Shutting Down Gay Saunas...?

"For me as a gay man, the notion that there exist within our communities a series of places that actively promote the convening  of gay men for participation in sex of various shades  and in groups of all sizes rather revolts me – and I ‘ve been round the block a few times, believe me. I’m no prude, not even close, but the days when we gathered in clandestine fashion for the want of a network or a sexual outlet are surely long gone....”

-------James Wharton, former British soldier and now LGBT rights campaigner, 'Shut down gay saunas if you want the community taken seriously,' says LGBT campaigner, Independent, 3 March 2014.

Woot!  Woot!.....There's nothing more touching - and hypocritical - than a gay activist who's seen the light......we're not sure whether that's the result of having been in Dark Rooms for too long (he does say he's been around the block a few times and there's lot of walking to do in a gay sauna) - or whether he's had some misguided epiphany, or whether he's just articulating the latest iteration of the global control scheme of which Faggotry and its enablers appear to be a part, which we analyzed in Faggotry As An Authoritarian State...??

There's a lot that can be said about Mr Wharton's stupid quote.

1.   Clandestine...?  Says Who....??

But for starters, FuelMix will give him some credit. He's partially right in alluding to gay sauna's clandestine history.  Clandestine, as in the Western European way of looking at things when gay saunas started making their appearance in Europe, UK and US from the late 19th century.  It's not well known that given the absence of sanitary plumbing in most Western houses in the 19th century, public bath houses were actually encouraged. It wasn't surprising that more discrete bath houses catering for a gay clientele would inevitably open. 

In the Mediterranean countries there is a long, rich and quite open homo-erotic bath house culture - and a long, rich and quite open homo-erotic societal culture that feeds into it.

Mr Wharton seems to suggest that "clandestine" is some sort of static state of being. In other words, once clandestine, always clandestine.  Not true at all. Some gay bath houses in the West have gone from "clandestine" to "mainstream" to "legendary".

Want proof....?

Consider New York's Continental Baths which during the 1960s and 1970s not only provided

"........a grand space for liberating homosexual sex and socializing, it hosted Patti Labelle, Bette Midler, Gladys Knight and other rising stars between (and during) all the action.......

The story is so incredibly rich: The place had a dance floor, a restaurant, a bar, a beauty salon and a boutique. It was one of the first establishments to introduce convenient STI testing, and its cabaret shows are now legendary........The Continental was also one of the first places straights and gays mingled openly, years before Studio 54.

Celebrities like Mick Jagger, Andy Warhol and Rudolph Nureyev felt comfortable enough to go there....... It was truly a moment in history where gay culture was feeding directly into the zeitgeist and the Continental was the conduit."

-----Watch: New York's Legendary Bathhouse, The Continental, Gets The Doc[umentary] Treatment, by Lawrence Ferber, Qwerty, 6 August 2012.

Seems to us that "the gay community" was being taken seriously over 50 years ago, Mr Wharton. (And that's just using ONE sauna as an example that was both a social network and a sexual outlet).

Oh yeah.....and self-proclaimed "activists" didn't have either the Politically Correct or credibility issues they now demand become everybody's else's baggage.

(Did we mention our blog doesn't have Politically Correct or credibility issues either...?)


2.   Actively Promoting Sexual Participation....?

Leaving aside for the moment the ugly issue of Gay Rape (which we've written about), Mr Wharton's revulsion requires clarification:

• Gay Saunas are licensed businesses. Like any business, it is dependent on cash flow.  That cash flow comes from customers shuffling through the door;
• Many businesses advertise to promote their goods and services.  A licensed gay sauna with a variety of amenities, is no different;
• Regardless of whether a gay sauna is run as a Club or just as a business, under no circumstances could a customer be compelled or coerced into having sex with other men;
• A properly managed, well run, clean, licensed gay sauna, is the safest place to meet men;
• If gay saunas continue to be the great social levellers i.e. one can meet a varsity jock, a bodybuilder, a chub, a twink, a silver fox, a bear, as well as a flight attendant, banker, doctor, waiter, architect, teacher, pilot and a struggling artist - then simply by showing up, a customer has tremendous leverage.......the gay sauna continues to be a casual (or not) social network and a sexual outlet;
• More social dinner dates and relationships have started in gay saunas than guys will admit. Who is anyone to judge the appropriateness of a venue.....?  Ever been to a hetero wedding or heard some of the stories of what went on between bridesmaids and guests in a clandestine fashion....?  It's enough to make FuelMix go "EEEEEEeewww".  Believe it or not, (and to paraphrase Mr Wharton), a hetero wedding IS a place for the convening of men and women to participate in sex of various shades.  Where are the hetero wedding activists complaining about that one.....?
• What about gay bars with "Backrooms" and really cruisy toilets.....? Should they be shut down..? Oh.....and did we forget about sexually active toilets in str8 clubs....? And that's before or after those str8 boys and girls kneel around the toilet bowl to do a line.....?
• What about gay gyms.....?? 
• Oh....Oh......what about all those fuckin' apps like....Grindr...??!! or online chat rooms....? Every last one of them actively promotes the convening of gay men in sex of various shades and groups.....

3.   The Gay Sauna As A Rite of Passage

• It's not just gay men who show up at gay saunas........one of the hardest things for str8 guys to get their heads around, is the stark reality that a gay sauna is also the great leveller of sexual orientation - regardless of a man's self-described public orientation. For many men, the gay sauna is where Denial Meets Dick.......and guess who always wins....?
• This might sound pathetic but we suspect it's true..........there's no shortage of twinks trying out gay saunas to finally get a handle on their sexuality.
• Check out FuelMix's Gay Sauna Underground series (click on the image of the peeping raccoons) to find out about the Life Lessons from a gay sauna.

4.   Open For All To See

• Go to a gay or gay-friendly retail shop, we're speaking of Asia here, buy something and at the cashier's desk, they might give you a gay map of town showing all the "attractions" plus postcards of hunky guys as stuffers.  You don't have to be gay to find out where the gay saunas are.
• Here in Very Rich Megacity, ABC and Galaxy are in the middle of Tsim Sha Tsui, pretty much spitting distance from any hotel in the vicinity.
• Central Escalator is across the street from a supermarket right in the middle of SoHo. And fuckin' everybody knows about the cruisy toilet in the market lane around the corner from it.
• Alexander is right next to the 5 star Langham Place Hotel and flies a rainbow flag at the entrance - with Big Top, ClubHouzz and Hutong within a 5 minute walking distance.
• Action and My Way are close to the Canal Road flyover and notoriously convenient to the very cruisy and grubby toilets under that flyover.

5.   Gay Saunas Aren't The Ones With The Credibility Issue

• For the record, we're not defending gay saunas.  They are what they are and they may not be for everybody.  But's that's hardly ground for the stupid polemic spewed by Mr Wharton.  Where's the "diversity" and "tolerance" dude.....?
• What we think we're seeing is a collective (and long overdue) backlash against "gay activists" who, having manipulated  issues via "outrage" have found that their positions simply don't stand up to analysis. We suspect that they have pissed off not only the world at large, but increasing numbers of independent thinking gay men who think that shutting up gay activists would be a good first step for gay men to be taken seriously.

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