Challenging Perceptions of “Straight”: Heterosexual Men Who Have Sex with Men and the Cultural Politics of Sexual Identity Categories

Research shows that some heterosexually identified men engage in sex with men; however, they remain largely hidden and little understood. Despite long-standing scholarly recognition that sexual identity and orientation do not always neatly coincide, the culturally normative heterosexual/homosexual binary tends to shape mainstream perceptions of such men as well as render them invisible in sexual health systems reliant on stable sexual identity categories. This invisibility, in turn, perpetuates the fiction of the binary. We explore perspectives on heterosexually identified men who have sex with men, drawing on recent research literature and on qualitative interviews with “key informants” in the Australian sexual health field who have frontline knowledge of these men. We consider the limitations of inventing a label to “encapsulate” these diverse men but also the significance of finding a language that meaningfully acknowledges their sexual realities and highlights heterosexuality as more varied and fluid than social attitudes and traditional sexual identity categories permit

BRISE StraightMSM Study: Understanding expert views on defining and reaching heterosexually-identified men who have sex with men for health promotion and care

Almost no published research exists specifically on heterosexually-identified men who have sex with men in Australia, and the international literature is also scant. Funded by BRISE, the Centre for Social Research in Health, in collaboration with Pozhet and representatives of NSW Health sexual health services, conducted exploratory research to investigate the sexual practices, sexual spaces, sexual health knowledge and sexual health needs of these men, and to consider opportunities to better engage them with health promotion and care. This report summarises the key outcomes of this pilot research, which comprised reviewing the literature, analysing existing survey data, appraising the terminology and activities evident in online personal ads posted by straight men who have sex with men, and conducting qualitative interviews with 30 professionals employed in health services, health promotion and other relevant roles in New South Wales