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Those in the LGBT community often face disparities in access to quality health care, leading to poorer outcomes like higher rates of STDs, researchers wrote in Annals of Family Medicine.
To reverse some of these negative health outcomes, Bruce W. Furness, MD, MPH, medical epidemiologist at the CDC, and colleagues created Transforming Primary Care for LGBT People. The 1-year intervention was tested on 441,387 patients in 123 clinical sites affiliated with 10 federally qualified health centers, or FQHCs.
Reference: Furness BW, et al. Ann Fam Med. 2020;doi:10.1370/afm.2542.
According to researchers, the 1-year intervention produced significant results, including:
a 42.9% increase in collecting patient pronoun information;
a 276.3% jump in gathering sexual orientation and gender identity data; and
a 300% increase in identifying LGBT patient liaisons.
Among eight of the test sites, researchers reported increases in:
Healio Primary Care spoke with Furness about the development of Transforming Primary Care for LGBT People, how to implement it and more.
Q: How did Transforming Primary Care for LGBT People come about?
A: In January 2016, CDC staff and advisers invited 12 FQHCs with a known interest in providing more LGBT-affirming care to respond to a competitive request for proposals. CDC funding allowed up to 10 FQHCs to participate. After careful review by internal and external experts, the 10 applicants that demonstrated the highest level of commitment from leadership; had the systems necessary to implement the intervention; and agreed to all intervention and evaluation activities were chosen as test sites. As the 1-year testing period went on, the intervention spread from 10 clinicians in 10 clinical sites to 431 clinicians in 79 clinical sites.
Q: What are the components of Transforming Primary Care for LGBT People?
The Practice Improvement Collaborative part consisted of each FQHC forming a team that included a quality improvement facilitator, a clinical champion and two or three additional staff members. Teams received monthly coaching calls with qualified project staff and accessed free resources from health centers that previously established programs to enhance the well-being of the LGBT.
Early on, the FQHC teams developed question forms and workflows to determine where, when and by whom sexual orientation and gender identity and sexual behavior questions would be asked. Staff received role-appropriate training at staff meetings and, in real time, wrote scripts for answering patient questions. Several FQHCs had LGBT patient-advisory groups provide input and feedback. Teams also worked closely with information technology staff and electronic health vendors to improve sexual orientation and gender identity and sexual risk data capture. Each team used plan-do-study-act rapid cycle tests of change with the clinical champion’s patient panel.
Gradually, teams expanded the intervention’s procedures to add additional clinicians and clinical sites within the FQHCs and helped respond when challenges arose. To increase buy-in from other FQHC staff, teams encouraged administrative leaders and governing board members to announce their support of the intervention to staff; trained all staff on LGBT health disparities and culturally affirming communication; and asked staff for feedback on proposed changes. Community engagement occurred through outreach coordinators and collaboration with local LGBT organizations. Cross-center collaborative learning took place through two in-person and three videoconference learning meetings; sharing of monthly reports of accomplishments and barriers; and contributing of questions and resources to a web-based platform.
By using Project ECHO, primary care and behavioral health clinicians could be mentored in providing high-quality, informed and affirming care to LGBT patients. Twice-monthly sessions that were facilitated by a multidisciplinary expert clinical team comprised brief didactic presentations followed by participant-led case consultation.
The ECHO sessions both enhanced and reinforced the practice improvement collaborative by focusing on STD and HIV screening, as well as other critical LGBT health topics, such as caring for youth and older adults, prescribing pre-exposure prophylaxis, screening for cervical cancer and providing gender-affirming hormone therapy.
All FQHCs received training and tools to capture quantitative data on screening and qualitative data on barriers and facilitators to implementation. Each team shared monthly data and progress reports with project staff and other teams to provoke insights and change. Senior clinical leaders at each FQHCs completed the practice assessment survey at baseline and at the end of intervention.
For each month of the intervention, FQHCs submitted de-identified and aggregated core clinical data on patients aged 13 years and older. For improved data integrity, FQHCs received coaching from project staff and resubmitted cleaned and corrected monthly data at the end of the intervention. Transcripts of mid-intervention interviews with FQHCs teams and leadership, narrative progress reports and presentations of lessons learned were also prepared and used.
Q: What are the costs associated with implementing this intervention?
A: We did not assess or measure this. But those wishing to replicate the intervention should consider the costs of patient education materials, technology support and implementation of new systems. Future interventionists may be able to create sized-down adaptations of the intervention, where small cohorts arrange peer-to-peer learning through free or low-cost videoconferencing software, which would decrease the costs for the participating center.
Q: Are there any new staff members whoneed to be hired to implement and maintain this intervention?
A: For those wishing to implement this intervention, there may be a need for additional hires. However, the staff members needed may already be within the organization. Each health system will need to assess the capacity of its group to decide what will be needed to both implement and maintain the intervention.
Q: What are the differences in implementing this intervention between rural and urban areas?
A: The biggest difference between rural and urban implementation was that the rural areas were less likely to realize they had sexual and gender minority clients. The rural areas were also less likely to have the experience and resources to provide these clients with appropriate care.
Six months after being ordered to close their doors due to the novel coronavirus outbreak, gyms, barbershops, nail salons, and other personal service businesses in San Francisco will be able to open for indoor service Monday.
But due to the pandemic, they will only be able to do so at “limited capacity,” according to city officials. More exact details should be announced by September 14, but business owners are expecting they will be restricted to 10% of their allowed capacity inside based on where San Francisco currently is on the state’s tiered COVID rankings for counties. It is in the red colored tier, as seen online.
“So many gyms are smaller than our gym, so 10% capacity means being able to pay the bills,” said Dave Karraker, who with his husband, Glenn Shope, owns MX3 Fitness on upper Market Street in the LGBTQ Castro district.
They are part of the San Francisco Independent Fitness Studio Coalition, which came together earlier this year to advocate on behalf of its nearly 100 small studios across the city. The coalition members together employ more than 800 people and provide health and well-being services to more than 25,000 residents.
In recent weeks it has raised alarms about the city still restricting such businesses from being open and threatened seeking legal action if the restrictions were not eased. Even after the city announced the new rules Thursday, the coalition warned in a news release that, “this entire business sector is on the verge of collapse due to financial burdens, having not been open in any meaningful manner since March.”
Karraker told the Bay Area Reporter the gym owners have been on a “topsy-turvy rollercoaster ride” since May, when they first began working with city officials on finding a way for their businesses to reopen safely.
City officials had allowed gyms to begin offering outdoor workout sessions and classes in the summer. As of September 1 they allowed barbers and hair stylists to see their clients for outdoor appointments.
The gay-owned Joe’s Barbershop at 2150 Market Street opened in its backyard that Tuesday. They have seen a stream of clients ever since, though were forced to close Wednesday when the sun was unable to break through the smoke and fog, causing a blood orange darkness to befall on the Bay Area.
Owner Joe Gallagher told the B.A.R. Friday that he is hopeful the city will base the capacity on square footage. If so, he expects he will be able to utilize roughly half of the 11 stations he has inside his storefront, which he noted, has windows both in the front and back that can be opened to provide for air circulation.
“We will certainly start back in on Monday based on whatever the stuff is,” said Gallagher, who marked his 16th anniversary in business Thursday. “I expect we will have to take out or use only six of my 11 stations. That way there is plenty of room between each station … It should be very, very safe and fulfill all the city requirements.”
For information about its appointment process, visit its website.
Up the street at the former location of Male Image, barber David Hone is working with a new owner to reopen the barbershop under a new name at 2195 Market Street. For now, he is seeing clients Tuesdays through Saturdays in the back patio space of the private LGBTQ-focused members club The Academy at 2166 Market Street. People can make appointments by calling (415) 850-8376.
“My pathway is so uncertain. I’m at The Academy for now. Back to the old shop when they get their permits,” Hone told the B.A.R. Friday.
As the B.A.R. reported in July, MX3 Fitness started holding fitness trainings with clients out on the sidewalk in front of its business after city officials allowed gyms to hold outdoor workout sessions. Until the smoky skies resulted in extremely unhealthy air quality this week, the gym had been at capacity with the four supervised workout stations it had set up along the 2300 block of Market Street.
Starting Monday, it will move one of the stations inside and, if demand warrants it, will add another station for supervised workouts. It will also be able to offer unsupervised indoor fitness, but at 10% capacity, it can only have four people inside the gym at one time.
“If the air improves, we expect there will be greater demand for outdoors,” said Karraker. “A lot of clients don’t want to be inside at all.”
Fitness SF’s Castro location, which was damaged early Friday morning when a car ran into the building at 2301 Market Street, has yet to post to its website or Facebook page when it plans to reopen. As of Friday afternoon the website only said that personal training clients could see their personal trainer only for outdoor sessions.
The local chain’s South of Market location, as of September 9, has been offering an outdoor gym members can book reservations to utilize. It is expected that the gym’s various locations will institute a reservation system when they do reopen.
Once San Francisco advances to the next COVID tier, coded with the color orange, the businesses likely would be able to bump up their capacity to 25% indoors. Hair salons, tattoo and piercing parlors, and massage services are also among the businesses that can reopen Monday but only for those services where face coverings can be worn at all times by everyone involved.
“Given our local trend in COVID indicators, low-risk, limited capacity indoor activities may resume,” stated Dr. Grant Colfax, a gay man who is the city’s public health director. “We will continue our gradual reopening as it allows us to monitor the spread, manage its immediate challenges and mitigate the long-term impact on our city. Our reopening pace continues to be informed by our ability to manage the risk of more activity that may result in more cases and hospitalizations. Our success is contingent on everyone doing their part, including wearing face coverings, social distancing, and avoid large gatherings.”
Small businesses can utilize a program overseen by San Francisco’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development to request a 30-day supply of hand sanitizer, surgical masks, and face shields via a community-based organization. To do so online, click here.
Hotels and short-term rentals, outdoor family entertainment centers, drive-in entertainment like outdoor movies, and outdoor tour buses and boats will also be allowed to reopen Monday under rules the city devised for outdoor gatherings. Places of worship and political activities such as a campaign office can also open but only for one person at a time indoors; up to 50 people outdoors.
Also starting next week indoor museums and galleries can submit health and safety plans to the city’s Department of Public Health in order to open as early as Monday, September 21.
As for schools and educational services in San Francisco, Community Hubs will open September 14 to support students with distance learning. In-person learning and child and youth development activities will also be opened on a rolling basis.
Classroom instruction will also be brought back on a rolling basis starting with the youngest children. Thus, limited classroom learning for children up to the sixth grade should resume September 21 if schools have been given approval for their safety plans.
The city’s goal is to allow for middle school in-person learning sometime in October. And in November, it hopes to open high schools for in-person learning.
“I’m so glad we can move forward earlier than expected to reopen more businesses that have been closed since March. These businesses have been struggling, and starting Monday, they’ll finally be able to serve customers again, with the necessary safety precautions and modifications in place,” stated Mayor London Breed in announcing the news. “It’s on all of us to keep doing our part so that we can get more businesses reopened, get our kids back in school, and keep making progress on our economic recovery.”
She stressed that people should be still be taking precautions to protect themselves and others from being infected with COVID when out in public.
“Wearing face coverings when you go out, keeping your distance, and washing your hands will help us keep the rate of transmission down and will help San Francisco recover from this pandemic,” stated Breed.
Gallagher told the B.A.R. that he has not had any issue with customers of his barbershop following the rules on masks and social distancing.
“It’s been great. We have been very, very busy,” he said. “It’s been awesome, people have followed the instructions and knew to wait out front until we texted them. Our customers are from San Francisco and are awesome, so everybody pretty much understood.”
Living in Fort Lauderdale for the past 7 years and having a revolving door on my guest room for visitors from New England, across the country, and from other nations, the task of finding things for guests to do has always been, but with COVID, I’m actually getting back to the basics of what makes the Greater Fort Lauderdale area one of the easiest places to live as an LGBT citizen.
Often times a city wants to get away from banging on the same drum as to what may place that city on the map. Greater Fort Lauderdale has some great stretches of sand that draw tourists and locals to the Atlantic Shoreline. During this summer, the open space of the beach has been a great escape from any crowds as you can make your own section of the beach happen, or just keep walking for miles, watching the wave, the boys, and the sun.
You can explore the eight distinct beaches of Greater Fort Lauderdale that cover 23 beautiful miles of Atlantic coastline by clicking over to sunny.org. Here are three of our favorites.
Sebastian Beach – A small section of the Fort Lauderdale sea coast has been scouted out by the locals living in and tourists visiting one of the hottest gay tourist destinations in the country. May you call it Sebastian or Sebastian Street Beach, you’ll know you’re there when you see the bears and the boys in the speedos. Fort Lauderdale’s Sebastian Beach is one of the more active sandy spots for the friends of Dorothy and has been named the “Hottest U.S. Gay Beach” by Out Traveler. It’s proximity to major hotels, gay resorts, and Wilton Manors makes it one of the best metropolitan – gay beach destinations out there. You’ll want to stay all day, but eventually the sun will fall behind the resorts and cast shade on the gay festivities, but we’re good with the shade. Check out the great food like Casablanca or a little further down, Coconuts. Visit year round for it’s always hot in Florida. The popular gay beach is located where Sebastian Street and A1A meet along the ocean, just steps south of the Casablanca Cafe, which we highly recommended, too. Alos recommended is searching for #sebastianbeach on Instagram. After looking art some of those pics, we need to get over there ASAP.
Haulover– You may find that more tourists know about this beach than locals. Know for it clothing-optional freeness, Haulover Beach also has ample parking, and other facilities like restrooms, concession stand, rentals, and plenty of sand. Remember that last clothing optional beach you went to where you had to hike forever and know some secret word to write in the sand ad be between this and that pole? Not the case here. Haulover is not in the heart of the Pompano or Fort Lauderdale like Stonewall and Sebastian respectively, but it’s located just north of Miami right off major roads. It needs to be as it is often ranked one of the Top 10 nude beaches in the world, is family-friendly, and is the oldest officially recognized nude beach in Florida. You don’t have to bare it all, but if you want to, haul yourself over to Haulover Beach. If you want to take a peek at who is there, take a look at the beach’s unofficial Instagram page:
It’s been a pleasure getting to know the beaches of Fort Lauderdale once again. With things as they are and making travel plans seems a little bit daunting and has the need of you being a little more cautious, it’s nice to know these open spaces and relaxing venues are there for us to kind of escape it all, while still being safe.
Greater Fort Lauderdale beaches are open and ready to welcome you. Your safety is our number one priority, therefore guidelines and procedures are in place to ensure social distancing and prevent the spread of COVID-19. For more information on guidelines for visitors, what’s open and more visit our COVID-19 Advisory page.
And do the Instagram thing and follow visitlauderdale for more information on dining, where to stay, arts & culture, and more!
screen shot from Instagram
For more great ideas for things to check out while visiting Greater Fort Lauderdale, check out some of our previous posts.
Strong Hands Gym is a facility infused with personal training, boxing, MMA, weight room, nutrition guidance and the first LGBTQ gym in Chicago.
The gym strives to accept all members of the gym and community. All who feel out of place and uncomfortable at other gyms will feel accepted, motivated, supported and empowered—no matter where they are in their personal and physical journey.
Stronghand Gym has implemented health and safety policies according to Chicago guidelines: mandatory masks and gloves, reduced class sizes/capacity and equipment/surface sanitizing.
As new Religious and Sex Education Curriculum comes into place in England this September, our new study finds the UK as a nation broadly accepting of its LGBTQ+ community, although with more complex views on how to tackle the subject in schools.
The study was conducted using our Public Voice panel among 2,363 people aged 16+ in the UK between 8 July and 6 August 2020. The findings reveal overall high levels of comfort within UK society towards lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. However, acceptance of lesbian, gay and bisexual people was higher than that of transgender people in leadership and community roles.
Levels of comfort
92% of people state they are totally or fairly comfortable with a gay or bisexual man, or lesbian or bisexual woman, being their neighbour, manager, GP or Prime Minister.1
Levels of comfort with transgender people are lower, with 82% of people fairly or totally comfortable with a transgender person as a neighbour, manager, GP or Prime Minister.
For parents with children aged 16 and under, 91% say they are fairly or totally comfortable with a gay or bisexual man or lesbian or bisexual woman as their child’s teacher, compared to 77% who express comfort about a transgender person as their child’s teacher.
These generally high levels of societal acceptance regarding LGBTQ+ adults in various roles stand in contrast with views about school lessons inclusive of LGBTQ+ people, which were more mixed. Our findings show:
Almost four in ten (38%) people agree with the statement that it is inappropriate for schools to teach a six-year-old that being gay is acceptable, whilst 52% of people disagree.
35% of people agree with the statement that it is inappropriate to teach a twelve-year-old that some people identify as a different gender than the one they were born as. 54% disagree with this statement.
These findings on attitudes towards inclusive education may well reflect a wider issue of LGBTQ+ discrimination in and around schools for parents and children alike. Kantar’s DIVA Survey in 2020 revealed insights into the LGBTQ+ women’s perspective; among those with children, 36% say they have experienced homophobia from other parents and 36% claim their children have been victims of homophobia due to their parents’ sexual orientation.
Comfort is higher amongst younger age groups than older ones: 93% of 16-24-year olds were comfortable with lesbian LGBT people as their neighbour, manager, GP and Prime Minister, compared to 80% of 55-64 year-olds, 77% of 65-74 year-olds and 75% of those aged 75 and over.
More of those practicing a religion expressed some level of discomfort with 17% compared to 12% of non-religious people saying they were uncomfortable with LGBT people in the roles mentioned.
Almost four in ten (38%) people agree that it is inappropriate for schools to teach a six-year-old that being gay is acceptable, whilst 52% of people disagree with this statement
30% of people agree that it is inappropriate for schools to teach a twelve-year-old that being gay is acceptable, whilst 50% of people disagree
Four in ten (40%) people believe it’s inappropriate to teach a six-year-old that some people identify as a different gender to the one they were born as, whilst 57% disagree
35% of people agree it is inappropriate to teach a twelve-year-old that some people identify as a different gender than the one they were born as, with 54% disagreeing with this statement
When asked comfort level with LGBT people as their child’s teacher, for parents with children aged 16 and under:
Comfort levels are higher amongst younger parents, as 88% of parents aged 25 to 34 express comfort with a lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender person as their child’s teacher, compared to 66% of parents aged 55-64.
75% of parents who are religious and practising are comfortable with someone who is lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender being their child’s teacher, compared to 86% of those who are not religious
The study also asked people in the UK about their view on conversion therapy. All major UK medical organisations signed a Memorandum of Understanding condemning the use of conversion therapy in all its form and in 2018 the government pledged to ban as part of its LGBTQ+ equality plan. The research found that:
Over one third of people in the UK (35%) think that conversion therapy should remain legal in the UK
Six in ten (60%) think that it should be banned
Women are much more likely than men to think it should be banned: 63% compared to 57% of men
The research also indicated some of the personal impacts on people within the LGBTQ+ community, providing insight into levels of loneliness of Britons:
19% of people who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual say they have felt lonely (“always or often feel lonely”) compared to just 5% of people who identify as straight/heterosexual.2
A total of 2363 interviews were conducted online among a representative sample of the UK population, aged 16 and over, between 8 July and 6 August 2020. Interviews were conducted using the Kantar Public Voice panel.
1. Figures are the average % comfort with the roles mentioned. Across each role comfort towards LGB people was higher than towards transgender people.
2. Unlike the other questions (asked between 8 July and 6 August 2020), this was asked in late 2019.
Summer may be ending soon, but the “Summer fun!” meme is just getting started.
You may have seen a “Summer fun!” meme or two on your timeline recently. You’ll know, because the tweets will read, “Summer fun! 🏖️❤️ (*private island all tested negative multiple times wear a mask ❤️ )” and feature a photo of a large group of people — usually from a television show or movie.
The meme is designed to mock unsafe superspreader events — large gatherings that easily promote person-to-person transmission — being held in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic. But the meme was actually inspired by a real-life party that was recently held on a private island.
On Friday, 39-year-old actor and musician Daniel Newman tweeted “Summer fun! 🏖️❤️ (*private island all tested negative multiple times wear a mask ❤️ )” alongside a photo of himself and 25 other people who can be seen posing close together without masks on. The original tweet has since been deleted, but not before it infuriated Twitter users.
For some additional context, Newman, who’s known for his role on The Walking Dead, got tested for the coronavirus back in March after someone in his Mardi Gras group tested positive. Newman detailed his struggle with the virus in a New York Times op-ed titled, “Acting in The Walking Dead Didn’t Prepare Me for Coronavirus,” and shared the difficulties he faced when trying to get tested.
Newman explained that when he went to the emergency room to get tested his results couldn’t be processed due to a shortage of beds. He was reportedly given a $9,116.00 bill even though the doctors couldn’t tell him if he tested positive or negative for the virus.
Though he couldn’t share an official diagnosis, the actor said he experienced common coronavirus symptoms including fever and shortness of breath. “Going for walks with my dog would leave me out of breath. I coughed at night and had difficulty breathing when I tried to sleep,” he wrote. And he ended the op-ed by writing, “My biggest fear is that I have passed whatever illness I have on to someone.”
Perhaps that’s why people were especially disappointed to see Newman maskless and not engaging in social distancing at an event a little more than five months after his symptoms. Just a thought!
The Daily Dot also noted that several people are questioning whether Newman’s event was actually held on a “private island.” Location tags from other photos of the event seem to suggest that the gathering took place at Tulum, a municipality in Mexico that doesn’t appear to be private.
Though Newman’s original “Summer fun!” tweet has been deleted, screenshots are forever. And his casual, downright braggy wording sparked the meme that’s taking over timelines this weekend.
People are mocking Newman’s private island party by positing photos of other groups of people — from the cast of Lost and The Sopranos, to a staircase full of American Girl dolls, and more. Here are a few of our favorite private island memes.
If you’re thinking of having a superspreader event in the middle of a pandemic, don’t. And if you do insist on hosting or attending an event with no masks or social distancing, just know if you share a photo from it to social media people will not hesitate to make a meme out of you.
Pop star and model turned silversmith and LGBT champion Efva Attling is the Queen of Swedish jewellery.
Having set out on her designer path in the mid 90s, Efva’s shops can now be found across the globe and her timeless pieces capture the clean yet bold look that is synonymous with Swedish design.
From stunning wedding ring collection, Love Bead to her Rainbow Freedom charity collection and the recent homage piece to the queer Mother of Moomins, Tove Jansson, Efva hits the nail on the head when it comes to creating jewellery that goes beyond the norm.
What’s more, Efva and her wife Eva are basically Sweden’s ce-lesbian equivalent of Ellen and Portia. Efva’s workshop remains on Södermalm in Stockholm. For more shopping in Stockholm, check out visitstockholm.com.
“There is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes” — many a Swedish child has grown up with this motto and it says a lot about the Swedish approach to outdoor clothing; it needs to be functional.
One brand that has taken that to heart is Fjällräven (literally meaning arctic fox). Founded in 1960 in Örnsköldsvik, their weatherproof clothing and camping equipment is used worldwide, however it may be their unisex Kånken rucksack that is best known.
Originally introduced in 1978 as a way of helping to straighten children’s backs, the Kånken rucksack has survived the test of time and today you can hardly move through London or Berlin without seeing one of these iconic square rucksacks in a multitude of rainbow colours . What’s more, it comes with a lightweight sitting pad, meaning that whether you’re out foraging for chanterelles or just catching the bus to town, this piece of kit will keep you both trendy and dry.
To put it to the ultimate test, and experience the conditions that Fjällräven was built for, we recommend exploring the beautiful wilderness of Swedish Lapland. Why not try the Fjällräven Classic hike, for example. This year they’ve got a women’s only group!
Fashion, music, illustrations, style, sisterhood. Let’s face it, any brand going by that motto has our support. Founded in Gothenburg in 2006 Monki has shaped millenial style with their unapologetic, intersectional feminism permeating their playful designs.
From their unretouched, stunning, Good Vibes Only swimwear campaign to their brilliant ongoing Periods Are Cool project, Monki proves they have got women, and equality, at the heart of their design. An interesting side note is that Monki is owned by affordable fashion giant H&M, a company that takes gender equality very seriously and that featured lesbian kissing in a recent campaign.
Other H&M brands include & other stories, COS and Weekday (check out their gender neutralPride collection) and they all do their bit bringing feminism to the high street. The Monk flagship store in Gothenburg is a great place to get to know the brand in its natural surroundings. For more about Gothenburg, visit gothenburg.com
Founded in 1924 by Estrid Ericson, interior design emporium Svenskt Tenn is a Swedish design institution found in homes across the world and their furniture, combining fun design and stylish usability has influenced artists, designers and shoppers for decades. Their quintessential prints and creative interior pieces have become synonymous with Sweden thanks to Estrid and her chief designer Josef Frankl — whose visions were inspired both by foreign trips and Swedish nature.
The company, which has always been driven by women, has its flagship store on Strandvägen 5 in Stockholm.
Thanks to profound seasons and long winters, Swedes know the importance of a good coat. It needs to be sturdy and look good — because you’ll be wearing it a lot. No wonder then, that Stutterheim has become so popular in recent years. Having collaborated with a range of big names, including Jay Z and Volvo , as well as lesbian rapper Silvana Imam on the rainbow-striped Vladimir jacket in 2014, the brand has not just won a lot of street cred but also gone down in queer fashion history.
Embrace Swedish melancholy and pay a visit to the store located on Åsögatan 136 in trendy SoFo district of Stockholm. Whilst in the area, do pop into the shop of Caroline Hjerpe, the up and coming designer behind the hugely popular feminist Kimberly collection.
Having worked in fashion for many years, Maria Erixon was sick of the commercial cycle of buying clothes and throwing them away when she founded Nudie Jeans in Gothenburg in 2001. She wanted to change that — and the concept she came up with has gone on to travel the world. The idea behind Nudie’s jeans is that you never wash them, or at least as rarely as possible, and that you get them repaired in-store when needed. Once you are finished with a pair you hand them back and they use the material for more repairs. Made from 100% organic cotton sourced mainly from India, where Nudie pays workers a living wage as supposed to a minimum one, these jeans are changing attitudes, and lives.
Sweden is well-known for its hand-blown glass and the Kingdom of Crystal, in Småland in South Sweden, is the much celebrated home to brands such as Kosta Boda and Orrefors. Slightly north of that, nestled in the forests of Östergotland in central Sweden, we find the small village of Reijmyre where Sweden’s second oldest glass blowing workshop is still active. Founded in 1810, Reijmyre Glass was the first glass factory to employ female designers and, much thanks to the legacy of their mid 20th Century designer Monica Bratt, they’ve become known for their timeless but playful designs — including the exclusive collection made for the royal wedding of Princess Victoria in 2010. Check out Monica Bratt’s signature design; the now iconic maroon red glass.
Sägen, meaning legend, is one of many Swedish design success stories. These handmade pieces of delicate jewellery by designer Elin Sigrén feature recycled porcelain and vintage details in fusion with contemporary Scandinavian design. Combining the past with the future, Elin brings old treasures to life as she is on a mission to show gratitude to the hard-working mothers who came before her. Having set out in 2007, Sägen’s pieces range from earrings in classic rose gold and pale pink to bold and humorous “crazy cat lady” necklaces.
Sägen is sold around the world but their headquarters can be found in Malmö, Skåne. For more about Malmö, check out malmotown.com.
Based in the northernmost village of Karesuando in Sweden, jewellery designer Erica Huuva has, ever since setting out in 2001, wanted to create jewellery and art that reflects her Sámi background. “I try to combine Sami aesthetics, modern elegance and natural elements in my creative process,” she says of the beautiful pieces that make up collections named after natural and cultural elements such as snow and reindeer marking rituals. Alongside the jewellery, Erica has always created a reflex with a difference which, loosely translated, has been named “if we are seen then we exist.” The idea behind it is multifold. You have to be visible not to be hit by a car driving in the dark but you also have to be seen if you are part of a minority, or else your rights may be overlooked — which is why part of the proceeds from the project go to a project working for Sámi rights. In 2016 that project was Niejda, a group supporting and mentoring girls and women with Sámi background. You’ll find Karesuando by flying to Kiruna in Swedish Lapland.
Whether you are looking for a coffee table book on sustainable food, self watering plant pots, jewellery with feminist statements, an ice breaker board game or you’re just after a bit of inspiration, you are sure to find design with a twist as Designtorget (literally The Design Market) showcases the best of fresh, Swedish craft. Perfect for gifts, the products often do their bit to poke holes at gender and societal norms — and they are sure to not just offer a snapshot of Swedish life but add a sprinkle of fun to your everyday tasks.
For so many years we were deep in the closet, fearful of being arrested, and threatened with pseudo-medical cures.
Then came the Stonewall uprising, the declassification of homosexuality as a psychiatric disorder, and the defeat of sodomy laws. And finally, the legalization of gay marriage.
Now—at least in some parts of the world — we’re free to live our lives exactly like everyone else. No one gets to tell us how to live, whom to love, or what we can or can’t do in the bedroom. We alone call the shots.
Then again, maybe we’re not as free as we think. Ever wonder why so many of us open our relationships? Are we always really deciding for ourselves how we want to live?
Or are we sometimes on autopilot, blithely following expectations and norms of which we aren’t even aware, oblivious to the possible consequences?
Spring, 1987: Although I didn’t know it at the time, my own introduction to the world of gay relationships was following a script that countless gay men have lived.
Growing up in that era, there were no visible gay relationships, no role models. Astoundingly, a gay porn theater/bathhouse did advertise in the Washington Post, my hometown paper, when I was a kid. While this was titillating, I dreamed of something more traditional and soulful for my future than the anonymous encounters and orgies at which those ads hinted.
So when hunky, adorable Justin* asked me out after a meeting of the campus gay group and we started dating, I was over the moon. That is, until my friends Ben and Tom, an older gay couple, shot me right back down to earth when, one evening over dinner, they asked if Justin and I were “exclusive.”
Huh? What a question!
“Just wait,” Tom said knowingly, “Gay men never stay monogamous for long.”
More than 30 years have passed, and the world of gay male relationships remains pretty much the same. Working as a psychologist for the past 25 years, I’ve listened to hundreds of gay clients share their own versions of my long-ago dinner with Ben and Tom. “We just assumed we’d be monogamous, but then this older gay couple told us, ‘yeah, let’s see how long that lasts.’ So we decided to open up our relationship and start playing around.”
New generations have the possibility of proudly visible relationships and recently, marriage. And still, for many of us, open relationships are seen as the default choice in one form or another: “Monogamish.” Only when one partner is out-of-town. Never the same person twice. Only when both partners are present. No kissing. No intercourse. No falling in love. Never in the couple’s home. Never in the couple’s bed. Don’t ask, don’t tell. Disclose everything. Anything goes.
Examining our affinity for non-monogamy can be seen as judgmental or anti-gay, “sex-negative,” tantamount to suggesting that gay men should mimic a heterosexual model that is patriarchal, misogynist, oppressive — and maybe not even really workable for straight people. Questioning our penchant for casual sex while we are coupled is also seen as a challenge to the inspirational (to some) narrative that gay men, free of the constraints of history and tradition, are constructing a fresh, vibrant model of relationships that decouples the unnecessary, pesky, and troublesome bond between emotional fidelity and sexual exclusivity.
But we do not honor our diversity if we expect that any of us should choose (or not choose) any particular role or path. After all, gay men are just as multidimensional, complex, and unique as other men.
And while an open relationship may be the best relationship for some couples to have, successfully being in one requires capabilities that many of us do not possess. Simply being a gay man certainly does not automatically provide skills such as:
The solidity of self to be trusting and generous
The ability to sense how far boundaries can be pushed without doing too much damage
The capacity to transcend feelings of jealousy and pain
The strength of character not to objectify or idealize outside sex partners.
Yes, open relationships can be as close, loving, and committed as monogamous relationships, which of course have their own difficulties. But even when conducted with thought, caution, and care, they can easily result in hurt and feelings of betrayal.
Moreover, open relationships are often designed to keep important experiences secret or unspoken between partners. Clients will tell me they do not want to know exactly what their partner is doing with other men, preferring to maintain a fantasy (or delusion) that certain lines will not be crossed. As a result, the ways in which we structure our open relationships can easily interfere with intimacy—knowing, and being known by our partners.
Consequently, we gay men often struggle to form solid, mutually respectful attachments that include both emotional and physical connection. Might any of these scenarios be familiar to you?
Jim and Rob came in to see me after a disastrous cruise with eight of their friends. Although it had not been their plan, between them they had ended up separately having sex with all eight. This had broken several of their “rules,” although as Jim pointed out, the rules were unclear because they often made them up to suit whatever they wanted to do, or not allow each other to do. Each partner’s ongoing anger over how his partner was hurting him by ignoring admittedly ad-hoc sexual boundaries meant that Jim and Rob hadn’t had sex with each other in two years.
Another couple I work with, Frank and Scott, have had an open relationship from the start. When they met, Frank felt strongly that monogamy had no relevance to him as a gay man. Though Scott wanted a sexually exclusive relationship, he somewhat reluctantly went along with Frank’s wishes because he wanted to be with Frank. In recent years the two have become near-constant users of hookup apps, and recently Scott met a younger man on Scruff with whom he has “great chemistry.” Now, to Frank’s dismay, Scott is dating Todd.
Carlos and Greg came to see me after Carlos discovered that Greg was hooking up numerous times a month. Although they had a “don’t-ask-don’t-tell” agreement and both assumed the other was occasionally having sex with other men, Greg’s behavior was far more frequent than Carlos had imagined or wanted to accept in his marriage. Greg was steadfast in his conviction that because he was following their rules, his hookups could not be negatively impacting his relationship with Carlos.
Beyond the hurt, enmity, reduced commitment, lack of connection, and distance they experience, men in these situations often tell me that their relationships and their lives have become overwhelmed by their pursuit of sex.
Another potential drawback to an open relationship: Yes, multiple partners are an easy (and fun) fix for sexual boredom. But when hot times can be easily found with others, we may feel little incentive to put sustained energy into keeping sex with our partners interesting. My educated guess: This is why many gay couples in open relationships have little or no sex with each other, just as a twosome.
Finally, it is troubling how easily, in our open relationship/hookup culture, we objectify those we have sex with and see other men as disposable, replaceable bodies. Treating others and being treated in this manner does not advance our respectfully relating to each other, nor does it benefit our self-esteem as men and as gay men.
What is influencing these behaviors?
Gay men lean toward non-monogamy for many interconnected reasons.
Men (stereotype acknowledged) often enjoy pursuing and having no-strings sex, so gay men readily find willing partners. Open relationships, seemingly fun and unconstrained, offering a stream of new partners to reduce the monotony of an ongoing relationship, can be intrinsically alluring. Gay men’s sexual connections have historically not been governed by societal rules, so we’ve been able to do pretty much whatever we want, as long as we’ve flown way under the radar.
And, open relationships are what we predominantly see around us as the relationship model for gay men, for the reasons noted above and also in large part due to the influence of gay history and gay culture.
For a deeper understanding of this last point, let’s take a whirlwind tour though gay male history in the Western world (much of which overlaps with lesbian herstory). Ancient, recent, forgotten, familiar, all of it is impacting our lives today.
Since at least the fourth century C.E., as Christianity gained influence, homosexual behavior was illegal in Europe, often punishable by death, and European settlers brought these laws with them to what became the United States. Some periods were relatively more tolerant, others less so. France became the first Western nation to decriminalize homosexuality after the 1791 Revolution, but harsh laws remained and were enforced throughout the Western world well into the 20th century. (And at present, 78 countries still have laws prohibiting homosexual behavior; punishments in some include the death penalty.)
Following World War II, America’s McCarthy “Red Scare” of the 1950s was accompanied by a campaign against the “Lavender Menace,” resulting in hundreds of homosexual government employees being fired. The anti-gay environment in the United States, similar to that in other Western countries, included FBI tracking of suspected homosexuals; the postal service monitoring mail for “obscene” materials including mailings from early gay rights organizations; prison terms for homosexual acts between consenting adults; and nightmarish “treatments” for homosexuality including chemical castration. Obviously, under conditions such as these, gay men had a difficult time congregating openly, meeting each other, or forming relationships. Many gay men lived fearful lives of isolation and furtive sexual encounters.
To get a chilling sense of what it was like to live as a gay man in this era, view William E. Jones’s “Tearoom” on the Internet. The film presents actual surveillance footage from a police sting operation of men meeting for sex in an Ohio restroom in 1962. The men’s fear is palpable, and the absence of affection or connection between them is heartbreaking.
While in 1967 parts of the United Kingdom decriminalized homosexuality, 1969 is known as the start of the modern gay rights movement because in June of that year, patrons of the Stonewall Bar in New York City fiercely fought back against a routine police raid. Following Stonewall, we began to congregate and organize openly, to throw off the cloak of shame, and to fight against third-class status. (In 29 of the United States it remained legal to fire someone simply for being gay until the June Supreme Court ruling in the Bostock case. The scope of that ruling is still being debated.)
During the 1970s, with sexual liberation coming on the heels of the civil rights era, the gay rights movement gained momentum. The American Psychiatric Association declassified homosexuality as a mental disorder in 1973. We became more visible, and gay culture—bookstores, bars, political organizations, and sex clubs—flourished as gay men rejected living in fear and openly celebrated their sexuality.
But by the late 1970s, HIV was silently making its way into the gay community. As men began to fall sick and die in staggering numbers early in the 1980s, anti-gay sentiment again exploded, and we began to equate our own sexuality with death. Yet the AIDS epidemic ultimately led our community to coalesce and strengthen, organizing to care for our ill and to fight for effective treatment, leading to greater visibility and acceptance, and providing some of the organizational groundwork for the equal rights battles that continue today.
History influences culture, and both our history and culture influence who we become, and how we lead our erotic and intimate lives. Modern gay culture developed in an environment of justified fear.
Often, the only possibility for us to meet for any sort of intimate encounter was through hookups and anonymous encounters. When connecting, we had to keep one eye over our shoulders, scanning for danger (this can literally be seen in Tearoom). Can such connections really be termed intimate?
For most of us, the days of outright surveillance are over. But the patterns of interacting that developed over many years have been passed down through the generations and still influence us in the present, even those of us who don’t face losing our jobs, family support, freedom, or lives if our sexual orientation is discovered. The longstanding need to hide, scan, and be vigilant has helped shape a culture of gay male interaction that— even when we are partnered — often centers on brief encounters, putting greater emphasis on sexual connection than on knowing and being known as multidimensional physical and emotional beings.
At the opposite end of the spectrum: The era of exuberant sexual liberation that followed Stonewall. In part as a reaction to our identity having been badly stigmatized and gay sex having been literally forbidden, both pre-Stonewall and to some degree in the era of AIDS and safer-sex campaigns, gay male culture has leaned toward placing strong emphasis on sex and hooking up. As a result, we often get the message that to be a successful gay man, we should be sexually desirable, open to sex, and have frequent conquests.
Other related factors that can contribute to our so easily leaning away from monogamy and toward multiple partners include:
The stigma around being gay denies many of us opportunities to date and romance early in life. Instead, the experiences of growing up gay, having to hide, and having difficulty discerning who might be a willing partner often lead us to have our first experiences in anonymity and shame, learning how to be sexual apart from and before we learn how to be close. As a result, we’re likely to have a hard time connecting sex and emotional intimacy. Moreover, our early experiences can set our arousal templates to be most aroused by secrecy, risk, anonymity, and being a sexual outlaw. Internalized homo-negativity from growing up in a culture that has stigmatized homosexuality and gay relationships may lead us to absorb the idea that our relationships, and gay men generally, are “less than.” Consequently, we may think that we, our significant others, our relationships, and our sex partners are unworthy of honor and respect; and we may easily behave in ways that reflect these beliefs, pursuing pleasure without considering the possible costs to what we say we hold dear. And we may not even realize we hold these beliefs.
As gay men, we are likely to have grown up feeling defective and hiding our true selves from our closest family and friends, fearing rejection. When children and young people don’t get a sense that they are loved for whom they really are, and instead grow up seeing themselves as damaged, it’s difficult to develop a positive sense of self-worth. Many of us are still seeking to heal this wound through our ongoing pursuit of sex and the companion feeling of being desired by another man, unaware of what is driving this pursuit.
Alcohol and other substance abuse are entrenched in gay culture, in great part as a means of soothing the isolation, distress, anxiety, and depression that many of us experience from living in an often-hostile world. Clients routinely tell me they are in a chemically altered state when they make decisions to engage in extracurricular sexual interactions that threaten or damage their primary relationships.
One more key factor, true for all relationships: While closeness can feel good, being close also means being vulnerable, which is scary. Open relationships can be a way for us to keep some distance from each other in an attempt to keep ourselves safer.
I became a psychologist at a time when gay relationships weren’t getting much societal support, with the goal of helping gay couples thrive despite a deck stacked heavily against us. Over the years, I’ve learned that some of the most important work I can do with gay male clients is to help them be more thoughtful about their choices, so that they can better develop stronger, more nurturing, more loving relationships.
We gay men often keep our eyes closed to the ways that we may be damaging our relationships through some of our most commonplace, accepted, and ingrained behaviors. Obviously, it can be painful to acknowledge that we may be harming ourselves through seemingly fun, innocuous choices, or to acknowledge the possible downsides of our ubiquitous open relationships.
Nevertheless, there is great value for each of us in figuring out, as individuals, what it means to live in a way that we respect; in holding our behavior up to our own standards, and only our own standards; and in clarifying how we want to live life even when there is pressure, from the outside world and from other gay men, to live differently.
Pressure from other gay men? That’s right.
On first thought one might think that we gay men would have no trouble standing up to others’ expectations. Certainly it’s true that openly acknowledging we are gay despite societal judgment and pressure to “be” heterosexual demonstrates a strong ability to be true to ourselves, and to manage our anxiety in the face of tough challenges.
But beyond the expectations of society-at-large are the expectations of gay culture about what it means to be a successful gay man. Here is where many of us can get wobbly.
Not finding complete acceptance in the larger world, we have the hope that by coming out, we will finally feel a sense of really belonging somewhere. If this means behaving in the ways that peers do, taking on what we perceive to be the values of our community in order to fit in, many of us are willing to ignore our own feelings, and possibly our souls, so as to not feel excluded yet again.
Jim and Rob, the couple who had sex with all their friends on their cruise, are sitting in my office, with my dog Aviv snoozing at their feet. After some consideration, they had decided to stop having sex with other men for a while, to see if this would help them to feel closer and re-start their sex life with each other. The rancor had decreased and they reported enjoying having sex together again.
Their news: Jim has decided to enroll in a graduate program on the other side of the country, and they are discussing how this will affect their sex life.
“Of course we’re going to have to make some allowances for this,” Jim says. I look at him quizzically.
“I mean, we might not see each other for a month or two at a time. So we need to have an agreement that we’ll have sex with other guys.”
Rob nods in agreement.
I ask them how they each anticipate the impact of both again having sex with others. They respond with shrugs.
“You know, our friends Bill and Dave—Bill has been working in Argentina for the last two years and they only see each other every three or four months. They’re definitely hooking up with other guys,” Jim notes.
“I mean, what else would we do?” adds Rob. “Not have sex for eight weeks?”
If I didn’t regularly have similar conversations with other coupled gay clients, I would be stunned that neither man is stopping to consider his own feelings about what it would mean to resume an open relationship. Both are focusing solely on their perceived need to have sex regularly, and on the notion that this is simply how gay couples should operate.
So much of gay history, culture, and relational development are shaping this moment.
When working with a couple like Jim and Rob, I do my best not to accept much as “simply a given.” Here are the questions that I wonder about with them: What have your hopes been for couplehood, and how is reality lining up with those hopes? How have you made your choices? How is your relationship working for you? What is most important to you?
As with Jim and Rob, I often find that clients haven’t considered these questions much. “It’s what our friends do” is the most frequent answer for how they have made the choice to have an open relationship. Many times it seems to me as if there’s a fog around these men’s thinking about their relationships.
I don’t want to contribute to the fog by colluding with them to believe that the particular heartbreaks that can come with carelessly conducted open relationships are unavoidable; that our relationships are not in fact fragile; or that we gay men must establish our relationships along certain lines simply because that is how it is “usually done.”
And when I challenge these clients to go deeper than stating that they are just doing what everyone else does? “Yes, it’s a struggle” is the answer I usually get. “It is painful when my husband doesn’t come home till the next morning.” And then: “But isn’t this how gay men have relationships? It’s what everyone around me is doing.”
These are the poignant and troubling words I hear again and again, echoing what I was told by my friends back in 1987.
Given the numerous interrelated factors that shape our choices in the realm of sex, it is difficult to envision gay men making significant changes in how we operate, especially as committed relationships are—at present—becoming less popular among younger people of all sexual orientations. But when we look at the arc of gay existence over the past 50 years, from the shadows to the margins of tolerance to marriage equality, it is clear that surprising and dramatic shifts are possible.
So I am hopeful that we gay men can get off autopilot and become more aware of the factors contributing to how we construct and manage our relationships. And I am hopeful that this awareness can go a long way toward our making ever more thoughtful choices, respectful of ourselves and our partners, that help us to build stronger, closer, and more rewarding relationships.
(All names and identifying information changed in this article.)
Many gay men often struggle to form solid, mutually respectful attachments that include both emotional and physical connection. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
For so many years we were deep in the closet, fearful of being arrested, and threatened with pseudo-medical cures.
Then came the Stonewall uprising, the declassification of homosexuality as a psychiatric disorder, and the defeat of sodomy laws. And finally, the legalization of gay marriage.
Now—at least in some parts of the world — we’re free to live our lives exactly like everyone else. No one gets to tell us how to live, whom to love, or what we can or can’t do in the bedroom. We alone call the shots.
Then again, maybe we’re not as free as we think. Ever wonder why so many of us open our relationships? Are we always really deciding for ourselves how we want to live?
Or are we sometimes on autopilot, blithely following expectations and norms of which we aren’t even aware, oblivious to the possible consequences?
Spring, 1987: Although I didn’t know it at the time, my own introduction to the world of gay relationships was following a script that countless gay men have lived.
Growing up in that era, there were no visible gay relationships, no role models. Astoundingly, a gay porn theater/bathhouse did advertise in the Washington Post, my hometown paper, when I was a kid. While this was titillating, I dreamed of something more traditional and soulful for my future than the anonymous encounters and orgies at which those ads hinted.
So when hunky, adorable Justin* asked me out after a meeting of the campus gay group and we started dating, I was over the moon. That is, until my friends Ben and Tom, an older gay couple, shot me right back down to earth when, one evening over dinner, they asked if Justin and I were “exclusive.”
Huh? What a question!
“Just wait,” Tom said knowingly, “Gay men never stay monogamous for long.”
More than 30 years have passed, and the world of gay male relationships remains pretty much the same. Working as a psychologist for the past 25 years, I’ve listened to hundreds of gay clients share their own versions of my long-ago dinner with Ben and Tom. “We just assumed we’d be monogamous, but then this older gay couple told us, ‘yeah, let’s see how long that lasts.’ So we decided to open up our relationship and start playing around.”
New generations have the possibility of proudly visible relationships and recently, marriage. And still, for many of us, open relationships are seen as the default choice in one form or another: “Monogamish.” Only when one partner is out-of-town. Never the same person twice. Only when both partners are present. No kissing. No intercourse. No falling in love. Never in the couple’s home. Never in the couple’s bed. Don’t ask, don’t tell. Disclose everything. Anything goes.
Examining our affinity for non-monogamy can be seen as judgmental or anti-gay, “sex-negative,” tantamount to suggesting that gay men should mimic a heterosexual model that is patriarchal, misogynist, oppressive — and maybe not even really workable for straight people. Questioning our penchant for casual sex while we are coupled is also seen as a challenge to the inspirational (to some) narrative that gay men, free of the constraints of history and tradition, are constructing a fresh, vibrant model of relationships that decouples the unnecessary, pesky, and troublesome bond between emotional fidelity and sexual exclusivity.
But we do not honor our diversity if we expect that any of us should choose (or not choose) any particular role or path. After all, gay men are just as multidimensional, complex, and unique as other men.
And while an open relationship may be the best relationship for some couples to have, successfully being in one requires capabilities that many of us do not possess. Simply being a gay man certainly does not automatically provide skills such as:
The solidity of self to be trusting and generous
The ability to sense how far boundaries can be pushed without doing too much damage
The capacity to transcend feelings of jealousy and pain
The strength of character not to objectify or idealize outside sex partners.
Yes, open relationships can be as close, loving, and committed as monogamous relationships, which of course have their own difficulties. But even when conducted with thought, caution, and care, they can easily result in hurt and feelings of betrayal.
Moreover, open relationships are often designed to keep important experiences secret or unspoken between partners. Clients will tell me they do not want to know exactly what their partner is doing with other men, preferring to maintain a fantasy (or delusion) that certain lines will not be crossed. As a result, the ways in which we structure our open relationships can easily interfere with intimacy—knowing, and being known by our partners.
Consequently, we gay men often struggle to form solid, mutually respectful attachments that include both emotional and physical connection. Might any of these scenarios be familiar to you?
Jim and Rob came in to see me after a disastrous cruise with eight of their friends. Although it had not been their plan, between them they had ended up separately having sex with all eight. This had broken several of their “rules,” although as Jim pointed out, the rules were unclear because they often made them up to suit whatever they wanted to do, or not allow each other to do. Each partner’s ongoing anger over how his partner was hurting him by ignoring admittedly ad-hoc sexual boundaries meant that Jim and Rob hadn’t had sex with each other in two years.
Another couple I work with, Frank and Scott, have had an open relationship from the start. When they met, Frank felt strongly that monogamy had no relevance to him as a gay man. Though Scott wanted a sexually exclusive relationship, he somewhat reluctantly went along with Frank’s wishes because he wanted to be with Frank. In recent years the two have become near-constant users of hookup apps, and recently Scott met a younger man on Scruff with whom he has “great chemistry.” Now, to Frank’s dismay, Scott is dating Todd.
Carlos and Greg came to see me after Carlos discovered that Greg was hooking up numerous times a month. Although they had a “don’t-ask-don’t-tell” agreement and both assumed the other was occasionally having sex with other men, Greg’s behavior was far more frequent than Carlos had imagined or wanted to accept in his marriage. Greg was steadfast in his conviction that because he was following their rules, his hookups could not be negatively impacting his relationship with Carlos.
Beyond the hurt, enmity, reduced commitment, lack of connection, and distance they experience, men in these situations often tell me that their relationships and their lives have become overwhelmed by their pursuit of sex.
Another potential drawback to an open relationship: Yes, multiple partners are an easy (and fun) fix for sexual boredom. But when hot times can be easily found with others, we may feel little incentive to put sustained energy into keeping sex with our partners interesting. My educated guess: This is why many gay couples in open relationships have little or no sex with each other, just as a twosome.
Finally, it is troubling how easily, in our open relationship/hookup culture, we objectify those we have sex with and see other men as disposable, replaceable bodies. Treating others and being treated in this manner does not advance our respectfully relating to each other, nor does it benefit our self-esteem as men and as gay men.
What is influencing these behaviors?
Gay men lean toward non-monogamy for many interconnected reasons.
Men (stereotype acknowledged) often enjoy pursuing and having no-strings sex, so gay men readily find willing partners. Open relationships, seemingly fun and unconstrained, offering a stream of new partners to reduce the monotony of an ongoing relationship, can be intrinsically alluring. Gay men’s sexual connections have historically not been governed by societal rules, so we’ve been able to do pretty much whatever we want, as long as we’ve flown way under the radar.
And, open relationships are what we predominantly see around us as the relationship model for gay men, for the reasons noted above and also in large part due to the influence of gay history and gay culture.
For a deeper understanding of this last point, let’s take a whirlwind tour though gay male history in the Western world (much of which overlaps with lesbian herstory). Ancient, recent, forgotten, familiar, all of it is impacting our lives today.
Since at least the fourth century C.E., as Christianity gained influence, homosexual behavior was illegal in Europe, often punishable by death, and European settlers brought these laws with them to what became the United States. Some periods were relatively more tolerant, others less so. France became the first Western nation to decriminalize homosexuality after the 1791 Revolution, but harsh laws remained and were enforced throughout the Western world well into the 20th century. (And at present, 78 countries still have laws prohibiting homosexual behavior; punishments in some include the death penalty.)
Following World War II, America’s McCarthy “Red Scare” of the 1950s was accompanied by a campaign against the “Lavender Menace,” resulting in hundreds of homosexual government employees being fired. The anti-gay environment in the United States, similar to that in other Western countries, included FBI tracking of suspected homosexuals; the postal service monitoring mail for “obscene” materials including mailings from early gay rights organizations; prison terms for homosexual acts between consenting adults; and nightmarish “treatments” for homosexuality including chemical castration. Obviously, under conditions such as these, gay men had a difficult time congregating openly, meeting each other, or forming relationships. Many gay men lived fearful lives of isolation and furtive sexual encounters.
To get a chilling sense of what it was like to live as a gay man in this era, view William E. Jones’s “Tearoom” on the Internet. The film presents actual surveillance footage from a police sting operation of men meeting for sex in an Ohio restroom in 1962. The men’s fear is palpable, and the absence of affection or connection between them is heartbreaking.
While in 1967 parts of the United Kingdom decriminalized homosexuality, 1969 is known as the start of the modern gay rights movement because in June of that year, patrons of the Stonewall Bar in New York City fiercely fought back against a routine police raid. Following Stonewall, we began to congregate and organize openly, to throw off the cloak of shame, and to fight against third-class status. (In 29 of the United States it remained legal to fire someone simply for being gay until the June Supreme Court ruling in the Bostock case. The scope of that ruling is still being debated.)
During the 1970s, with sexual liberation coming on the heels of the civil rights era, the gay rights movement gained momentum. The American Psychiatric Association declassified homosexuality as a mental disorder in 1973. We became more visible, and gay culture—bookstores, bars, political organizations, and sex clubs—flourished as gay men rejected living in fear and openly celebrated their sexuality.
But by the late 1970s, HIV was silently making its way into the gay community. As men began to fall sick and die in staggering numbers early in the 1980s, anti-gay sentiment again exploded, and we began to equate our own sexuality with death. Yet the AIDS epidemic ultimately led our community to coalesce and strengthen, organizing to care for our ill and to fight for effective treatment, leading to greater visibility and acceptance, and providing some of the organizational groundwork for the equal rights battles that continue today.
History influences culture, and both our history and culture influence who we become, and how we lead our erotic and intimate lives. Modern gay culture developed in an environment of justified fear.
Often, the only possibility for us to meet for any sort of intimate encounter was through hookups and anonymous encounters. When connecting, we had to keep one eye over our shoulders, scanning for danger (this can literally be seen in Tearoom). Can such connections really be termed intimate?
For most of us, the days of outright surveillance are over. But the patterns of interacting that developed over many years have been passed down through the generations and still influence us in the present, even those of us who don’t face losing our jobs, family support, freedom, or lives if our sexual orientation is discovered. The longstanding need to hide, scan, and be vigilant has helped shape a culture of gay male interaction that— even when we are partnered — often centers on brief encounters, putting greater emphasis on sexual connection than on knowing and being known as multidimensional physical and emotional beings.
At the opposite end of the spectrum: The era of exuberant sexual liberation that followed Stonewall. In part as a reaction to our identity having been badly stigmatized and gay sex having been literally forbidden, both pre-Stonewall and to some degree in the era of AIDS and safer-sex campaigns, gay male culture has leaned toward placing strong emphasis on sex and hooking up. As a result, we often get the message that to be a successful gay man, we should be sexually desirable, open to sex, and have frequent conquests.
Other related factors that can contribute to our so easily leaning away from monogamy and toward multiple partners include:
The stigma around being gay denies many of us opportunities to date and romance early in life. Instead, the experiences of growing up gay, having to hide, and having difficulty discerning who might be a willing partner often lead us to have our first experiences in anonymity and shame, learning how to be sexual apart from and before we learn how to be close. As a result, we’re likely to have a hard time connecting sex and emotional intimacy. Moreover, our early experiences can set our arousal templates to be most aroused by secrecy, risk, anonymity, and being a sexual outlaw. Internalized homo-negativity from growing up in a culture that has stigmatized homosexuality and gay relationships may lead us to absorb the idea that our relationships, and gay men generally, are “less than.” Consequently, we may think that we, our significant others, our relationships, and our sex partners are unworthy of honor and respect; and we may easily behave in ways that reflect these beliefs, pursuing pleasure without considering the possible costs to what we say we hold dear. And we may not even realize we hold these beliefs.
As gay men, we are likely to have grown up feeling defective and hiding our true selves from our closest family and friends, fearing rejection. When children and young people don’t get a sense that they are loved for whom they really are, and instead grow up seeing themselves as damaged, it’s difficult to develop a positive sense of self-worth. Many of us are still seeking to heal this wound through our ongoing pursuit of sex and the companion feeling of being desired by another man, unaware of what is driving this pursuit.
Alcohol and other substance abuse are entrenched in gay culture, in great part as a means of soothing the isolation, distress, anxiety, and depression that many of us experience from living in an often-hostile world. Clients routinely tell me they are in a chemically altered state when they make decisions to engage in extracurricular sexual interactions that threaten or damage their primary relationships.
One more key factor, true for all relationships: While closeness can feel good, being close also means being vulnerable, which is scary. Open relationships can be a way for us to keep some distance from each other in an attempt to keep ourselves safer.
I became a psychologist at a time when gay relationships weren’t getting much societal support, with the goal of helping gay couples thrive despite a deck stacked heavily against us. Over the years, I’ve learned that some of the most important work I can do with gay male clients is to help them be more thoughtful about their choices, so that they can better develop stronger, more nurturing, more loving relationships.
We gay men often keep our eyes closed to the ways that we may be damaging our relationships through some of our most commonplace, accepted, and ingrained behaviors. Obviously, it can be painful to acknowledge that we may be harming ourselves through seemingly fun, innocuous choices, or to acknowledge the possible downsides of our ubiquitous open relationships.
Nevertheless, there is great value for each of us in figuring out, as individuals, what it means to live in a way that we respect; in holding our behavior up to our own standards, and only our own standards; and in clarifying how we want to live life even when there is pressure, from the outside world and from other gay men, to live differently.
Pressure from other gay men? That’s right.
On first thought one might think that we gay men would have no trouble standing up to others’ expectations. Certainly it’s true that openly acknowledging we are gay despite societal judgment and pressure to “be” heterosexual demonstrates a strong ability to be true to ourselves, and to manage our anxiety in the face of tough challenges.
But beyond the expectations of society-at-large are the expectations of gay culture about what it means to be a successful gay man. Here is where many of us can get wobbly.
Not finding complete acceptance in the larger world, we have the hope that by coming out, we will finally feel a sense of really belonging somewhere. If this means behaving in the ways that peers do, taking on what we perceive to be the values of our community in order to fit in, many of us are willing to ignore our own feelings, and possibly our souls, so as to not feel excluded yet again.
Jim and Rob, the couple who had sex with all their friends on their cruise, are sitting in my office, with my dog Aviv snoozing at their feet. After some consideration, they had decided to stop having sex with other men for a while, to see if this would help them to feel closer and re-start their sex life with each other. The rancor had decreased and they reported enjoying having sex together again.
Their news: Jim has decided to enroll in a graduate program on the other side of the country, and they are discussing how this will affect their sex life.
“Of course we’re going to have to make some allowances for this,” Jim says. I look at him quizzically.
“I mean, we might not see each other for a month or two at a time. So we need to have an agreement that we’ll have sex with other guys.”
Rob nods in agreement.
I ask them how they each anticipate the impact of both again having sex with others. They respond with shrugs.
“You know, our friends Bill and Dave—Bill has been working in Argentina for the last two years and they only see each other every three or four months. They’re definitely hooking up with other guys,” Jim notes.
“I mean, what else would we do?” adds Rob. “Not have sex for eight weeks?”
If I didn’t regularly have similar conversations with other coupled gay clients, I would be stunned that neither man is stopping to consider his own feelings about what it would mean to resume an open relationship. Both are focusing solely on their perceived need to have sex regularly, and on the notion that this is simply how gay couples should operate.
So much of gay history, culture, and relational development are shaping this moment.
When working with a couple like Jim and Rob, I do my best not to accept much as “simply a given.” Here are the questions that I wonder about with them: What have your hopes been for couplehood, and how is reality lining up with those hopes? How have you made your choices? How is your relationship working for you? What is most important to you?
As with Jim and Rob, I often find that clients haven’t considered these questions much. “It’s what our friends do” is the most frequent answer for how they have made the choice to have an open relationship. Many times it seems to me as if there’s a fog around these men’s thinking about their relationships.
I don’t want to contribute to the fog by colluding with them to believe that the particular heartbreaks that can come with carelessly conducted open relationships are unavoidable; that our relationships are not in fact fragile; or that we gay men must establish our relationships along certain lines simply because that is how it is “usually done.”
And when I challenge these clients to go deeper than stating that they are just doing what everyone else does? “Yes, it’s a struggle” is the answer I usually get. “It is painful when my husband doesn’t come home till the next morning.” And then: “But isn’t this how gay men have relationships? It’s what everyone around me is doing.”
These are the poignant and troubling words I hear again and again, echoing what I was told by my friends back in 1987.
Given the numerous interrelated factors that shape our choices in the realm of sex, it is difficult to envision gay men making significant changes in how we operate, especially as committed relationships are—at present—becoming less popular among younger people of all sexual orientations. But when we look at the arc of gay existence over the past 50 years, from the shadows to the margins of tolerance to marriage equality, it is clear that surprising and dramatic shifts are possible.
So I am hopeful that we gay men can get off autopilot and become more aware of the factors contributing to how we construct and manage our relationships. And I am hopeful that this awareness can go a long way toward our making ever more thoughtful choices, respectful of ourselves and our partners, that help us to build stronger, closer, and more rewarding relationships.
(All names and identifying information changed in this article.)
Many gay men often struggle to form solid, mutually respectful attachments that include both emotional and physical connection. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Chris smiles widely as a video of Miso Chan, a transgender creator presenting as a young woman with pink hair, plays next to him. A song with the lyrics “Now I know what’s real and what is fake,” loops in the background.
Then Miso Chan rips off their wig, pulls tissues out of their shirt and is revealed to present as male. Chris’s face drops to a wide-eyed deadpan expression.
The video has been viewed over 1.7 million times — and its comment section is filled with cruel remarks.
“This is why I have trust issues nowadays,” one person replied. “Imagine what it’s parents thought,” said another.
Chris, who is 17 and uses the name @Donelij online, has grown an enormous audience on TikTok. Before his account was banned on Tuesday he had amassed more than 2.5 million followers. Another one of his accounts had more than 2.2 million followers, but, on Friday afternoon, both of Chris’s backup TikTok accounts were banned as well. (“This account was banned due to multiple community guideline violations,” read a banner atop the account.)
“It’s stressful,” he said by phone. “That’s how I got my money.”
Chris’s account is known in the TikTok community as a reaction account, an account where someone creates reaction videos that appear alongside other TikToks. Reaction and commentary TikTok channels are a growing niche on the platform and have been taking off in recent months.
Nearly all of Chris’s videos follow the same format: a video loops to his right, he smiles, sometimes gives a thumbs up, then something happens in the video and his smile drops. The majority of Chris’s videos are reactions to anodyne moments. In one, his smile drops when a man slams a brick of tofu in his own face; in another it’s when cockroaches appear onscreen.
Some of his videos, however, feature reactions to LGBTQ creators. He has a shocked expression when men put on skirts, when a man sucks on a straw, or when trans people reveal transformations over time.
Even though he never says a word, thousands of people have called them out for being homophobic. Young gay and trans TikTokers who have been featured in Chris’s reactions report they have suffered vicious harassment from commenters and in messages. Some have deleted their accounts.
Chris said he had no ill intent with his videos, and said, before his accounts were banned, that he would stop duetting members of the LGBTQ community.
“I want people to know I’m not homophobic or transphobic,” he said. “The facial expressions I make in my videos are jokes. I myself didn’t think of them as offensive, but I can see how people would take it that way and I don’t want them to feel that way.”
Rob Anderson, 32, a TikTok creator who is a gay man, ended up in the cross hairs after calling attention to Chris’s videos in a video of his own. Immediately after posting, Mr. Anderson was inundated with a stream of gay slurs, death threats and threats to his family.
“It’s a vicious, intense relentless form of harassment and it’s endless,” said Mr. Anderson. “These people go through all of your social channels, find any information about you — they sent gay slurs to my agent. It doesn’t stop, it doesn’t go away one day and leave.”
Any creator who speaks out against Chris’s content inevitably receives a wave of threats and harassment. After Toby Phillips, 20, posted a soft-spoken ’90s-style PSA video asking Chris to take responsibility for his fans’ behavior, he too suffered for it.
Mr. Phillips was met with death threats and doxxing attempts.
As the controversy began trending on Thursday, popular creators began to weigh in, including the children of several politicians and celebrities.
Cisco Hernandez, a 15-year-old high school student in San Diego, was dismayed to see that big creators he followed were expressing support for homophobic content. He posted a video about his disappointment and was immediately met with an onslaught of harassment himself. Mr. Hernandez is not a full-time TikTok creator. He has a very small following and was shocked by the vitriol he encountered. “People DMed me telling me to kill myself, a lot of other things,” including homophobic slurs, he said. Mr. Hernandez identifies as bisexual.
Other large TikTok creators began issuing threats to LGBTQ creators for speaking out. In an Instagram Live on Thursday night, Freek Da Gemini, a 21-year-old TikTok creator with more than 750,000 followers, issued threats to a 17-year-old, calling him a slew of homophobic slurs. “I’m saying slurs, yeah I said a slur,” he said on his livestream, adding that the young man could expect to have “blood leaking out of his head” if he encountered him in person.
Chris’s fans say that critiques of his content are overblown. “This has to be the worst display of cancel culture that I’ve ever seen,” a YouTube drama commentator known as Relex said in a video on Thursday. “He’s getting canceled for the facial expressions he’s making in his videos. How are you getting offended by someone who doesn’t even talk?”
Many flooded the comment sections of LGBTQ creators with the snowflake emoji.
Chris said that he had been on the receiving end of harassment himself as anger about his content built on the app. “I get called the N-word, monkey, in my DMs, people saying they’re going to kill me when they see me,” he said. Many TikTokers have encouraged their fans to flood Chris’s comments with abusive messages, others have attacked members of his family and have tried to get him thrown out of school.
He also said he was frustrated with his fans’ behavior. He said that he’s spoken out several times on his TikTok account asking people to stop making homophobic comments, but that ultimately he can’t control the millions of people who follow him, and that they interpret his pleas to “spread positivity” as a covert directive to attack.
“A percentage of my followers are trolls and I feel like they do this because they like getting adrenaline on the internet,” he said. “I’ll just keep on trying to get my fans to change their ways. I’m trying my best to get my fans to stop doing what they’re doing.”
Many members of the LGBTQ community respond that, whether Chris intended to or not, he built an audience of homophobic followers by posting homophobic content and it’s now his responsibility to manage that audience.
“They say Chris is not responsible for his followers,” said Mr. Anderson. “To that I say: Of course he is. He’s cultivated this group of people with this content. The people who follow him are the people who enjoy the content he’s putting out and his content is clearly anti-gay and homophobic. If you have a large following, it’s your responsibility to make sure people aren’t getting hurt by what you post.”
In this experience, many young creators are realizing how inadequate TikTok can be at protecting users from harassment. Hateful videos snowball quickly as they gain traction on the app’s all-powerful “For You” page. There’s no mechanism to mass report or mass block a user’s entire following. Comment controls are limited and glitchy; the reporting process can be slow. Often, harassment campaigns are instigated with a wink and a nod.
“We are committed to promoting a safe and positive app environment for our users. Our Community Guidelines outline behavior that is not acceptable on the platform, and we take action against behavior that violates those policies, including by removing content or accounts. We also offer a number of features to help users control their online experience, including options to report inappropriate content, limit and filter comments and block users,” a spokesperson for TikTok said in a statement.
“I’m 32, I’m not on this app to have drama with teenagers,” Mr. Anderson said, “I’m confident about who I am. But there are queer people who are 15 or 16, exploring their gender. They are just trying to explore who they are.”
While Michigan’s lower peninsula may not be top of mind for queer travelers, the lower portion of the state is a more diverse one than many people realize. From big-city Pride parades to idyllic queer beach getaways, the state is a great one to explore, especially in the world of COVID-19, where road trips are more desirable to many.
Detroit is synonymous with Michigan for a lot of people, and with good reason. As the 13th largest metro area in the U.S., the city and its environs comprise 40 percent of the state’s population. Motor City Pride is the state’s largest Pride celebration, and the city’s Black Pride celebration, Hotter Than July, is the county’s second oldest such event (this year was the 25th anniversary).
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In addition to a plethora of queer establishments to sample—Soho, Pronto!, Inuendo, Adam’s Apple, Menjo’s, Gigi’s Cabaret, Woodward Bar and Grill—visitors will want to check out the area’s historical sites, from the Underground Railroad to the many venues that influenced Motown and Rock ‘n Roll. Ferndale, one of the area’s gayborhoods, has an openly gay mayor, its second one in a row.
Other nearby community events include Pride events in Windsor, Canada and Ann Arbor, so you can get more Canadian-flavored and collegiate vibes if you so choose. Michigan also boasts a lot of mid-sized cities, each with its own pride events and local flavor: Lansing, Grand Rapids, Bay City, Kalamazoo.
An Unspoiled Corner
We recently ventured to the northwest corner of the lower peninsula to Traverse City and found a welcoming and vibrant area. Home to Up North Pride, the area has an endless supply of beaches, crystal clear water in the Grand Traverse Bay and plenty of interesting shopping. There’s even a gay club located downtown, Side Traxx, a longtime popular local dance spot.
If pampering yourself is important, check into the stunning Grand Traverse Resort and Spa, located about 10 minutes east of downtown. The 16-story hotel tower provides incredible views of the water and surrounding gentle hills. Dinner at the rooftop Aerie Restaurant and Lounge is glorious at sunset, with some amazing seafood options and an impressive wine list, including some nice Michigan wines.
PHOTO: Experience excellent cuisine at the rooftop Aerie Restaurant at the Grand Traverse Resort and Spa. (photo by Paul Heney)
The attached Spa Grand Traverse is a soothing space and ranked as one of the Top 100 spas in the country. While COVID precautions precluded a couple’s massage, we understood the reasons and instead did simultaneous massages in different rooms. Here, as everywhere else we went in the area, people took masks and other precautions seriously, which eased our fears about getting sick.
We also enjoyed a variety of attractions in Traverse City, from the magnificent 450-foot-tall sand dunes at the nearby Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore to multiple lighthouses, hiking trails, dozens of area wineries (most with tasting rooms!) and a tall ship cruise on the bay, with the Tall Ship Manitou. The area also boasts some excellent restaurants and is popular in foodie circles. Try the dragon wings appetizer at Red Ginger—you’ll be back for more, trust me.
The city is also well known as one of the main cherry growing regions of the country, and you’ll find everything from cherry candy to cherry pies to cherry wine here. The National Cherry Festival is held nearby each July.
Life’s a Beach
Further south down the Lake Michigan shoreline, and only about a two-hour drive from Chicago, is the scenic Saugatuck/Douglas area. Located just south of Holland, Michigan, this has long been a popular LGBTQ retreat, with picturesque beaches and lovely summers. I’ve heard it described as “the Midwest’s Provincetown,” and that seems an apt description after our visit.
We stayed at The Dunes Resort, one of the largest gay-owned resort in the country. The Dunes is situated on 20 acres, located only about 3/4-mile from the beach. You can choose from motel rooms or a variety of cottages that sleep from one to six guests. There are also some smaller dormitory-style rooms available for the budget-conscious.
The Dunes, with its signature Adirondack chairs painted in rainbow colors, is a wonderful queer haven. It includes a gift shop (with a lot of nice clothing choices), a bar, karaoke area, outdoor nightclub/performance space and a wonderful pool deck that’s been greatly expanded over the years. We met nice couples from all over the Midwest, and there was a fun vibe at the pool all weekend, even with the COVID-19 restrictions.
PHOTO: The drag shows at The Dunes Resort are well produced and a highlight of each week’s activities. (photo by Paul Heney)
The resort has a regular series of weekly events, including a piano lounge, great drag shows, karaoke night and poolside DJs. What’s more, there are annual events that people come back for every year, such as Mardi Gras (August), Christmas in July, Venetian Weekend and big celebrations around the Fourth of July and Labor Day. It also brings in major DJs from Chicago, Detroit and beyond.
Saugatuck and smaller Douglas are adorable little towns, which boast a lot of good restaurants, as well as plenty of art galleries and shops. They’re both quite walkable, and the Pride flags are ubiquitous—always a positive sign when exploring a new place.
There’s something about sports romance that easily makes it my favorite sub-genre. The stakes, the uniforms, the tropes—all of it just speaks to me. And luckily for me as a queer reader, there are plenty of sports romances with LGBTQ relationships.
If you like your sports romance books the way I do (that is, incredibly queer), you’re in the right place. With a mix of YA and adult romances included in this list, you’re sure to find a sports romance that will hit all of the right tropes for you.
Eric Bittle thought he was confident enough on the ice as a figure skater. But when he joins Samwell University’s hockey team, he feels so out of his depth. Hockey is so much more aggressive—and, to Bitty, dangerous—than ice skating, and he doesn’t know whether he “fits” as a gay man on the team.
Will he be able to keep up with his teammates—and avoid falling for the team captain?
After a painful divorce, Tina Durham finds new friends and an outlet for her emotions in roller derby. But the romantic tension between herself and her coach—Joanne “Joe Mama” Delario—is hard to ignore. When their relationship off the skating rink turns into something passionate, can Tina overcome her fears of being dependent on and vulnerable with someone she could lose?
Soccer player Sebastian Hughes’s senior year is off to an excellent start. His teammates are like family, his soccer technique is on point, and he’s found an environment where he can be open about his sexual orientation.
But things take a challenging turn when Emir Shah, Sebastian’s childhood best friend, attends the same summer training camp. Emir treats him with nothing but bitterness and, to save his team’s chances at success, Sebastian attempts to reconnect and salvage their relationship. But what if their estranged friendship turns into something deeper?
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When her daughter joins a college basketball team, single mother Liz Elliot is reminded of her own college basketball days—and the struggles she faced as a closeted lesbian. Head coach Sheridan Ross has no interest in love but finds herself inexplicably drawn to Liz. But is the spark between them enough for Liz to come out and stop running from the past?
In March 1941, 16-year-old Theodora “Dizzy” Hosler tries out for the P.B.S.W. Ramblers softball team. Softball is her one passion in life, and she’s determined to find success on the field.
Here she meets Frannie, a teammate that shares her passion for softball. When their friendship develops into something deeper, they must decide whether love is worth the sacrifice that comes with it.
New York Admirals captain Scott Hunter is in the middle of a losing streak until, after ordering a smoothie from a local coffee shop, he wins his first game in weeks. Now, he can’t start a home game without that smoothie in the morning.
But as he gets to know barista Kip Grady, he must make a difficult choice. Does he give up on the first unconditional love of his life, or does he come out as gay?
Hockey player Ryu Mori’s season turns for the worse when he discovers he’ll have to compete for his position with rookie Emmett Armstrong. Emmett is confident—even a little cocky—and Ryu struggles to get through to him.
Though Ryu doesn’t want to admit it, he finds himself attracted to his teammate. When he discovers that Emmett feels the same, he must put aside his ego to risk a chance a love.
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I did not have a plan when I came out on WEEI four years ago. My goal was to hang with the morning guys, and if I was going to succeed on the air, I knew I had to be myself. That meant publicly coming out as gay, so I could be unburdened to share the intimate details of my life to the listeners.
I apologize for any emotional duress that may have caused.
On this week’s edition of “The Sports Kiki,” I was granted the rare opportunity to connect with another gay sports talk guy, Ben Livingston. While I was working at WEEI in Boston, Livingston was at Philadelphia’s legacy sports station, WIP, producing the city’s No. 1-rated afternoon show, “Marks and Reese.” We both spoke liberally on the air about our gay lives, without obfuscating many of the details.
“I wanted me talking about being gay on the radio to be just like when people talk about being straight,” Livingston told me. “We were just talking about my dating life. I was afraid at first that if I talked about things germane to being gay, it would be a turn off to the listeners. But I realized that talking about gay dating really isn’t that different.”
Admittedly, sometimes I took the conversation to unnecessarily extreme levels, boasting about hedonistic late-night bathhouse visits and sweaty nightclub interactions. It turned into a crutch for me, and over time, I made an effort to become more judicious about which parts of my weekend I shared. But merely fitting in among my married and middle-aged straight co-workers was never the goal. I wanted to stand out, and show “Chris in the car” that homosexuality is something to celebrate.
One of the more ironic parts of sports talk radio is that it really isn’t about sports. Sure, we talk about games and trades, but issues drive the conversation. And more than anything, it is a talk show. The good hosts actually talk to each other, and oftentimes, the natural flow of conversation deviates from the latest hot take about LeBron James’ playoff record — and onto stories about everyday life. This is called “guy talk,” and at its worst, devolves into misogynistic squawking and creepy one-liners. But when done well, it should feel like the listeners are also invited to the bar — remember those? — and eavesdropping on a conversation between good friends.
I don’t hide my sexuality when I’m talking with my actual friends, so I never saw a reason to do it on the air. Besides some nasty texts and tweets, I can’t say I encountered a lot of homophobia on the job, though there’s no doubt some listeners probably were uncomfortable.
Livingston says he hopes openly gay sports talk hosts speaking openly about their lives will eventually propel the format to become more inclusive.
“That’s what I hope sports talk becomes,” he said. “That we can talk about you or I going on a date in the same way that we talk about men and women going on a date, that there isn’t this intrinsic difference. I think that’s where ‘guy talk’ can pivot. ‘Guy talk’ doesn’t just have to be about women — like, ‘err women’ — it can be just about guys just having these urges.”
Livingston left WIP in July 2019 to move to New York City and change careers. He says his desire to live an active gay lifestyle didn’t coincide with the non-stop world of sports talk radio — too many Saturday night playoff games — and he wanted to take on new challenges. He’s living his dream gay life. It would make for great radio.
“My friends, if they hear I’ve slept with four guys in a week — and I have. I’m a 29-year-old gay in New York. Let’s be honest,” he said. “They will not be like, ‘that’s gross,’ or, ‘oh God, did you bottom?’ They’re not like that. They just high-five me and are like, ‘that’s awesome.’ That is what I hope for sports talk and gay guys and LGBT people in general. We can start to normalize this stuff.
“Honestly, anybody who’s had great sex three times in the last week should be really happy, and people should be able to enjoy those things and not feel shameful about them.”
Dating is hard. That’s just a fact. Dating while queer is often even harder. When you’re a guy who’s attracted to people of the same gender, there are simply fewer instances in which you can serendipitously meet somebody and experience that romantic spark. Which is why gay bars and other inclusive spaces have become such an important part of life for people in the LGBTQ+ community, including gay and bisexual men.
Of course, if you’re a queer man looking for love, not every town has a gay bar that you can just head to whenever you’re in the mood to get your flirt on. And in the pandemic, meeting and mixing with a lot of people in a public setting is out of the question.
Enter: The Apps. Whether you’re looking for somebody fun to chat with, to swap photos, or make a connection with the goal of eventually meeting for a real-life date, we’ve got you covered. These are the 8 best LGBTQ-friendly dating and hookup apps for queer men. (When you find one you like and sign up for an account, make sure you follow these tips for taking a really great photo for your profile!)
Bonus: when you are ready for an-person meet-up with a person you met on one of these dating apps, check out our ideas for awesome first dates and second dates. You’ll look like a total romantic genius without breaking the bank.
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Grindr
OK, let’s get this one out of the way first. Grindr is so well-known as a gay dating and hookup app that even straight people have heard of it. We all know how it works; the home screen shows you a grid of guys near your location, you can chat, share photos, and send voice memos, and meet the love of your life—or the love of your afternoon, at least.
Scruff is very similar to Grindr in its grid functionality, but unlike Grindr, which has been criticized for perpetuating a “no fats, no femmes” attitude among its users, Scruff was originally geared towards gay men of differing body types. Specifically: bears, otters, wolves, daddies, and other “tribes” that find body hair and a more stocky built attractive.
Jack’d promises new users that they’ll be able to connect with “the most diverse community of gay, bi, trans, queer, and curious guys around the globe,” and is popular among men of color. You can search by what a guy is into, his relationship status (for those looking to play), and the Discover tab lets you find profiles based on recent activity.
Unlike many gay dating apps which show you a grid of the guys nearest to you, Surge is more like Tinder, allowing users to swipe through profiles until they land on one they like. The “swipe right” / “swipe left” / “it’s a match” functionality are exactly the same, so if nothing else, you won’t have to waste any time figuring out how the app works once you’ve downloaded it.
Adam4Adam started out as a popular desktop-based dating website for gay men. Remember those?
Anyway, now that nobody has time to sit down and log on to find a date, A4A is in the app game, serving up pretty much the same kind of user experience as other services like Grindr.
Into bears? Growlr really is where the wild things are. While even Scruff caters at least partially to guys with lean physiques, Growlr is specifically for bears, cubs, and dadbods.
In many countries where LGBTQ+ individuals are still persecuted, like Chechnya, the most widely used and well-known gay dating apps like Grindr have been banned. Hornet, which looks and works a lot more like a social networking platform than a dating app, provides a safer alternative for queer men in some locations (although it too has been prohibited in places like the United Arab Emirates).
Dating for transgender and nonbinary people can be a nightmare, even on queer apps which purport to be inclusive. Tser is a dating and hookup app specifically created for trans, enby and gender-fluid singles — including, for the purposes of this list, trans men who identify as gay or bisexual. Because everyone deserves a safe space to flirt.
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