urban Dictionary, Wikipedia, and Dictionary.com. Essentially, though, it refers to a young white man with a slim figure who looks boyish and isn’t very traditionally masculine.

While some gay men are trying to rehabilitate the word by removing gender stereotypes, a certain “flair of the feminine” remains in the word’s popular usage.

If you’d like a visual, crowd-sourced definition, go to Porn Hub and search on “gay twink.” The most popular films on the list will feature guys who appear more or less androgynous, besides being young and white. Femininity is inextricably wrapped up in how “twink” is actually used.

And that’s OK.

As much as I used to struggle against my perception of myself as less than masculine, I’ve since come to understand that gender stereotypes are toxic, and that valuing the masculine over the feminine by default is a form of misogyny.

Let’s face it, Twink is a sexual term. We gay and bisexual men use it primarily to talk about who we want to have sex with, or at least who we want to watch in a porn vid. Some of us are into slim and smooth, others into the more muscular and hairy “bear” or “daddy” look. For some, androgyny is a turn on, for others, hypermasculinity.

Attraction is unconscious.

None of those types have anything to say about the worth of the people they describe or the worth of the people who experience the attraction. But sometimes we gay and bisexual men cross lines when we judge people by how they look.

Twink isn’t just a type. It can be used as a slur.

Sometimes twink gets thrown out as an insult, especially by guys who are into men with a more masculine presentation. What gay man hasn’t watched a buddy roll his eyes and say something like, “Her? Please, she’s such a ditzy twink. I want a real man.”

That negative judgement extends a lot further than just acknowledging a lack of attraction. It’s more than a simple, “He’s not my type.” Words like that contain an inherent rejection of the feminine that crosses a line into misogyny, into suggesting that feminine characteristics are inherently bad. They seem to whisper, “I don’t like that guy because he looks or acts like a girl.”

That attitude is almost understandable among some gay men. How many of us have grown up surrounded by hostility because our peers judged our own masculinity lacking? How many of us were teased or bullied for not performing masculinity well enough?

I was.

Rejection of feminine characteristics in other gay or bi men can be a form of self defense, though clearly a toxic one. Men who value femininity as highly and as equally as they value masculinity would be incapable of using a feminine characteristic as an insult. Just something to think about.

Conservative slurs are unabashedly rooted in misogyny

Social conservatives typically insult gay and bisexual men by comparing us to women. They aren’t shy about it, not any more than they’re shy about their sexism.

Maybe Landau’s transphobic cracks about Elliot Page weren’t so bizarrely out of context after all. Maybe his transphobia is part of an entire package of gender policing.

Oh, and Aaron Fisher?

He sure doesn’t look like a twink to me. He looks like a street-toughened bad ass who doesn’t put up with misogyny or gender shaming. I guess that makes conservatives like Landau and Crowder really nervous. He overturns their paradigms.

You know what I say to them? There’s a new world coming! A healthy world where men aren’t better than women, where gay boys don’t get bullied for being twinks, and where grown men don’t mock trans people.

Get ready, guys. There’s a new Captain American in town, and he’s coming for you!

James Finn is a former Air Force intelligence analyst, long-time LGBTQ activist, an alumnus of Queer Nation and Act Up NY, an essayist occasionally published in queer news outlets, and an “agented” novelist. Send questions, comments, and story ideas to [email protected].