This is one of those things that’s really hard to explain to anyone that isn’t a minority, but I think you did a really good job conveying the nuance of it. I, as a white man, would likely never know about this side of human interactions if I wasn’t gay. And it’s not just with people fetishizing you. People will be similarly underhanded with their hatefulness too. People do these little micro-expressions that, when looked at as one odd expression, can be explained away. But, when you are the person these expressions are regularly directed towards, and it’s the same person consistently being weird towards you, you start to see trends. Sometimes you can pickup on these trends right away, with new people. Because it’s a fully intuition-based thing rooted in years of spotting these trends, it can be hard even explaining it to ourselves sometimes… Like, “why am I getting a weird vibe from this person?”. Then they say one of the common things these people say and you’re like “ooooohhhh… Next!” Lol.
It can also just be projection, watch out for that.
I’ve certainly projected my “I know what that facial expression means”/“I know why you said it like that” onto someone when it was really my own insecurities or assumptions.
This is one of those things that’s really hard to explain to anyone that isn’t a minority, but I think you did a really good job conveying the nuance of it. I, as a white man, would likely never know about this side of human interactions if I wasn’t gay. And it’s not just with people fetishizing you. People will be similarly underhanded with their hatefulness too. People do these little micro-expressions that, when looked at as one odd expression, can be explained away. But, when you are the person these expressions are regularly directed towards, and it’s the same person consistently being weird towards you, you start to see trends. Sometimes you can pickup on these trends right away, with new people. Because it’s a fully intuition-based thing rooted in years of spotting these trends, it can be hard even explaining it to ourselves sometimes… Like, “why am I getting a weird vibe from this person?”. Then they say one of the common things these people say and you’re like “ooooohhhh… Next!” Lol.
It can also just be projection, watch out for that.
I’ve certainly projected my “I know what that facial expression means”/“I know why you said it like that” onto someone when it was really my own insecurities or assumptions.
If you’re looking for a trend, you’ll find it.