The Dance of Two Men: Beyond Tops, Bottoms, and Beauty: Rethinking How Gay Men Seek Love (Part 3 of 5)

I have wanted to bring up this point for a while, but the need became even clearer during our core team meeting last Sunday at Mr and Mr. As we discussed the recurring challenges in our matchmaking process, one tricky yet crucial issue kept resurfacing, something our customer relations expert deals with every day as he navigates members’ concerns. Including this section in the article feels important because it may finally help us put these patterns into perspective.

Love among gay men is often framed through a narrow set of criteria: top or bottom? Masculine or feminine? Good body or not? These questions, though familiar, have come to shape the way many navigate dating and relationships. But why has our search for connection become so deeply tied to sexual positions and physical aesthetics? And more importantly, what are we missing when these become the primary filters through which we assess compatibility? To understand this, we must acknowledge the lingering imprint of heteronormativity on queer lives. Even as we resist its constraints, its binary lens quietly shapes our choices. The fixation on top and bottom roles, for example, is often interpreted as sexual preference. Yet beneath this simplicity lies a deeper tension: the replication of heteronormative power dynamics. “Who is the man?” “Who takes the lead?” “Who is dominant?” These are questions rooted not in queer liberation but in a straight world’s discomfort with anything that disrupts its binaries.

What is interesting, perhaps ironic, is that as a community that fundamentally opposes rigid heteronormative roles, we often unconsciously recreate them in our own relationships. A top may be presumed to be more masculine, assertive, or emotionally distant. A bottom may be assumed to be softer, more nurturing, or submissive. These stereotypes flatten us, reducing rich emotional, intellectual, and relational complexity into one-dimensional roles. And when desire is shaped primarily by these pre-assigned scripts, our choices stop being choices; they become conditioned behaviours. Then there is the emphasis on looks: six-pack abs, sharp jawlines, youthful or fair skin. While attraction is natural, the obsessive aesthetic culture in gay spaces didn’t emerge in a vacuum. Many gay men grow up seeking validation in a world that repeatedly tells them they are “less than.” Physical perfection becomes a currency and an armour against rejection, a proof of belonging. Apps amplify this further: bodies become profiles, personalities become summaries, and desire becomes swipeable.

But these criteria cannot sustain a long-term emotional connection. They rarely speak to the qualities that make love nurturing, resilient, or meaningful: empathy, values, emotional maturity, shared aspirations, communication, humour, safety and compassion. These other considerations, the very foundations of partnership, are often overshadowed by the urgency to fit into a desired sexual role or aesthetic mold.

What if the universe is offering us more than we allow ourselves to explore? What if queer love could be a space of radical openness where roles are fluid, identities unfixed, bodies diverse, and intimacy free from inherited expectations? To grow as individuals and as a community, we need to question the frameworks that restrict our relational possibilities. Not by shaming preferences, but by examining where they come from. Not by rejecting desire, but by expanding its vocabulary. And not by policing each other, but by collectively redefining what we see as desirable, lovable, and worthwhile. Queer love has always had the potential to break boundaries. It is time we stopped recreating the very systems that once suffocated us and instead allowed ourselves to imagine, explore, and embrace the limitless forms that love can take.

When our choices become rigid, we must ask, where do they lead us? If our checklist keeps shrinking the pool of possibilities, are we prepared for the outcome it creates? What if there are no matches for the standards we’ve set… does that mean we choose to remain alone? It’s important to have deal-breakers, of course. Everyone is entitled to boundaries, values, and non-negotiables. But we must also reflect honestly: should sexual roles or beauty really fall into that “absolute no-compromise” category? If our criteria are shaped more by fear, conditioning, or community pressures than by genuine self-understanding, then they may be limiting us rather than protecting us. And when our filters become too narrow, we risk locking ourselves out of relationships that could have offered depth, growth, and emotional fulfilment. The question, then, is not whether we can choose but whether our choices are helping us move toward connection or pushing us further into isolation.

I will come back to you all soon… and continue this series of queer relationships. Thanks for reading