Disempowering men to speak about or owning up their sexual need for men

I wonder if a discussion on Tearoom Trade would help us in matters pertaining to queer choice. Tearoom trade, for those who don't know, is impersonal sex in public places—highway truck stops, public restrooms, parks—between men (I haven't heard about women doing this). Queer theorist Michael Warner spoke on my campus last year, and he regards this practice to be a vital part of queer life; he said that gay (-identified) men had always considered it important to turn public spaces into sexual spaces. Anyway, whether Tearoom trade is good or bad is not the focus here. The focus is on how this practice intersects with identity issues.

Laud Humphreys, a doctoral student in Washington, did an ethnography called "Tearoom Trade: Impersonal Sex in Public Places." He reports that partner selection and negotiation are all accomplished silently; no words are spoken. Sex may be dyadic or group sex. It is usually oral sex. A weird sort of community develops; the men are intimate, yet they do not know each other. A "watch queen" stands at the door of the restroom to knock on the door if anyone is approaching. The encounter is anonymous, quick and furtive (it has to be). Anyway, curiosity killed the cat for Mr. Humphreys—which made for a good book but bad ethics. He noted down the license plate numbers of the participants and followed them home, claiming to be a health researcher. He made the men and their families fill out surveys. What he found was that these avid tearoom traders were married fathers, leading double lives.

Now, if these men were married fathers, they obviously weren't queer-identified. I read an article on this topic recently that said that it was silly to demand to know if a Tearoom trader identifies as queer; answering such a demand would imply speech—which is a no-no in Tearoom trade situations. The article concluded that queer identification and sexual orientation were situational.

Men would be sexual with men only as long as they can avoid the 'queer' identity

I had the opportunity to visit a tearoom recently (blush blush); this is a porn video arcade near my town. The hallways and booths are without light. In the booth, TV screens show ten channels of straight porn and only one channel of gay porn. Outside each door, men stand silent, like Buckingham Palace guards. If a man walks in and enters a booth, the man at the door goes in there with him. As I was in a booth, a very cute older man walked in and started fondling me. I reacted, perfectly naturally, I thought (naïve old me) and gave him a little kiss. The man got upset and left in a hurry. Why, I wondered, does this man have no problem with wanting to give me a blow job, but have a problem with a little kiss?

Friends tell me that he is probably like one of Humphreys's respondents. Married and closeted—he can get kisses from his wife. If he were out and proud, why would he be at a tearoom? I am inclined to agree; the stress in the whole space seems to be man-sex WITHOUT any assumption of a (stigmatized) queer IDENTITY for the participant. Which is why one watches straight porn all the while through the act; which is why no words are spoken; which is why men keep a scowl on their faces through it all and depart hurriedly afterwards.

.....

Just another straight experience

He was just not geared to think about love and bonding with another man. When I invoked him sexually, he responded very subconsciously, positively to it. But the moment he became aware he held back. But then started to get more and more drawn. He also started to get drawn emotionally.

He could barely accomodate the physical part of it, very, very superficially, without acknowledging it. But he neither wanted the emotional part nor he knew how to deal with it or 'nibhao' it. Not because it is not natural for men to do so. But because, the nature was never allowed to develop in him, like with other 'straight' males.

While physically and emotionally he was getting united with me -- more on the subconscious level, even if he kept fighting it on the concscious level, the more conscious part of him, continued to run after girls, to seek emotional and social union with a girl.

Therefore, he thought nothing of breaking the 'deal', the 'essence' of this bond. He couldn't honour this essence, and started to openly court girls and seek to develop relationships with them.

When I retaliated and threatened to leave him, suddenly he would be forced to leave that girl but that would leave him seething with anger at me, and then he would try to hurt our bond as well. He wanted to get out of it, but just couldn't.

In all this running away from me, one day he suddenly fell in love with a girl. It seems it was his first love. He fell head over heels for her.

It broke my heart and left him. He didn't get that girl, and he couldn't deal with my loss too. He changed himself a lot in the beginning when threatened with losing me. For the first time he indirectly acknowledged our bond.

But, as soon as I seemed to return (I hadn't actually, I just wanted to see if he could change as much as I now wanted him to change) ... he was back into his old ways again. He wanted a sexual relationship with me, but very, very superficially, without showing any sign of intimacy, whether emotional or social.

He haven't got down to anything remotely sexual yet, because, in the first part (before he fell in love with the girl) he was running away from it, and today, I don't want to give it to him, unless he changes.

And that is the story of man's oppression. Of how he is broken from another man. This is the ugly reality of Heterosexuality, which is portrayed as so noble and respectful by the society. Heterosexuality is a demon, an evil that forcibly breaks men from his basic nature and turns him into a monster, an unfeeling, unnatural, selfish individual with a stone for heart.

You can't see this oppression of men, because men have been made to feel so ashamed of this natural reality that he doesn't want anyone to see it. And the society doesn't let anyone see it either. Any discussion or display of it is quickly marginalized into the unmanly, third gender, gay ghetto.

They claim, if you like men, you're one of those 'homosexuals' so, its only scientific and reasonable that you go there.

This is just part of the whole oppression process. Part of the conspiracy against men.

There is certainly a conspiracy against men. Otherwise, such strong oppression cannot happen without someone actively working to make that happen.

Coping with pressures to resist the need for affection from other boys in boarding schools

Is homosexuality common at boarding school?

The school I attended was a co-educational school. That is the boys and girls were in the same lessons. The only difference was they were in different dormitories and sports were single sex.

So place yourself in the shoes of a young child far from home. With nobody to cuddle them when they are sad or hurt. What happens - well these children have a few options.

(1)Crush any desire for affection and touch.
(2)Seek this from other children.

Many of us, who have attended boarding school from a young age, learn (1) and we will usually have gone through (2), been thoroughly humiliated then learn to do (1).

Bearing in mind that dormitories are single sex I think this answers the question of where (2) comes from.

poster: JGEE

Whores exerting their invisible power to kill real manhood

There was this 'heterosexual' girl (the kind which in men's spaces we used to call 'whore') in my office who in the present heterosexualized world had quite a lot of power over men and their freedom to express man to man intimacy.

When I was new to the office, she tried to flirt with me, but I kept away from her, and made it obvious that I was not interested in her... (i do like girls but, I was looking for a monogamous bond with a guy). Being a modern girl, she did her calculations and in her mind, partly arrived at the fact that I was 'gay'. There was no way I could tell her I am not 'gay', eventhough I like men, because there's just no scope for me to talk about these things. I had to keep a 'heterosexual' image.

Anyway, I actually liked a guy in the office and we started doing the straight flirt -- and unfortunately, he turned out to be her boyfriend... I dropped that guy like anything... but not before she became aware of what was going on and got determined in her mind that I was 'gay'. Her boyfriend fell in love with me and didn't want to let me go. But, she started to guard him like anything and made sure that we did not meet in her absence. Once when her boyfriend called me in her absence she made a great hue and cry about it, though

Then a new guy came in office, and I soon reaslized he was what I had been looking for all this time and we quickly became involved with each other. He was a macho guy, and we started sitting too intimate with each other. It was completely normal in an Indian setting. And no one would have noticed, but people who suspected my 'sexuality', including another guy I had flirted with. This girl immediately knew what was going on.

She became bitchy about our intimacy and when we were sitting too intimately with each other with our legs on top of each other, she turned back from her seat and started to look at us in anger. She was looking right at my legs that were touching his crotch, and looking in a very angry, disaproving way, rotating her wide eyes, and then she asked, what is going on?

My macho friend, who was not only too young, but also very, very careful about his straight image was taken aback. He had done nothing which was outside the scope of 'straight' in India. He was taken off guard but managed to tell her confidentally that we are having a "man to man talk".

After that my friend became very cautious about how he interacts with me, and this create a big barrier between our relationship. He stopped being intimate with me after that... not in the same carefree manner, he used to do till now.

.....