We really lost a lot of male emotional connectivity in the last century. It's tragic how many men have grown lonely and then bitter in our atomized society.

I've only ever gotten on there to laugh at the reviewers. The site had potential, but is unfortunately dominated by human garbage.

Gotcha

The wording isn't similar, it is exact. Queequeg tells Ishmael that they are married while their foreheads are pressed together and Queequeg holds him. That said, Ishmael doesn't interpret the act as a western-style marriage and Queequeg doesn't mean it as one.

Queequeg is Polynesian; it's known that historically Polynesians had intimate partners of the same sex. The Maori word Takatapui was employed for such companions. Obviously, the idea of gayness as it is understood now cannot really be applied to people of that era and cultural context, but I think it's fair to say that it was a little gay.

Here's the exact wording, from chapter 10:

"If there yet lurked any ice of indifference towards me in the Pagan's breast, this pleasant, genial smoke we had, soon thawed it out, and left us cronies. He seemed to take to me quite as naturally and unbiddenly as I to him; and when our smoke was over, he pressed his forehead against mine, clasped me round the waist, and said that henceforth we were married; meaning, in his country's phrase, that we were bosom friends; he would gladly die for me, if need should be. In a countryman, this sudden flame of friendship would have seemed far too premature, a thing to be much distrusted; but in this simple savage those old rules would not apply."

Hence the joke.

I only meant to take a lighthearted jab at our modern American conservative school boards threatening to remove all literature that even hints at homoeroticism. I understand Melville was making something of a joke of it himself, but the scene is undeniably homoerotic, and those are Queequeg's words.

I was making a bit of a joke, but it's in chapter 10.

"If there yet lurked any ice of indifference towards me in the Pagan's breast, this pleasant, genial smoke we had, soon thawed it out, and left us cronies. He seemed to take to me quite as naturally and unbiddenly as I to him; and when our smoke was over, he pressed his forehead against mine, clasped me round the waist, and said that henceforth we were married; meaning, in his country's phrase, that we were bosom friends; he would gladly die for me, if need should be. In a countryman, this sudden flame of friendship would have seemed far too premature, a thing to be much distrusted; but in this simple savage those old rules would not apply."

Here I was thinking it was the gay marriage at the beginning.

Edit: For the haters who are downvoting me - I was making a bit of a joke, but it's a joke based on the text of the book. From chapter 10:

"If there yet lurked any ice of indifference towards me in the Pagan's breast, this pleasant, genial smoke we had, soon thawed it out, and left us cronies. He seemed to take to me quite as naturally and unbiddenly as I to him; and when our smoke was over, he pressed his forehead against mine, clasped me round the waist, and said that henceforth we were married; meaning, in his country's phrase, that we were bosom friends; he would gladly die for me, if need should be. In a countryman, this sudden flame of friendship would have seemed far too premature, a thing to be much distrusted; but in this simple savage those old rules would not apply."