Before the days of living my life as a non-closeted gay man, my female friends would often call me “the gayest-straight guy" they had ever met. For a number of years, I would ask myself how I should receive this comment and whether it has anything to do with the fact that I had a great fascination for the arts. It was not until after my first year of college that I finally took this comment as one of the biggest compliments I have ever received. And before I go further, please note that this is not a story about my sexuality, but rather about manhood.

You might ask, why would being called the “gayest” boy in the entire sophomore class be a compliment? It was not because I liked being known as the kid who chose a paintbrush over a basketball, and yes, I am well aware of that horrible stigma our society has, but it was because my friends saw me as an exception to the non-spoken rule that has been engraved into our culture where one needs to treat women with cruelty as if they were objects to be viewed as a straight male.

While it was a compliment, it upsets me to understand that when my friends called me the “the gayest-straight guy," it was because they could not process how there could be a straight man who treated them with the level with kindness and respect they deserve. It was a strange idea to their brains to see how one who might be attracted to them is not constantly trying to prove how manly, how macho or how tough he is to them. More than that, they did not see me with qualities that our culture has come to accept but also expect from our fathers, brothers, and all other male figures around us who continuously compare women with victories rather than appreciating them as a fellow human being.

The hardest part is to realize that these male figures are my friends. In no way am I saying that they are bad people; it is not easy to know that the very men I love so much in my life are also the ones who cannot seem to understand how their actions have greatly impacted why women are constantly feeling unloved. For them, it was all about criticizing women for their sexual freedom. For them, it was all about the chase of how many girls they can get. For them, it was always about doing everything they can to make them feel more “manly” that they have forgotten just how to treat women with kindness.

I still wonder how things would be different had I never came out, because there is a part of me that could not help but feel guilty for taking away my girlfriends’ only exception to the rule of manhood. I knew for a fact that there good guys out there, yet these cowards who call themselves “men” were the ones that are mostly desired. The worst of all was to see that these great men I knew were the ones to finish last every time, and they slowly began to believe that the only way to be wanted by a girl was to break her heart and then offer to put the pieces back together.

Looking back to my 15-year-old self, maybe I was the “gayest straight” guy in my sophomore class. Regardless of my real sexuality -- yes, I am gay -- it warms my heart to know that I was able to show my girlfriends that they do deserve to be treated with love and respect by men. After all there are nice guys all around. There are straight males out there who can treat their females with compassion and love, yet they are just the harder ones to find.

So next time, ladies, if you are lucky enough to meet a guy that knows how to treat you like how a man should, don't tell him that he's the gayest straight guy you've ever met. Tell him how much you appreciate him for not being what our society and culture have come to expect of him.