Dec 30, 2006

Gay Sex in the 70's

V and I rented 'Gay Sex in the 70s' from Blockbuster last night - about the dawning of gay liberation in NYC. It's an amazing movie. It interviews some "survivors" of the period, who describe the freedom of the scene back then, the piers, the trucks, the clubs, the back rooms, the parties, the FREE love as only gay men can give it. When these guys, all in their 50's and 60's now, describe their youth, it's overlaid with a profound melancholy (thanks to AIDS) - and at the same time, a secret joy, like they were reliving a wonderful dream. None of the men interviewed renounced their activities, or "recanted". It was like they were living in a magical moment, and they knew it, and treasured it, even WITH all the suffering that followed.

I came out in 1981 - the dawning of the AIDS crisis. I remember furtively reading the 'Advocate' in the school library, and the first press given to the growing "gay cancer". The shadow of death has always haunted my sex life. My life.

The movie interviewed a few modern young gay men - this stood out:
"I can't even smoke a cigarette in a bar, let alone have sex in a park".

Art: St. Mark's Baths poster by Boris Vallejo. Coincidentally, The Secret Gospel of Mark, yep, St. Mark, allegedly included a story about Jesus having gay sex.

1 comment:

Devin said...

Ok-this is too weird-well at least in the way that everything seems so inter-connected lately--someone at another blog had a post (of course cant remember-maybe it will cum to me:-) with some work by B Vallejo and others -I happened to mention that I thought Vallejo was wonderful or whatever- this was like the last time i was online -and that was about it- i was looking thru some papers later on of stuff i had printed off the puter in the last 3 years+ and of all things- and i dont remember doing this at all --period--apparently in 2006 i printed off the Vallejo 'mothman' image -why i dont know-and now this am -when i was originally just gonna shut the puter off and work on my writing project -instead i think what the heck and decide to start your archives (in 2006 also)this am at least for a half hour or so--haha- i never would have guessed Vallejo did a St Marks baths poster!!

On another note -even tho i was quite young still when the 'gay cancer' stuff started being talked about (16-17) I self hypnotized myself (to use an expression) until about 83 or 84 that they would find some common connection between these cases that would not involve me or anyone i was in contact with- talk about stupid magical thinking -but even with this crisis in the background i must not have been the only one with crazy theories on how it would be resolved as I remember sex being extremely easily had-of course i was quite young which seems to be an attractor in itself to many in the 'culture' but i was certainly no Antinous with my scrawny body and moptop hairdo-well i guess i was no Polydeukes either haha-maybe most of us are somewhere in the middle--

also sometimes these quotes from gay men my generation to older strike me as extremely poignant- many times even moreso when taken with the younger generation -who have never not known fear of sex-but of course the program anymore is to make people afraid of your own shadow -and it seems to be working -which reminds me that the psycholgical shadow projecting i see out there is insane-and very dangerous IMHO.

the party is indeed over -my question is will a new party ever begin? for us gays? for everyone?

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