Ladies Love Getting Gay-Married

Now that New York’s become the biggest state to legalize gay marriage, we’ll see whether it will follow in the steps of other marriage equality states in another respect: Seeing more women marry than men.

The New York Post crunched the numbers and found that there might be a reason the archetypal gay male friend is disappointing his BFF — he’s statistically less likely to get married than a lesbian friend.

In Connecticut, 3,252 lesbian couples have been married since 2008, compared to 2,053 male couples. In Massachusetts, 8,404 female couples, 4,911 male. In New Hampshire, 1,113 pairs of women, 411 pairs of men. In Iowa, 1,376 lesbian marriages, 772 gay male marriages. In Vermont, 1,157 to 597.

It would be interesting to compare the data to other countries, such as Canada and several in Western Europe, that have also legalized gay marriage, though we weren’t able to find reliable recent numbers.

There’s any number of stereotypes to draw on here, of course. A Daily Beast story on marriage-ambivalent gays and lesbians touched on them briefly: “As any bride-to-be knows, men can be notoriously commitment phobic. Multiply that by two, and you get an idea of what happens when two guys consider tying the knot. But even for lesbian couples-U-Haul jokes aside-the idea of marriage can be scary (and it should be).”

Historian Stephanie Coontz had another, rather convincing explanation. “This is the way men and women have been socialized from the time we’re born,” she told the Post. “Go out, don’t commit too early’ . . . It’s the message all men receive.”

Gay Or Straight, Guys Reluctant To Say I Do [NYP]
Gay Marriage In New York Brings Pressure To Tie The Knot