SASL HUH?

SASL stands for Straight Acting / Straight Looking. This 4-letter description is found lurking around most gay dating and community websites.
Published on: 25 July 2008

For those who don’t have their Internet Acronym Dictionary handy SASL stands for Straight Acting / Straight Looking. This 4-letter description is found lurking around most gay dating and community websites. But what is the psychology behind specifying that you are or are looking for a SASL person?

First off, I have discovered that this is an almost exclusively gay term and not used by lesbians or seemingly any admixture of sexuality in between. This gives us a key into what creates the need for this category – a pressure on guys to appear manly (something which I’m sure many lesbians would commiserate with in being pressurised to be more feminine). Does the need to fit in create some sort of inner homophobia?

I’d like to examine this animal tail first with the term “straight looking”. In our modern world with metro sexual males dressed to their eyeballs in brands and perfectly manicured, what is defined as “straight”? Should it be scruffy or mismatching or not too tight? This categorisation becomes hazy by the recent occurrence of the “emo look”(think punk with emotion) which has elements of an always childlike Peter Pan crossed with Japanese Animé though my imagery may be influenced by emo’s liberal use of Rock Star make-up. It is not regarded as a masculine trend, though undoubtedly worn by many masculine people. Or is it?

When the shirt comes off, surely modern media would have us believe that only cover models for Mens Health are worthy of a SASL sash? To complicate matters further our images of masculine or non-masculine are culturally influenced and set by various icons of the time and place we live in. The late Quentin Crisp who inevitably was always sporting an elaborate cravat, though stylish would certainly not be tarnished by a SASL brand. A youthful example of an icon who challenges the existence of the SASL category is Pete Wentz (bassist for the group Fall Out Boy and recently married to Ashlee Simpson). While sporting masculine tattooes his style is what I term “gothic emo”. Wentz certainly calls his “straight acting-ness” into question with his repeated publicity claims around occasions where he has kissed boys.

“Straight acting” seems most notably categorised by two traits – hand gestures and manner of speech. Does this mean that anyone with good diction is regarded as being gay? I infer from the term “straight acting” that this refers to a gay guy who shows little or no signs of being gay in public. This seems a rather conservative viewpoint where all things sexual or affectionate should remain hidden. Throughout history such repressive views have further complicated issues around people grappling with the psychology of sexuality. Surely a more liberal social stance should allow people to grow more easily into themselves?

We all have preference on what image we like to portray to the world and on which images most attract us and so we should. However, as with any generalisation, one person’s SASL is not another’s. Therefore, should we categorise so broadly or perhaps rather use our talents in communication to better describe what it is we prefer.