The famous speedo is a monument to timeless style and unquestionable confidence in men’s swimwear. This sleek and form-fitting swim brief has captivated the eye and generated fascination among beachgoers and poolside aficionados alike for years. Aside from its bold design, the attractiveness of a man in a speedo resides in his ability to convey confidence and a celebration of the male form.
The speedo is designed to hug the body in all the right places and showcases the male figure with athletic flare. Its sleek design not only improves mobility when swimming but also offers a sophisticated air that transcends trends. The sleek lines and brazen confidence of the speedo encourage men to embrace their bodies, challenging traditional ideals of masculinity and body image – and nothing beats a hot bulge either.
While the speedo’s charm is undeniably appealing, it also has a long history in the realm of professional swimming. A mark of strength and resolve, athletes around the world have wore these sleek swim briefs to glide through waters with maximum precision and speed. Embracing the speedo can be a tribute to this tradition, connecting wearers to a lineage of champions who have graced the seas before them.
Beyond its sporting origins, the modern speedo has grown into its own fashion statement. It is worn by men from all walks of life and is a bold expression of confidence that crosses cultural borders. As society embraces body positivity, the speedo serves as a symbol of self-assurance, enabling men to feel at ease and attractive in their own skin.
When I was a teen, I never had posters of sexy, oiled women on my bedroom walls. Thank you, God. My older brother had one next to his bed, a gaudy poster of an off-duty Hooters waitress in a swimsuit two sizes too small for her aggressively enormous chest, her skin lubricated to the point of requiring warning signs for nearby 18-wheelers. It was also autographed, which I thought was amusing. That he requested an autograph from a Hooters waitress. That he needed to reposition the hot wings baskets on the table so he could unfold the poster and wait for her to write a special message. That this was most likely not the first time she had to sign a poster as some strange adolescent dude with buffalo sauce breath wheezed heavily next her. Teenage lads are creeps. So says the Bible.
Forget that – Just think Mark Walberg – The 21-year-old showed off his six-pack abs and significant bulge in nothing but form-fitting white boxer underwear.
However, some 25 years later, men’s underwear is still not permitted to display too much skin: Aerie released a range of body-positive underwear for men in March, showcasing models of various shapes and sizes in an unretouched photoshoot.
That shoot also included something unexpectedly uncommon: a male model in skimpy blue briefs. He is shown taking out the trash in a video published by the corporation.
If it felt strangely peculiar for a brand that sells to a wide range of people, it’s because “sexy underwear” for guys is all too often a punchline, invoking the homophobia associated with the eroticized male. We’ve come a long way since the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s, but our underwear hasn’t.
Wahlberg’s was not the first time men’s underwear dared to market sex to male consumers: muscle mags from the 1950s and underwear catalogs from the 1960s and 1970s depicted beefcakes in tight trunks and briefs.
The first Calvin Klein underwear commercial campaign featured gold medalist pole vaulter Tom Hintnaus dazzling in a pair of tighty whities in 1982.
Until Marky Mark, however, the company failed to make luxury underwear fashionable for the common guy.
“We were repositioning Calvin’s men’s underwear line, which at the time was a relatively small business,” Neil Kraft, the company’s previous senior VP, explained to Ad Age.
When Kraft and his employer spotted Wahlberg on the cover of Rolling Stone, they felt he’d be ideal for helping Calvin Klein get into the men’s underwear industry. “[H]e had a natural likability,” Kraft observed of the actor. “I believe it was picked up in print and on television.”
Following the campaign’s unprecedented success, sales increased “exponentially,” according to Calvin Klein and other men’s retailers.
Of course, I never had the opportunity to be an adolescent creep. To begin with, I was a nerd who hung a big picture of The Incredibles on my wall until I was about 17 years old, so expressing my developing adolescent horniness was already doubtful. But I was also queer, in the closet, and terrified of disclosing my secret. I’d act prudishly shocked whenever my friends dragged out some raggedy edition of Playboy or horrifying DVD they’d discovered buried in their own older brothers’ sock drawers. “How ghastly,” I’d exclaim as I collapsed onto my velvet sofa clutching my pearls. “These bodies are for mothering and churning butter, not for our gawking!”
Men’s underwear has become a multibillion-dollar industry in the more than two decades afterwards. According to 2014 sales data, the international undergarment market took in $110 billion, with names like Calvin Klein playing a significant role. The company made over $3 billion in total revenue in 2014, with the boxer briefs Wahlberg popularized remaining its most profitable product.
But, for all that Calvin Klein has altered, some things have remained constant. In terms of revenue, the company has continued to trail behind Hanes, which posted record numbers in 2015: $5.73 billion globally.
Hanes’ products resemble what men’s underwear has looked like for decades: huge fabrics that could be waved like a flag on a cruise liner.
Hanes’ best-selling line on Amazon is the Tagless Tartan Boxer (no. 4 overall), which is designed to conceal even the smallest evidence of genitalia. The Ultimate Dyed Boxer Brief (no. 6) comes next, which is slightly more flattering. Both are more popular than any Calvin Klein product.
In an ideal world, I would have responded to their findings with my own nasty discoveries. “I see your Playboy centerfold,” I would have said, “and raise you this Us Weekly photo of a shirtless Nick Lachey walking his dog.” Please take note of the tight gray gym shorts, as they are essential to enjoying this shot.” But gay adolescent guys aren’t allowed to be overtly thirsty. Our options are either holding our pearls or pretending to be straight, neither of which is ideal. I never got to display Hanson, Chad Michael Murray, or Orlando Bloom posters on my bedroom wall. My love for *NSYNC was limited to their musical stylings, not Justin Timberlake’s sensuous hips and beautifully crunchy hair. I never got to explain that I just watched Desperate Housewives for the hot gardener, that I went through Channing Tatum’s whole modeling portfolio, and that I knew the exact minute in Troy when Brad Pitt’s Grecian ass was almost totally revealed. I didn’t get to slurp dirty mags full of disgustingly oiled males in swimsuits two sizes too small for their aggressively big bulges or hang a signed photo of some beefy jock who served me hot wings.
Hanes’ sustained success stands in stark contrast to Andrew Christian and 2(x)ist, who utilize sex to market underwear. Andrew Christian, the Glendale, California-based apparel company named for its head designer, is clearly Calvin Klein’s replacement.
His company produces fashionable jockstraps that function as push-up bras for one’s package. Marky Mark with a spray tan is the classic Andrew Christian model, the type of guy who wouldn’t appear out of place on the set of a pornographic shoot.
Andrew Christian’s advertisements gush over the unattainable physiques of hairless twinks lazing by the pool. To emphasize the message, one of the company’s most popular lines is dubbed “Trophy Boy.”
Andrew Christian is selling a lifestyle as much as underwear, and it’s simple to guess who the brand’s core target is: gay males.
Straight dudes had no idea what to do with Andrew Christian underwear in a 2015 video by YouTuber Michael Rizzi. They were nervous and even uncomfortable when they encountered them.
“Initial thoughts?” After trying on a pair, one man confessed. “Shame.”
“There’s a lot of skin going on,” added another.
The males polled appeared to agree that they would wear the clothing if their girlfriends requested them to. After all, many people have stated that it appears to be quite good.
What is the source of straight men’s aversion to “sexy underwear?” In a 2007 piece for Out magazine, Mark Simpson—who originally invented the term “metrosexual”—states that briefs, particularly male swimwear, have long served as a symbol of “gay pride and exclusion.”
Even as male celebrities such as David Beckham, Daniel Craig, and Cristiano Ronaldo have flaunted their chiseled physiques in public by wearing Speedos (a trend he refers to as “spornosexual”), Simpson observes a persistent strain of homophobia when it comes to the sexualized male form.
He writes, “Speedos on a non-gay beach are the surest way to earn yourself angry stares, abuse, and plenty of room for your beach towel.”
In the 1960s, a noteworthy case of what Simpson refers to as “Speedophobia” occurred in response to the sight of scantily clothed gay men cavorting on the beaches of Cape May, New Jersey.
According to a 1969 article in Philadelphia magazine, “their public displays of affection, particularly among men wearing women’s bathing suits on the main beach, turned off the townsfolk.”
The Cape May City Council replied by prohibiting Speedos from its beaches and posting signs around the little resort town that stated, “PROHIBITED: the wearing of skintight form-fitting or bikini-type apparel or bathing suits by males over 12 yrs.”
Today, men continue to link the male bikini with homosexuality in generally negative ways. Jesse Colter was kicked out of a Kentucky water park in 2014 for wearing a red Speedo after allegedly being branded a “queer” by officers on duty.
After fighter Dennis Hallman wore a lavender bikini with the words “Training Mask” after losing a wager three years before, the UFC really banned fighters from wearing Speedos during contests. “I’ve never been so embarrassed being in the UFC,” president Dana White stated at the time.
An even more notable case was former New York Yankees baseball player Derek Jeter, who allegedly backed out of a marketing arrangement with a Swedish underwear designer.
During a 2015 lawsuit, the firm claimed that Jeter had a problem with how the product was promoted. “[Jeter] demanded that [Frigo] not market to the gay community and states that he did not want the Frigo brand to be’too gay,” the company said in court.
The intricate design of the underwear, which features a crotch pocket and strings, owes a lot to brands like Andrew Christian. Frigo, according to Vice’s Matthew Leifheit, is “really, really flattering from the side.”
If our relationship with what we wear down there has a stench of homophobia, University of Winchester professor Eric Anderson, who lectures on masculinity and homophobia, presents a plausible reason why: For a long time, all types of male underpants were considered shameful.
“Showing underwear above your waistline was highly embarrassing for men in the 1970s and 1980s,” Anderson told the Daily Beast. “You don’t need designer underwear because your underwear was designed to be hidden.”
Alonso Duralde, a film reviewer, concurs. In an interview with NewNowNext, he explained that throughout cinema history, male underwear have rarely been considered as sexy or the man wearing them as desired. “Men’s underwear was the punchline to a joke,” he remarked.
Although seeing guys in briefs was frequent in films like Play Misty for Me and Midnight Express during the 1970s, Duralde argues that the tendency in recent years has shifted to boxers.
Wearing briefs is considered unmasculine and girly. In Wild Hogs, the socially awkward Dudley (William H. Macy) sleeps in his tighty-whities, similar to what Screech may wear.
For men, wearing underwear is an act of gender performance, which entails avoiding everything considered as feminine. The same is true for any other type of clothes, such as skinny pants or a messenger bag (sometimes known as a “man purse”).
Anderson feels this is because heterosexuality is exceedingly vulnerable for many males. “Straight men who want to be thought straight must prove and reprove their straightness,” he stated. “They can do so by proving and reproving masculinity—in the traditional sense.”
Things are changing, according to Anderson’s research. Simpson’s term—the metrosexual—symbolized a new type of man a decade ago.
“It started with a male New Yorker who was good looking, thin, probably wearing fancy clothes, and didn’t care if people thought he was gay because he was wearing fancy shoes,” he explained. “The fact that it ended in’sexual’ was key—it was the first time men could say, ‘I’m not gay, I’m metrosexual.'”
Today, he believes that label is becoming increasingly obsolete with young men: “It’s so widely accepted that they can wear better clothes and pay attention to their bodies.”
Because Anderson is situated in the United Kingdom, he concedes that there may be some “cultural lag” in terms of diminished homophobia in men’s fashion. However, there is evidence that he is on to something.
The Underwear Expert, an online “underwear of the month club,” claimed last year that the majority of its clients (27 percent) chose briefs over boxers, and the majority (54 percent) preferred low-rise underwear.
In interviews, Andrew Christian has consistently stated that “gay underwear” is for everyone. “The new generation of men, whether straight or gay, are much more liberal and don’t care how something is labeled,” he told homosexual Star News in 2013.
That has yet to convert into the men’s clothing revolution prophesied two decades ago, when Marky Mark first dropped his pants.
Straight men, on the other hand, stand to benefit much from adopting sexy underwear: questioning our preconceptions about men’s fashion will result in a culture that lowers the stigma and guilt that are all too often connected with demonstrations of male sexuality.
There’s a simpler reason why men shouldn’t be frightened to try on Andrew Christian: It’s quite hot. They could even be astonished to discover that they enjoy it.
Similarly, I missed out on all of the social flirtations, lunchroom ogling and giggling, blushingly confessing who I thought had the best smile, hair, or clothes, sitting on the bleachers with my friends watching boys play basketball — everything that girls in teen movies do when they start liking guys. On the other hand, I never had the similar locker room chats, as bad as they may be, those sentiments that teen boys express when they begin to like girls. I was stuck in the terrible, closed-off homosexual middle.
I didn’t come out formally until I was 20 — long after practically everyone else had, but nevertheless. There were still individuals I knew who hadn’t figured it out, and I wasn’t about to make it public that I’d been a fan of Team Large Bulge the entire time. By then, I’d spent my adolescence convinced that I’d successfully concealed my sexuality beneath layers of awkward nerd. It still seemed strange to be homosexual in public, on the internet. To publicize that I was reading through Tumblrs filled of Zac Efron’s developing abs (before Zac Efron became Hulk Efron), Tom Daley’s butt in speedos, and Darren Criss’s lusty eyebrows.
But Tumblr is the internet’s bedroom wall, and it’s where I started cultivating — at least semi-publicly (nobody followed me on the internet back then) — my own collection of sleazy Hooters posters hanging beside my bed: Harry Styles in tiny yellow swim trunks, Nick Jonas’ bulging arms, Anderson Cooper in a tight black shirt holding a sloth — everything I would have taped inside my locker a decade before.
Today, I am proudly thirsty on the internet, as are most Twitter Gays. I have no qualms about following a disproportionate amount of gorgeous gentlemen on Instagram (though, to be fair, I refrain from leaving weird remarks a la elderly men on PornHub). I’ve made my fair share of unprintable remarks about the Hemsworth brothers on Twitter. In fact, I was hired at BuzzFeed in 2012 in part because of early stories in which I openly fawned over beautiful male Olympians and their magnificent, muscled buttocks. Soon, I was the Thirst Reporter at BuzzFeed, writing fawning stories about my shallowest internet male crushes, formally fulfilling my teenage self’s need to publicly and proudly show my gratitude for a beautiful set of abs and a chiseled jaw.
Of course, there are many users on the internet that find Gay Twitter’s thirst annoying. And, I’ll agree, teenage boy horniness isn’t exactly a desirable lifestyle. However, being a boldly thirsty gay on the internet entails more than just being annoyingly lustful for the purpose of being lustful. It’s about regaining those times when we weren’t able to be ourselves.
So, with my apologies to Chris Pratt, the thirst isn’t going away anytime soon.
