Gay WeHo a Twink Town? Scruff Says No

It probably won’t surprise anyone to learn that West Hollywood is not where the bears are (you’ll need to head east to Silver Lake for that).

But some recent research on Scruff, the gay mobile app that offers the most search options, contradicts the larger gay community’s perception of WeHo as “twink town.” In fact, only four percent of Scruff users in the West Hollywood area identified themselves as twinks on a recent day, while 66 percent identified themselves as the far more masculine “jock.”

The Urban Dictionary defines “twink” as “the gay answer to the blonde bimbo cheerleader,” which may be one reason why it’s not an category many WeHo Scruff users choose to describe themselves. The term is widely believed to come from the famed Hostess Twinkie —  tasty with no nutritional value.

On the other hand “jock,” as defined by Mister Hollywood, means “muscular with low bodyfat and attractive.” There’s next to no connection between gay jock and athlete, although there certainly are plenty of games gay jocks play.  Some make the connection between jock and “jock strap,” an underwear item favored by many gay men because it calls attention to what makes them men.

The second largest category (49 percent) of WeHo gays is “geek.” Even Urban Dictionary, the largest compendium of hip terms, hasn’t been able to put a definition to that. But the implication of “geek,” given its use to describe those who are tech-savvy, is “hipster,” an old term only your Daddy might use.

Speaking of daddies, WeHo has a decent share of those, with 22 percent of Scruff users identifying themselves as such. There are even a couple of guys in the 18-24 age bracket who define themselves as such. Go figure! Urban Dictionary describes a “daddy” as a “gay man who is usually middle-aged (40-60+), who has a more dominant personality and doesn’t mind providing monetary funds and/or protection and guidance to his mate/boyfriend … but his mate doesn’t have to be that much younger than him necessarily for the term to apply.”

And finally, you really do have to head to Silver Lake to find the bears, those voluptuous yet masculine gay men who take pride in the fact that their waists are larger than their chests. Our Scruff research shows that in gym-loving WeHo, only 14 percent identify was such. But then again we weren’t using Growlr.