Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today?

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

"Because you see, if it were me, I would feel free to say that I was gay!

(But I'm not gay.)"
If You Were Gay, Avenue Q

The opposite of Everyone Is Gay, Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today? is a trope that takes place in a genre filled to the brim with Ho Yay. So, to compensate for this, every other line of dialogue comments on how some character is straight and their relationship with someone else is platonic. Every other cast member also comments on how this person is in fact in a totally normal-type relationship. Not That There's Anything Wrong with That, but they aren't.

This isn't just a story that turns someone straight or just takes a hardline on Ship Tease... this is a story where nobody will shut up about it, ever. Naturally, because of Suspiciously Specific Denial, many people will interpret this as a case of Transparent Closet whether the character is gay or not. And like all tropes, people will invoke this on purpose.

If they're not just trying to convince people which way they swing but that they swing at all, it's Have I Mentioned I Am Sexually Active Today?

Contrast with Have I Mentioned I Am Gay?. If a character achieves this through acting gay, that is Gay Bravado. Contrast Armored Closet Gay when the person is both homophobic and gay.

Examples of Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today? include:

Anime and Manga

  • Gojyo from Gensoumaden Saiyuki lives to constantly remind everyone in the Sanzo Party that he loves the ladies, yet outside of one episode not canon to the comics, Gojyo has never been with a woman despite his good looks. He has the strongest gay vibes of anyone in the group, picking to particular person to shovel that on to. It doesn;t help that the mangaka has a history in BL mangas.
  • The infamous Sailor Moon season three dub had everyone, even random Monsters Of The Week, blessed with the knowledge and the compulsion to comment on how not only is "Amara" the cousin of "Michelle", but so were Sailors Uranus and Neptune cousins. The fact that the dubbers were lazy and forgot (or did they?) to remove many Les Yay scenes made it even more of a farce.
    • Some hardline Sailor Mars fans claim her abortive crush on Mamoru in the television show (and found nowhere else) was an attempt to downplay the fact she Does Not Like Men, since none of the other boyfriendless girls has a similar subplot. Ironically, the idea Rei leans a bit is a running gag in later seasons. Newer adaptations seem to avoid giving her romantic pursuits altogether. The original manga version had her regain memories of her past life where she made a vow of chastity to the Princess. She gets no romance what so ever after this, though a flashback chapter does show that a man more or less broke her heart before she regained her memories which may have added another reason for keeping that vow.
  • In The Wavering of Haruhi Suzumiya sexually-insecure teenage Narrator Kyon is very careful to remind the reader of his heterosexuality in this story where men seem to be constantly be implying attraction to him, either through Three Is Company misunderstandings or just being Itsuki Koizumi.

Now let me set the record straight, I am an absolutely normal heterosexual male. My preference for "the same team" weighs less than that of a humming bird, in other words, it's non-existent. Whether subconsciously or unconsciously, my preference has been "straight". See? Aren't I right? My body would go hot just thinking about Asahina-san. If Koizumi had called me saying such stuff, I would've hung up already. By the way, I'm not bisexual either. Do I make myself clear?

    • Kyon is a master of this trope, and due to his role in the story may be edging into Suspiciously Specific Denial.
    • Actually, this might not be as deserving as it seems - Koizumi, for one, isn't all that homosexual in the original novels (largely seems to be an invention of Kyo Ani, who knows their audience too well,) and this is one of the only "I'm not gay" moments in the novels (presuming the fan translations to be accurate.) Kyon's wordy denials of things are a characteristic trait of his narrational style, and are as likely to be Thou Dost Protest Too Much (especially when denying feelings for Haruhi and/or his enjoyment of the crazy adventures around him) as they are to be genuine denials. Besides, that specific incident came right after what sounded like an incredibly Soap Opera-ish confession of love by an old classmate over the phone. It makes things a little uncomfortable for Kyon until the classmate clarifies that it's for Yuki.
  • Yuki of Gravitation spends the first couple of books reminding Shuichi about how totally straight he is. Less ironically, Hiro is also very conscious about his status as the token heterosexual around.
    • The creator seems to enjoy throwing in little bits of Hiro-Shuichi Ho Yay everywhere. Witness the pocky incident in the very first episode. Also when Hiro is about to leave the band ("Your dream is my dream!" "And your dream is my dream!"). However, his crush on Ayaka is perfectly sufficient to serve the purpose of pairing him up and signaling to the audience that Hiro is (mostly) straight and the Ho Yay isn't going anywhere.
      • And remember the doujinshis the creator published herself... we see Hiro is really bisexual, if anyone considers those canon.
  • A slight variation: In the hentai anime Frantic, Frustrated, Female and its sequels, the main character regularly refer to her friend as "onee-chan" (sister) and her landlady as "okaa-san" (mother), which is the emotional relationship she has with them. Every time she uses these words, and I mean, EVERY time, the subtitling is quick to point out that they're not related, and thus the lesbian sex scenes do not imply incest. M'kay?
  • Arashi from Paradise Kiss has to remind both the readers and George that he is heterosexual, thank you, about as often as the latter brings up the subject that he plays for both teams -i.e., fairly often.
  • Something of an example in Angel Densetsu. While not intended as gay, it was noted that the character Yuji displayed a lot of Ho Yay towards the hero. Thus, in later parts of the manga, Yuji develops some Belligerent Sexual Tension with Ikuno, thereby establishing him as heterosexual. But he still wanted to really to go hug the hell outta him when he revealed his Woobie past...
  • Kaorin from Azumanga Daioh says she's straight, though it's quite obviously a coverup.
  • In the Lucky Star manga Konata once stated while she is a yuri fangirl she is not a lesbian.
  • While not actually said, Shugo Chara made it clear that Nagihiko is straight in episode 56 when he's assigned as the newest Jack's Chair . He refuses, and Tadase, as an attempt to change his mind, shows off his Bishie Sparkle. However, Nagihiko isn't at all amused by this. Later, when Tadase and Kukai tell Amu, a girl, about Nagihiko being the new Jack, Amu lets out her own Bishie Sparkle, to which Nagihiko cannot resist. This alone counts as enough evidence that, yes, he likes girls.
  • In Revolutionary Girl Utena, Utena makes sure to tell Anthy that she, despite all appearances, is totally just into normal boys. Played for Drama: Utena is only 14 and simply doesn't know what love is yet, and her desire to be straight leaves her wide open to the destructive sexual manipulation done by Anthy's brother Akio.
    • Later on in the series, this is Played for Laughs when Touga claims to be straight. Even though his Ho Yay with Akio is through the roof, and the two are actually seen rolling around on a bed together with their pants undone. Not to mention the number of scenes where Touga and Saionji are shirtless together for no apparent reason.
  • In a case of "Have I Mentioned I Am A Heterosexual Male Today?", Kyo of Girl Got Game, a Sweet Polly Oliver worrying that her secret has been compromised, tries to reinforce her cover by going around groping girls wildly. The results are mixed.
  • In The Tyrant Falls in Love, the main character Tatsumi, even after he has consensual sex with Morinaga, insists that he "is not a damned homo!".
  • Yuuri, the main character of Kyou Kara Maou, finds his cries of "Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today?" largely ignored in a world where, apparently, Everyone Is Bi. It doesn't help that he's got an all-male harem. Or a male fiancee. Who he adopted a child with.
  • In The Familiar Of Zero has the flamboyantly Camp Gay stereotype bar owner Scarron, such as wearing dresses and having his all female staff refer to him as madamoiselle. Come to the surprise to both the viewers and the cast that Jessica is his daughter.
  • In Angel Beats!, Hinata has to continually reinforce to Otanashi that he isn't like that, subverted later in the series.
  • Played for Laughs in Baccano! with Christopher Shouldered. Being under the impression that his Vitriolic Best Bud Chi might have a crush on him, Christopher tends to punctuate any sort of statement of affection with the fact that he's not into men, lest Chi get his hopes up. Chi just begrudgingly puts up with it like the rest of Christopher's eccentric behavior.


Comics

  • One issue of Birds of Prey has Black Canary going up against Talia, daughter of Ra's al Ghul. Talia's main power appears to be wearing Stripperiffic outfits and dominating people with her vampy dialog. But Canary isn't the least impressed with her because 'I'm heterosexual to the bone!'.
  • Used repeatedly in several CAPTAIN EXCELSIOR strips after Ward sleeps with the owner of the Homosexual Intercourse. #47 #48 #51 #52
  • Seems to strike Gotham City Sirens when Paul Dini isn't writing, Ivy must mention how she likes guys or fall for a male plant alien or yell about how she's forever alone. Some people really can't handle the Ivy/Harley relationship.
  • Deadpool deliberately cracks jokes about his own Ho Yay with people half the time, and spends the other half saying homoerotic stuff about Cable / Weasel / Spider-Man, only to immediately retract it and insist that he's totally straight. If this sounds contradictory, remember that he's completely off his rocker. Possibly the best example came when the Black Mamba's powers made him picture his greatest fantasy - rubbing suntan lotion on Cable's back at the beach. "That was not my fantasy! It was you - that Darkforce stuff planted that image in my head!"
    • And when he tried to prove to Black Mamba, Asp, and Diamondback that he was clearly heterosexual, he dropped his pants to show off. He still had on the yellow panties from earlier, when he was in a Marvel Girl outfit to "distract Cable with my sexy legs."


Fan Works

  • The Girl Who Lived: Rose Potter, who despite ogling naked girls and going to sleep with Ginny and waking up in a spooning position, is totally not a lesbian.
  • Sonichu: Christian W. Chandler would like to remind you to STAY STRAIGHT!
    • This is the main reason some hold to the idea of it all being mega-epic Trolling. He discusses what he has to do to 'stay straight,' nicknames himself Chris-Chan, compares himself to Chun-Li of all Street Fighter characters, and on and on and on, but is absolutely definitely not one of those evil gay people, really.
  • How Hogwarts Became a Nudist Colony: "Draco is straight now."
  • Light and Dark The Adventures of Dark Yagami: Dark Yagami could have this trope renamed in his dubious honor.
  • Go to YouTube, and look at any Animated Music Video depicting a really close relationship between two characters of the same sex. A very large percentage of the ones that aren't Shipping will comment in the description that it's not a Yuri/Yaoi video. Naturally, this makes you think about it more. The fact that they're usually set to love songs makes it funnier.
  • Marik in Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series. He constantly denies that he's gay, despite a penchant for The Little Mermaid, tight clothes, and his evil BFF Bakura, as well as a fondness for reading Yaoi.

Marik: Wait a second, are you coming onto me? I already told you, Bakura, I'm not gay!
Bakura: Could've fooled me.
Melvin: And me!
Marik: Hey, shut up, you don't know anything about me!
Bakura: Marik, he is you! He knows everything about you.
Marik: He is the gay one!

    • And now Yuusei and Jack from Bonds Before Time Abridged. Yuusei starts the movie by assuring Jack that liking Top Gun isn't gay, as how could a movie about men calling each other cute nicknames, playing half-naked volleyball and riding phallic vehicles at high speed be anything but straight? He spends the final duel engaging in a lot of Ho Yay with Yami, before repeatedly waving it away with a 'no homo'. Yami is... much less insecure.

Yugi: You know, you always were my favorite protagonist.
Yuusei: Right back at you, Yugi. It feels so good to know you'll be playing with me. (sexy music, intense eye contact) No homo!
Yugi: Ah, yes...no homo...indeed.
(later)
Yuusei: You can ride with me anytime, Yugi. (sexy music, intense eye contact)...no homo.
Yugi: Ah yes, I was just about to say, uh, no homo.
(later)
Yuusei: You can be my wingman anytime, Yugi.
Yugi: No, Yusei. You can me mine. (sexy music, intense eye contact)
Yuusei: No homo, right?
Yugi: All of the homo!

Sora: Right—and what are we betting?
Riku: A kiss.
Sora: What?
Riku: I mean… a kick. In the ass. I'll kick your ass if you don't. Because I'm not gay or anything.
Sora: Who said you were?
Riku: Nobody. Because I'm not. Yeah. Totally straight. I love chicks. Yay boobs.


Film

  • Jay of the View Askewniverse. In Clerks he rambles about performing oral sex on Silent Bob (who remains completely deadpan throughout, suggesting he does this a lot), then leaps away, flexes menacingly and shouts, "I hate guys! I LOVE WOMEN!" In Dogma his response to being accused of fantasizing about men is "not all the time," which is as good as an admission that he does some of the time. Then there's his habit of referring to Silent Bob as his "Hetero life-mate."
  • Halfway through the "I Like Boys" number in Teen Witch, you'll be thinking those girls are obviously in serious denial.

The Nostalgia Chick: Movie, stop! You're trying way too hard!

    • From the comments section..."Having never seen the movie this is from I can only assume that this musical follows the story of a lonely lesbian girl who must deny her true passions while watching girls in leotards dance around the women's locker room singing about their heterosexuality."
  • Rapper Alpa Chino in Tropic Thunder has built his career around this trope. He's gay.

I love the puss (hell yeah)/I love the pussy (hell yeah)/I love the pussy rollin' down to the floor

Watney: (looking at a blond girl) Oooh, yeah, I love 'em!
Tom Servo: I am so heterosexual!

  • Achilles with his words and actions in Troy, since the very first minutes of the movie. Cousin. Totally my cousin. In conclusion: cousin.
    • This backfired somewhat since, ironically, Achilles and Patroclus were indeed cousins, but this didn't preclude their being lovers in Ancient Greek society. Cousin relationships are far from universally taboo, whatever America/Hollywood thinks. Troy's principal inaccuracy was in making Patroclus younger; in fact, he was the older of the two according to the Iliad.
    • The Iliad shows the two as close friends in the style of other Greek heroes; it was later Greek writers who put the two together as a couple. Pederasty was a practice of Classical Greece; evidence of it is practically nonexistent during Mycenaean times (when the Trojan war was thought to be fought) or during the Greek Dark Ages (when Homer was thought to have lived).
  • It doesn't get more blatant than the last line in Clue, by a man being blackmailed for being supposedly gay:

Mr. Green: I'm going to go home and sleep with my wife.

    • Of course, the joke in that particular ending is that he really isn't gay, he's an undercover FBI agent who has been pretending to be gay and to have been blackmailed for it. Or, arguably he really is gay, having to pretend to his FBI superiors that he isn't gay and for the sake of the mission he had to "pretend to be gay".
  • Seth in Superbad: 90% of his dialogue is about how much he wants to have sex with girls who are far more attractive than a guy like him deserves, with the remaining 10% being devoted to his obsession with his "best friend" Evan.
  • Near the end of Bruno, the main character claims to have achieved his goal of becoming heterosexual. In fact, he proves it by hosting a cage-fighting show called Straight Dave's Man Slammin' Maxout, and giving the audience a speech about how hetero he is. The audience loves him at first, but become enraged when he passionately makes out with another man in the cage.
  • In The Lord of the Rings, especially the extended cut, the filmmakers felt the need to make sure that we pointed out that SAM IS NOT GAY, despite all the unfortunately Ho Yay scenes later on. So, they forced in a few scenes with Rosie, who he does marry in the book as well, but who's hardly mentioned.
    • A few scenes apparently equals one scene in Fellowship and the payoff of the marriage in Return of the king. Out of 12-ish hours of film. The fact that they got over the homophobic Values Dissonance that has come into play since the books were originally written and portrayed such a close platonic friendship between two men is progress.
    • Oddly enough they felt no such need with Merry and Pippin, who are just about as blatant and actually end up living together at the end of the book. Maybe they just decided to go with it in that case.
  • Nearly all male characters in the 2009 Star Trek film find some way to imply their heterosexuality, as noted by RedLetterMedia's review of the film.
  • In Class Act, hip-hop culture is so foreign to Duncan's father that when Duncan begins associating with Blade, his father thinks Duncan might be gay! He finds out the hard way at the end when he catches Duncan having sex with his girlfriend Damita.
  • In Orgazmo, Dave the Lighting Guy has a habit of prefacing everything he's about to say with "I don't wanna sound like a queer or nothin'..." with everything he says following this statement becoming increasingly homoerotic as the movie progresses.
  • Obviously actual sex isn't an issue because the characters are toys, but in Raggedy Ann And Andy A Muscial Adventure, Andy feels the need to insist that, even though he's a soft, cuddly ragdoll owned by a girl who's into dresses and tea parties and all the finest in stereotyped little girl interests, he's a super-macho manly-man action type guy and he'll fight anyone who even thinks the word "makeup".
  • In Plan B, Bruno repeatedly hits on Pablo, kisses him, and even proclaims his love for him. But he's not gay. Really, he's not. He's just doing all this to drive Pablo away from Laura so that he can get back together with her. Hell, the mere notion that he could like Pablo in that way for real is enough to send him running for the toilet! Likewise, Pablo isn't gay either and makes sure to tell Bruno that when Bruno tries to get them to kiss for "practice" for some commercial. Over and over again. They do eventually accept that they're gay for each other, at the very least.


Literature

  • In The Hollows series, Rachel repeatedly mentions not being 'wired that way' regarding Ivy (especially after she invites the vampiric Ivy to bite her in A Fistful of Charms).
  • Despite being surrounded by hawt bisexual men, Anita Blake goes out of her way to mention that by the way, she doesn't like girls at all and she isn't bisexual and so on and so forth. This doesn't stop her from snogging a gorgeous siren, or "holding fingertips" and gazing into the eyes of a stripper who's offering her a free lap dance, but... she's really straight, dammit!
    • Bella Morte, fountain of blood for a line of vampires with sexually-based powers, gave her mind-boggling oral sex in a magical dream.
  • In Lamb the Gospel According To Biff, John, after being in an awkward gay moment, says things like, "Well, she looks like a nubile wench!" while pointing at an adulteress. (She was nubile, so points to John for working outside of his element.)
  • In one of the original Greyhawk novels, the protagonist begins acting as stereotypically masculine as he possibly can - openly leering at women, deliberately wearing worn out or dirty clothing, etc. - because he's worried that a gem he's been using to increase his magic is turning him into a woman. It isn't.


Live Action TV

  • On The Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert isn't gay, but he does claim that "Men know what men like". He also claims that the "Gay Agenda" (e.g. baby carrots) is to turn him, specifically, gay.
    • In the Christmas special, he repeatedly gets caught under mistletoe with his special guests. Eventually, he makes out with a grizzly bear. The end credits make a point of noting that 'Female Bear' was played by Matt Brady.
    • Then there's the rainbow-themed closet parties he threw in college. Or the spectacular line "refuting" the gay-rights argument that nobody accuses straight people of choosing to be straight—it went something like, "Damn right I chose to be straight! I wake up every morning and fight those urges!" Or this Daily Show piece which contains the classic line, "We don't hate gay people." "We're just angry at the ones who turn us on."
    • Played with on this segment[1] when Ricky Martin came out of the closet.

"Just look at him on the cover of Rolling Stone! Surrounded by naked women... who I'm sure he is just seconds away from noticing! Right now, he's too busy staring straight into the viewers' eyes as if to say, "You and me man, both totally straight! Ha-cha!""

"I enjoy the theater, I've enjoyed it all my life,
I enjoy it with my female woman wife!"

    • And while we're on the subject, Tek Jansen has obviously had hundreds of girlfriends.
  • It was rumored that Star Trek: Enterprise was going to have the franchise's first openly gay main character, and that this character was Malcolm. In fact, it transpired the possibility had been discussed with the actor but was eventually rejected. In what may or may not have been a response to this, the writers started to show him talking about women or flirting with women pretty often. His actor Dominic Keating, however, declared that he played Reed gay anyway, and considering his interactions with Tucker, Archer, and Hayes, fans tend to believe him.
    • However, one episode involving the future crew being descended from the current crew as a result of time travel stated that he died a bachelor, causing him to look disappointed and vaguely pensive. It could be taken as an implication of his true sexuality, though that's probably not what was intended.
    • Lampshaded in the final episode in which Riker is speaking to Malcolm and then appears to ask him if he found Trip attractive - we discover however the scene has secretly changed, and Riker is now addressing Hoshi.
    • Star Trek: The Original Series: Have I mentioned I am screwing Green Skinned Space Babes, and not Green Blooded First Officers today? Fangirls still aren't convinced.
  • Inverted with Jody Campbell of Soap (played by a young Billy Crystal). In the earlier seasons, he would shoehorn mentions of his homosexuality into damn near every scene he was in.
    • Though to be fair, this was usually in response to another character (usually Bert) either insinuating or overtly insisting that Jody would be less gay if he would only date more women/do manly things. So basically, nearly everyone in the cast was obsessed with pointing out (or, in some cases, rather stridently denying) how very gay Jody was.
      • This also had to do with the fact that his brother, Danny, was adament that Jody was really heterosexual and a joker, absolutely refusing to accept that he was gay until a touching scene when he left the house to go into hiding from the mafia.
      • There was a frequently-reused shot of the Campbell family around the dinner table, at which Jody fastidiously (almost artistically!) buttered and re-buttered the same piece of bread for what seemed minutes on end. Seemed to be intended as a giveaway mannerism, or did I read too much into it?
    • There was also a great moment in Season 4 where he went to a doctor to sort out his sexuality, demanding he was gay even though he had a biological baby with a woman he had gotten pregnant and was in love with another woman. Bisexuality was never introduced...
  • Scrubs: Turk and JD. Oh, Turk and JD.

J.D.: [waking from an Imagine Spot] STOP IT! I DON'T HAVE GAY JUNGLE FEVER!
Turk (to Carla): Okay, we should go!

    • Even in the Musical Episode in which they have an entire song celebrating their "Guy Love", they find it necessary to mention that "There's nothing gay about it / In our eyes".
  • Jack Benjamin, crown prince of Gilboa in Kings, does this as a matter of policy, making a big show of what a boozy, party-hard womaniser he is. He gets a horrible surprise when he finds out his father has known all along. Quoth king Silas: "I've been keeping pictures of our family out of the free press for years... Wrestle it to the ground, numb it with ice, but you cannot be what God made you. Not if you mean to take my place."
    • Jack is, of course, the Ho Yay interpretation of King Saul's son Jonathan, who had a covenant and very... hands-on relationship with David—even while David was Saul's biggest enemy.
  • In a Friends episode, when Chandler is trying to get a date for Rachel:

Chandler: I say, Drew! Are you seeing anybody right now? (Drew looks at him) Og-ee-op, I'm not asking for me, I'm? I mean? No, I'm-I'm not gay, I'm not asking you out. I'm not-I'm not-I'm not gay!
Drew: I didn't think you were gay. I do now.

    • There's also "The One With the Baby on the Bus"; a woman mistakes Joey and Chandler for a couple while they're out with Ben, so later when two women start talking to them, this occurs:

Woman: So what are you guys out doing today?
Joey: Oh we're not out. No, no. We're just uh, two heterosexual guys, hanging with the son of our other heterosexual friend, doin' the usual straight guy stuff.

  • A variant occurs with the Narrator of Breaking the Magician's Code. The male narrator takes the opportunity in every episode to mention to us just how much he appreciates the Masked Magician's hot female assistants. This is, of course, accompanied by the camera work adopting a Male Gaze.
    • This just makes things more hilarious when he says something like "The secret to this illusion is hidden in the Magician's pants."
  • For most of her first season on Skins, Naomi Campbell (not that one) made numerous protestations of her heterosexuality. Since she'd say this in between passionate makeout sessions and even sex with Emily, neither Emily nor the audience were inclined to believe her.
  • Tomboy character Jo from The Facts of Life balances out her butch behaviour when she first arrives by constantly referring to her boyfriend Eddie, and getting into relationships with men more frequently than the other characters. Efforts to femme her up became increasingly blatant in later seasons. By the final season, she was married and wearing a skirt. Presumably, this was either to make her more marketable, or to discredit the Les Yay Subtext between Jo and Blair.
  • iCarly: Tomboy character Sam has a few episodes that seem intended to remind the audience that she's not actually a lesbian. One of them has her becoming "girly" to impress a guy. But still ends up beating a bully, impressing the guy with her strength... and he's never seen again. At best they have caused Sam to be considered bisexual, and episodes have just increased the Carly/Sam subtext by way of scenes like Carly chasing her around trying to get Sam to say words like "panties" or things like having Sam ripping a dress off Carly to perform in a beauty pageant.
    • One theory is that the attempts to remind the audience that she's supposed to be straight is the result of Executive Meddling, only for the writers to make it even better. It does seem like the subtext has increased a lot.
  • With all of the Ho Yay on Whose Line Is It Anyway?, Colin Mochrie has reassured the audience that he is heterosexual when things have gotten waaay over-the-top.
    • After Ryan talks about how much he and Colin love show tunes:

Colin: I'm married!

    • After Ryan kisses him on the lips to incite a Drew Carey Spit Take:

Colin: I need to get home to my wife...

Ryan: That sounds great, doesn't it?
Colin: It sure does! I'm not confused about my sexuality at all!

  • Craig Ferguson of The Late Late Show often inverts this as a gag.
  • This trope is played with by a character itself, not the creators of the show, in an episode of Glee where gay character Kurt, after coming out of the closet, decides to act like a stereotypical straight guy, wearing flannel shirts and attempting to speak with a deep voice, even making out with a girl, in an attempt to fit in better and believing it would make his father love him more. Throughout the episode he constantly asserts his newfound "macho" status, but no one really buys it (except Brittany.) He goes back to his normal, flamboyantly gay self in the end.
    • Earlier in the series, before he comes out, Kurt calls the club's disco routine "really gay." After Kurt comes out to Mercedes but before he does to his dad, Kurt tells Finn he isn't gay.
    • Santana, who tip-toed out of her Armoured Closet in order to confess her love for Brittany, only for her to leap back into it when she was turned down. The next time the two met, she blamed the whole thing on temporary insanity and made sure to point out that she was now going to write an awesome heterosexual song about her boyfriend. She then got so flustered by Brittany looking at her that she asked her to look away in order for her to remember her locker combination.
  • The song "Bret You Got It Going On" from Flight of the Conchords starts with this, ends with this, and is filled with a truly remarkable amount of Ho Yay. As mentioned several times in the episode, it's totally not gay when Jemaine puts a wig on Bret and spoons him, because he's imagining Bret's a woman.
  • Parodied in a sketch on Smack the Pony, involving two female actresses filming a lesbian kiss scene. One of them, clearly somewhat homophobic, is given to loudly expressing how disgusting she finds the whole process once the cameras have stopped filming, and at one point demands that an aide call her fiancee and "tell him I love him." Unfortunately for her, her co-star is clearly nursing quite a heavy crush on her at least, and keeps suggesting that they might need to retake the scene a little too frequently and eagerly.
  • Seinfeld gives us this gem:

Jerry: "This jacket has completely changed my life."
George: "Can I say one thing to you? And I say this with an unblemished record of staunch heterosexuality."
Jerry: "Of course."
George: "It's fabulous."

  • MAD TV parodied Michael Jackson's "You Rock My World" and its video as "I Do Like Girls", referencing the tendency of several of his videos (including this one) to portray him as a ladykiller, while his Real Life behavior suggested he that part of his private life, well, private. Anything that did go off-message was too odd to tell.
  • Virtually every single episode of Supernatural features some little scene or line of dialogue for Dean to assert his heterosexuality/masculinity. Dean gets more than all other male characters on the show combined, often at the expense of his brother, who despite being shipped around in fandom is still by far the less slashable of the two. Funny, that.
    • These sometimes backfire quite spectacularly. 'Posse magnet' - Getting Crap Past the Radar or just Dean wanting to be surrounded by cowboys?
    • In 'Sex and Violence' Dean declares his glee over working a case involving strippers. Later in the episode we see him in a strip club devoting all his attention to bonding with a very male FBI agent. All the more amusing since the agent turns out to be the siren they're hunting and Dean was totally oblivious.
    • "My Heart Will Go On" has "Besides, Titanic didn't suck that bad." *Cue Sam looking at Dean funny* "Winslet's rack?"
    • In "Let It Bleed" we also get "I was too busy having sex with women." (Naturally, fans have often interpreted this as Suspiciously Specific Denial for Dean.)
  • This lyric from the 'Pretty Bunsun' number on Muppets Tonight

Jonny Fiama: Pretty Bunsun...I'm not really into that...

  • An almost laughable use of this trope in one episode of The George Lopez Show, where a girl that can easily be confused for having to fathers has one or both of the men say some line that assures the audience that they sleep with tons of women all the time, multiple times, in every scene that they were in.
  • John Watson from Sherlock is very adamant on his straightness. Unfortunately, nobody believes him, not even his girlfriends. Saying 'I'm not gay!' doesn't ring very true since he's more or less obsessed with Sherlock, would die for him in a heartbeat and displays unbelievable amounts of jealousy over Sherlock's connection with Irene Adler. The fact that he and Sherlock are terminally codependent and all but boyfriends anyway doesn't help. At this point, it's entirely possible not even John believes his own assertions.
  • Frat boys Eric & Jeremy of The Amazing Race 9 spent roughly 90% of their screen time talking about how much they liked girls. Seriously, you could probably make a drinking game out of it.


Music

  • "I Like Goils" by Type O Negative fits this to a T, written after frontman Peter Steele (R.I.P) posed nude for Playgirl and discovered a great percentage of the readers were male. Whether or not it is a parody of hypermasculinity and homophobia or played straight is anyone's guess nowadays.
  • Katy Perry's I Kissed a Girl: A song about girl-on-girl kissing that implies she is drunk and so "lost [her] discretion", doesn't even know the girl's name, that the name doesn't matter anyway, that it "ain't no big deal", that she hopes her boyfriend doesn't mind (got that, right? her boyfriend) and that it doesn't mean she's in love tonight. The video pushes it further, while not featuring even a single kiss, as it still ends as All Just a Dream, and she wakes up besides her boyfriend.
  • Anytime a rapper says "No homo," it's this trope.
    • Mocked furiously by The Lonely Island in a song called "No Homo", in which a bunch of male friends get together and do increasingly homoerotic things (up to and including both having gay sex and actually coming out of the closet), all under the justification "no homo", which totally means they were just kidding.
    • Unintentionally (and hilariously) subverted by radio stations who started blocking out "no homo" as a slur.
  • If I were gay, I would give you my heart/And if I were gay, you'd be my work of art/And if I were gay, we would swim in romance/But I'm not gay, so get your hand out of my pants. Courtesy of Stephen Lynch who ends up shagging the friend he's talking to in the song.
  • The song “Heterosexual Man” by The Odds smacks pretty heavily of this.
  • The Team America: World Police song "Only a Woman" plays this for laughs: Only a woman can brighten up my day/Only a woman can touch me the right way/Only a woman is allowed to touch me there/All I ask is that you're a woman. (Or a man.)
  • Jon Lajoie's character MC Vagina in the song "I Kill People":

So if you'll come at me I'll trip you then I'll suck your nuts
I-i mean I'll punch your nuts
Sucking them would be gay and I'm totally not gay
I'm all about V-A-G-I-N-A.

So I took her to my crib, and everything went well as planned
But when she got undressed, it was a big old mess, Sheena was a man
So I threw him out, I don't fool around with no Oscar Meyer wiener
You must be sure that the girl is pure for the Funky Cold Medina
You know, ain't no plans with a man
This is The Eighties and I'm down with the ladies
Ya know?

Theater

  • Avenue Q. "I wish you could meet my girlfriend, but you can't because she is in Canada!"
    • "She's my girlfriend, my wonderful girlfriend, yes, I have a girlfriend, who lives in Canada! And I can't wait to eat her pussy again!"
    • Beat. Beat. Beat. *orchestra hit*
      • Not in the soundtrack, but onstage, not only the characters, but also their puppeteers, the whole orchestra, and the conductor stare slack-jawed in a seemingly endless awkward moment. Drives it home.


Video Games

  • Gears of War 2 arguably does this. After the raft of jokes about about the homo-erotic 'macho man' overtones of the first game the second repeatedly refers to Dom's Wife and hints at a romance between Marcus and Anya that never serves any purpose beyond re-enforcing his heterosexuality.
    • The achievements for the Co-Op Campaign go the other way with names like "Dom-Curious" in GoW 1, and "One Night Stand", "Open Relationship", and "Friends with Benefits" in GoW 2. Speaking of which...
  • Taken to almost absurd levels in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. Snake and Otacon are living together with an adopted daughter at the start of the game, so rumor has it that Otacon was hooked up with Naomi in an attempt to sink the Snake/Otacon ship, she dies three-quarters of the way of the game, leaving Otacon free to dedicate himself to staying by Snake's side in the Epilogue.
  • Mocked and subverted (in that it brings forth more Ho Yay rather then denying it), in Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World. In a sketch after discovering that Regal killed a loved one, Emil begins to wonder if he could kill Richter...At which point he lamely tries to explain the difference between his like for Richter and actual romantic affection. Keep in mind that this is his Inner Monologue...
    • In the first game, one of the things Zelos says in his first encounter with the party is "I'm not interested in talking to guys", which is occasionally taken as borderline Suspiciously Specific Denial, or at least protesting a bit too much.
    • Guy Cecil in Tales of the Abyss also reminds people this at times, seeing as simple contact from a girl causes him to shout and jump away from her, though in his case it's a major Dude, Not Funny moment. When he was a kid, his sister and all the maids in his house sacrificed themselves to protect him while Duke Fabre was committing genocide against them. He ended up being covered by their bodies for several days on end.
  • Dear, dear Yosuke from Persona 4. Oh, indeed. Yes, partner, of course you're 100% straight, we get it already.
    • Teddie probably fits this too, since, despite all his talk about scoring with a girl, he seems pretty into kissing Kanji or the MC during the King's Game...
    • Kanji: "YOU SAYIN' I LIKE DUDES?!"
  • Wedding Dash has seemingly every other line consist of Flo and Quinn affirming that, despite being extremely close friends and roommates who line up fairly well with the stereotypical Butch/Femme lesbian couple, they are in fact heterosexual.
  • Robot Unicorn Attack is specifically designed to induce this trope in a heterosexual male player. Heavy Metal Edition is a pretty good way to mention that you're heterosexual.
  • Brucie in Grand Theft Auto IV will brag about his female sexual conquests whenever anybody questions his sexuality. Notably, in the DLC "The Ballad of Gay Tony" Luis notices him trying to come on to him, so Brucie defensively claims that he was simply trying to see if Luis was gay.
    • Also in "The Ballad Of Gay Tony" the creators of the game went out of their way to show that Luis Lopez is straight, because the world is not ready for a gay Player Character. A minor hint is Tony only having a gay side earring and Luis only having a straight side earring. Although many jokes are made by friends about Luis's sexuality, they drown the story with "Luis, you're such a straight skirt-chasing idiot." and filling the gameplay with sex. (Don't Worry! It's Straight Sex, Players!)


Webcomics

  • In Misfile Emily makes sure to frequently remind everyone that she and Ash are Just Friends and she has no romantic feelings whatsoever, none at all, nuh-uh, no way for Ash.
    • She does have a justification. She has fallen for Ash, but Ash suffered an accidental Gender Bender, and fully intends to revert said condition. So if Emily turns out to be lesbian, their relationship will not be possible. Unless she turns out to be bi. And all of this is assuming she even remembers that Ash used to be a girl for a while when he turns back into a guy. It's complicated.
  • Hunter of Suicide for Hire does this to some extent when explaining why he defended homosexuality by holding a congregation of protesters at gunpoint. Justified Trope in this case because he's a teenage boy discussing his actions with his best friend who is also a teenage boy, and possibly also because a flashback shows his father's, er, enthusiastic attempts to ensure his son's heterosexuality (by giving him porn when he was thirteen).
  • Monette of Something*Positive originally made a point of reassuring everyone she met that she was not straight. And she failed miserably, because she always slept with every guy within reach... and a koala. She has since improved on keeping her, or just met the right woman.
    • Actually, if this troper remembers right, Monette finally decided not to label herself as either gay or straight, and settled on identifying herself as bisexual.
  • Subverted in El Goonish Shive - Nanase was constantly reminding herself she's straight and blames her attraction to Ellen on Ellen's pheromonic powers, only to find out Ellen doesn't have them anymore, which means she really is a lesbian. Played straight with Tedd, who has often denied being gay because of his appearance. Of course, considering what regularly happens in this webcomic, the sexuality of any main cast member, at some point, becomes quite debatable.
    • To clarify: There's every indication that Tedd really is straight (at least, again, inasmuch as orientation applies with EGS), and totally secure in what there is of his masculinity too. He only brings it up constantly because people are constantly questioning it.
    • Amusingly, Tedd is often romantically involved with Elliot in alternate universes... but always heterosexually (i.e., when one of them is a girl). The Tedd in Ellen's AU "childhood dreams" had a crush on AU Ellen (Elliot's clone) but she didn't reciprocate. Either the author is having fun (not only the readers, but other characters have been treated to Elliot/Tess or Tedd/Ellen, to their squick and/or amusement) or he's implying that the qualities that make Tedd and Elliot such close friends would also make them a great couple, if only parts and preferences worked out.
  • Faz of Shortpacked seems to go out of his way to pursue women simply to reinforce his belief that he's straight, even though all evidence (including his actual sexual relations in the past) contradicts this.
    • Specifically, he chose purity over sleeping with Galasso's hot daughter, and slept with Ninja Rick. However, the latter was only so he could become a Twofer Token Minority (gay and Asian) and keep his job, and he has made repeated advances on Amber, which she hasn't reciprocated. He also seemed sad when Amber hugged him and he revealed he's never touched a woman as much as a simple hug before. Bottom line is that he may be straight, bi, or gay, but he is clearly messed up.

Faz: Faz requires platonic intimacy.

  • In the later issues of Sonichu, every handful of pages is guaranteed to have more than a few carefully veiled hints that the main characters and the comic creator is straight, and usually more than a few not-so-carefully veiled hints, along the lines of "I, Christian Weston Chandler, am straight". He sure brings this up a lot for some reason.
  • In an interesting inversion, Yuki from webcomic Ménage à 3 is afraid that she's turning straight (or bisexual) for Gary, as shown here. (NSFW)
    • Well, as Zii said, "She's not a lesbian, she just doesn't sleep with men", mainly due to her trauma.
    • Sonya, the waitress Zii tricks into making out with her. Notable in that she doesn't invoke the trope until later that night... while eating Zii out. And after that, apparently obsessively, on a daily basis.
    • That is to say, she apparently eats girls out. On a daily basis (her boyfriend has taken to bringing other girls home for threesomes). All while invoking this trope.

Sonya: Thanks to you, I eat pussy on a nightly basis!
*CRASH* as her waitress friend overhears and drops a pot of coffee.
Sonya: I'm... I'm really not a lesbian!

  • Belkar Bitterleaf of Order of the Stick, despite being a shameless womanizer, is adamant about asserting his masculinity at every turn, displaying Squick at the slightest signs of Ho Yay. He seems far more concerned about it than anyone else in the cast.
    • And yet, when Roy gets turned into a woman, Belkar hits on Roy, even though he knows it's Roy, just to mess with him, and claims he's secure enough in his manhood to be able to do that. Hmm.
      • Likewise when Elan's father wonders why they are staring at him (he looks like Elan with a different palette) Belkar fields the question by explaining that they are staring at him because he's hot. From the father's response this is actually quite common and Belkar again takes great joy in tormenting Roy about it, to the point of responding to Roy's threats with "That's what he said".
  • Played with in this Terminal Lance strip.
  • In Homestuck, Jake gets like this in his conversation with the autoresponder, presumably after Dirk confesses and Jake rejects him. To be fair, AR was being deliberately combative and confrontational about the whole thing.

GT: *Blows smoke off red hot irony pistol.*
GT: *NONSUGGESTIVELY!!!!!*
GT: Um.
GT: Yeah.

  • The (fictional) publisher of Jet Dream comic books created comics loaded with Gender Bender and Wholesome Crossdresser characters, but strictly limited boy-on-boy contact (even when one of the boys looked just like a girl) to "D-F-K" (Dance-Flirt-Kiss), and then only for "training purposes." This was apparently due to his idiosyncratic belief that at the dawn of The Seventies, men needed to adopt a "Fem Is In!" lifestyle to survive in the brave new mostly-female world that would ultimately arise from Womens' Lib, sperm banks, test-tube babies, and cloning.


Web Original

  • Mackenzie Blaise from Tales of MU spends a lot of time reminding the readers that she isn't a lesbian, but her relationships with women say otherwise, She's goes into some pretty heavy denial at first - For example, upon having sex with Amaranth for the first time, her initial reaction is to deny that what they'd done counted as sex, and then to inquire into whether Amaranth possessed any special abilities that cause otherwise straight girls to be attracted to her. Eventually, she gets over it.
  • Played straight and then subverted hard at the very last moment in the Zero Punctuation review of Guitar Hero III. Mentioning several times how he got together with guy friends to play the game, in a manly and completely heterosexual way, he finishes the review with:

"...but it's just not as much fun as tonguing another man's balls. [[[Beat]]] I mean, as it used to be. ...I'm not gay".

    • Also mentioned occasionally and in a off-handed way in subsequent reviews. Often just a quick "Not gay" thrown in after a particularity gay statement.
    • After a possibly love-hurt Non Sequitur in his Sims 3 review where concludes that all women are evil, he ends "Incidently, I'm still not gay." (His animated character starts lifting weights as a manly activity.)
    • Even in his Extra Punctuation coverage of Dragon Age 2, where he talks about how he pursued a homosexual romance with a male character and even did a little roleplay on it, to show how roleplay in video games shouldn't reflect on what kind of person you are in real life...he still mentioned his heterosexuality quite a few times...and then stated that David Bowie used to be an extremely sexy man.
  • The [title of show] Show's "What is [title of show]?" [1] bit from Episode 3: "Hey Jim, I'm straight, did you watch the game last night?"
  • Man in the Box: Cameron. [2]
  • Justified-ish in the Athena #1 review on Atop the Fourth Wall. Linkara takes a moment to announce that his dislike of female objectification and pointless nudity is not due to having a disinterest in the female form, since he is not gay. He then apologized to his male gay and bisexual viewers for this, because he's nice like that.
  • When The Nostalgia Critic reviews Independence Day, he fawns over Will Smith for a minute before slapping himself and reminding himself, "Boobs! You like boobs!"
    • Amusingly, Doug Walker tends to go the opposite way. While Spoony and Linkara mention Scarlett, Liz and their fangirls quite often, his fiancée isn't mentioned that much. He'd rather say that there was a Mr. Critic or that he has a "lucky" boyfriend while making an oral joke or striptease for his brother for laughs.
  • Blogging Twilight has the writer describing, "The curve of [Jacob's] bicep looking like a roller coaster track that eyes, and perhaps fingers, cannot help but ride…um…GIRLS HAVE BOOBS AND I LIKE BOOBS!"
  • This parody of Bad Romance is all about this trope and Heterosexual Life Partners.
    • There's also this parody of a Jason Derulo song that might be even more heavy-handed on it.
  • Pegasus of Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Abridged Series actually inverts this trope. While basically screaming at the top of his lungs "Have I Mentioned I Am Gay?" in every single episode, he's as straight as they get. This prompts him into nearly killing some characters for discovering his true sexuality.
  • Homestar Runner: Strong Bad tries to assert his heterosexuality as much as he can, particularly after flirtacious scenes between him and Homestar. And then there's Email brianrietta...
  • The episode of James Gunn's PG Porn, "Squeal Happy Whores", features a guy singing about the sex he plans to have with the girl he's singing to: "I'll be so rough, you'll gag / cause I'm the opposite of a fag!"


Western Animation

  • According to Word of God, Stewie Griffin from Family Guy actually is gay (although he seems more bisexual).
  • Since Static Shock couldn't show Richie being gay, they used this to help get that facet of his character across. (Confirmed by Word of God.)
  • The Boondocks has had some fun with this one. (No homo.)
  • William Murderface in Metalocalypse. It shows in at least five episodes, including a time where he won't eat any food that is longer than it is wide, because it's too close to a penis. Pickles notes that for this to bother him so much, he must be thinking about dicks in mouths all the time.
    • When Dethklok reveals that they will be designing a line of clothing, Murderface takes the podium and assures everyone that even though he is about to enter the fashion industry, he is not gay.
  • Tyler had a line like this on Total Drama World Tour, when he introduces himself to Alejandro right after a bunch of admiring girls did:

Tyler: I like girls.

[Waylon Smithers enters with a woman holding his arm]
Bart: Mr. Smithers? I thought you were, you know-- uh.
Smithers: Ha ha, no I'm straight. As long as I take these injections every ten minutes. [he injects himself] I LOVE BOOBIES!

  • Pasila: Rauno Repomies is interviewed for television, but since someone mentioned the possibility that they might suggest that he's gay, he spends most of the interviews proclaiming he's not, until the only way to get out of the situation with honour is to admit that he is, even though it's not even true.
  • Kyle Broflovski is often Mistaken for Gay with his mortal enemy/frienemy, Eric Cartman. Whether or not it's because Cartman gave him AIDs, or because Cartman sabotages Kyle's date with a girl by singing to him in front of thousands of people, Kyle would like you to know that he is definetly not in any way involved with Eric Cartman.


Real Life

  • There is an entire Facebook group dedicated to this trope in Real Life, called, "I'm Sexually Inappropriate With My Friends But Not Actually Gay". [3]
  • The infamous Real Life press conference called by baseball player Mike Piazza when he was a member of the New York Mets. The sole purpose of that conference, it seemed, was to announce that he was heterosexual. Rumors questioning Piazza's sexual preference had been getting pretty frequent up to that point.
    • Piazza, New York catcher/ are you straight or are you gay?
  • After former U.S. Senator Larry Craig was caught having a homosexual affair, he arranged an interview that was essentially him mentioning he was heterosexual over and over again, with his wife constantly by his side. The Daily Show was naturally all over this. "And look! He's married! To a woman! A she-woman!"
    • And that's not even going into his "wide stance" excuse.
  • Ted Haggard is an evangelical pastor in Colorado and leader of the National Association of Evangelicals until 2006, when a escort and masseur claimed Haggard had been paying him for sex for three years. He went into intensive counselling with four ministers, one of whom later claimed Haggard "was completely heterosexual" This is satirised by the song "Ted Haggard Is Completely Heterosexual" by Roy Zimmerman. (Later, Haggard said in an interview "...probably, if I were 21 in this society, I would identify myself as a bisexual.")
  • A running joke on one season of Have I Got News for You was that whenever Jason Donovan was mentioned, someone would quickly add a variation on "Jason Donovan? Did you know he's heterosexual?" - a reference to his then-topical overly defensive response to claims to the contrary - he sued a magazine which said he was gay. Not because there was anything wrong with that, of course, but because t hey said he was lying about it.
  • When Eric "Eazy-E" Wright of the rap group N.W.A. revealed that he'd developed full-blown AIDS, he pretty much spent the remaining few months of his life telling anyone who would listen that he didn't get the disease from gay sex, but from good old fashioned groupie banging.
  • Cultural critic Devon Carbado wrote that he liked to play a game when reading articles about and interviews with gay author James Baldwin: count how many lines it takes for the author to somehow announce that he is heterosexual, usually via mentioning a wife. According to Carbado, it is always (or nearly always) in the low single digits.
  • Hal Sparks, post Queer as Folk, seems like he has to assert that he is heterosexual in real life at every opportunity by talking about women he'd like to have sex with as much as possible.
  • According to Bronson Pinchot, Tom Cruise was like this on the set of Risky Business.
    • It should also be noted that when Tom Cruise's marriage to Nicole Kidman was breaking up, he sued a French gay porn star who claimed they'd done the deed. There was a reason for that South Park episode.

"Daaaaad! Tom Cruise won't come out of the closet!"

    • Or the episode of Family Guy that suggests that the reason Cruise runs in all his movies is to escape his own gay thoughts (represented by an Imagine Spot balloon of himself noticing attractive men on the film crew).
  • Let's face it—we all know somebody like this.
    • We probably all were like this at one point in our lives, that point most commonly being early puberty.
  • One famous example: When Cindy Crawford and Richard Gere were married there were rumors that the marriage was a cover for one or both of them being gay. In 1994 they placed a full page paid advertisement in the London Times to state "We are heterosexual and monogamous and take our commitment to each other very seriously."
  • Upon becoming President George W. Bush's new Chief of Staff in 2006, 51 year-old bachelor Josh Bolten had a press release sent out, letting everyone know that he lived with his girlfriend and her children. Also, it detailed his loves of bowling and motorcycles.
  • When Cybil Shepherd addressed the 1993 gay rights March on Washington, she opened her speech by recounting how her father asked her, "Why are you addressing the rally? You're straight!" Gotta make sure to get that in the first paragraph, don't you know.
  • From an actual magazine cover: "Justin Bieber! He's young! He's a star! And he just loooooooooooves girls!" Glad we cleared that up...
    • From an official Justin Bieber bio book: "GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS"[2]
    • This is not necessarily to emphasise his heterosexuality. The real reason Bieber is so popular among prepubescent girls is because he is a poster-boy for G-Rated Sex.
  • Christian Weston Chandler has a bit of a problem with this.
  • Fox News was more than glad to help clear up any possible rumors about 2012 Republican presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty. Just to be clear.
  • Vic Mignogna's absolute certainty none of the characters he's played are gay, even Ho Yay-filled CLAMP works, does make one wonder.
  1. March 30, 2010
  2. DRINK! FECK!