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A provocative and smart article in Out Magazine discusses whether online cruising is ruining gay male culture. This is an insightful, must read piece.
Are sites like Man Hunt a gift or a curse? Is it a great place to meet potential mates, or is it a cyber den of inequity and sexual addiction? This article explores these important questions.
7 Comments:
Manhunt hasn't killed gay culture anymore than The Advocate sex ads killed gay culture in the 1970s. I was accidently educated on gay politics while reading The Advocate sex ads in the old center pull-out section. This is an idea worth trying again on the internet. The fact that a link from Manhunt generated the most traffic ever for the NGLTF should be a wake up call for gay political organizations. The NGLTF and HRC could either create their own separately branded sex ad site or partner with a site such as Craig's List to generate more traffic. A similar idea was successfully done in the 1970s by a former Wall Street business man who had purchased The Advocate. The men-seeking-men sex ads were the most profitable section of the magazine, but they made it hard for the serious political action portions of the magazine to be shown to politicians and parents. The solution was to put the sex business and personal sex ads in a center pull-out section. This practice continued until the 1990s, but Christian Republican censorship drives forced the sex section to be spun off to a separate magazine that was rarely sold at any mainstream newsstands. Of course, the ads were already being killed by computerized phone services and eventually the internet. I believe Gay Times in the U.K. has figured out how to merge online sex ads linked to serious political action material. The U.S. is far behind, perhaps due to our Puritanical nature.
posted by Thomas Kraemer, at
8/07/2008 6:46 PM
internet chat is nothing more than a jerk off scene. It is somewhat hollow. Certainly not a fullfilling habit to take up.
posted by ewe, at
8/08/2008 12:16 AM
Online sex ads DO cheapen gay culture, but only because they are placed in printed media unrelated to sex, sexuality, and the social scene. And the fact that they are all marketed to men cheapens it further, marginalizing women, even though in a bizarre manner, in my opinion. I'd rather not be marketed to in such a manner - but it still smacks of inequality. "Serious" non-gay political magazines aren't filled with sex ads. IF sex is the only way to get a gay man's attention, for ALL things, even things UNRELATED to sex, then we DESERVE the jeers that the religious right throws at us as a community for being sex-obsessed cruisers. You heard me. But notice how I wrote IF. I have yet to meet a gay man who fits this description.
I realize it's difficult when a single gay publication has to please "everyone," including the cruisers and the bar-hoppers. But I look forward to the day when I can walk into a regular magazine shop or book store and can find magazines for gay political enthusiasts and gay "Maxim" type mags; a gay "USA Today" and a gay "Wall Street Journal," so that I can have a choice of content and quality. And, honestly, gay men might enjoy seeing those ads, but as a lesbian they kinda make me squeamish and not want to buy the issue.
If the US is "far behind" the UK on such matters, I say, for once I'm FINE being "too Puritanical" to be that way.
posted by Emily K, at
8/08/2008 2:24 AM
I am totally and utterly indifferent to Manhunt. I don't use it. I don't have anything against other people using it. It has nothing to do with me. It doesn't ever cross my mind when I think of words like "gay" and "culture".
The "gay culture" I know of is the one in Madison where I live. Friends and professors at the University, the LGBT Campus Center and LGBT studies department; the feminist bookstore on State Street; my husband's gay hockey and rugby teams; the local gay bars; the queer talk radio show; the bike rides to benefit AIDS research...
posted by Eshto, at
8/09/2008 1:33 PM
