Pee familiarity vs. sexual orientation

[Carb0nBased 647]

In the thread about Youtube videos, someone posted a link to a video of a gay couple where the boyfriends were peeing together for the first time. This made me wonder about something, and I decided to make a separate thread because it is really off the topic of Youtube channels. 

I find it quite surprising that two gay boyfriends hadn't peed together before, and it's an interesting thing to think about the implications of this. While it's certainly the case that a decent number of heterosexual boyfriends and girlfriends have never peed together, I just assumed that was in large part because boys and girls grow up being taught to pee apart in different bathrooms. In other words, while couples might say they hide peeing from each other "maintain the mystery" or something like that, I would have thought that the only reason this thinking even has a chance to come into play is because people of the opposite sex need to take the active step of overcoming their programming to pee separately. Whereas, most boys grow up peeing in urinals next to people of the same sex anyway, so gay men would need to actively decide to pee separately despite being far more intimate with each other than they are with the vast majority of men/boys they have shared a bathroom with.

I suppose that in the early parts of a relationship, gay men--like any two people who are developing an attraction to one another--may well want to be selective and a bit "coy" about how much they share about their bodies, so they probably aren't going to for instance change in front of each other even if they already do that with friends. I also did see that the previous video was them getting naked together for the first time, so it seems like their relationship may be very new. But I'd just think that once two men DO progress to physical intimacy, there are likely a lot of barriers that are nearly or totally absent just on account of them being both male. I'm interested in learning more about this from though from someone who isn't just speculating like I am--how much less awkward is intimacy about body functions with someone of the same sex in a relationship?

[DoctorDoctor 1,391]

I think there is a big difference between peeing together and watching/observing someone else peeing.  I am a straight male and pee along-side of a lot of other straight men all the time, but we aren't looking at each other.  At most, I would see a glimpse of another guys stream.  I know women peeing outdoors frequently pee in very close proximity to other women, a lot of times closer than I would pee next to another male friend.  Again, I doubt they are actually "watching" each other.

Before there were indoor toilets, married couples (and I would guess same sex couples) frequently peed in chamber pots in their bedrooms during the evenings with very little privacy.  Maybe there was a fabric privacy screen at most, but I guess that most family members actively peed in front of other family members.  There were multihole outhouses with no privacy screens too.

I believe that the introduction of private indoor toilets brought the expectation of privacy between family members when peeing.  Now, in the U.S. it is almost common where houses have enough separate bathrooms that there is one for each family member.

[NortheastPeeFan 361]

I think if a guy grew up never peeing next to another guy before, then possibly peeing with a boyfriend could be a novel experience.  I also think some guys may avoid peeing next to someone they know because they feel embarrassed about doing so.  I'm a gay man and though my relationships have all been online and never got to the meeting up in real life stage in which peeing would come up, I can say I would be nervous peeing next to my boyfriend for the first time.  Heck, I even get nervous about peeing next to a friend or co-worker.  I don't feel that way about peeing next to a stranger, but for some bizarre reason I feel embarrassed about peeing next to someone I know and spend time with.  Getting back to boyfriends, I think what also might be happening is not wanting someone you have a crush on/are in love with to see you doing something that many consider gross, even though we all do it every day. 

[gldenwetgoose 21,487]

I know from time to time we've had the debates on the site here (irrespective of sexual orientation) about guys being nervous or pee-shy in front of other guys in public bathrooms.

I do wonder if it's a generational thing...  I mean as a kid growing up in the 70s things were very different to now.  Apart from the general affluence and materialistic society we have now, for one we were less 'information connected'.  What I mean by that in our formative years we didn't have the internet, chat rooms, forums and the like. What we had were just the influences of those around us, parents, teachers, friends and siblings.  We did things the way they did.  At school, the done way to pee was standing at the open white urinal wall, toes too far over the gutter and having competitions with each other to see who could pee highest up the painted wall above the top of it.

Also I wonder if we were less 'cosseted' in a way.  None of the 'it's all right darling, if it makes you uncomfortable you don't have to do it...'  Instead our lives were sometimes brutal, sometimes abusive and sometimes we suffered in ways which clearly aren't acceptable.  But in other ways we did just deal with things and didn't always have an alternative.

It's also a common perception that today's generation don't spend all their free time exploring and playing outdoors - and a rose tinted view that as kids we did. With that perception is the view that today's kids spend all their time indoors and by definition right next to a bathroom.

So for those guys in the clip, if all they've known has been using bathrooms with widely spaced and partitioned urinals, same sex bathrooms with only toilets and not squeezed shoulder to shoulder with other guys, or playing outdoors in the summer with their mates peeing together in the great outdoors - and if they don't have the attraction to pee that we do - then it's completely understandable for them to be a little out of comfort zone.  Don't forget that we focus all our attention on pee on this site and in our lives.  For them though that's not the case.