Yesterday I kicked a guy out of my bedroom, out of my house. Shouting, furious. Get the fuck out and stop wasting my time. He's a "dom top" who saw me as a "sub btm", so this was flipping the script. In the script running in his head, him being dominant meant he could inflict discomfort and it was my job to take it. Dominant sex does it for me, but lack of skills really doesn't. Not in another top, anyway. I say "another", because I was top only myself until about this time last year. My own script is more about getting lost in the moment, not following orders or submitting to another bloke. Ineptitude in a top pulls me out of the scene. I find myself thinking "I could do this better" - spectating critically, rather than playing along together. The guy last night used his fingers, roughly, with nails, without lube, and I stopped him and kicked him out. Not just because it felt unpleasant. It became clear he thought "dominant" excused him from having to learn how to be a good top; that's how that script works in his head.
Sexual scripting (Laumann & Gagnon) is conceptual terrain that Trevor has worked with productive results, suggesting that a major script for bottoms is using their bodies to complete circuits of pleasure and power (in plain but possibly reductive language, "giving pleasure to the top"). I agree with him that it would be fascinating to study the scripts that tops enact in their play, but it would be a tricky area to study. Many of the fantasies involved are wildly socially unacceptable. Often a top keeps them to himself while playing along with a different, more socially acceptable script. The interviewer probably needs to be a top himself to ask the questions and understand the psychology, but this could incite bravado (one-upmanship) and produce an interview dynamic of amplification. I would personally face a struggle with my Catholic, feminist, best gay boy upbringing to not downplay that content in my write-up; writing about my own life I still frequently introduce theory and let the intelligent reader figure it out.
Last night's bad sex experience suggests a couple of things about the role sexual skill plays. Someone asked me if he was just a newbie, and oddly enough, I can't imagine a newbie making the same mistakes. They might struggle with insertion (as every new top does) but they'd be more likely to err on the side of checking too much on how I was going. As it happens, I'd played with this guy before and said no thanks to playing again; he asked why not and I told him, in detail. And then he modified exactly nothing when he got back in my bedroom. No doubt partly because his script allows no speaking parts to anyone he casts as "bottom". But I also figure he suffers from some kind of erection-induced learning disorder: the moment he gets hard he can't remember anything you tell him, and talking about sex gets him hard. It's a vicious cycle.
I'd like to add another layer to the analysis via Mihail Cziksentmihalyi's concept of flow, the state in which arousal and control (ie skill) are perfectly matched. In that state, creative work just flows: you look at the clock and eight hours have passed without your noticing. It's diagnostically useful, too. My own writing problems typically occur when I have high arousal (care too much about the topic, or I'm really stressed out) and I lack the writing and conceptual skills to match the complexity of the topic or the intensity of my feelings about it.
I think we can use that concept to explain what makes good sex work. I also think it's relevant in a prevention sense to the practice of intensive sex partying (Prestage & Hurley, Hurley & Prestage) where a premium is placed on choreographing a balance between pleasure and intensity on one hand and bodily, chemical and HIV risk management on the other. It's easy to see how arousal and control interact with sexual scripting. To last night's dud root, the "dominant" script clearly meant he didn't need to be (or learn how to become) a good top. And to be fair, my relative lack of bottom skills meant that my own script was unsustainable, where a more experienced player might have continued and managed his top to completion of his script and his own satisfaction. That's something I'm careful about in my practice as a top -- I find out beforehand what script turns a prospective partner on and how much skills and confidence he's got, and I meet him there. The whole experience has also got me thinking about what skills and sensibility make a good top -- but that might be a topic for another posting.
Remember the hot butch in the Ray Bans who made out with Gaga in the prison yard scene of the epic Telephone music video? Turns out she's a personal trainer named Heather Cassils. In a great interview for out.com, Cassils discusses depictions of queer women in pop culture, performance art, and the experience of sniffing at Gaga's cigarette glasses. Here's a clip:
I've been in shoots before, and I've worked with other artists, and there's this thing where they try to femme anybody up -- especially when it's mainstream media. And there's this expectation that you're either going to fit on one end of the spectrum or the other, so I really appreciated that I literally showed up on set and was allowed to go just as I am. My body is a complete construction.
Not really a music video. More of a bizarre short film with musical interludes. Quite something to see.
And PS she has such a chameleon-face! Which is why she will undoubtedly stay very famous for many years to come. She knows how to keep morphing, keeping people interested. The comparisons to Madonna are not far off the mark. Well, Madonna of yesteryear anyhow.
Marzo 8 de 2010. En el mismo dÃa me tocó ir a una mesa de debate sobre el dÃa internacional de la mujer, escuchar hombres a favor de la interrupción legal del embarazo, comentar con mis compañeras activistas sobre cómo muchos hombres siguen/seguimos en la lógica de hablar de temas de mujeres en el mismo tono de voz que Ricardo Arjona (vaya mentada!) me tocó el chisme de que en una mesa de debate por la tarde a una de mis amigas le tocó escuchar el comentario de un muchacho que sólo tomó la palabra para decir "las viejas se siguen victimizando un chingo" para irse acto seguido de concluida su frase, y en el evento/kermesse/exposición colectiva de una escuela de arte me tocó ver a una mujer con un pin muy grandote del tamaño de un pañuelo de esos que van en la solapa y muy interesante además, que decÃa "yo no celebro muertes ni conmemoro guerras"
If you live in Michigan, please ask your representative to vote no if and when HB 4583 comes to a vote in the House. From the MM:
Under the proposed changes, a patient will sign a general medical consent which includes permission to test for HIV. If a physician decides to run an HIV test, they will have to get verbal consent before ordering the test and note it in the file. However, a patient is not allowed to verbally decline an HIV test. Patients who do not wish to be tested will be required to put that in writing.
[...]
Mark Peterson, a spokesman for Michigan Positive Action Coalition (MI Poz), a group of HIV-positive people and their supporters in Michigan, said the legislation was not needed.
"I think the problem with this legislation is that it is an answer seeking a problem," he said, noting that hospitals and other medical groups in Southeast Michigan have been complying with the current law, which requires anyone ordering an HIV test to provide a patient with pre-and post-test counseling, as well as sign a specific document on the issue created by the Michigan Department of Community Health.
"It does concern me that we are eliminating that requirement," said Byrum.
The bills sponsor is Representative Roy Schmidt (a democrat from Grand Rapids), to whom I just wrote this note:
Representative Schmidt,
I'm writing in regards to HB 4583, requesting that you withdraw it from consideration. As a sociologist who studies HIV/AIDS for a living, I can say that this law is unnecessary and will do more harm than good. HIV testing is a very sensitive practice that requires a great deal of trust between doctors and their patients. Consent for HIV testing is essential for that trust to be possible. As you are surely well aware, many new infections in Michigan are among African American men who have sex with men - a population that already holds a relatively high level of distrust for medical providers due to experiences of prejudice and mistreatment. Thus, this legislation will damage what is already a fragile relationship between these men and their providers, which would *lower* HIV testing rates due to men avoiding medical attention altogether.
If passed, this bill will have dire, unintended consequences. Please, I ask sincerely that you reconsider this unnecessary and wrongheaded legislation.
California, rich in resources, rich in human talent, rich in industries, and very rich in the rich, can afford a first rate education system. But our quagmired political system (minority rule), anti-tax political culture, upsidedown state budget priorities, and the configuring of higher education itself on the model of a business -- these have demoted public education to the status of a failing discount store.
Indeed, there is more at stake here than the loss of a great system of education, than the madness of permitting oil wealth, real estate wealth, Silicon Valley wealth, banking wealth, Hollywood wealth, agribusiness wealth and prisons to grow ever larger while starving our schools. There is more at stake than the madness of cutting the fuel to the economic engine that generated so much innovation and capacity in California during the last century. It is also the case that there can be no democracy without an educated citizenry.
Without quality public education, we the people cannot know, handle, let alone check the powers that govern us. Without quality public education, there can be no substance to the promise of equality and freedom, no possibility of developing and realizing individual capacities, no possibility of children overcoming disadvantage, or of teens reaching for the stars, no possibility of being a people guiding their own destiny or of individuals choosing their own course. Above all, there is no possibility of being a self-governing people, a democracy:
As the world grows more complex and integrated, as the media grows ever more sophisticated and powerful in shaping events and ideas, what maintains democracy is not the technical instruction into which resource-starved schools are rapidly retreating. It is not the reduction of high school to 2 years, college to 3, not vocational training for the many, but the kind of education through which future citizens learn to understand and engage the complexities of this world.
We already intuitively know this, but it's worth reiterating that unemployment rates and education level are highly correlated - and those without any higher ed have suffered tremendously during this downturn:
The moral of the story: Providing resources for people to access quality higher education at low or no cost must be central to a class-conscious political agenda.
"Being fucked into an orgasm without touching yourself is something that bottom boys like me dream of - it's a fantasy because it's so downright difficult to achieve. It's only happened to me three times, and each time poppers made it possible. Here's why."
I had already been having sex for a decade before I tried poppers for the first time. They always seemed a bit seedy and scary to me - classified under the header "drugs" in my mind and thus were suspicious. But there I was, on all fours, when suddenly my partner put a bottle under my nose and instructed me to breathe in. "What the hell?" I thought. You only live once!
It is difficult to describe the kind of sensation that poppers provide. A bit of chemistry to start. Chemically speaking, most are members of the alkyl nitrate family and they are found in stores in liquid form. They may be labelled as "video head cleaner" or -- the more ridiculous and more common label -- "liquid incense." (Amyl nitrate -- the most famous of the family -- is also a medical treatment for cyanide poisoning!) To call them fragrant would be misleading. While they have a strong aroma, it is not the kind you want your linens smelling like when you wake up in a luxurious hotel. It's more noxious that alluring, a fact that scares many away.
Poppers have the direct effect of relaxing your body's smooth muscles (including the chocolate starfish!), which results in the dilation of your blood vessels and thus an increased heart rate. This is why you should never use them with Viagra or other ED medications - the result could be a dramatic drop in blood pressure and heart attack.
Okay, chemistry and medicine aside. Let's get to the good stuff. The first time anyone attempted to describe what they did for them, it was a friend with a few years of experience under his belt. He looked at me dramatically in the eye, and with a very serious tone told me this: "It's like you're going to die from a disease whose cure is lodged deep inside you. Your partner has to get it out." What a statement, indeed! I was a bit taken aback.
Live from Acapulco! Well, not quite live - but we did film this past weekend on our beautiful balcony during our Spring Break vacation in Mexico. Me and Maxime have quite a great episode in store for you, complete with frank discussions on being a femme bottom, having sex without fear of HIV, cruising, vacationing with straight friends, and having straight friends in general. Fasten your seatbelts, girls, it's gonna be a bumpy ride!
When you live in Michigan, you start to forget what the sun feels like on your face. So for Spring Break each year, Maxime and I travel down to Mexico to meet our friends Nolberto (who blogs here!) and his partner Chema for a week of mischief and splendor. Aaron joined this year, and after a 14 hour journey (2 flights and one bus ride) we made it to Acapulco for some fabulousness.
Anyholler, obviously blogging will be a bit slow this week. But I'll be popping in to share a photo from time to time :)
Got something to say about gay sex, but don't want your name attached? Every Wednesday starting next week, we'll be posting anonymous columns from gay/bi/queer men just like you! Anything goes: Best sex you ever had, tips and tricks you've learned along the way, and reflections on the trials and tribulations you've encountered in your sexual escapades are all welcome.
Submissions should be at least 500 words with a rough maximum around 1000 words. They will be posted in the order received, with editing only for grammar. Send your submissions by e-mail to . Include a title and I'll publish them here under an anonymous user account. Once published, the e-mail will be destroyed. Your identity will never be revealed!
Looking forward to reading and sharing your dirty thoughts!
"Risk" as a conceptual approach for much of the research on health has come under attack from many sides. Risk is everywhere and nowhere, it seems. When it comes to gay men's health, gay men's sexual risk practices have particularly been scrutinized by researchers who wish to stop gay men from doing such naughty things as having sex without condoms. Many have suggested that rethinking "risk" (traditionally conceived of through the lens of an isolated rational actor making complex cost-benefit analyses aimed at maximizing returns and minimizing harm for him/herself) as a concept is a necessary step towards creating a more effective / ethical / social public health.
As I was reading for my class today on the Sociology of Law, I came across this very interesting distinction between "risk" and "uncertainty" that gets made in the literature on organizational behavior:
"On the whole, then, high-technology start-up financing poses challenges not only of risk but also of uncertainty. Although lay parlance often employs these terms interchangeably, the organizational decision-making literature uses them to describe two distinct conditions. Under conditions of "risk," decision-makers may not be able to predict the future deterministically, but at least they can describe it probabilistically: with a little effort, individuals can identify the full range of options and outcomes, and they can determine roughly how likely it is that any given option will produce any particular outcome. Consequently, despite the presence of risk, decision-makers can still make rational choices based on expected-value calculations, and markets can still produce efficient coordination based on contingent-claims contracts.
Uncertainty, on the other hand, arises when decision-makers cannot determine either (1) the full menu of alterative behavioral options or (2) the relative probability of alternative possible outcomes. Unlike risk, uncertainty is deeply incompatible with the neoclassical model of fully rational decision-making. Instead of producing a careful expected-utility analysis of all lines of action, conditions of uncertainty tend to produce "boundedly rational" decision strategies, involving "good enough" choices, gut feelings, and rules of thumb. At a more macroscopic level, uncertainty elevates transaction costs and exacerbates intra-organization strains and power struggles. Consequently, unresolved uncertainty poses a fundamental cognitive and organizational obstacle to the formation and maintenance of stable markets for high-technology start-up capital."
-- Suchman, M. & Cahill, M. (1996) "The Hired Gun as Facilitator: Lawyers and the Suppression of Business Disputes in Silicon Valley." Law & Social Inquiry, 21(3): 679-712.
So my questions of the day: What would it mean to reconceptualize men's safer sex practices as enacted in an environment of uncertainty -- rather than in an environment of risk? Is "risk" really the appropriate concept for understanding these complicated, negotiated practices?
It's day three of sickness. Hence my old movie marathon. Today I'm watching Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, featuring Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell. You'll remember the famous "Diamonds are a girls best friend" scene. But today I thought I'd highlight this GAYtastic scence featuring Jane and some scantily clad dancing muscle-queens. Enjoy!
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