‘Totally straight’: Contested sexual identities on social media site reddit

Abstract

This article is centred on a case study of the ‘Totally Straight’ (r/TotallyStraight) ‘sub-reddit’ on social media site reddit. r/TotallyStraight serves as a web forum for sharing gay pornography amongst men who identity as straight. I draw on a small-scale study of the r/TotallyStraight subreddit, conducted over a period of three months. Analysis reveals that while r/TotallyStraight is largely used as a forum for sharing porn depicting men, it also serves as a space for affirmation and sharing personal narratives related to contested ‘mostly straight’ sexual identities. The moderators of the subreddit, and the users themselves, foster a supportive, non-judgemental discourse. It is argued that this phenomenon could be representative of broader cultural shifts towards less rigidly defined sexual identities.