Fun with Dick and Dick: Homosociality on r/MassiveCock

Abstract

Social media and content-sharing platforms provide new opportunities for the circulation of not only professional and amateur porn productions but also “pornographic self-representation”. This study examines the interactions that occur when male pornographic self-representation is shared in an inclusive space that welcomes both straight and gay men to post dick pics and gaze/comment on them. Focusing on the Reddit forum, Massive Cock, we conducted a discourse analysis of a selection of posts, comments and account profiles collected over a seven-month period. Based on our findings, we contend that Massive is a homosocial space where homoerotic dick gazing reaffirms and disrupts the heterosexual–homosexual binary. Our findings point to an uneven dynamic in which the majority of the posters perform a straight identity, whereas the majority of commenters perform a gay identity. Their comments serve to disrupt hegemonic masculinity and, in turn, create a space that welcomes mostly straight and bi-curious performances of masculinity. Such performances are possible due to recent cultural shift away from homo-hysteria and towards a more inclusive heteromasculinity. Collectively these performances produce an inclusive “fraternity of the cock”, but it is one which maintains a heterocentric focus and function.