What's the Deal with Bathroom Sex?

[Guest tweety]

What is this all about? How is it done? (I can see how in a handicap bathroom, but not a reular stall.)

Why is it done? I can't understand why in an age of on-line escorts anyone needs this?

What is the thrill in this? (I understand the allure of the Mile High Club, but an arport bathroom, no?)

Where / when will this end?

[TampaYankee]

Why is it done? I can't understand why in an age of on-line escorts anyone needs this?

What is the thrill in this? (I understand the allure of the Mile High Club, but an arport bathroom, no?)

Different folks... different strokes. Some get off on public sex and its risk. Others just want to get off free and anonymously.

In this case it is what happens when the body's irresistable urge meets the immovable midievil intolerant mind. He is not alone in the suffering of this angst (cf. Rev. Ted). I suspect in addition to the urgency, he presumed that this scenario would maintain his anonymity and not leave a paper trail like hotels do. Foolish mistake in this case. Not only paper but lots of ink and gigabillions of electrons.

I feel sorry for the guy. His inability to cope with his sexual preferences has destroyed his life and put a big ding in the lives of others.

[Guest SouthernMan]

"Why is it done? I can't understand why in an age of on-line escorts anyone needs this?"

My question, in return, is WHY do 90% of the people who post here and at DP, assume that every visitor/poster is someone whose ONLY experience with M4M sex is on a pay for play level?

Many of us have had lots of sexual encounters, in a variety of locales (i.e. parks, trooms, bars, etc.) that have not involved an exchange of funds for service. Don't you read CraigsList? I seldom pay anymore, and at 50+, still meet for free, many men of all ages off of CL.

Gay men are always, imo, ready for an encounter. A public one only adds to the excitement. Thats what GAYDAR is all about!

[Guest tweety]

Many of us have had lots of sexual encounters, in a variety of locales (i.e. parks, trooms, bars, etc.) that have not involved an exchange of funds for service. Don't you read CraigsList? I seldom pay anymore, and at 50+, still meet for free, many men of all ages off of CL.

Gay men are always, imo, ready for an encounter. A public one only adds to the excitement. Thats what GAYDAR is all about!

Ok, that may explain why? Can somene please explain how and what? I really don't see how this works and how it could be even remotely enjoyable even if you can save a few bucks by not renting...

[Guest StuCotts]

Ok, that may explain why? Can somene please explain how and what? I really don't see how this works and how it could be even remotely enjoyable even if you can save a few bucks by not renting...

Enjoyability is in the eye of the beholder, and nobody is in a position to point the finger of ridicule at what turns others on. Thinking that the only objective of not hiring is to "save a few bucks" (sometimes not as few as the escort's performance is worth) is short-sighted.

Verbal explanations of how and what could never be anything but inadequate and pointless. If you really want to know, get your act together, take it to where the action is and do your own primary-source research.

[Guest tweety]

Long on why, still short on how...?!

So Many Men's Rooms, So Little Time

Why men like Larry Craig continue to to court danger in public places.

By Christopher Hitchens

Posted Saturday, Sept. 1, 2007, at 4:09 PM ET

I knew it was all over for Sen. Larry Craig when he appeared with his long-suffering wife to say that he wasn't gay. Such moments are now steppingstones on the way to apology, counseling, and rehab, and a case could be made for cutting out the spousal stage of the ritual altogether. Along with a string of votes to establish "don't ask, don't tell" and to prohibit homosexual marriage, Craig leaves as his political legacy the telling phrase "wide stance", which may or may not join "big tent" and "broad church" as an attempt to make the Republican Party seem more "inclusive" than it really is.

But there's actually a chance—a 38 percent chance, to be more precise—that the senator can cop a plea on the charge of hypocrisy. In his study of men who frequent public restrooms in search of sex, Laud Humphreys discovered that 54 percent were married and living with their wives, 38 percent did not consider themselves homosexual or bisexual, and only 14 per cent identified themselves as openly gay. Tearoom Trade: Impersonal Sex in Personal Places, a doctoral thesis which was published in 1970, detailed exactly the pattern—of foot-tapping in code, hand-gestures and other tactics—which has lately been garishly publicized at the Minneapolis-St Paul airport men's room. Theword "tearoom" seems to have become archaic, but in all other respects the fidelity to tradition is impressive.

The men interviewed by Humphreys wanted what many men want: a sexual encounter that was quick and easy and didn't involve any wining and dining. Some of the heterosexuals among them had also evolved a tactic for dealing with the cognitive dissonance that was involved. They compensated for their conduct by adopting extreme conservative postures in public. Humphreys, a former Episcopalian priest, came up with the phrase "breastplate of righteousness" to describe this mixture of repression and denial. So it is quite thinkable that when Sen. Craig claims not to be gay, he is telling what he honestly believes to be the truth.

However, this still leaves a slight mystery. In the 1960s, homosexuality was illegal in general and gay men were forced to cruise in places where (if I can phrase it like this) every man and boy in the world has to come sometime. Today, anyone wanting a swift male caress can book it online or go to a discreet resort. Yet people still persist in haunting the tearoom, where they risk arrest not for their sexuality but for "disorderly conduct." Why should this be?

In my youth, I was a friend of a man named Tom Driberg, a British politician who set the bar very high in these matters. In his memoir, Ruling Passions, he described his "chronic, lifelong, love-hate relationship with lavatories." He could talk by the hour about the variety and marvel of these "public conveniences," as Victorian euphemism had dubbed them. In Britain, they were called "cottages" in gay argot, instead of "tearooms," and an experienced "cottager" knew all the ins and outs, if you will pardon the expression. There was the commodious underground loo in Leicester Square, which specialized in those whose passion was for members of the armed forces. There was the one at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, much favored by aesthetes, where on the very foot of the partition, above the 6-inch space, someone had scribbled "beware of limbo dancers." (The graffiti in cottages was all part of the fun: On the toilet wall at Paddington Station was written: "I am 9 inches long and two inches thick. Interested?" Underneath, in different handwriting: "Fascinated, dear, but how big is your dick?") On Clapham Common, the men's toilet had acquired such a lavish reputation for the variety of lurid actions performed within its precincts that, as I once heard it said: "If someone comes in there for a good honest shit it's like a breath of fresh air."

Perhaps I digress. What Driberg told me was this. The thrills were twofold. First came the exhilaration of danger: the permanent risk of being caught and exposed. Second was the sense of superiority that a double life could give. What bliss it was to enter the House of Commons, bow to the speaker and take your seat amid the trappings of lawmaking, having five minutes earlier fellated a guardsman (and on one unforgettable occasion, a policeman) in the crapper in St James' Park. Assuming the story about the men's room in Union Station to be true, Sen. Craig could have gone straight from that encounter to the Senate floor in about the same amount of time.

Driberg was a public campaigner for gay rights and carried on as such even after being elevated to the House of Lords (where I am pretty sure he told me there was more going on in the lavatory than most people would guess). But it was with a distinct hint of melancholy that he voted for the successful repeal of the laws criminalizing homosexuality. "I rather miss the old days,"he would say, wistfully. Well, the law legalized homosexual behavior only "in private," so he could (and did) continue to court danger in public places. The House of Lords actually debated the question of whether a stall in a public lavatory constituted "privacy": the reason being that in Britain you have to put money in a slot in order to enter such a place, and this could be held to constitute rent. Private Eye printed a poem about the learned exchange on this between two elderly peers of the realm: "Said Lord Arran to Lord Dilhorne, a penny/ should entitle me to any/ thing I may choose privately to do. Except you."

Thus, without overthinking it or attempting too much by way of amateur psychiatry, I think it's safe to assume that many tearoom-traders have a need, which they only imperfectly understand, to get caught. And this may be truest of all of those who are armored with "the breastplate of righteousness." Next time you hear some particularly moralizing speech, set your watch. You won't have to wait long before the man who made it is found, crouched awkwardly yet ecstatically while the cistern drips and the roar of the flush maddens him like wine.

[Guest tweety]

Bathroom Sex FAQ

Cruising signals, legal issues, and Larry Craig's "wide stance."

By Christopher Beam

Posted Wednesday, Aug. 29, 2007, at 6:22 PM ET

Sen. Larry Craig

Sen. Larry Craig was arrested in June for soliciting sex in an airport bathroom, Roll Call reported Monday. According to the police, Craig had "tapped his right foot … as a signal used by persons wishing to engage in lewd conduct." After pleading guilty to a charge of misdemeanor disorderly conduct, the senator paid $575 in fines and fees and was sentenced to a year of probation. But since then, he has said he regrets his guilty plea and that his actions were "misconstrued"—he merely has a "wide stance" when using the toilet.

This incident raises all sorts of questions about cruising signals, congressional privilege, and the logistics of bathroom sex. Here's a roundup of our favorites.

Is tapping your foot really code for public sex?

Yes. The signal has been around for decades in the United States and Europe. Generally, one person initiates contact by tapping his foot in a way that's visible beneath the stall divider. If the second person responds with a similar tap, the initiator moves his foot closer to the other person's stall. If the other person makes a similar move, the first will inch closer yet again. The pair usually goes through the whole process a few times, just to confirm that the signals aren't an accident.

Next, one of the men will slide his hand under the divider. This usually means he's inviting the other person to present himself, as if to say, "Show me what you got." The partner can respond by kneeling on the floor and presenting his penis or rear end underneath the divider. Or he can swipe his own hand under the divider, as if to say, "You go first." Some married men make a point of displaying their wedding band (like Sen. Craig allegedly did) to make themselves more alluring.Just how sexy can you get when there's a divider in the way?

It depends on the bathroom. If the participants were in the last stall in a long row, they might have enough privacy to get it on right there beneath the divider. Alternatively, one person can enter the other's stall by surreptitiously ducking out and back. Positions vary depending on the space, but one classic setup has one man sit on the toilet while the other straddles his legs and receives oral sex. (In the 1970s, some men frequenting the popular bathrooms at Bloomingdale's in New York would hide their legs by standing in a pair of shopping bags.)

As a U.S. senator, doesn't Craig have special protection from the law?

Yes, but that doesn't mean he could have used it. In Article I, Section 6 of the U.S. Constitution, the so-called "arrest" clause says that senators "shall in all cases, except treason, felony and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same." At the time of Craig's arrest, he was on a layover during a trip from Boise to Washington, D.C., a Craig spokesman told Slate. Since he had votes to make that evening, he could have argued for the special privilege. That said, courts have ruled that the speech or debate clause doesn't protect members of Congress from arrest in criminal and civil cases.

Members of Congress have invoked the privilege before, but not always with good results. Former Iowa Sen. Roger Jepsen was widely mocked in 1983 for invoking the speech or debate clause to wriggle out of a traffic ticket. Back in the early 1960s, New York Rep. Adam Clayton Powell used the law to avoid facing a defamation lawsuit back home. Both of these cases drew a lot of attention to the lawmakers. So, if Craig wanted to let the incident pass unnoticed, he was smart not to invoke the clause.

Can Craig still maintain his innocence after pleading guilty?

Sure, but that doesn't change his legal status. Whether or not he committed a crime, Craig may have hoped that pleading guilty would be the best way to avoid scandal. Either way, the plea counts. As Dahlia Lithwick wrote in a 2001 Explainer, "Since up to 90 percent of criminal convictions result from plea bargaining, and at least 90 percent of the people in prison seem to insist that they are innocent, it stands to reason that the criminal justice system will not necessarily invalidate a guilty plea simply because the defendant makes out-of-court statements about his innocence."

Is it wise to use a "wide stance" when you go to the bathroom?

No. When you're sitting on the toilet, spreading your feet and leaning forward tightens the levator ani muscles that control defecation. If you're having trouble passing stools, you should take the opposite of a wide stance, and lean back. Doctors recommend this technique to relax the bowel muscles.

Got a question about today's news? Ask the Explainer.

Explainer thanks William Leap of American University, Don Ritchie of the Senate Historical Office, and Robert Theobald of Comprehensive Colorectal Care.

[TampaYankee]

Long on why, still short on how...?!

So Many Men's Rooms, So Little Time

Why men like Larry Craig continue to to court danger in public places.

By Christopher Hitchens

Posted Saturday, Sept. 1, 2007, at 4:09 PM ET

Tweety,

Much thanks for a very interesting and entertaining read.

[TotallyOz]

Sherman Yellen

Fear and Self Loathing in Idaho

Posted August 30, 2007 | 10:13 PM (EST)

When I was a young man I knew a renowned art historian, born a Jew, whose loathing for his co-religionists knew no boundaries. It was the nineteen fifties and this distinguished and successful man -- whom I do not name out of consideration for his living children -- devoted much of his time to living in a pretend WASP world. The Holocaust and the long history of persecution that Jews had suffered had not opened his heart to his own people, it had caused him to shut off any feeling for them. Through a connection to then President Eisenhower, he even managed to purchase an apartment in an elegant "restricted" Fifth Avenue apartment building. He married his young gentile Smith College graduate assistant, and for all his success, deeply resented that his religion kept him from a place on the board of the Metropolitan Museum of Art which was then off limits to Jews. When a famed Jewish art collector and philanthropist died, and left his remarkable art collection to the state of Israel with the proviso that this "expert" deliver the dedication speech, the art historian kept postponing the trip until he was forced to go by his young wife. As he descended the airplane steps into the Holy Land, he fell forward and dropped dead. He was buried in Israel where he will lie for eternity. A sad, true, and dare I say it, funny story. We all know such people. Their self loathing is often explainable, the effects of a hostile culture upon them in their youth -- explainable but never justifiable, and comically tragic.

We have such an example of the high ranking self-loather on the Supreme Court. Justice Clarence Thomas whose rise in the world was aided by progressive jurists establishing anti-segregation laws, was appointed by Bush the elder to smuggle an unacceptable reactionary into the court under cover of his color. This undistinguished jurist, married to a Caucasian, and beholden to the far right, has possibly done more to halt the progress of African Americans than any other sitting Judge. I say possibly only because it is harder to look into the hearts and minds of a Roberts, or Alito, our recent Bush Junior appointees. You need a canary and a miner's lamp to gaze into that noxious heart of darkness and stay alive.

And now we have another champion self-loather in Senator Larry Craig. An abusive anti-gay culture has created this misshapen monster of a man - one who fought against the rights of homosexuals in the Senate while allowing his own gay proclivities to express themselves behind toilet doors. It is more than an act of hypocrisy; it is an American tragedy. The self hatred has tragic consequences; not only for the Larry Craigs of the world and their families, but for those he viciously attacked in his "Defense of Marriage" proposals. The fear and loathing in Idaho is truly fear and self-loathing. And with any luck and a lot more compassion there will be less of this in my sons' world and in my grand-daughter's generation.