“Micro gay” is the new status for straight guys who want gay benefits minus the sex or discrimination.

Harald Lenner sits in a cafeteria across from his best friend Chris. The pair are ending their second years at a well-known university the way many college students do—cramming for exams, hitting parties, and hooking up. But unlike the old school, hyper-masculine and hyper-hetero culture of the past, Harald and Chris fancy themselves what many students now call “micro gay.”
 
This new category of sexuality is becoming commonplace among youth who seek a way of defining themselves that is not in opposition of homosexuality, by teasing an interest that will most likely remain unrequited. If this sounds a little hard to reconcile, it is. Even for Harald and Chris, who promise they’ve never hooked up with each other, but have thought about it.
 
“Being micro gay is kind of like being really into dinosaurs, even if you’re never going to see one in real life,” Chris explains.
 
The term itself, micro gay, suggests that one is homosexual but only to a small degree, and although some students we spoke to had slightly differing definitions, the predominant view seems to be that micro gayness is a state of mind in which one is primarily heterosexual but can envision what it would be like to be gay—and in a positive way.
 
When Chris and Harald say they’ve thought of being together romantically, they caution that this will most likely never become reality, mostly because they are drawn almost pathologically towards women. 
 
“Sometimes, they’re all I think about,” admits Harald, who is scrolling through Tinder as he speaks to us. When we ask if there are any men in his feed, he becomes a bit defensive and says, “I am into dudes, but in a theoretical way, and not on Tinder.”
 
Unlike the classic macho man who’s secretly gay, micro gayness seeks to call out the most infinitesimal homosexual tendencies straight people may have and bring them to light, thus achieving a measure of social awareness and elevated morality.
 
“No offense,” Chris starts, “But people from your generation probably hid it. You made gay jokes and would tease other guys about how you wanted to have sex with them and then there’d be a big laugh. Today, there’s no laughter. We say stuff like, ‘nice ass bro,’ but we mean it.”
 
Still, Chris makes a point of saying he would probably never have sex with a man, while still allowing for an outside possibility of it happening. 
 
“If it happens, it happens,” he says. Harald agrees and adds, “Straight guys can be gay too.”
When we ask, just to confirm, if either of them has ever had gay sex, they take a nuanced, if confusing, stance.
 
“We’re micro gay,” Chris asserts. “Not gay gay.”
 
“I’ll put it this way,” Harald says. “I could go to the Pride parade if I wanted, but if I did, I wouldn’t hook up with any of the dudes.”
 
Harald and Chris have no plans to attend any Pride events this year but aren’t ruling it out in the future. An element of the micro gay community, they say, is not having a particularly strong interest in traditionally gay events, movements, or issues. In fact, students like Chris and Harald find those things a little “gay,” a term they say they are allowed to use pejoratively owing to their status as micro gay. 
 
Faculty member Dr. Charles DeMize says the uptrend in micro gay men is something whose time has come. 
 
“Until recently, it was only macro gays who were allowed to call themselves gay. What the culture tends to do is rethink hierarchies and sort them out in a way that makes sense for the times. Our times call for more people with fluid sexualities and, in this case, more homosexual thoughts.”
 
Fraternity president Mike O’Donnell says that “Chicks have been that way forever. Just watch a porno. We’ve had girls at parties hooking up in front of me.” As for men hooking up with each other, Mike hasn’t noticed a lot of movement. “Dudes no,” he says. Then he thinks about it and adds, “Nope. I don’t think I’ve seen any of that.” When we ask him about micro gays, he tells us, “What the fuck is that?”
 
While the movement clearly hasn’t caught on with everyone on college campuses, it is something to be aware of as the culture opens to new ideas and lifestyles. As for Harald and Chris, they tell us they will continue seeking acceptance for their status in the LGBTQplus acronym. 
 
What letter would they like to represent them? “Maybe a little ‘g’,” Harald suggests. “Yeah,” Chris agrees, “You could put it right next to the big ‘G.’” 
 
As the two high-five each other over their “little g” concept, it’s hard not to notice a little limpness in their wrists. But just a little. 

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