Being Gay in Public Life

The Daily Politics had Stonewall head honcho, Ben Summerskill, as their guest today.  It acted as a reason for the programme to explore  being gay in contemporary public life.  The whole show is available via the BBC iPlayer, but the relevant clip can be viewed here.

Bathhouse Videos

A hat-trick of thanks to the Bathhouse Blog as they are also responsible for this post.  One of the great challenges I face when teaching students about the phenomenon of public sex, is explaining the physical dynamics of these spaces.  Grupo Pases (a Spanish Sauna group) have produced a series of videos for their venues which offer a (albeit glossy) insight into their spaces.  Ignore the 'party' videos but take a look at the others - they are really useful, and are comparable to UK sauna spaces.  They are pretty safe viewing too although expect lots of bare bums on show, and a surprise amount of friendly contact.  The backing music choices are inspired.  Check them out here.

Birthday Blog: From the Archives Pt5

This blog has always been as much about the irreverent and entertaining as the serious and doctrinal law.  As such, it's had a variety of music videos and comedy clips over the last five years, but this post from 2008 continues to stand out as a personal favourite.  The clip on the post has since been removed but you can still watch the video via this link.

Birthday Blog: From the Archive Pt1

2007 saw a whole series of programmes on both the BBC and Channel Four marking forty years since the publication of the Wolfenden Report back in 1957.  This included the controversial Clapham Junction which, quite apart from the debatable political and cultural aspects, offered a rare opportunity to look at Paul Nicholls' willy.

In contemporary Britain, television is a key medium for projecting our visions of sexuality into the nations living rooms.

In November, 'mainstream' broadcasting also sought to explore contemporary sexuality, and in my view did a much better job than the 'worthy' shows that had been produced in the summer.  The popular - and really quite brilliant - BBC drama, The Street, featured a story between two working-class men.   The class dimension to sexuality is rarely discussed, and looking back on this show, I think it would just be as significant if broadcast today as it was in 2007.  Perhaps rather depressing.  Anyway, here is my post reflecting on the broadcast.

Thanks to the power of YouTube, you can also watch the episode (in 7 parts).  It begins with this video.  You can then navigate to the other clips via the options on the right hand side.  Enjoy.

HIV and the Law: A US Inter-disciplinary Perspective

The Institute for Multimedia Literacy at the University of Southern California have released a series of wonderful videos.  These video-based digital arguments are the final projects  for a unique class that joined IML420: New Media for Social Change, with HP470: Case Studies in Global Health. Student teams consisted of students from both classes and they were required to create a short research piece that explored some facet of HIV and the law.  There are nine videos in total and you can watch them all below.

OUT4MARRIAGE

I always tend to be suspicious of 'pack mentality' initiatives, typically trendy projects that everybody piles in on and serve as nothing more than the most ephemeral worthy event, soothing the egos of celebrities and 'ordinary' members of the public alike.  Sometimes however, I've just got to get over my own cynical streak and get involved.

So it is with the Out4Marriage campaign, a campaign that Pink News is promoting with gusto.  Unsurprising, given that the project was conceived by PinkNews.co.uk founder Benjamin Cohen and Mike Buonaiuto, the director of the Coalition for Equal Marriage viral video.  Inspired by the 'It Gets Better' Campaign, the idea is that individuals record videos of themselves coming out for marriage, explaining why they are supporting a change in English law and always ending with the same phrase.

I've previously expressed my view that same-sex marriage is politically inevitable in English law and it remains my view.  However, there is a always the possibility that in an apparent silence from the pro same-sex marriage lobby, we might concede an open goal.  Moreover, the historical narrative will suggest that there was no great demand for same-sex marriage - that it was merely an example of political expediency by the Coalition government of 2010-2015.   This campaign suggests otherwise.

I'm also incredibly conscious that I'm uncomfortable with marriage and whilst some queer theorists reject the die oaf marriage full stop, I disagree with that strand of Queer Theorists, accepting instead a fluidity which allows a range of social and legal partnerships to emerge.  Anyway, the other week I had a go at making a video for the campaign.  The end result is below.  It's rather hideous but I tried.  I hope you'll think about recording one too.



Check out their website here.

I Woke Up Gay

Chris Birch appears to have a dead skunk on his head.  This was my opening thought to the much-hyped BBC Three documentary which hit UK screens this last week.  The programme received a huge amount of attention in the media and on social media, following earlier such media feasts when the story was covered in the tabloids. The documentary, I Woke Up Gay, featuring 'Kris' (he creatively changed his name) and his boyfriend Jak (the Telegraph noted this odd aversion to the letter 'C') as he tries to prove that it was a stroke that turned him from a heterosexual into the homosexual media seeking performer he is today.   Most reactions seemed divided between whether people believe him or not.  His boyfriend doesn't, and if the man who in all probability has been intimate with Kris's bodily fluids, doesn't believe him, what chance for the rest of us?  Certainly the academic who put him through a test to find out (it involved a computer but it could have been showing an endless stream of porn for all the viewer could see) also concluded that he was probably born gay.

My conclusion - for what it's worth - is I don't know.  I'm not some moral crusader, convinced he is a self-deluded fibber, or knowing schemer.  Nor do I fully buy his story.  I generally believe that that the categories 'gay and 'straight' are flawed with people generally capable of some fluidity around these labels.  It seems likely that the stroke - whether chemically or psychologically - had some impact on moving him within this fluid labels but some latent homosexuality was always there - as it is for many.

The lack of engagement with these potentially more complex - and more rewarding - ideas was disappointing but the disappointment didn't end there.  The programme revolved around Birch changing his 'personality' post stroke.  There was no reference to a sudden desire to be pounded into oblivion by a hard cock (or to do so to someone else).  Nor was there even the faintest curiosity to fellate another male, or taste another man's semen.  Yet these, surely, are the things that might indicate one may be a gay male.  That and running for a therapist at the prospect of cunnilingus.   Instead the programme - and Birch - resorted to odd characteristics to distinguish between 'old' (straight) Chris and 'new' (gay) Chris.  Old Chris was beer-swilling and thus obviously straight (which does raise some serious questions about the French) whilst new Chris is a hairdresser.  Old Chris was Chavvy, new Chris is erm, dressed like a twit?  No, fashionably turned out I think is the phrase. There are no gay chavs apparently.

He also now takes an interest in his appearance, which will puzzle many a heterosexual male, and also curiously erases metrosexuality.  This interest extends to the insane act of receiving a botox treatment although I got the feeling this may have been so he could perform for the camera rather than reflect his common practice.   The programme also emphasised that he was in a  small Welsh village, suggesting that by definition he was 'odd'.  You expect screaming homes in the metropolis but imagine in a  small town...the scandal...or at least so seemed to be the sub-text delivered with the subtly of a mallet.

The thing that drove me nuts more than anything was Chris and his blooming 'memory box'.  This has been put together by Chris to help his memory as he has no memories before the stroke.  If this is true - and it clearly isn't completely true, given his remembrance of various things - then how does he know he was straight before?  Given he has forgotten lots of things, maybe he has forgotten that he was in the closet?

I do think Birch enjoys the limelight, and I do think he's milking this story for all it's worth in that perilous quest for celebrity.  I don't blame him for this but it does make me less likely to believe a story apparently motivated by profit.

Scenes such as the immensely private writing of a letter to his estranged Mum are performed on camera, and he reads out the content.  This seems about creating good television rather than genuinely reaching out to his Mother.  When he says "it's quite difficult to write this letter", I find myself disbelieving him - and like a dodgy witness, his whole testimony is thrown into doubt.

We see him develop a stack of old films which show the 'old Chris'.  He seriously waited until now to develop those pictures, even though they were in his 'memory box'.  Again, I great this revelation with utter disbelief.  If he was really about establishing credibility to his story, he would surely have prioritised getting film developed before tabloid exclusives and then BBC documentaries.  He might have woke up gay, but I'd like to know what he was dreaming about.

Check out the programme on the BBC iPlayer here.

HIV+ and Slutdom

Josh of Confessions of a Bareback Sauna Slut (NSFW) 'fame' has published on his blog a video that was previously available via the porn performer Christian Knox.  Josh has regularly talked about his promiscuous sexual behaviour, that this behaviour is bareback (condomless) and most recently, that he is now HIV+ (and continuing to engage in bareback sex).  I would have embedded the video here but there is the occasional (very brief) bit of sexual footage which intercuts this video interview.

The video was filmed in Chariots Sauna in Shoreditch, London in mid-January 2012. They took over a small cubicle in the sauna, and it was filmed on Cristian’s iPhone.  For many it will be the first time they are able to put a voice to the man. He is un-repentant about his behaviour in the past, or his continued bareback sex.  He explains his rationale and his je ne regrette rein philosophy in the course of the video and comes across as comfortable with his status and behaviour.  He also comes across as articulate and (I think this is incredibly significant) likeable.  Likability is important in reaching out to a wider audience, in enabling people to feel comfortable for long enough to 'tune in' to the message that is being presented.  

This presentation is important in putting a face - and now voice - to the increasingly visible identity of the HIV+ barebacker which goes some way to helping wider society get their heads around people who choose a mode of behaviour which puts them at greater health risk, and then having become positive, they become the transmitter to someone else.  This is a form of behaviour that policy-makers and legislators around the world are increasingly concerned with, whilst jurists must grapple with the criminal law implications that arise from this increased policy focus.

Check out the video interview (NSFW) here.