Alternative title: Carrie Prejean makes me realize I’m completely crazy and probably a hypocrite.

This Miss California has been all up everywhere in my eyes and ears in the past two days.  Here’s twenty words about what happened if you haven’t heard: In the Miss USA pageant, Miss California was asked about gay marriage by judge Perez Hilton during the interview section, she said she was against it, and she came in second place.

It’s kind of an interesting situation, but I don’t really want to debate the fairness or legitimacy of anything involved because Perez Hilton is a professional troll, beauty pageants are silly, and everyone in this situation is wrong.

What struck me is this MSNBC clip juxtaposed her saying “marriage should be between a man and a woman” and then Obama saying the same thing.  I felt my fight-or-flight getting into fight mode when she was talking – tensing up, feeling myself getting angry – but then calming down once Obama was speaking.

I think I have homophobedar.  Gaydar exists, science says.  Why not? Could this be the missing chapter to Malcom Gladwell’s “Blink”? 

Additionally, I might be crazy.

It’s a 9-minute clip, but the section in question is from 2:45-3:10.  The whole piece is pretty dece.
 

Anyway, am I the only one that, despite the words they’re saying, feels like Carrie would be weirded out by two dudes holding hands and Obama would be completely fine with it? 

The problem is that this is just a gut feeling, and I don’t really have much data or prior knowledge of this phenomenon to clearly describe it.  The only explanation I have is that they have different microexpressions, with Prejean’s being mainly disgust, while Obama’s is sadness? I’ve only seen one episode of Lie to Me; I’m not very qualified in facial coding.

For another example, since I’m explaining this so poorly, let’s go over to the world of stand-up comedy.

First, listen to this 30-second clip of Patton Oswalt talking about New Yorker sweater vest-wearing fags.

Now check out this 30 second clip of Larry the Cable Guy talking about the gay mafia (there’s a weird beeping noise after the joke fyi):

Patton’s material is objectively more offensive, yet Larry’s more innocuous bit makes me a little nervous and upset, like he’d hate crime me if it were socially acceptable. I also feel that if the two of them told the other one’s joke with the same words, Patton would still not seem homophobic and Larry would.

A series of ponderin’ questions:

• Does this make sense to anyone?  Has anyone else experienced this phenomenon of intuiting a person’s level of homophobia?
• Is this me being biased, because I already liked Obama and Patton? And does that bias affect this?
• Or is it that I liked Obama and Patton because I can sense this?
• Why is this?
• Is this all nonsense, and should I have posted this Monday afternoon?