In regards to the term, Driver's epistemology finds that it is 'a young, white, and performed masculinity that can be fetishized, consumed.
The term twink has been accused of relying on ' ageist and racist tropes of youth and white desirability' by Susan Driver. Ī backronym has been constructed for twink, according to which it stands for ''teenaged, white, into no kink', although these specified traits are not universally accepted as either necessary or sufficient to classify an individual as a 'twink'. The food is described as 'little nutritional value, sweet to the taste, and creme-filled' by comparison, the young men are described as 'short, and blond, and full of creme', with creme being a euphemism for semen. Īnother possible origin of the term may be a derivation from the American snack cake Twinkie, commonly regarded as the quintessential junk food. Oxford Dictionaries claims twink has origins in the 1970s. Some trace its first appearance to 1963, although it may be derived from an older British gay slang term twank, which means: 'The quarry of a homosexual prostitute (male) a man willing and ready to become any dominant man's 'partner' '. The exact origins of the term twink are disputed.
