Gay Relationships Doomed?

Those who have it keep talking about how easy it is to find but in practice, this is not really the case. All I've seen is people who have either been single all along, were in a relationship but are now taking a break, are in an open relationship, are in a relationship but are cheating on each other, just got into a relationship and are madly obsessed with each other or are in a relationship but spend very little time with each other (classic straight married couple where both busy themselves with their careers and/or children).

I don't want to come off as sounding extreme. I have seen people who are in healthy relationships and do spend a lot of time with each other as well as apart but that's one in a million. In some ways, I might've summarized any relationship regardless of gender or sexual orientation in my cases above but I just see it much more often in the gay community.

As if all these observations weren't bad enough, now there's a book validating this fact. There was article in today's Metro with the title "Perennial Singledom Affects Gay Life." In the article, the following facts have been listed:

• 40-60% of gay men are single. This is one-third to two times higher than for lesbians and heterosexuals, and many gay men will spend most of their lives unattached.
• The happiest gay singles are singles by choice.
• 20% of gay men say their current best friend is an ex-lover.
• According to one gay therapist, "Shame about being single has been a common theme in my support group. We've internalized the notion that it's somehow better to be in a relationship so there must be something essentially wrong with us if we've arrived at midlife and we're still single."

The author's recommendation is to come to terms with the fact that you will be single for the rest of your life: "If I'm going to be single for the rest of my life, what am I going to do to be happy? Once you start breaking it down into things like companionship, then start asking yourself how you can have that in your life now. Don't assume that having a boyfriend is the only way to get that."

I have two things to say to this. Firstly, most gay people are not in relationships because they're too damn picky and they think with their penes instead of their brains. Whereas with the heteros, marriage is generally about compatability, with the homos, it has everything to do with how a person looks and nothing to do with how they are. A lot of the people who complain they never find boyfriends will also dismiss people based on ONE photograph or the wrong skin tone or an imperfect feature. And I just love the justifications: sorry, not my type (based on one photo) or sorry, not into asians or his nose is too big. And I just love it when people have a list of all they're not looking for in their profiles. I get a feeling that I'm going to have to submit an application just to talk to them and they've listed out the criteria I must possess to qualify. Give me a break! If you do that, please don't whine about not finding a boyfriend!

Secondly, I'm a little confused about the intentions of the author. He's essentially saying accept that you will be single forever and look for whatever you're looking for in a relationship elsewhere. Well, most gay men are doing exactly that. They go to bars/clubs/bathhouses for sex and they get emotional support from their friends. A relationship combines the two things and for many gay men, there's a disconnect between the two and sex becomes purely a bodily, and not an intimate and spiritual experience. And I think that's where the problem of the community lies. But by saying "accept you will be single forever," he's just promoting the bathhouse culture. Not that there's anything wrong with that if that's what you want but not everyone wants that.

I'm not saying I have all the answers but based on what I've seen, successful relationships require a lot of work and compromise. If you live your life only for yourself, then you will obviously not be able to do that. And while gay men are a little more in touch with their emotions than straight men, they are, in the end, men who think with their penes first and then their hearts last which is why, statistically, lesbian relationships are the most stable, then heterosexual and then gay male relationships.