Who Gets to Eat Pizza Before Gay Sex?

There’s a scene in Comedy Central’s underrated sitcom The Other Two that’s one of the most honest depictions of gay dating I’ve seen on TV. Struggling actor Cary Dubek (Drew Tarver) goes on a first date with the attentive teacher Jeremy Delongpre (Daniel K. Isaac).

They have to decide who gets to eat the pizza.

Here, I have to thank the stellar writing by co-creators and former Saturday Night Live head writers Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider. When it comes to how queer people date, specifically gay men, bowel movements and the foods that cause them can derail a night from the get-go. Deciding who gets to eat the pizza can tell you more about a couple’s compatibility than any icebreaker about dogs or cats.

Gay men are notorious for starving themselves in anticipation of bottoming — that is, receiving anal sex — later that night.

Or we proclaim our radical decision to choose food over bottoming.

Rarely do we acknowledge, though, that most people can eat and fuck without poop making sex a fecal threesome. While it’s popular, maybe even progressive, to use bottoming emojis and identify as tall bottoms, the issue is this: Whatever a man fed your hole can never make up for physical starvation after sex.

It’s certainly not a concern for the tops — and so it shouldn’t concern tops what their partner eats before sex. As porn star (and tastemaker of the bottoms) Ty Mitchell previously told us, Shit Dick Summer is not over. It’s time for bottoms to take a stand.

Remy Duran, sexually fluid former contestant on the most recent season of MTV’s Are You the One? and Twitter’s King of the Tops, has made it his mission to let bottoms know that if they’re fucking, he’s okay with whatever happens after you split the chili fries. “As a boyfriend who’s a top, I would never allow my boyfriend to [starve] — because I look like this tyrant,” Duran tells MEL. 

For some bottoms, they enjoy douching or fasting as mental preparation. “It’s nice to have a pre-sex ritual,” OnlyFans star and bottom-rights icon DamagedBttm previously told me of douching before sex. “It’s like warming up before a workout, or pregaming before going out to bars.”

If you’re worried about painting your partner, you can stop eating at least two hours ahead of time. “After eating an average meal, your gastrocolic reflex may kick in within an hour,” Elena Ivanina, a gastroenterologist for Lenox Hill Hospital in New York who blogs at Gutlove.com, tells MEL. Gastrocolic reflex is when food stretches out the stomach, stimulating colon mobility and causing a bowel movement. If you’re lactose intolerant, you might discharge as quickly as 30 minutes after eating.

But don’t starve yourself just to avoid a little poop. “Who can just eat a salad for dinner and have the energy to have good sex?!?! You need fuel to fuck well!” David, a 47-year-old from Los Angeles who has over 25 years’ experience having sex with men, says over Twitter DM.

David had a fecal phobia in his 20s when first exploring his sexuality. It took entering a 15-year relationship at age 26 for David to fully understand his body’s bowel movements. “When you’re with someone that long, you tend to not get as paranoid about this sort of stuff,” he says. “And because I wasn’t so worried during that time, I saw how my body worked.” He learned greasy pizza was off-limits before sex, but generally, pasta was fine.

That’s great for coupled-up men like David. But what about perpetually single gays like me? For us bottoms still navigating dating life, there are certain foods that will help us firm up our stools and avoid diarrhea. Ivanina, the gastroenterologist, recommends more fiber-based meals. We are not worrying about being low-carb in 2020! Eat those Olive Garden breadsticks — but order that Sweetgreen grain bowl, too.

But nothing is more healthy than simply accepting our power as bottoms. “I’ve literally had to just tell guys ‘No’ when they try to go near my ass,” says Frank, a 37-year-old gay man from San Francisco who requested to remain anonymous. But over time, he learned to embrace the bottom rights movement. Now he’s relaxed his standards a bit: “Just make sure you wash your ass when you shower.”

As we enter a new year, we’re embracing No Paint Shaming 2020. We bottoms must reclaim our confidence (and our holes) from tyrannical tops. Remy Duran sums it up, comparing mid-sex poop to overhearing a parent with a crying baby: “I don’t know if I became desensitized or if I just grew up and stopped caring. But if you’re a mature adult, it doesn’t really matter.”

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Joseph Longo

Joseph Longo is a culture and entertainment journalist whose work has appeared in The Associated Press, Entertainment Weekly and more. He's still trying to understand what it means to be a Gemini Rising.