I bet you it's because people in general are hella stupid. Like a girl could probably tell some hick that was dropped on it's head as a child that she is gay and the hick would probably respond "You means yous only goes out with gay fruity guys? Well I'll be damned!". This way if she says lesbian it would make more sense to the more simple minded.

Disclaimer: Not saying all hicks are stupid. That's just the example I used here.

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Is that all it is? Not quite sure I buy that. If so there should be the Male and Female Democratic Committee. Female and Male Cancer Society. Bastard and Bitch Humane Society.

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When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser. Socrates

I once had a Jamaican friend who insisted that lesbians just needed a case of the right manhood (his). He also felt there was religious damnation due for gay men.
Then I learned that only men were called gay because they seem happier then the lesbians who would always be angry at straight men (him).
He also insisted that there were no such thing as gay Jamaican (men).

Redneck stereotypes?
Jamaican stereotypes?
Male stereotypes?

No, just Stupid stereotypes!


He is not my friend anymore.

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You seem to be picking me up wrong. The point I'm trying to make is that I don't agree with labelling everything. In fact, I actually agree with your original post, I'm just saying that all the labels seem rather useless. After all, when you say that a woman is a lesbian you know she's gay and vice versa. I think also it may just be convention. I think the term "lesbian" is actually quite a modern phrase and "gay" has been used for a lot longer to describe a homosexual male, so when a woman is described as gay, it somehow doesn't seem right to most people, hence the "need" for a different term for the gay woman.

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It would be much simpler wouldn't it.......I vote for all to be Bi (with a preference)

"Straight gays"...?

I think you just invented a whole new genre of porn....

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To me this distinction is from older times.
Its just like using her or she for a female and He for a male.
just a gender distinction and not discriminative in any sence.
Well, that how I understand.

I thought it was, "it's not gay if it's in a threeway. With a girl in the middle there's some leeway."

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I also don't mean to sound like a smart ass but doesn't queer mean gay/lesbian as well? It seems like an acronym of synonyms almost

I think that as to why men are gay and women are lesbian's we should look at the origin of the words.

Gay, to be gay, used to mean joyful, happy, carefree, and showy. He/She danced Gayly. You look gay today. etc etc. I think it was the late 17th century... maybe 18th, that it started taking on sexual connotations and started to also mean "uninhibited by morals". So for example a "Gay Woman" was a hooker.

Then I believe it was during WW1, or just after that Cary Grant used it in a movie. Something about him dressing up as a woman, and someone asking him about it. He said it was because "he became gay".

As for Lesbian, that goes back to the Greece, and their hedonism. :P the Isle of Lesbos was the home to Sappho. She was a poet, and women were left in her care for teachings and whatnot. She was known to proclaim her love of women. The term Lesbian was used in the 1800's to describe any aspect of of Lesbos. It was also used in medicinal journals to describe "erotic relationships between women".