Straight guys play at being gay to pick up chicks

The Observer

It's Saturday night, and Phil Graham and Dan Farndell are putting the final touches to their game plan for the evening. Graham has a new necklace, which he's not too sure about and Farndell is practising his walk, trying to replace every hint of masculine swagger with a more effeminate swing.

'Does this look too much?' Graham asked, fingering the gold chain around his neck. 'No, it's spot on - they'll love it,' said Farndell. Dressed in tight black T-shirts and trendy jeans, with leather jackets, hair gelled and subtle touches of jewellery, they want to look like any other gay couple out on the town.

But they are not like any other gay couple: they are 'Strays' - enthusiastic players of a new dating game gaining currency across the country when STRaight men pretend to be gAY to attract women. It's a trick, they insist, that delivers the required results.

'I never actively claim to be gay, but by simply giving women the impression I might be I find practically without exception there's more chance they will sleep with me when they realise I'm heterosexual,' admitted Graham, a 28-year-old computer expert from south London.

Gay best friends are a celebrity must-have - Madonna is seen out with Rupert Everett, Geri Halliwell turned to George Michael in her hour of need, and Sex And The City character Carrie Bradshaw relies on gay friend Stanford Blatch. But now, according to tomorrow's edition of Cosmopolitan magazine, heterosexual men are taking advantage of the vogue.

Geoff Saunders, the homosexual author of Other People and Watch My Lips, says the tactic has gained popularity over the past 18 months.

'It was the gay community that first coined the name Strays,' he said. 'I've seen Strays in action as far afield as Glasgow, Manchester, Leeds and Brighton.

'The gay community is divided about this tactic: on the one hand, we find it amusing and can understand why straight men do it; girls love hanging out with gay men because they want someone they can chat to and have a laugh with without worrying about ulterior motives.

'Obviously not all gay men dress and act like these men, and it's insulting to suggest we do. In reality, these men are not pretending to be gay, they're simply pretending not to be heterosexual predators on the pull.'

The ruse occurred to Graham a couple of years ago when a girlfriend told him one of his most attractive qualities was being unusually open for a heterosexual man. 'I didn't start pretending to be gay as a deliberate, cynical tactic right away,' he said. 'But the thought just grew until I decided to give it a proper go.'

Allan Pease, who co-wrote the recently published Why Men Can Only Do One Thing At A Time And Women Never Stop Talking with his wife Barbara, has observed the phenomenon in other countries.

'Men have begun testing this Stray technique in America and Australia too,' he said. 'But it's doomed, no matter what country it's tried in, because women all over the world want the same thing from their men, and that's someone they can trust.'

What began as a joke for Graham and his friends has become a routine: he estimates he can pick up twice as many women when in Stray mode than he can when approaching them as himself. Now, when he goes out to meet women, the chances are he'll pretend to be gay.

'I admit it still feels a bit odd to actively try to downplay my masculinity, but if I end up with a girl it's a temporary sacrifice I'm prepared to make.'

Farndell, an architect from Essex, agrees. 'I'm more successful and less nervous if I treat dating almost as if it's a sitcom or I'm a character in a film. You're not putting yourself on the line.

'To tell a woman you're gay is the end of everything,' he says. 'You need to make absolutely certain she can't accuse you of lying or deceiving her. The knack is to nuance your behaviour so she assumes you're homosexual but, when she realises you're not, feels it was she who misread the situation.

'Dancing is always a good ploy because heterosexual men aren't supposed to be able to move. That's a really big mistake on their part, because most women love dancing.'

The deception didn't seem to trouble Erika Johansson, a 25-year-old fashion buyer for a designer clothes label who approached Farndell as he danced with Graham and was soon shimmying up and down his side.

'To be honest, the only reason I started dancing with Dan was because I didn't think he was going to hit on me,' she said later. 'I could just be myself.'