Polymorphic Party Play

Polymorphic Party Play:

What is Forbidden?

By David Rosen

Lust and wickedness are acceptable to me, I walk with delinquents with passionate love. I feel I am of them – I belong to those convicts and prostitutes And henceforth I will not deny them – for how can I deny myself. Walt Whitman 1

What is Forbidden sometimes homoerotic acts but only between women. Some use electric Soft moans hold the audience's toys, whips, bondage restraints and attention; a breathless silence fills this some use only their all-too-human dark, marijuana-scented sex club in a touch. There are, however, “house run-down building in San Francisco’s rules” that are scrupulously followed: SoMa district. A tall, thin woman with No unsafe sex, no spilling of blood, no short-cropped hair tenderly caresses violation of personal privacy unless her lover’s naked body. Dressed in invited. This is a smart, postmodern black tights with knee-high boots and club, where people gather to push the a short leather vest, she takes up a limits of sexual pleasure in the age of small electric vibrator delicately AIDS. strokes her playmate. Strapped at her wrists and ankles, the lover lays This sex club, the Power Exchange, is prone and willingly helpless on a an example of a growing, nationwide leather-covered masseuse's table. network of adult deviant sexual Wearing nothing but a blindfold and a fantasy and play. It represents chain-link dog collar, she America’s 4th sexual pulsates to her lover's revolution, this one touch.* pushing further the revolutions of the 1840s, The lovers appear 1920s and 1970s. In oblivious to the crowd distinction to earlier that has gathered to movements for sexual watch their performance. reform, today’s revolution Forty or so men and remains unseen and fifteen women, mostly in unacknowledged, hidden their 30s and 40s, behind a background of diverse in race, class and Christian evangelical style, have spontaneously assembled battles over cultural values, local wars to enjoy this act of performance art. against pornography, media pursuit of Throughout the night, participants will sex offenders and periodic sex engage in public and private sexual scandals involving celebrities and encounters within the confines of this politicians. adults-only sex club. Sometimes the "performers" will be two or more Hidden beneath the shadow of the players, sometimes solo actors; they religious right’s culture wars, a sexual will engage in heteroerotic play, insurgency emerged and spread among consenting adults. Much of it is noncommercial in character, involving * Photo: SF Weekly Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

what has been traditionally identified conventions like Hedo-fest as illicit or nonconventional sexual (Washington, TX), Couples Choice practices. A good deal involves (Eagle Nest, NM), the Orlando commercial relations, often involving International (Orlando, FL) and Life kinky sex like sadomasochism (s&m) Style West (Las Vegas). and bondage & discipline (b&d). Equally important, it is taking place Sexuality has long been a battleground within an expanding cultural in American society. Today, the environment of media, fashion and Christian right contiues its culture wars advertising industries aggressively over abortion, gay marriage, exploiting references to a wide variety pornography and sex offenders. of deviant sexual indulgence. Hidden Nevertheless, since the Democratic in plain sight, a new sexual revolution Congressional victories in the 2006 is taking place in America. election, there’s been a noticeable relaxation in the cultural wars. A more Swinging tolerant cultural climate has emerged, one faciliating the growing popularity “‘Swinging’ is not really a favored term of fomerly “illicit” sex among anymore,” declares Tony Lanzaratta, a consenting adults. retired Los Angeles police officer and head of the nation’s largest swingers Illicit adult sexual practice seems more association, NASCA International. widespread than at any time in (NASCA originally stood for North American history. Such sex is an American Swing Club Association.) historical evolving category of sexual “Swinging kind of connotes 1950s practice involving traditionally deviant wife-swapping crap,” Lanzaratta adds, practices engaged in voluntarily by “it has little to do with that, and that’s consenting adults. While oral sex and why lifestyle organizations prefer to light s&m and b&d were once use the term ‘play couple.’” Referring considered deviant, they have now to San Diego, for example, Lanzaratta been integrated into acceptable or says that it is a virtual hotbed for what “healthy” adult sexuality. he calls “play couples.” “A lot of people just have little neighborhood Over the last decade, deviant sex or get-togethers in their homes, five or “perversion” has been redefined to six couples who go for it.”2 involve what psychiatrists call “non- pathological" or “egosyntonic” Mate swapping represents just one of deviance – deviance without pathology a growing universe of illicit sexual or guilt. Deviance differs from sexual practices flourishing throughout Bush- pathology because of the voluntary or era America. Having flourished during consensual nature of the participation. America’s 3rd sexual revolution of the Involuntary or nonconsensual sexual ‘70s, it is again fashionable. NASCA practices, whether labeled pathological identifies 168 swingers clubs across or illegal acts, like pedophilia, rape, the U.S., with California (26) and sex slavery or lust-murder, violate the Texas (20) having the greatest autonomy or humanity of one or more number. In addition to intimate of the participants.3 liaisons at members’ homes, swingers meet in party venues throughout the While no authoritative estimate of the country, from Philadelphia (Club Kama number of adults engaged in Sutra) to Miami (Miami Velvet) to consensual deviant sexual practices is Mountain View, CA (BackDrop, the available, these practices are not nation’s oldest swing club). They also uncommon. Heterosexual couples gather at various local and national across the country regularly meet at

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

“swinging” or “swapping” get- roles, marriage arrangements and togethers; gays and straights attend property relations these groups both commercially-licensed and private promoted. Upstate New York, popularl “play parties” to engage in a variety of know as the “burned out district,” was couple- and group-sex activities. the epicenter of much of this religious fervor. Since the 1780s, it was home Reflecting still further the changed to the Shakers and in the 1830s sexual culture, these gatherings are no spawned the Oneida Perfectionists and longer public secrets, restricted to Mormons. Still other utopian backrooms or red-light districts. They communities of the era included are often listed in weekly free Modern Times (on Long Island, NY, and newspapers and online websites like Berlin Heights, near Cleveland, OH) craigslist. With little fanfare, a new and Memnonia (near Yellow Springs, sexual revolution is taking shape OH). Together, these groups against a background of evangelical exemplified a remarkable social Christian and conservative “family experiment that set the stage for 20th values.” century sexual mores.4

The sexual underground Oneida is illustrative of 19th century “free love” movement. It was founded America has long sustained a vigorous by the charismatic visionary, John sexual underground. From the earliest Humphrey Noyes, who believed that brothels and “bawdy houses” in every person could experience "perfect Revolutionary-era port cities to today’s holiness". He conceived this holiness play parties and s&m get-togethers, as “Bible Communism,” drawing Americans have long parteken in a inspiration from Matthew: “in the wide variety of deviant or illicit sexual resurrection they neither marry nor practices. A wink-and-nod culture, are given in marriage, but are like the often lubricated by bribes and angels in heaven”. [Mt: 22:30] For organized crime, permitted men and, Noyes, as with many 19th century to a lesser extent, women to engage in utopians, holiness was intimately illicit or unacceptable sexual practices. linked to sexual pleasure.

This deviant underground has Oneida practiced what Noyes called repeatedly challenged mainstream “complex marriage." In such an sexual culture especially during arrangement, every woman was to be America’s three preceding sexual married to every man and every man revolutions, during the 1840s, 1920s was married to every woman. In and 1970s. Each contested existing principal, men and women could have social conventions and pushed the sexual relations with anyone (of the limits of sexual experience. To opposite sex) they wanted. Sex was appreciate the historically unique to be an art and "sexual selfishness" character of today’s 4th revolution, it is was rejected. important to appreciate the earlier revolutions. Noyes settled in Oneida fleeing a likely adultery conviction in his native Amidst the fervor of the Great Revival, Putney, VT, based on a group-living a 2nd Awakening that swept rural arrangement with another couple. He American during the 1830s and ‘40s, founded his communitarian settlement thousands of Americans challenged in 1848 with a core group of thirty conventional values and joined new supporters. Oneida women shunned religious and utopian groups. Many the then-conventional long dress for were drawn by the unconventional sex short skirts and pantaloons. By 1878,

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

Oneida had more than 300 adherents and urban sex circuses. All helped and with branches in Wallingford, CT, spread a new, illicit eroticism Newark, NJ, Putney and Cambridge, throughout the country.5 VT, and Brooklyn, NY. The community formally dissolved in 1881. In addition to selling illegal alcohol, many speakeasies facilitated One of the distinguishing features of prostitution. The common speakeasies the sexual relations at Oneida was the found prostitutes congregating like adoption of a novel birth control other customers and solicited business, technique – "male continence," but left the speak with a date to intercourse without ejaculation. Birth conduct their affairs. In other certificate records indicate that it was speakeasies, prostitutes worked as not a fool-proof method. It hostesses and solicited sexual services. acknowledged and attempted to deal The prostitutes either provided a with two basic features of patriarch – hurried encounter in an on-premise exclusive male sexual fulfillment and private booth, upstairs room or the traditional linking of pleasure from backroom or left to conduct the sexual procreation. Oneida came under encounter at a nearby apartment crib, repeated public attacks for its radical hotel room or secluded alleyway. At living arrangements. these speaks, the hooker gave a kick- back to the saloon’s management. Each 19th century utopian community However, the most notorious had its own unique forms of social and speakeasies functioned like brothels. sexual relations. Where the Here the prostitute worked as a Perfectionists embraced “complex “resident” or “sitter” and the sexual marriage,” the Mormons believed in exchange took place in the speak’s polygamy among male leaders of the backroom. order. The Shakers were radical communitarians, believing in the "Girl shows" were another form of live communal ownership of property and sexual performance during the ‘20s. that men and women were equals. They often were part of touring Equally radical, they opposed marriage carnivals, the unique sideshow that and practiced celibacy; the Shakers first appeared at the 1893 Chicago believed that sex was a sin. Exposition. Its target audience was Collectively, these movements small-town and rural America. By challenged conventional notions of 1920, there were an estimated two propriety and pleasure. hundred operating throughout the country. The Roaring ‘20s is fondly recalled as the era of speakeasies and bathtub “Girl shows are distinguished by how gin, jazz and race mixing. One of the ‘strong’ the dancers are allowed to hidden aspects of the ‘20s was how perform — in other words, by the Prohibition facilitated sexual extent of sexual abandon of the revolution. This revolution ranged dancing routines and the degree of from the shortening of woman’s skirts, genital display,” notes the historian the use of lipstick and her adoption of Robert Allen. He adds: smoking. It also involved greater freedom of artistic expression in In the large and more sedate carnivals theatre, music, literature and motion (those that play state fair dates, for pictrues. It witness a significant example), the performance might end with expansion of prostitution and the a strip down to the G-string or its removal for a moment just before the dancer leaves popularity of nearly-nude burlesque the stage.” He goes on to point out that shows, traveling carnival girl shows “[i]n the smaller shows, however, where

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

‘stronger’ acts are the norm, the intentional "accident" — the striptease performance might end with a was introduced into burlesque around 6 gynecological anatomy lesson.... the time of World War I and quickly became the dominant mode of Another erotic art form of the presentation.* According to legend, Prohibition era was burlesque. In its May Dix performed the first "strip" at hey-day, burlesque was like no other the Minsky Brothers' New York form of sexual presentation and most theatre: admirably mirrors America’s evolving attitude towards sexuality. It made its In 1917 they constructed a runway into the U.S. debut in New York on 28 auditorium so that patrons could examine September 1868, when the British star cooch dancers more closely. ... May Dix did Lydia Thompson took to the stage of her dance act in a short black dress with George Wood's Broadway Theatre to detachable white collar and cuffs. At the perform in Ixion. Thompson was a end of her song one hot summer night, she national sensation and, almost single- removed her collar as she walked offstage, trying to forestall the next laundry bill. handedly, instituted a new, popular art Someone in the audience demanded an form that competed with the encore, at the end of which she removed traditional legitimate theater. her cuffs as well. ‘Between the heat and the applause [reports Morton Minsky], May What originally distinguished burlesque lost her head, went back for a short from the other popular forms of male chorus, and unbuttoned her bodice as she entertainment was the radical appeal left the stage again.’ of the female performers, stars following in the mode established by The striptease was "burlesque's last- ditch and ultimately unsuccessful Thompson. Forgotten today, their 8 appeal was founded on a compelling strategy to stay alive." presentation of female identity. This identity uniquely combined what Allen The wildest sex scenes of the ‘20s has called "sexual allure and inversive sexual revolution were reserved for feminine insubordination." He what were popularly known as sex clarifies: circuses. As Eric Garber discovered, “Either half alone could be controlled they “were raucous establishments and made to please without seriously where illegal activities such as undermining the position of the male drinking, gambling, and prostitution spectator. Fused together in a single were available.” And, as he found, performer, however, this combination “others offered a variety of sexual was much more threatening.” The pleasures cafeteria-style.” Most of original burlesque stars directly them were held in urban black engaged her male audience, communities like New York’s Harlem challenging established masculine and were an integral if largely hidden prerogative, undermining their part of the Roaring ‘20s. It was also exclusivity to erotic desire and, thus, "the heyday of lesbian and gay clubs foreshadowing the post-feminist pop and performers in Harlem." stars of the late-20th century.7

th As the 20 century progressed, * The striptease appears to have made its burlesque faced intensifying first appearance at the St. Louis Exposition competition, notably from movies of 1896 when Omeena performed what among prerecorded media and from was called the "take off." [Allen/230] cabarets and revues among live There also seems to be considerable formats. In response — and overlap between more lower-class apparently as the result of a very vaudeville and extreme burlesque. [Clement/236-44]

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

Circuses were often set up in "buffet bathhouses to venues offering the flats" — apartments rented out for most specialized sexual indulgence. social functions. Rent parties were a With the 3rd sexual revolution, anything tradition brought from the South with seemed possible.9 the great migration, a tradition that was continued in all the big Northern The Sandstone Ranch Sandstone was cities. For a modest admission fee the most well known intentional sex (often 25 cents), visitors were treated community of the 3rd sexual revolution. to "dancing and jazz, and bootleg Secluded in the hills of Topanga liquor for sale in the kitchen." One Canyon, just north of Los Angles, it could dance for free, but food, alcohol, was, as Gay Talese reported, a place drugs and sex were priced extra – and “like none other in America, an people paid. audiovisual aphrodisiac, a tableau vivant by Hieronymus Bosch.” Founded However, with the coming of the Great by John and Barbara Williamson in Depression and World War II, the 1969, it drew a fairly wide and often radical sexual experiences of the ‘20s distinguished following among “free came to a long hiatus. The post-War love” advocates and others exploring consumer revolution slowly began to their heterosexual desires. The remake popular culture and helped sexologists Alex Comfort and Phyllis launch not only Billy Graham and and Eberhard Kronhausen, the American’s 3rd awakening, but journalists Gay Talese and Max America’s 3rd sexual revolution as well. Learner, the artist Betty Dodson, the This movement gained momentum performer Bobby Darin and political with the tumultuous upheavals of the activist Daniel Ellsberg were among the 1960s. The combined force of the Civil regulars. According to the historian Rights movement, anti-Vietnam war John Heidenry, at “its high point, mobilization and emerging women’s membership rolls reached 275 and gay liberation movements helped couples....”10 push the demand for greater sexual freedom. The popularity of “Playboy” Estimates vary as to the scope of such magazine and the Playboy Club (the clubs. Two swingers, William and first one opened in 1960), the Jerrye Breedlove, in their 1974 book, adoption of the birth-control pill and, Swap Clubs: A study in Contemporary eventually, the Supreme Court Row v. Sexual Mores, provide the most bullish Wade decision in 1973 set the estimates. Extrapolating from data parameters of this revolution. from findings of Alfred Kinsey’s Unfortunately, the AIDS epidemic of Institute for Sexual Research at the ‘80s ravaged the gay community Indiana University, they report: “The and brought an end to America’s 3rd number of swap clubs in 1953 was sexual revolution. probably less than 2 percent of the married couples between the ages of During the ‘70s, America’s sexual 20 and 45 years. In 1963, it was vocabulary changed. Sex was in the probably above 5 percent. By 1973, air, in the media and in every the total will probably reach 15 relationship. Not surprising, there was percent – maybe reaching all the way an increase in the venues catering to to 25 percent before leveling off.”11 heterosexuals, homosexuals and bisexuals who sought to fulfill their However one reads the Breedloves’ wilder sexual desires. These ranged findings, a distinct sexual sub-culture from explicit sex clubs to invitation- existed and, for those who sought it only “swing” or “swap” clubs that out, could be found and joined. They attracted married couples, to gay report that mate-swapping groups

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

operated not only in New York, Los dingy, seedy dive it appeared to be Angeles and San Francisco (90 couples from the outside.” participating), but in mid- and small- cities like Baltimore (32 couples), A very different experience awaited Detroit (42 couples), Philadelphia those who visited gay sex clubs. (more than 100 couples) and Seattle Chicago’s Hellfire Club (operating out (34 couples). Heidenry claims that at of the Inferno) and San Francisco’s 15 their height “[s]wing clubs had opened Association explored the limits of gay in nearly every state in the Union, with s&m play. The Catacombs, also in twenty-seven in California alone, and San Francisco, gained an international most of Canada.” America was alive reputation for fisting or “handballing.” with swappers. The 3rd sexual revolution reached its zenith on 21 March 1980 when the Swap clubs operated in Chicago, San Catacombs hosted what the Francisco and other cities. In New anthropologist Gayle Rubin found to York, they had names like the Castle, be “the first time significant numbers Catacombs, Chateau 19, Club O, Fifth of kinky gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, Dimensional Jazz Club, Handball and heterosexuals partied together in Express, Hothouse, Inferno, Mineshaft the Bay Area.”12 and Percival’s. However, the club that gained the most notoriety was New Public sex York’s Plato’s Retreat, located at the Hotel Ansonia, premises of the former Today’s radical sexual culture suggests Continental Baths, on the Upper West the diversity of deviant practice and its Side. availability throughout the country. They include both places of legalized In November 1979, Plato’s Retreat prostitution (in Nevada) and places of reached its zenith. As Heindenry noncommercial illicit encounters, retells the story, “an occasional porn including strip clubs, swinger get- actress named Tara Alexander took on togethers, gay bathhouses, members- eighty-six men, four at a time, in a only sex and fetish clubs and an nonstop six-hour spectacle dubbed the assortment of other venues. These Supermathon.” The performance was examples illustrate the increasing so provocative that it was videotaped range of venues of sexual assignation and rebroadcast over a New York X- available to a growing number of rated cable show, Midnight Blue. Was adults. the sexual olympics conceived at this event? For the last twenty-eight years, gay and straight sexual deviants have met The atmosphere at gay clubs was even in San Francisco during Leather Pride more radical. Among New York clubs Week to celebrate the Folsom Street were the Anvil, Cock Ring, Mineshaft Fair. On the last Sunday in and Sewer, with the most notorious September, between three-hundred- being the Anvil and the Mineshaft. The and-fifty and four hundred thousand Anvil was located on West 14th Street fetishists, their admirers and voyeurs and 11th Avenue, in the heart of the gathered in what is considered the meatpacking district, which then had world’s largest assembly of sexual little residential population and was deviants. While the street fair was the deserted late at night. One regular centerpiece of the week’s adventures, visitor, Philip Gefter, described it as almost every night featured a special “Weimar culture … on acid. It seemed deviant-themed event.13 more like a club with a kind of festive, ersatz honky-tonk atmosphere that the

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

The people strolling along Folsom planned specialty events were Street came from across the Bay, “Beginning Bondage: Quick Tips,” across the country, across the globe “Sticks and Punching with Lady Hilary” and from every conceivable and “Japanese Rope Bondage with background, including sexual Madame Butterfly.” To encourage inclination. So entertaining, whole personal ease, the space was families came to gawk and participate designated off-limits to photography. in the festive revelry. Folsom Street was packed with people for five blocks Folsom week involved a wide range of and lined with booths offering scheduled public events. They everything from s&m whipping included: an art show, “Daddies and sessions and fetish toys, to Dukes”; “a spoken word smut salon,” performances by rock bands and “Perverts Put Out”; a women-only displays by erotic artists, to AIDS/STD event, “This Shit Will Fuck U Up”; a tests and to literature on gay-friendly veterans fund raiser, “Mr. & Miss Gay evangelical churches, and to hotdogs Bridges Uniform Party;” and a full- and beer. dress gala at the Magnitude dance club (with tickets running $90 a pop). According to The San Francisco One night the Leathermen’s Chronicle, Tom Maiolo, a visitor from Discussion Group hosted a “Fetish Tampa, FL, attending his first fair and Fair” that showcased a variety of outfitted in a leather vest and chaps b&d/s&m demonstrations featuring with his butt exposed, exclaimed, “So “some of the most knowledgeable and far, so good. I love this, and I’m just respected experts in the community.” getting started.” Another fairgoer, Other special events included an Jaeleen Bennis, mused, “This is like evening with erotic performance Disneyland – you’ll never see anything artists Cleo Dubois and Fakir; a formal like this in the world.” gay-oriented uniform dinner, Roll Call 2007, sponsored by California Boots One woman, going by the name and Breeches Corp.; a male/male Andrea Storm, was dressed in a tiny spanking get-together; and a host of silver dress shaped like a martini glass after-hour private fetish sex parties with bra cups decorated like green for straight and gay male and female olives. "It's totally fun," she said. "I adventurers. Folsom Street had don't get very far because I keep something for almost everyone. getting photographed. I feel like I'm on the red carpet." As the Chronicle In 2008, for example, the fair reports, “… couples led each other up generated considerable national and down the street with dog collars attention when the conservative group, and leashes, men in thong underwear Concerned Women of America (CWA), played Twister, women in stilettos and came out against it. CWA branded the fishnet stockings spilled out of their fair “reminiscent of biblical Sodom and corsets, and shoppers browsed stalls Gomorrah.” It was especially disturbed selling products such as baseball caps by the fair’s take-off on Leonardo da reading ‘Master’ and ‘Slave’ and a Vinci’s “Last Supper” as its promotional book entitled ‘Dungeon Emergencies poster. The twelve apostles and the and Supplies.” devotional wine and bread were replaced by men and women decked One area, Venus’ Playground, was out in s&m leatherwear and a table full designated as a women-only space. It of sex toys. consisted of one tent used as a dungeon for sex play and another tent CWA spokesperson, Matt Barber, noted for demonstrations. Among the in a press release, “Scripture says that

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

God is not mocked, yet it doesn’t stop gays, straights, tops, bottoms, blacks, people from trying.” It added, “[a]s whites, Latinos, although evidenced by the latest stunt, open predominantly white gay men. ridicule of Christianity is unfortunately very common within much of the The “Journal” also lists some three homosexual community.” Barber hundred and fifty clubs and other expressed considerable displeasure organizations serving male and female, over taxpayers being “forced” to pay gay and straight fetishists into leather, for the fair in which, in his words, rubber, bears and bikers as well as “’gay’ men and women [are allowed] to s&m, b&d, water sports, fisting and parade the streets fully nude, many other indulgences. One of these having sex – even group orgies – in groups, the Satyrs Motorcycle Club of broad daylight, while taxpayers funded Los Angeles, recently celebrated its police officers look on and do fiftieth anniversary. absolutely nothing.” Noncoersive adult deviance does not CWA launched a national campaign stop at uniforms and fetish wear. against Miller Brewing for its Throughout the country there are promotional support of the fair. The many noncommercial and commercial campaign picked up momentum when gatherings that cater to every Fox and other cable news networks conceivable sexual proclivity. Some jumped on the story. While Miller is a take place at invitation-only venues, long time supporter of LGBT events, while others occur at private get- the brewer capitulated and removed its togethers or are between a husband logo from the poster. Andy Cooper, of and a wife in the privacy of their the fair’s events committee, joked, “I bedroom. Still others are between a guess it wouldn’t be Folsom Street Fair hooker and a john in a call house or without offending some extreme hotel room; many others are between members of the global community.” total strangers in the proverbial And added, “[t]he irony is that da Vinci backseat of a car or the backroom of a was widely considered to be strip club or gay bar. Such encounters homosexual.” often involve just two people, others may involve three or more Folsom Street is part of an adult, participants. And these gatherings noncommercial deviant sexual culture seem open to greater sexual that is growing throughout the country. exploration – to indulge in the In its “Leather Community Calendar,” perversions of one’s choice -- than the gay-oriented “Leather Journal” lists ever before in American history. This approximately two hundred fetish is, in essence, what distinguishes events that take place across the today’s 4th sexual revolution. country. Like Folsom, major annual happenings including the Gay Pride Sexual commerce Day parades bring out diverse fetishist contingents in cities across the country Nevada remains the only state to have and the Key West Fantasy Fest that legal whorehouses. Prostitution was draws over 80,000 deviants. Other decriminalized in the early 1930s and annual events include the more formally legalized in 1967. By the hardcore, weekend-long gatherings like late-90s, there were nearly forty legal the International Leatherman (ILM, brothels ranging from the famous Chicago) and the Mid-Atlantic Leather Mustang Ranch to cribs in and around Association (MLA, Washington, DC) Beatty, Carson City, Elko, Ely, Reno conferences that bring three to five and Las Vegas. Today, at a license fee thousand in full regalia – men, women, of $135,000 to $5 million, there are

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

thirty-six legal bordellos covering the McCormick, then chairman and chief state. Each legally employs between executive of Savvis Communications, one and fifty female prostitutes and, $241,000 on his American Express together, they generate an estimated card for one night’s entertainment, $35 to $50 million annually. suggests the clientele who visits some of the more-upscale venues. A 2005 University of Las Vegas study found that in Southern Nevada, twenty More explicit examples of venues that adult shops and thirty strip clubs were encourage sexual liaisons include operating. Clark County had licensed sex clubs, a host a private approximately 100,000 registered fetish clubs and gay bathhouses. erotic dancers; about 2,500 worked Licensed sex clubs like the Power daily and 4,000 performing on the Exchange (San Francisco), Peepshow weekends. The study classified (New York) and The Green Door and operating prostitutes into The Fantasy Social Club (Las Vegas) “independent call girls” (working in cater to a heterosexual crowd, though bars, casinos and nightclubs), “house” encourage female homoeroticism. A escorts (serving casinos), “outdoor” handful of commercial gay male-only hookers (streets walkers) and “junior” sex clubs operate in San Francisco, Los prostitutes (inmates of sex-slave Angeles and Philadelphia as well as a operations). As the authors note, “Las dozen or so gay bath-houses provide Vegas is the symbolic center of the sex discreet sexual encounters throughout industry in the United States.”14 the country. (Comparable venues for heterosexual men, including massage Gentlemen’s clubs – i.e., strip clubs, parlors and bathhouses, serve more some with X-rated nude dancers, lap often as fronts for commercial sex.) dancing and private backrooms for And then there are the numerous other, more intimate services -- are no specialized fetish services catering to longer limited to Las Vegas. TUSCL, a b&d, s&m and other indulgences website of strip clubs, lists 2,800 operate throughout the country, often throughout the country; Texas (217) hosted by a professional dominatrix and Florida (215) have the greatest like “Lady Cheyenne,” “Lady Tara number. University of Las Vegas DuBleys” or “Mistress Elizabeth.” In researchers estimate the number of these “safe sex” venues, nearly strip clubs might be as high as anything goes. 5,000.15 The spirit of today’s public sexual Among TUSCL’s list of “best” clubs are encounter is best suggested by an Mons Venus (Tampa, FL) and Hip exposé of the Peepshow play party Huggers (Kokomo, IN). Larry Flynt’s held monthly in New York. It was Hustler chain now operates clubs in featured in the popular weekly, “Time New York, San Francisco and six other Out: New York,” as part of a special cities. Many independent operations, sex issue – “Porn & Pop Culture: Art like Delilah’s Gentlemen’s Club Gets Down ‘n’ Dirty”.17 In addition to (Philadelphia, PA), are upscale the Peepshow profile, the magazine establishments, while many more, like reported on the latest “pornographic” Club Kalua (Queens, NY), the site of a literature and movies as well as much-publicized police shooting of providing an historical sketch of three late-night revelers, are sleazy burlesque and the birth of the joints found off highways at the striptease. For hip New Yorkers with perimeter of most cities and towns.16 9/11 now only a fading memory, sex is However, a scandal at New York’s back. Scores, in which the club billed Robert

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

The Peepshow claims to serve as “an “Master Steelow,” a sex entrepreneur alternative private adult looking for an innovative, profitable arty, pansexual, sexually Mixed crowd way to bring together what he calls “a Adamantly fetish friendly, Bi, straight, more erotic and uninhibited element,” gay, lesbian, curious, couples, founded the Peepshow. It seeks to singles, cross dressers, Gothic, Foot combine his previous party endeavors, worshipers, transgender, swingers, the Funhouse Party, a monthly Dark subs of all sizes and shapes can alternative dance party, and the Flesh come and be who or what ever it is Theatre, a weekly s&m dance play that they want to be …” Not an party. Like all safe-sex clubs, this one uninteresting crowd. has its house rules:

And its “rep” precedes it! “Time Out” Single men are NOT allowed to enter the titillates its readers, describing a Pitch Black Room alone at any point. They couple of scenes from a recent party: must be accompanied by either a date or a person who they are interested in interacting with once inside the Pitch Black Men wandered around naked, while women Room. A single man escorted into the strutted through topless. By 11pm, a room stays with his partner while there. If bullwhip-wielding dominatrix was your partner leaves the room you leave mercilessly beating a bound slave. with your partner. Nearby, a goth bitch-goddess sat on a sofa, basking in adulation as her devoted No Cameras: No photos or recording slave licked her dainty toes. … devices will be allowed unless clearance

before hand with promoters, Film will be In the Pitch Black Room, reserved for confiscated and asked to leave couples and encounters with strangers, a immediately. man sporting black leather chaps screwed his miniskirted girlfriend doggy-style, right next to a thrusting threesome. … At the Peepshow and other sex clubs, such rules lubricate both social and Its “Fetish & Fantasy Dress Codes” sexual intimacy. suggests a vivid sense of the club’s intended audience: There are also countless public, semipublic and private places where Acceptable Attire: Leather, Latex, PVC, Full men and women of all sexual Uniform (not just BDUs pants), Kinky persuasions gather to explore deviant Drag, Glam, Vampire, Gothic, Formal intimacies. While male heterosexual Wear, as a Devil, an angel, cupid, a porn theatres have almost playboy bunny, a satyr, fantasy, Cyber, disappeared, some gay theatres and Past, Futuristic, Club Kid, Fabulous, sexy, video booths hold on. Yet, they do so silver, Trekker, wing's, body mod's, at considerable risk. The 2005 arrest Victorian, pajamas, feathers, latex, leather, rubber, horns, corsets, stilettos, of seventeen men at the Belvedere cat suits, candy Goth, Angelic horns, Theater, Decatur, GA, in an collard Slaves, Dominatrix, Masters, Dark undercover vice sting operation Raver's, alternative, infantilism, Adult targeting “lewd sex acts and indecent Diapers, saran wrap, imaginative, wear exposure” shows how vulnerable are sheer fabrics (with thongs), lingerie, liquid these venues. latex is allowed at this event. Full outfits in Red, White, Pink, and Black are the colors One should not forget the dance halls, of desire or in minimum head to toe black adult bookstores, highway rest stops, dress or anything else your imagination dreams up. parks, docks, alleyways and the once- common public toilets (or “tearooms”) Every fantasy seems to be welcome! in which gay men and (occasionally) lesbian women as well as straight

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

couples gather (and sometimes get arrested!) to engage in anonymous In Huntsville, AL, church-going women sex. One example involves what the regularly stop at Pleasures, an Washington, DC, police "upscale romance boutique." euphemistically refer to as the “P However, Sherri Williams, its Street beach,” a section of Rock Creek proprietor, has been battling a state Park near Dupont Circle that has been law that criminalizes the production a longtime gay male cruising spot. and/or sale of "any device designed or Additional venues of illicit sexual marketed as useful primarily for the indulgence include the private parties, stimulation of human genital organs"; after-hour joints and, most unfortunately, in February 2006 and importantly, the bars and social clubs even with ACLU support, she lost a that foster not only sexual liaisons (in federal district court decision that backrooms), but a shared identity and upheld the law. sense of community among deviants and other sexual outsiders. A growing universe of online sites provides people with even more Finally, there is the growing sphere of discrete ways to order whichever “adult” specialty boutiques and sexual fetish they desire. Industry women’s-only sex-toy get-togethers pundits estimate that between (often called “Passion Parties”) help 100,000 and 400,000 sites are women and men play out their wildest pornographic and many of these sell fantasies. San Francisco’s Good the most risqué, private sexual Vibrations has been in operation for accoutrements. Adam & Eve, a North nearly thirty years; a “Business 2.0” Carolina adult product company, reporter referred to it as a sex toy claims to have over four million “Pottery Barn … as mall-friendly and customers. And “altsex” at Google all-American as Restoration Hardware” groups is a virtual cornucopia of illicit and with $12.5 million in annual sales. desires. With little fanfare, Amazon Cake, operating in New York and got into the adult products market two London, hosts monthly parties catering years ago and might be the biggest to women (with men in attendance) seller; it carries more than 40,000 sex where dildos and other toys are products under its “Health and demonstrated and sold. Even some Personal Care” section. A new cultural of New York’s most glamorous retailers landscape defines America sexual are involved; Soho’s Kiki de life.19 Monparasse sells a $450 titanium vibrator and the venerable Henri A new forbidden Bendel store offers a $688 silk whip. Today’s sexual adventurism differs This new sex culture is not limited to significantly from earlier periods of big cities. Many exurban and rural American history. Where the earlier communities are seeing an increase in ones reflected an almost naïve what is called "freeway porn." In innocence, today’s are more self- Abilene, TX, Newton, IO, Buckhorn, conscious, fully in keeping with our MO, and Sawyer, MI, adult sex stores hip, spin culture; where the earlier are popping up like kudzu. Three ones were part of broadly social, stores operate on the 65-mile stretch political movements, today’s are very of I-70 between Abilene and Wilson, much a ho-hum middle-class Kansas. Lion's Den Adult indulgence. Where the earlier ones Superstores, a national chain based in were hosted by utopian idealists and Columbus, OH, is the market leader small-time operators (including with twenty-nine stores in ten states.18 organized crime), today’s are often

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

driven by entrepreneurs and giant avail him/her-self of the pleasures of corporations like the giant phone their choosing. This new era began companies and the major hotel chains. with Hugh Hefner’s “Playboy,” Today’s sexual revolution is being launched in 1953, and gained integrated into the market economy.20 momentum during the ’60s and ‘70s. It was halted during the ‘80s and ‘90s The 4th sexual revolution is largely the as AIDS swept the globe. Today, as consequence of two critical events. In AIDS (in the West at least) is being 1973, the American Psychiatric “managed” through sophisticated drug Association reclassified homosexuality. regimes, a new sexual revolution is in It did this by revising the Diagnostic full swing. and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders (DSM-III), redefining Surprisingly, both periods – the 1970s homosexuality from a mental disorder and today – share much in common. to (in its most egodystonic or self- Previously, the U.S. found itself stalled destructive form) a paraphelia. The in a military quagmire and confronted outcome of this decision was the by an increasingly skeptical public. transformation of consensual sexual Then, as today, as war was fought perversion from a disorder to what half-the-globe away, Americans were some analysts’ call “deviance without overwhelmed by the gluttony of pathology.” Thirty years later, the consumerism and suffered no apparent Supreme Court’s landmark Lawrence domestic hardship. During both and Garner v. Texas decision sanctified periods, a unique sexual the right to personal sexual privacy experimentation flourished. A new, among consenting adults. The Court radical sexuality found acceptance. legitimized (noncommercial) sexual perversion among consenting adults, A half-century ago Herbert Marcuse whether involving a gay or straight, warned that, while perversion conceals female or male, black or white adults. a kernel of utopian negation by Once a mental disorder or a crime, challenging monogamous, conventional sexual perversion has become a sexuality, it could also serve as a form lifestyle. Together, these of repression. His insight rings true developments, medical and legal, today: “The range of socially legitimized a new sexual cultural in permissible and desirable satisfaction is America.21 greatly enlarged, but through this process, the Pleasure Principle is Historically, illicit sexual pleasure, like reduced – deprived of the claims which an appreciation for good cooking and are irreconcilable with the established fine wines, was reserved for those of society. Pleasure, thus adjusted, the upper class. It was an acquired generates submission.”22 taste, an indulgence limited to the few: the sensuous pleasures of Nothing demonstrates the market’s hedonists and decadents, the erotic power to mediate sexuality than the arts of courtesans and Casanovas attempts by religious fundamentalist throughout the ages. To be fully to resist its ceaseless temptation. This appreciated, such pleasures required a effort to resist the commodification of certain skill and leisure time. While female sexuality is exemplified in the pathology could afflict anyone, only attire prescribed to devout Amish, the chosen few could truly indulge Hassidic and Muslim women, whether their perversions. in the form of wearing the headscarf, long-sleeved top and long skirt or The post-WWII consumer revolution wearing the higah or higab, or the changed sexuality. Today, anyone can covering veil, the niqab. Women are

Sex Matters What is Forbidden?

the most burdened by the market’s society.” One consequence is that commodity culture, even in its deviance has suffered, submitting negation. (along with pleasure) to the demands of the marketplace. And at no time is We live in a sensually poorer, more greater submission required then demanding and less fulfilling time than amidst a major social crisis – a crisis in the ‘60s. For consenting adults today, which Iraq is but the most painful, the 4th sexual revolution is “freer” yet bloody symptom. no longer (in Marcuse’s words) “irreconcilable with the established

Notes:

1 Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, “Your Felons on Trial in Courts,” in The Complete Poems, Francis Murphy, ed., (New York: Penguin, 2005), 407. 2 Tony Lanzaratta interview, Thomas K. Arnold, “San Diego Swings,” www.sandiego- online, August 2002; www.nasca.com. 3 Roy F. Baumeister and Jennifer L. Butler, “Sexual Masochism: Deviance without Pathology,” in D.R. Laws and W. O’Donohue, eds., Sexual Deviance: Theory, Assessment, and Treatment (New York: Guilford Press, 1997), pp. 225-39. 4 Chris Jennings, Paradise Now: The Story of American Utopianism (xx ); see also Kern; Sears; Spurlock. 5 Ruth Rosen/83-84; Mumford/96-97; Gerber. 6 Robert Allen/xx 7 Allen/xx 8 Allen/xx] 9 Heidenry/211-12, 218-19; D’E-F/340; Rubin-1991/119, 123, 131; Stein/146; Shilts/23; Heindenry/263-64; Kaiser/244-45. 10 Talese/398-99; Heidenry/175-76; [Paterson/346-47. 11 William and Jerrye Breedlove, Swap Clubs: A study in Contemporary Sexual Mores 12 Rubin-1991/121-28, 130-31. 13 San Francisco Chronicle, “Leather and Corsets and Whips, Oh My,” October 1, 2007; BAR, 27 September 2007; see also www.folsomstreetfair.com. 14 Kate Hausbeck and Barbara Brents, “Sex Industry and Sex Workers in Nevada,” University of Las Vegas, Center for Democratic Culture, 16 December 2005. 15 www.tuscl.com; www.thesmokinggun.com, October 21, 2005. 16 See alo Jenna Jameson, Regan Books, 2004. 17 “Time Out,” October 14-21, 2004. 18 Laura Douglas-Brown, “Police Arrest 17 in Undercover Raid at Theaters,” “Southern Voice,” January 17, 2005; Lou Chibbaro, jr., “Police Seek End to ‘P Street Cruising,” “Washington Blade,” November 12, 2004, vol. 35, issue 45 19 Suzi Parker, Sex in the South, Justin, Charles, 2003; Jonathan Birchall, “Amazon Quietly Cashes in on Sex Toy Market: Range of More Risqué Products Dramatically Increases,” FT.com, August 29, 2005. 20 David Kushner, “Can’t Buy Me Love,” “Mother Jones,” May-June 2006, Vol. 31, Issue 3. 21 APA, DSM-III, Washington, DC: APA Book, 1987; Roy F. Baumeister and Jennifer L. Butler, “Sexual Masochism: Deviance without Pathology,” in D.R. Laws and W. O’Donohue, eds., Sexual Deviance (1997); Lawrence and Garner v. Texas (02-102) 539 U.S. 558 (2003). 22 Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 1964, p. 78.