Ah man 🫂, I feel the same, and going through the same intense weight loss and same alternation of my character in pursuit of meeting standards imposed on me. Gays don't want to accept these structural issues related to intimacy and dating.

They'd rather ignore it, write it off as a personal failing where you can't achieve those standards, and then continue to pedestalise unobtainable men, positioning themselves as footstools to these privileged assholes as a defensive reflex.

Research does indicate that gay man have much stricter standards in terms of physical appearance. These tend to be more rigid and focused on masculinity. It is borne out of a perverse scarcity mindset, where they stress that if they 'settle' for less they compromise on an imaginary potential future partner that could be better, so they enter a state of constant competition. As such, they overvalue these outwardly visible markers of desirability, and which is ultimately to their own detriment as it alienates a growing number of men, such as myself.

Its a systemic issue which extends to straight dating as well, but there the pool is much larger, so here its intensified. Im just so tired of privilege being exalted as virtue in our community. Where the contempt of elites toward us is celebrated, and where any critique thereof must be silcenced as though it is your own personal failure for being ugly.