men together

I've not been particularly interested in Glastonbury before but this year I've found myself watching quite a bit of the BBC coverage; and I've been finding it quite compelling.

Now, men in bands. I was watching Coldplay (and I do like Coldplay -- I discovered them thanks to you, fellow lj_peeps, *g*) and there was whatever his name is, Mister Main Singer of the Band, introducing the guitarist: "And this is Mr Jonathan Buckland, my best friend and the best guitar player in the world."

Now, do women say such things? But men say these things all the time, and I love it! Mister Jonathan Buckland (when do women introduce each other as Ms? We just don't do that), my best friend -- the sweetness of it! The lovely homosociality! Nobody forced these men to form a band; they were just a student band; men just do these things. Men just like hanging out together and doing stuff together with their best friends. T'h has a theory about this, he thinks it's a masculine thing, this ability to form groups and bonds and bands, and the tendency for men to stick up for each other in institutional settings, form Old Boy networks and so forth. I tend to agree.

Now why do they do this? The other side of the coin is the dreadful rivalry and hierarchy that men experience in patriarchy, where everyone wants to be top dog and alpha male and elbows the others out of the way on their way to the top and whips out his penis to see how much longer it is than his rivals' and how many more balls he's got. This happens a lot in academe and everywhere else, not least in politics! So maybe the men who form bands with their best friends are forming little protective groups within this larger climate of patriarchal rivalry.

And why do we women slasher love them so? This goes beyond two guys having sex. We love the homosociality of this group thing. We love the 'This is Mr Jonathan Buckland, my best friend and the best guitar player in the world'. We love these declarations of love and the displays of public affection, of touching and hugging and kissing among mates. This is why we were all drawn to lotrips, I'm sure of it. It wasn't the Viggorli or the Domlijah primarily, or not for me, anyway, and not for many, many others, judging by the many orgy fics I used to read in lotrips. In lotrips it was so difficult to pull out 'the one OTP': impossible. Lotrips was very different from fandoms such as Smallville or Star Trek where you get One Pairing done over and over. Lotrips was never, ever about the One Pairing but always about the men bonding. I remember reading fics where basically every single man on set was having it off with every single other man on set, where people drifted from one pairing into another. These driftings could be easy-going orgies with a smile or they could be angst-ridden fests of jealousy but it was as if the authors (us!!) just needed to try out more than just one pairing possibility in that amazing setting of homosociality. I remember how electrifying those first photos were, of group hugs and everyone cuddling up to everyone else!

We women don't do this. Not in this way. And we love the way sexuality is woven into these men-to-men relationships. I'm not sure it's envy we feel; I don't think I feel envy -- hm, perhaps a little bit, actually, *g*. But we love to observe it and think about it and write and read our way into it. It's this thing that really exists irl, and we are excluded from it, so we spin it further within our own homosocial online communities.

We have our own woman-only homosocial communites, we do, but they work differently from the men's. I haven't yet thought through exactly how.

Anyway, here's to misters being best friends.


(His name is Chris Martin, it appears.*g*)