Several years ago, I became a friend of Gavin D. on Facebook and some other social media sites. He was a college wrestler from Wisconsin, about 200 miles away from my college town.
He never mentioned girls, but he mentioned other boys quite often. I figured that he was gay, but not quite ready to come out yet.
His younger brother Manny was quiet, artistic -- also gay-coded.
Apparently Manny was feeling left out, with two wrestler brothers and a sister who was a gymnast. At age 14 he joined the wrestling team, then began bodybuilding combined with intermittent fasting. Strength training is fine for teenagers, but they are generally discouraged from bodybuilding until their bone structure is fully developed, and their body fat should not drop below 6-10%.
Manny shredded down to 3%, then down to an unhealthy and unattractive 1%. Soon he was competing in venues like the Brew City Classic in Waukesha, and was the the subject of adulating video and articles "Insane 16 year old bodybuilder!"; "The Wonderkid Bodybuilder"!
More after the break
He never actually won a competition; the adulation came mostly from the novelty of a super-shredded teen. When he got to college, he stopped posting on social media, and I moved on to other things (I lost track of his older brother, too).
I've been doing several posts on amateur bodybuilders, and today I thought of Manny again. His Instagram has some recent photos, buffed but not shredded, with fans complaining that he lost his edge.
And his tagline: "Faith filled family man." "Faith filled" usually means "homophobic," and "family man" usually means "I have reproduced, so I'm infinitely valuable." He never mentioned a girl on his social media, so I always assumed that he was gay.
Besides, as of this writing he's 24. When did he have time to get married, have children, and turn homophobic?
Older brother Gavin is "faith-filled," too, but at least he has time for "what's important": hanging out with his buds.
Wait -- his Facebook profile is a close-up of hand-holding. One of the hands has red nails. Dude is straight, too, or maybe bi.
O Tempora, O Mores, O Sh*t
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