The Boy Who Cried Woke

A Short Story About the Frequent Homosexual Tendencies of Cishet Men

Brad Mann just left the voting booth. He walks down the street with his chin high, his chest out, and an “I Voted” sticker—the struggling life support of the American people—wrapped around his white finger. He voted for Agent Orange. Brad says it wasn't a hard decision (this is a lie).

Donald Trump holds a rainbow flag from a supporter at a campaign rally in Greeley, Colorado, on Oct. 30, 2016. (Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images)

Here’s the thing: Brad grew up in a middle-class household with two parents, four older brothers, two dogs, and no sisters. Brad enjoyed his childhood. They would take trips to “the lake” every summer and go tubing on their boat. They would get lots of gifts for every birthday. They would be reminded to go to church twice a year on Easter and Christmas. They would go on every school field trip. What a beautiful family!

Brad is conventionally attractive for the societal perception of what an attractive cisgender man is. He’s tall, he has toned muscles, a well-defined jawline, nice hair, and so on. He has never struggled with ladies. Brad got his first girlfriend in eighth grade. The catalyst for this relationship was somebody starting a rumor that Brad might be gay. His dad’s advice: “Just get a girlfriend.” So he did. It wasn’t hard.

It’s the same story for Brad’s four brothers. They are all conventionally attractive, and finding an equally attractive girlfriend has never been a struggle for the Mann boys. The total number of girls that the six men in Brad’s family have dated is a wide web of heartbroken women. The Mann boys aren’t picky, they say, they just have standards! If all the girls who have dated a Mann were lined up, they would look quite similar: short, white, blonde, skinny, rich, Republican, and eager to take their place in the nuclear family.

Brad is 22. His oldest brother is 30, married with a kid. The next oldest is 28, married with two kids. The next oldest is 26, married with a kid on the way. The next oldest is 24, married with no kid yet.

Brad is often mocked by his brothers and his father for not getting married yet. All of them were married by 22! Why hadn’t he? His brothers would call him a limp dick, or a sissy, or a secret faggot, but it was all just fun and games. Brotherly love. They knew it wasn’t true. They knew it must’ve been the women’s fault, not Brad’s! Besides, being gay is just a joke to them, not a reality.

When Brad was in eighth grade, the most powerful insult he could say was the word “gay.” “That’s gay, dude,” “Bro, you’re so gay,” “What, are you gay or something?” “No homo, bro.” Brad knew from a very young age that gay means bad.

Now think about how funny it is that Brad has a small secret that has hung heavy on his conscience for nearly a decade, like a noose hanging around the neck of a dead fag. See, when Brad was in eighth grade, he shared a futon with Johnny Williamson at a group sleepover with all their friends. They had been playing video games and foosball and eating junk food all night. And once they tired themselves out, around one in the morning, they decided to call it a night. They each found a place to sleep, and Brad happened to be beside Johnny on a futon. Don’t worry, they were packed in that damp basement like sardines. Nothing gay about it. But that didn’t stop the jokes. Brad and Johnny were quite close. “You two are cute,” “You gonna start jerking each other off?” “Get a room, fags!” Brad and Johnny didn’t care. They knew nothing would happen between them.

And it’s so ironic that within the hour, after all the boys had checked out for the night and were fast asleep, Brad and Johnny were pulling each other’s pants down to jerk each other off as quietly as they could without waking everybody else up. But don’t worry, it’s not gay. Nobody else found out. Brad and Johnny vowed to take it to their grave.

But then the rumors of Brad’s homosexuality arose at school, and he had to figure out what to do. He and Johnny never spoke again; both boys believed the other had failed to keep his mouth shut. Brad started dating a girl. The relationship lasted a few years, even though she didn’t meet his standards for sexual fulfillment. He grew a beard. It was hard for Brad.

It was hard for Brad because Brad couldn’t get hard in his relationship. This scared him. The thought that he may not be turned on by a woman loomed around the corner, but Brad kept it well out of sight and out of mind because thinking those thoughts would be the equivalent of admitting to one’s “affliction”—that he may be a homosexual.

So Brad did everything he could to prove to himself, his family, and the world that he was a real man. He lifted weights more, he always made sure to lower the pitch of his voice when speaking, he joined the football team, he treated his girlfriend like an object, he watched YouTube tutorials on how to replicate the behavior of an alpha male, he researched why women have to be so goddamn difficult to talk to, he whined on Twitter about how any piece of media that contained even a minuscule amount of representation of a marginalized group of people was “woke pandering,” and—most importantly to Brad—he (religiously) followed influencers who shared similar opinions on what they called the genetically inferior sex.

Brad became the ultimate image of what a white, cisgender, heterosexual man should be. He shunned other men who didn’t look and act like he did, and he shunned women who didn’t look and act like a Barbie doll (the one with an apron and high heels on, or nothing at all).

And then Brad’s saving grace came along: Agent Orange. An ultra-rich sociopath with the desire to turn America into a Christian, oligarchical ethnostate wanted to run for president! What more could Brad ask for? Agent Orange shared similar feelings about women and about homosexuals; therefore, voting for him must further Brad’s front as a real man, right?

But here’s the thing: voting for Agent Orange wasn’t an easy decision for Brad, even if he tells everybody else that it was. Despite the alpha male look, the disrespect toward women, the hatred of homosexuals, the constant crying over woke pandering in media, and the influencers who fed him conservative propaganda, Brad had a little secret, and it’s quite funny.

See, in Brad’s free time, he likes to go on online apps under the alias “masc top hung DL LF bottom twink/fem/trans,” and he tries to find people who have penises so he can stick his penis inside them.

Definition Time!

• masc - adjective

  1. : a shortened form of “masculine” used to describe one as presenting themselves in a masculine manner

• top - noun/adjective

  1. : a man who prefers to give anal penetration during gay sex

• hung - adjective

  1. : the quality of having a large penis, often falsely self-prescribed

• DL - noun/adjective

  1. : an abbreviation for “down-low”

  2. : a man who wants to have secret homosexual affairs but still wants to be perceived as straight

  3. : a man who is too insecure to admit he is a homosexual
     Example: Brad describes himself as a masc top hung DL because he still wants to feel like a real man while he has sex with other men.

• LF - verb

  1. : an abbreviation for “looking for”

• bottom - noun/adjective

  1. : a man who prefers to receive anal penetration during gay sex

• twink - noun

  1. : an effeminate gay man

• fem - adjective

  1. : a shortened form of “feminine” used to describe one as presenting themselves in a feminine manner

• trans - adjective

  1. : a shortened form of “transgender”

  2. : used to describe someone who is transgender

  3. : a term often used by those who have the desire to sleep with someone who possesses the opposite genitalia of the gender they present as
     Example: Brad prefers to have sex with transgender women because he has a secret fetish for women with penises, but he still views them as men; therefore, he believes admitting to this would mean that he is a homosexual.

Oh, the horror! How can this be? Brad is the prime example of a real man! But real men don’t have secret affairs with other men and transfeminine people, right?

Well, fortunately for Brad, his oldest brother has a secret too, yes. The oldest of the Mann boys, married to a beautiful, subservient, cisgender woman for over a decade, raising a child with her—another prime example of what a real man should be—also happens to go onto online apps to have affairs with other men and transfeminine people. What?!

Turns out all the Mann boys—yes, including Brad’s father—aren’t as heterosexual as they claim to be. But that doesn’t make much sense, does it? They all voted for Agent Orange, whose vision of a Christian, oligarchical ethnostate includes the eradication of the queer population. Turns out insecure masculinity is quite a strong and controlling feeling, one that can’t stop them from voting for Agent Orange.

Let’s get back to Brad.

Brad Mann just left the voting booth. He walks down the street with his chin high, his chest out, and an “I Voted” sticker—the struggling life support of the American people—wrapped around his white finger. He voted for Agent Orange. Brad says it wasn't a hard decision (this is a lie).

Skip to the end of the day, after most of the votes have been counted and the winner is clear, and guess who it is? Agent Orange, that’s right! Brad feels good about himself. He is excited to let the world know that he contributed to Agent Orange’s election. He is very excited. Extremely excited. So excited that maybe he should take the opportunity to celebrate. So what does Brad do? He’s ashamed to admit it, but he decides to undermine his own elected agenda by finding a “twink/fem/trans” to stick his penis inside.

Brad has three usuals who are his go-to’s when he wants to have one of his little affairs.

• The first is a boy who was on the football team with Brad in high school. They saw each other half-naked in the locker room all the time. This teammate was proudly out as a homosexual (one of the only men at that school—and the only one on the football team—who was brave enough to say such a thing), and Brad knew this, so he would “fail” to hide his boner around this teammate in the locker room, which he eagerly noticed. One thing leads to another, and Brad ends up sticking his penis inside him. From then on, they would regularly see each other for sex. So, after leaving the voting booth, Brad texts him, but what’s this? The message failed to send. How strange. Turns out, this openly gay former teammate has decided to go back into the closet and deny ever being a homosexual due to the election of Agent Orange.

• No worries, Brad texts his next go-to: a twink he met online. This was Brad’s first hookup under his “masc top hung DL LF bottom twink/fem/trans” alias, and this is who got Brad addicted to these online affairs. So Brad texts him but gets a very hostile response. The twink does not want to see or even speak to Brad because of Brad’s open support of Agent Orange and fear of being perceived as a homosexual. He, along with many other queer people, says he is abstaining from DL men due to the election of Agent Orange.

• No matter, Brad texts his final go-to: a transgender woman whom Brad had only recently met online. This is his favorite go-to because she fulfills his secret fetishes more than anyone else. She looks like a “real” woman, he tells himself. While he has sex with her, he can convince himself that he is having sex with a cisgender woman if cisgender women had penises, and we all know that a penis on a woman is Brad’s favorite thing in this whole wide world. So Brad texts her but gets no immediate response. No worries, Brad can wait. So Brad waits and waits and waits and wonders why she won’t text him back.

Little does Brad know that she placed a bag over her head while inhaling a canister of helium until she suffocated herself to death that night due to the inability to live in a world that she has accepted is not for her.

Brad doesn’t know what to do! Who would have thought that outwardly hating queer people while secretly having sex with them for the sake of being a real man makes no sense? Could it be that the more a cis man attempts to maintain his image of being an alpha, the more he has to hide? Could it be that the vast majority of “heterosexual” men have a secret fetish for other men and transfeminine people? Perhaps.

But Brad asked for this, didn’t he? Silly Brad. Poor Brad. All the Mann boys are in the same predicament, but they each think they’re the only Mann in their family with this predicament. And they will continue to think that because even when you acknowledge that most “straight” men have secret homosexual tendencies, they will each claim that they are the common denominator—the truly straight one, the last bastion of a Christian oligarchical ethnostate.

Silly, gay little straight men.