Cabin Fever

At first they were just bug bites. Simple bug bites. They were a part of urban lore. Something that would happen to a friend of a friend of yours and finish stories that began with "So I know this guy who went home a girl and..."

But then they started to appear.

My first experience with bedbugs was three years ago when a coworker curiously noticed itchy bites on the back of his neck. It was the dead of January. "That's odd," I thought "what kind of bug bites in the winter" and continued typing. How funny not to think anything of them then. It only dawns on me now that's that what those bites were. The beginning of it all.

Over the years the stories grew more frequent. They seemed to heighten during the summer. The friend of a friend became your friend and the consequence for drunken one night stands now included the only STD you could get without actually having sex.

Soho was the first to be hit. A giant warehouse sized clothing store shuttered for business because of these "little critters." They were nothing at the time. A minor inconvenience. But then South Street Seaport became infested. The expensive clothing stores were quick to act. They covered all stock clothing in plastic garment bags. Their newspaper ads touted "plastic encased clothing" in the same sunny manner as things like "free range chicken" or anti-bacterial soap. But then the New York Times and The New York Post reported stories of people leaving movie theaters with bites. Soon it was less about where you were shopping, and more about where you were going, and who you were seeing.

The bites continued. People stopped riding the subway. They stopped getting in cabs. The risk was potentially everywhere. People began wearing garbage bags over their clothing. Some even went as far as putting surgical masks over their mouths. The paranoia was setting in. And then, as if it were ordained, they began to appear. They flooded the city.

The laundromats and supermarkets were the first to be looted. Food and water was ironically much less of a commodity than containers and anything plastic. People started running for the exits with such haste they forgot about Manhattan being an island. The subways stopped running. The traffic clogged the tunnels. Ferries capsized due to overcrowding. People jumped into the Hudson. The power went out.

That was four days ago.

Through the crackled reception on my radio I can hear scientists trying to blame the outbreak on the heat: This summer has been (crackle) heat indexes in decades. The bugs are a species (crackle) they (crackle) respond to heat. Due to large underground (crackle) probable infestation (crackle) gross multiplication. After that there's nothing but static. I turn my radio off. Then on again. I leave it on.

I've been waiting for another emergency broadcast but one hasn't come for over a day now. I'm on my own. It's alright, really. I have resolve over it. Life sucks. Nature is nature. Bugs are born and if the planet says so, they'll take over. I just never imagined it would be this. What with all the trouble in the world, it just seems so easy and comical that I'd be taken out by humanity's break under a bug no bigger than a chocolate chip.

The gun shots echo up from the street and the screaming of women is endless but what kills me even more is that you guys are in Fire Island right now! Of course you are! Of course you're away from all this! But, what can I say? Work's work. Who knew this would happen? You lucky fucking queens, I swear...

I suppose I do have the last laugh though. I TOLD you this building in Murray Hill was worth something. I'm the only guy alive on my block! This, as you guys say, "dingy" post-war apartment of mine is so well built and tight that the bugs are at a minimum. I'm diet-bedbug here while the city has gone super sized. And, while we're at it, let's just call a spade a spade: You know David's Bagel is the best in the city. Can I get an amen?! Thank you. I'll tell the owner you guys say hi. Last I checked his body was still crumpled beneath the street light.

I can see you now. Speedo clad, mixed drink in hand huddled around the pool listening for the next radio update. The rescue boats from Maryland and Boston should be arriving any minute now. Hell, if they get there soon enough you can get toPtown in time for Tea. If that's the case, which going by your luck, probably is, please tell Tommy I always had an eye for him and if I wasn't being attacked by bedbugs, in a city bursting with chaos, I'd have asked him out.

I knew I shouldn't have picked up that call. You guys begged me not to, but it was just an ordinary day. Had I known I was going to be maggot-food in a week I wouldn't have taken the work call, but it was Saturday afternoon and I already had my fill of booze and boys. Now you guys are soaking it all up. Your own isle of male. I suppose Fire Island is now the literal Never-Never Land we've all been searching for. The place where you never have to grow up. Where you stay young and beautiful forever. Let me know some years down the road whether that legend actually proves to be true or not. That island, that glistening sliver of land. A swimmer on his back drifting at the edge of the ocean. Damn you lucky bastards.

The terror in the streets is growing. The glass is breaking all around me. My radio has been silent for more hours than I'd like to admit. This city, the high rent, the heat, the hustle and bustle and the creepy-crawlies which only exist in the shadows have finally taken me under. The city has officially caved in.

But hey, look on the bright side, at least they don't have to debate building that fucking mosque anymore.

Fact or Fiction: Roxy Reopening

Let me see you put your hands up!

Well the rumors have been circulating for well over a year now. Does anyone have the cold, hard skinny on this? Is the Roxy going to reopen this winter?

I can only hope so! In my opinion NYC gay nightlife took a harder hit than expected when The Roxy closed. Things certainly haven't been the same. Smaller venues, less dancing. Blech! It's a sad era in NYC when the gay men here have no arena sized dance floor to call our own nor a means to represent our enormous presence here in this city.

Whether you went there or not, often or hardly at all, The Roxy was a place where on any given Saturday night you could lose yourself in a sea of men and a throbbing beat that kept you dancing til dawn.

Stepping on to that dance floor made you feel like - - - like you lived in New York City.

1 in 8,000,000

1 in 10 - 1 in 8,000,000

The New York Times is doing a new Photo/Audio project entitled "One in 8 Million" where they follow the life stories of individuals living in and around New York City. Recently, One in 8 Million did a feature on Ra Ruiz, a 22 year old queer youth who identifies as one of the Christopher St. Pier kids. Her story is both brutal and inspiring.

View the project and listen in: It will give food for thought about the Pier Kids and the issues facing them and their surrounding residential West Village community.

Also, click here for a post I wrote last year entitled, "The Importance of the West Village and those God-Damned Christopher St. Kids" on the same subject.

Unbuckling Straps: An undoing of the NYC Leather Community

Past or present?

A week ago the decades-old organization of Gay Male S/M Activists (GMSMA) of New York put the kibosh on their twice a month meetings and community. Over the years numbers of attendees dwindled from hundreds to just a handful and as the letter below states, "there are simply not enough men who are willing and able to step forward to lead the organization."

The letter below was dropped in my inbox a few days ago.

I recently attended the final Wednesday night meeting of Gay Male S/M Activists (GMSMA). That’s right, I said “final.” Finished. Done. It’s over. The organization’s annual meeting on Wednesday, June 17, 2009, was billed as a “celebration of GMSMA." What’s happening is that after decades of being a vibrant, thriving organization of gay men interested in learning about safe, sane and consensual s/m, GMSMA is now “transitioning” into a non-profit foundation. There will be no more Wednesday night programs.

During its heyday, GMSMA had hundreds of members from not only New York City but from across the country and even from overseas. Regular meetings were held twice a month, and it was not uncommon for the third floor meeting room of the gay community center on West 13th Street to be jam packed with dozens or even 100 or more men eager to learn and to socialize. One night the topic might be how to tie up your boyfriend in really good rope bondage, another time you could learn all about flogging and whipping, or how to put together a really kick-ass cop or firefighter uniform....

GMSMA was also an activist organization. Its leaders were instrumental in securing a place at the table for the leather community in groundbreaking gay civil rights marches in our nation’s capital. It was also the first s/m organization to include “S/M” in its title. That may not sound like much of a big deal today, but when GMSMA was founded back in 1981 those who engaged in s/m activities were often looked upon as freaks or deviants — even by those in the larger gay community. Believe it or not, GMSMA had to fight to be allowed to meet at the gay community center. In later years it became one of the center’s biggest financial donor organizations.

There were about 45 men in attendance at the last meeting in June, including a leather top who brought a very sexy and shirtless tattooed slave on a leash, who greeted the men he was introduced to by getting down on his hands and knees and licking their boots. Most who showed up were old-timers — one came in on the train from northeastern Connecticut. A few who came were newer members. At least half — including me — were former board members of the organization who had put in years or in some cases even decades of service to the community. But when the official business of the meeting got under way and the remaining officers announced the sad plans to effectively shut down the organization, only one man in attendance raised an objection.

It was painful for many others as well, but the unfortunate fact, what everybody knew — and what ultimately led to the end for GMSMA — is that there are simply not enough men who are willing and able to step forward to lead the organization anymore. The current board was down to just three members (a fourth signed on to help in the coming months with the transition). They were over-worked and under-appreciated. The harsh reality is that the organization simply could not continue to exist in its current form without more manpower.

It's unfortunate when an organization such as this, where gay men can come together and learn "safe, sane and consensual" ways to broaden their sexual horizons comes to a close.

I'm not a leather guy and I suppose that's just the problem. Very few men hovering around my age range and younger seem to be interested or know or know-to-care or care-to-know anything about the leather community or the meaning and history behind it. Sure some of us have our Sam Brownes and harnesses for events like The Black Party and Folsom Street East, when leather is acceptable and down-right dress code but by no means is there a trend going toward the leather lifestyle. Older friends tell stories of what leather truly means. That it is much more than fashion, accessories, more than "Masc and solid," more than butch and mean. Leather is a means to discovering the deeper connections two men can have between one another. A bonding experience. An exposure and measure of trust and vulnerability. Still, maybe for those of us whose closet doors were left ajar rather than bolted shut there isn't that search for sexual comprehension or need for fetish-based sexual fulfillment. Sex is here. It's now. It's out, it's open. It may not be talked about as much as it's happening but it is happening. The analogy of leather, no longer, necessarily applies? Maybe if play spaces and dungeons were more widely available, established or more culturally/socially accepted leather would be more current or stand a greater chance? Yet even though I'm one of those casual street event, Folsom-based leather guys it strikes me as a loss, a changing of landscapes, a shifting of wavelength when communities such as these meet an end.

Is it all be too far gone? The men of true leather are either dead or significantly older and the few still proudly fastening chaps and strapping harnesses, outside of commercial scenes, are seeing their beloved, sought out organizations closing. I suppose it's all fitting. What place does leather have these days? Here in NYC. New.York.City. We have only The Eagle, which is rather leather-light and The Lure and Spike are long gone, gone, gone. If International Mr. Leather and Mid Atlantic Leather are major events, then where are the pockets of that in other urban/rural areas? Have we become lazy or casually unconcerned?

Will we see a resurgence in leather and this community? Will men step up and lead or will this be yet another relic of our past?

Pride 2009

40 years later

Ordinarily I'd try and write some lovey-dovey, all inclusive post about Pride. I would probably make it more difficult on myself by trying to write in prose, be dramatic and aim for the tear ducts. I'd struggle to tap into that root source of what all the love and visibility and pride truly mean. But I don't feel like it this year. I know what it all means. I know how love and visibility and pride twacks my heart and stirs my consciousness. I don't need to convince myself any further.

All I can say is that from the Drag March to the Dyke March to the Pride Parade to the Pier Dance I saw thousands of faces that are all special, all important and deserve to be heard and respected.

Walking with Drags, the Dykes and the entire community one bewildering question came to mind repeatedly, "How can anyone hate our community? Why would anyone want to detract from this color, this vibrancy, this diversity, this joy?" Never have I seen a greater celebration of life than within these marches. It's all so motivating, so inspiring: the fight, the cause, the oppression, celebration, tragedy and romantics that is our lifestyle. All of us together under the same banner. A community. The thought alone drives light into my body, surging through my veins and beaming out of my pores.

We are so much to this nation. To this world. To humanity as a whole. We'll wait for our marriages to pass through the bureaucracies. We'll let our politicians argue endlessly over something as stupid as "Don't ask don't tell." They can take it. Go ahead -have at it, clowns.

But all I really want is my god-damned thank you. We, the gay community, are responsible for so much beauty, art, color, life - our threads are inextricably woven into the fabric of humanity and for that I want my appreciation. I want my thanks. How dare anyone deny us of anything when we contribute so much?

I'd fight a lifetime just for that.

Dyke March:

More to come...

Countdown to Pride: Dyke March 2009

Not a parade but a protest march!

Tomorrow at 5PM is the 17th annual NYC Dyke March. It'll be my 4th year in row to attend the Dyke March. I love supporting and showing love for our lesbian/queer sisters and I suggest you do the same. Besides, it's a helluva lot of fun!

Meet up is Saturday June 27th 5PM sharp at Bryant Park.

Click HERE for everything you need to know.

It's the time to hit the streets! Make some noise. Be visible. Be heard. Demonstrate, agitate, liberate! Bring signs, banners, drums, giant puppets, flags, hula hoops, or just be there! And if you really want to make things happen - be a marshal (check out ACT-Up’s marshal training for what marshals do during a march).

The Dyke March is a protest march, not a parade -- we don't ask for a permit, because we have the right to protest. As lesbians, we recognize that we must organize amongst ourselves to fight for our rights, our safety, and for visibility. Thousands of dykes take over the streets every year in celebration of lesbians and to protest against ongoing discrimination, harassment, and anti-lesbian violence in schools, on the job, in our families, and on the streets.

My Amazing friend Rich Weaver pointed me in the direction of some old Queer Nation fem-based Artivism. I'm posting them below to get your feminist anger to a raging boil!

It's Just a Drag March

I had the chance to sit down with TheOccasionalFag.com's Brian Griffin and learn about NYC's annual Drag March and what to expect this year:

Friday June 26th 7PM
Tompkins Square Park

NYC Day of Decision Rally

The cops were surprised by our numbers. Nice turn out.

Learn how to lobby your NY Senator by going here: www.meny.us

And don't forget about Queens this Sunday.

Washington Square Park Face Lift

The fountain was successfully moved and now you can see the water from any point North, East, South, West. The new benches are nice and the ground has been leveled. Good job, NYC.

Contrast

The contrast between two marriage rallies yesterday in NYC couldn't have been greater. In the early part of the day I jumped uptown to attend an anti-marriage equality rally organized mostly by a group of Hispanic and Latino church goers who despite their insistence that Jesus loves us feel very strongly that gays do not deserve equal rights.

The number of people defending the gay name and standing up for marriage equality was small if not minute. A smattering of the usual faces with a dab of young lesbians. Small signs and a few banners. We were outnumbered 10,000 to 30. We stood at our barricades, mostly in silence, and held our signs as men and women, old and young, many accompanied by a small child yelled, "One man and one woman!" "Read the bible!" "Jesus loves you!" and "God bless you!" As a Jew, all this Jesus/God bless you stuff is always hard to stomach but when you see first hand the degree to which these people truly dislike you and use God's name to defend their twisted logic it leaves the feeling of a sucker punch to the soul. Their "God bless you" and "Jesus loves you!" reeked of being inauthentic and that was later proved when the sound of their mass applause carried up several blocks into our ears. It sounded like an army preparing for a battle. Combative, charged and ghastly. It's been a long time since I felt that kind of hate. It was ugly and simple in it's color. Black and white. The people rejoicing in their efforts to keep gays as second class citizens were bleak and boring, scared and traditional. Old world. They showed nothing but commitment to keeping this world as colorless and dry as possible. As I write this I'm still trying to shake the shiver of hearing their roaring applause traveling upwind. It was clear sooner than later that this was an anti gay rally and had little to do with marriage.

But the protest ended and those of us remaining shook hands and went our separate ways until the pro-marriage rally later in the day. Weighed down by what I just experienced I was craving a distraction. Some reminder that despite the mass of people I just witnessed that there are people who love us, who care for us and would like to see us equal. I ran into Elmo in Time's Square and he helped cheer me up. We both thanked Governor Paterson for supporting marriage equality and a smile returned to my face.

At 5PM at 45th St. and 6th Ave. a mass of young and old, gay and straight, white, Black, Asian, Latino, Everything gathered in celebration of equal rights and marriage. Immediately the crowd was everything the morning crowd wasn't. We were full of life, optimism and energy. Color flowed out from everyone as did hugs and handshakes, smiles and "how are ya's." Our signs were smart and creative. This is when everything started to feel a lot better because I was reminded what gay is and why we're fighting for equal rights. Because we matter. Because our color and contribution to this country, to this world, matters and I'll be damned if the color we bring to the fabric of humanity goes unnoticed and remains unequal. While the morning's anti-marriage rally featured men in suits and black clothing ours featured vibrancy and singing and the perfect combination of comedy and anger. It was all a very nice moment and to have our Governor and Mayor speak to us, in support of us, gave a certain validation that things are going to change. Those people at the morning's rally will be on the losing end of this fight. We aren't going anywhere any time soon and I know we will keep rallying, keep screaming and keep bringing color to this world until our voices are heard and our lives and families appreciated.

200 Steps

The underground transfer between the L Train and the 123 Trains is approximately 200 steps. I made the mistake of counting one day as a means to pass the time during my every morning commute. Now those steps are all I can think about.  Every morning I'm plagued with the thought of how I am going to spend those 200 steps.

"How today will I spend these steps?  What will occupy my time? What will I think about? What will I ignore? Will I pay attention to my walking, every step and beat of the way, or will I reach the end without even realizing what all I have traversed?"

There is no skipping them.  No fast forwarding.  They are an every morning constant and those steps never become more or less than what they are: 200 in total.

To take my mind off the 1 to 200 count I've created games that I play with an unknowing public. I'll jump off the train in haste and clamor up the steps before anyone else.  My game is to remain the first person up the stairs and to remain the leader of the pack from all who have just gotten off the L Train and are making the same underground transfer to the 123.  Other times I'll give someone I've spotted a lengthy head start and try to catch up with them, if not beat them all together, before the 200 steps are out.  

Then there are those days when I put my body on auto-pilot and let my mind dream wildly.  I'll find myself in the heart of a zombie Apocalypse, dodging those who have been recently infected and walk briskly to my desperate point of escape.  Other times I walk past the advertisements, roll my eyes and cringe at the world around me.  Often, I'll take in the graffiti, wonder about who left it there and why it tickles me so to see a moustache painted over a sickeningly thin female model or the words "I smile because I'm complacent" written over Scarlett Johansson's face on the He's Just Not that Into You movie poster.   I'll dream about the movies I want to make (but never will,) the books I want to write (but won't get to,) the blogs I want to post (but I have work!) the world I want to save (but why?)  When the 200 steps expire, these thoughts will become ghosts.  There one moment - gone the next.

There are the mornings when I study people.  The way they walk, the swagger in their step, the shoes they decide to wear.  How women can spend lifetimes walking in high heels and how people regard or disregard the man selling poetry and the youth strumming his guitar.  I'll half cruise the men walking against me.  Men wearing suits or dirty jeans and work boots.  There are those who still carry lunch boxes, possibly still sitting on steel beams, overlooking an ever expanding city and there are those still carrying briefcases - what these days cannot fit on an iphone, I don't know - yet the briefcase remains in hand, a trench coat flowing behind them.

I have teased myself with the thought of counting the number of fluorescent lights or the number of lightly tainted, now off-white tiles but it all seems too much.  200 steps in addition to an umpteen number of fluorescent lights and the ungodly amount of tiles stretching across the transfer is overwhelming enough, let alone knowing the count.

In 200 days I will have left a younger version of myself behind for every step of the way. So strong these evaporating thoughts, my younger self. Five steps now. 

Ten and I'm ancient. 

Today's Yesterday, Today

Left out of textbooks and any sense of educational history, I often feel as though Bookstore literature is the only window gay people have into our actual, cultural, factual history. It's also remarkably uncanny how certain threads of yesteryear's struggles are still so boldly woven within today's fabric.

The passage below is from Alan Helm's Young Man from the Provinces:

"...The summer after my junior year in 1958, I remained in New York doing test shots and putting together a modeling portfolio; otherwise, I spent my time exploring the gay world. It was such a different world, and now such a vanished one, that it's not easy to explain. Intensely secretive and hidden, it went on mostly at night behind the unmarked doors of the bars and in apartments where the shades were always drawn. The 415 Bar on Amsterdam Avenue was typical: you walked in, saw a few locals talking with the bartender, and figured you'd made a mistake. But through an unmarked door and in the back and down a flight of stairs, you entered a cavernous basement teeming with hundreds of gay men who were dancing and laughing and cruising and kissing and drinking and passing out in the johns. No wonder that during my two years with Dick I'd not had the slightest suspicion such a world existed. It was determined to remain as hidden as possible.

The men were too. Everyone I knew was more or less closeted and spent a lot of time in the workaday world passing for straight. Save for a few artists and hairdressers and decorators and dancers, we were all terrified of being found out. Gay men regularly married for the sake of appearances or inheritances and just as regularly committed suicide. If you heard that a gay man was seeing a shrink , it only meant one thing: he was trying desperately to "go straight," which sounded more like a road sign than a way of life. Parents routinely disowned and disinherited their gay sons or had them committed to mental hospitals where they were subjected to shock treatments and lobotomies and a popular therapy of the day called "aversion therapy": "by means of hypnotic suggestion and conditioning, the author has been able... to create deep aversions in the male homosexual to the male body." How do you do that? "Suggestions of filth associated with the male genitalia of their partners were implanted in their subconscious and reinforced periodically during the hypnotic trance." Psychiatrists published abominations like that with pride and impunity. In their view, which was mainstream America's view made professional and scientifically unassailable, homosexuality was an abnormality to be corrected at all costs; the most barbarous treatments were justified in the name of destroying such pernicious tendencies. There were gay men walking the streets of Manhattan in those days who had been rendered incapable of sex or had their memories obliterated by electricity. For some, it would take years to put their minds back together again; for others, the effort was hopeless. Of all the enemies we had, psychiatrists were among the most dangerous. And our parents, of course. I never met anyone who was out to his parents; you had to be crazy to do such a thing.

There was no place in public where it felt safe to be gay. Even inside the gay world you weren't secure, since bars and parties were raided all the time. You'd be having a beer and a chat with someone in a bar when suddenly the police would appear at the door screaming "Stay where you are, this is a raid!" Fear would sweep over the place, followed by a stampede for the back door, people falling over each other and jamming the exit in their panic to get out. During one of my own terrified escapes, I was fleeing out the back when I saw a fat man I knew wedged in the bathroom window leading to the alley. The next day, his name appeared in the papers along with the names of the other men arrested in the raid- a couple of dozen all told, an average take. He was fired of course and evicted from his apartment, and there was nothing he could do about it. There were no legal aid societies or political action groups for gays in those days, no gay weeklies or bimonthlies to publish his plight and raise money for his defense. What defense? Firings, evictions, arrests, entrapments, blackmail, muggings, murders- they happened all the time, they came with the territory.

At parties, you knew the instant the police had arrived. The room would fall silent and without even turning to look, you knew a couple of New York's finest were at the front door, "Fuckin' Faggots" scrawled all over their faces. Sometimes they told us to keep it down and they went away; other times they told us to break it up and then stood at the door as we filed out between them like guilty things caught in a shameful act. I never once heard anyone protest or ask why we had to break it up. We just did as we were told.

Except for the drag queens, bless their sassy, revolutionary hearts. But they always got beaten up and arrested and thrown in jail, over and over again. "Such masochists," we said. "They're really sick."

Whenever our world came into conflict with the straight world, group loyalties crumbled. Threatened with arrest or blackmail, thrown out of a party, chased down a midnight street by a gang of fagbashers, it was each gay man for himself, running for fear, lost in panic to save his own skin. We didn't have much political awareness, partly no doubt because our enemies were so often invisible: cultural opinion, legal precedent, psychiatric theory, social convention, religious stricture- nothing you could insult or demean or punch in the face in return. The most pernicious enemy of all, and the most invisible, was our own self-hatred.

Almost all of us bought into the straight notion that there was really something wrong with us, something abnormal and perverted and ultimately pathetic. It still astounds me to think how many derogatory names the straight world has invented to designate gay men: fags, faggots, pansies, perverts, inverts, aunties, flits, queers queens, cocksuckers, nellies, sickos, homos, sodomites, pederasts, sissies, swishes, fairies, fruits, and the list goes on. The reverberations of that lexicon sounded even in our dreams, inducing a kind of concentration camp mentality. We were disposable, the scum of the earth, living crimes against nature (thank you, Thomas Aquinas), and we knew that socially, religiously, legally, psychoanalytically, and in every other way that mattered, we were beyond the pale of what was considered acceptably human. I don't remember that we talked about the sense of shame the straight world bred in us, but it was pervasive in our lives, and I don't know anyone of my gay generation who's ever been able to shake it. I certainly haven't. You can still see it in the timid gestures toward self-exposure of a John Ashberry or Jasper Johns, and in the furtive, guilty cruising of gay men in their fifties and sixties.

With so much fear and danger hedging our lives it's no wonder we were a wildly romantic bunch. Mainstream America was too, of course. My parents had grown up in a world fed by Hollywood fantasies of romantic love, and the lyrics of popular songs urged a desperate, eternal monogamy: "Once you have found him/Never let him go," and then the repeat in case you weren't paying attention the first time. In 1957, 96 percent of adult Americans were married, if you can imagine such a statistic. Heterosexual marriage was the only model of adult life that existed at the time, so gay America was busy coupling in the imitation of its masters.

Since romance thrives on obstacles (Tristan and Isolde, Romeo and Juliet, Cupid and Psyche, Antony and Cleopatra), there was no more fertile ground for romance in those days than the gay world. I don't think I ever made love with a man without first convincing myself he was a potential long term lover, and if the first date went well, which invariably meant the first night of sex, I was ready next morning to shop for monogrammed towels. All the frenetic cruising and partying and sexing had as its goal the paragon lover, a gay knight on a charger who would sweep us off our feet and make everything all right, compensate us for the oppression we had to put up with and for the pervasive sense there was something lacking in us that only the right man could supply. We fell in love a lot and conducted our mostly brief affairs with operatic drama-passionate avowals of eternal devotion, fits of jealous rage, wrenching breakups replete with nervous breakdowns and threats of suicide. The few of us of sustained affection managed successful relationships, but most of us got "married" and settled down for a brief while, then broke up and broke down, then grieved and cruised until we met the next candidate for our troubled affections, and thus the same round all over again."

Stop the Arrests Footage

Footage from Saturday's Coalition to Stop the Arrests protest at Mayor Bloomberg's crib:

New York Nightlife: Back with Vengence?

Come on, how could you not be hyped?

Sparber spins hot disc.

Action Alert: Saturday Dec. 20th - Light Up the Night

Saturday Dec 20th: NYC Lights Up!

Sat December 20
6-8PM Columbus Circle with a March to Times Square

JoinTheImpact, the group who brought you the Nov. 15th Prop 8 National protests comes the next phase in actions and rallies. This Saturday Dec. 20th will be a rally in Columbus Circle followed by a march down to Times Square.

Go here for the Official Facebook page. Link it, blog it and email it out.

On December 20th, we ask that you join us again for a nation-wide demonstration. The rally at City Hall on November 15, 2008 was just the beginning. In cities across the nation, people will once again be taking to the streets to stand up for Equality. We are not done fighting!!!
6:00pm
MARCH FROM COLUMBUS CIRCLE TO TIMES SQUARE
7:00-8:00pm
RALLY IN TIMES SQUARE

Be sure to go to the facebook page because they have suggestions as to what to bring and information on how to become involved and a sign up to volunteer to marshall the event. If you never marshalled an event before and want to I strongly recommend doing so. It's a tremendous amount of fun and puts you right smack in the middle of the action.

I unfortunately will not be able to attend (ugggggh!!) because I'll be out of town for work but I'll be there in spirit - candles, glowsticks, flashlights and all.

Rage!

HIV Stops With Us, Huge NYC Transit Campaign

I couldn't help but notice the new massive HIV Stops with Us campaign in the West 3rd subway station.

HIV STOPS WITH US is a multifaceted national social marketing campaign that aims to prevent the spread of HIV while also reducing the stigma associated with the disease. The campaign features real HIV positive people from across the country and a wide spectrum of HIV negative persons in their lives - family members, friends, care providers and partners talking about real issues.

HIV STOPS WITH US builds on the highly successful HIV STOPS WITH ME campaign, which was nominated for Best Advertising Campaign by GLAAD (Gay Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation).

I'm not sure if this campaign is any more or less effective than last year's, or if it's effective at all, but I find something encouraging about the signs being so inescapably huge. Discuss?

But hey! Before doing anything: take a step back and take a deep breath.

Focus on the images, the message.

Take your time on the last photo in the column. Let it resonate.

What does it say to you?

Please share your thoughts.

HXiness

I've really got to hand it to this week's HX magazine for pumping out such a cute and creative who's who in current New York nightlife. The photos of the nightlifers really capture the essence of who these people are and it's nice to feel a sense of community in the out and about nightlife world.

My favorite picture has to be DJ Josh Sparber's and it's not just because he's a friend of mine and the fact that we went to summer camp together as kids (or that I saw him naked, at 9 years old, in the shower house) but more so because he's just so adorable, so nice, so smart and simply an all around wonderful guy, who without a doubt, knows how to spin a fantastic party. He would never consider himself an "otter" but he definitely has a good sense of humor about it. He's the one in the baseball cap and Nike tank.
The spread is well done. Fun and poppy. I've never invested much in the local gay rags other than what's going on but if they keep up a style like this I can see myself enjoying more issues.

Other friends and loved ones in the spread are Snaxx's Rich King and DJ Gustavo, Paul "Hey 5 dollas!" Short of The Spit parties, Tai Chi Alfonso and Duane Roggendorff of Mr. Black's Addict Parties, and the incredible edible, Mr. HX, Doug Repetti.

The full spread is on the HX Website

National Protest: NYC

In another protest of massive numbers the LGBT people of NYC and their allies rallied in support of equal rights and national recognition. The event was as packed and inspiring as Wednesday night's event at the LDS Chruch in uptown Manhattan.

With more time to organize and taking notes from Wednesday's event this protest honed in on what is happening within NY politics, who we should keep our eyes on and to further carry the fight for our national equal rights.

There were significant decline in Mormon-related signs, which I think is a step in the right direction, and a notable surge in signs relating to general equality, unity and upbeat remarks on hypocrisy. The crowd covered the spectrum of age ranges and races with a special shout out to those in their early twenties. Speakers ranged from politicians to local celebrities and artists and throughout the two hour event the pulse in the crowd remained attentive and energized.

This tidal wave is growing and we are all riding it's crest.

Video above is shot by Father Tony and features me and Paul of Habitat67 trying to stir up some energy. I could only get through a few versus before my throat blew out but I expected everyone else to follow along. Well, not so much. But it sure is one hell of a good time trying to do so. Also in the video is David of Someone in a Tree and a cameo by my friend and actor Wilson Cruz.

Equal Rights w/ Lil David
Photos: John Nalley

New York Times on Join The Impact

The playing field changes:

Gay-Rights Activists Use Web to Organize Global Rally

By Claire Cain Miller

The Internet played an unprecedented role in rallying voters during this year’s election. In the aftermath of the election, Web 2.0 tools are continuing to play a role in other causes, astonishing long-time activists with the power and speed with which it gets their message out.

The latest example is a series of international protests scheduled for Saturday in opposition to California’s Proposition 8, the gay marriage ban that passed on Nov. 4. Join the Impact, a Web site built the morning of Friday, Nov. 7, has rallied hundreds of thousands of people who are gathering this weekend in eight countries, 50 states and 300 cities.

“This is the potential of the Web,” said Ben Elowitz, chief executive of Wetpaint, a company that builds Web sites for individuals and companies and built one for Join the Impact. “When Web 2.0 started, people started talking about giving ordinary people a voice online. This is the pinnacle of giving people a voice online.

Up, Up, Up

My last count of the confirmed guest list for the NYC Prop 8 Protest before I shut down and head up:Rage.