Authors question if a love of d*** makes someone transphobic

What’s the difference between “queer” and “gay”? What can people do to be better allies? And does a love of d*ck make someone transphobic?

These are just some of the questions that authors Stu Oakley and Lotte Jeffs address in their latest book, Do Ask, Do Tell: Queer Life, Love and Culture Laid Bare.

Playing on the name given to the US military’s former policy that required personnel to deny their sexuality, the book is less bothered with concealment and more focused on revealing information, in the hope of creating a better, more-informed LGBTQ+ community.

The book is packed with insights into almost every facet of the LGBTQ+ community, acting as a guide to queer people and allies.

In an extract, shared with PinkNews, Stu explores whether being a gay man, and in love with d*ck, makes someone transphobic…

I’ve already mentioned Eddy in this chapter, and you will get to meet him properly later in the book, but when Lotte and I first had a coffee with him in Soho, I was immediately smitten. The guy was hot, and let me tell you I’ve been flinging fire emojis at his Insta ever since. He has gorgeous blue eyes, a chiselled physique and a damn good set of thighs.

Eddy is a sex worker and proud owner of no-holds-barred X and OnlyFans accounts, so I couldn’t help but have a little browse. I found myself faced with questions that I hadn’t been anticipating, as [his] videos and images feature him playing with his vagina and enjoying penetration.

You see, and I’m just going to say it, I love d*ck. I love them. Love the shape, the feel, the look and, well, they turn me on. It’s a large (fnarr, fnarr) part of my sexual attraction to someone. Therefore, if I was in a relationship with a trans man [who] didn’t have a dick, would I be able to be sexual with them? Or do my sexual desires lead me down a path of exclusion?

These questions got me thinking about how our sexualities and personal desires can be weaponised against our community from within, to further create a divide between us and our trans siblings. I don’t think my love of d*ck makes me transphobic. Or does it?

One of the reasons we have these different labels of sexuality [is to enable] us to align with the one that most represents our desire (or lack of). I’m confused and worried about what my feelings may mean to a part of the community I care deeply about.

I decide to confide my worries with my friend Freddy McConnell, a journalist and trans man. “Stu, [he says], firstly we’re talking about it as if this is a real problem. It’s not. It’s been constructed by groups like the LGB Alliance (a trans-exclusionary group), to make people afraid of trans people. The idea that preference is transphobic is in itself a weapon used against trans people to paint us as unreasonable and coercive.

“We are not out here saying ‘you must want to sleep with us’, and, honestly, we don’t want to sleep with people who are going to make judgments about us before they’ve even met us. You are now thinking, ‘I only like d*ck, so does that make me transphobic?’ No, it doesn’t. And the fact that you are worrying about whether it makes you transphobic, means that, on some level, far-right groups have succeeded in making cis people fearful.

“In terms of preference, it’s OK to feel that way about d*ck, but if you then jump to: that means I’ll never explore sexual relations with a trans person, that’s when you slip into transphobia because you’re writing off an entire group on the basis of a very reductive and often inaccurate assumption. That’s when it becomes akin to any other kind of broad preference, in that there is a high probability it is actually informed by prejudice and unconscious bias. Even though it might very much feel like a preference, it is actually rooted in the prejudices that pervade our society.”

I put these points to my new crush Eddy. “For me,” he [says], “it often comes down to an ingrained association of men with penises. That association is hard to break. When someone says they’re into men, most people picture a penis. That’s just not the association I have, [or] the association my boyfriend has, and not the association many trans people and allies have. I believe that most people’s sexualities are not based on genitals. As a sex worker whose clients are 99 per cent cis gay men, I know this first-hand. Their attraction to me, and sexual desire for me, and enjoyment of my pussy, makes them no less gay.

“Of course, some people’s desire is dependent on genitals, and I realise this is where your head is at, and when that’s the case I do not believe it to be transphobic, as long as it’s conveyed respectfully and not from a place of prejudice. However, sometimes the association is so strong – many people assume they’re into d*cks, but really they’re just into men – and they never considered that the d*ck might not be as important as they realised, and that a pussy can bring fun and pleasure in new ways. Desires also don’t have to be one or the other: you can love d*ck and love pussy, you can love d*ck, and still have an amazing and fulfilling sexual experience with someone who doesn’t have one.”

I ask Eddy if that is not the difference between being gay and being pansexual? “For me, my vagina is not feminine,” he [replies]. “Someone is pansexual if they are attracted to the person rather than their body, so the gender and sex are irrelevant. If a gay man finds me hot, he is still gay. It doesn’t make him pansexual. I’m a man – a complete man – and my vagina doesn’t change that. It’s problematic to make this jump, as it implies that trans men are not men.”

Chatting to the guys makes me feel better about the feelings I’d been having. But this isn’t about me slapping myself on the back for not being a massive transphobe. I very much recognise, or at least hope I recognise, the difference between preference and prejudice, and what a fine line there is in between. It’s important for us to accept that all of us have deeply personal sexual feelings, that range from simple to complex, and that weave between our gender binaries, non-binaries and sexualities. It’s one of the reasons we have such a wonderful array of sexualities, that Lotte details in our opening chapter. We can’t dismiss how we feel but I think all of us can benefit from sitting back and questioning how those feelings could be built on foundations of bias, rather than our true attraction.

 Do Ask, Do Tell: Queer Life, Love and Culture Laid Bare is out now.

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