Lester Brathwaite has an interesting post on Huffington Gay Voices about gay male sex, intimacy and hooking up which is worth reading. I don’t agree with his assessment, that his compulsion with hooking up constitutes an addiction, and I think he further promotes shame around sex, but I also think he raises valuable questions to be discussed. Gay men need to be talking about sex and intimacy, because not talking about it is part of what has led us to the anonymous hookup culture that Brathwaite rightly sees as lacking.

However, what he describes as “the reality of the internet’s sway on people’s attitudes and mores,” has nothing at all to do with the internet. Nor does hookup culture. Long, long before the internet gay men hooked up, but the internet has changed the experience and the hunt for sex. It makes it easier to objectify ourselves as well as other men, and makes it easier to be removed from the experience of sex leading to more bad or unfulfilling sex to be sure. I remember reading Jess Lair’s book, “Sex-If I didn’t Laugh I’d Cry”  in 1985 and thinking he was right on the money, even though the book wasn’t about gay sex specifically. I wanted a relationship, I wanted companionship, and too often sex was just this mediocre experience which left me (and others?) wanting more, rather than satisfied and content. I remember believing that sex had to be able to be more than what it too often was, and I was clueless as to how to have it be better all of the time.

Internet culture and sites like Manhunt, or Grindr aren’t the problem. They just provide a layer of separation and turn hunting for sex (what we so often do when we really are wanting to find intimacy) into this commodified voyeuristic effort.  Like window shopping, but rather than merely admire what’s on display, we so often pick it apart expecting perfection as a defense mechanism to mask our own fears that we won’t find what we are looking for, which is someone who wants us.

I grew up with an alcoholic parent who was a rage-filled drunk. I have seen the inability to “have just one drink,” and that’s part of why I cringe when anyone describes hook up and on-line cruising as an addiction. From my perspective Brathwaite’s efforts are far more about compulsion than addiction but either way, he is right about how the medium itself and the hookup culture promote a cycle of failure. The harder you look for something that isn’t there, the farther you get from finding it. Brathwaite probably would have had far more success at getting his feelings met had he made a connection with those guys who showered him with compliments, rather than deciding he could do better. But we all operate from a space of believing that we aren’t enough, and therefore, the other guy isn’t enough. That’s the cycle of failure in a nut shell.

The real cause can be linked much father back than the birth of the Internet and apps like Grindr. Back before on-line personals, and even further back than printed personals. Who remembers when the Advocate was a newspaper format with a pull-out mid section printed on pink paper, raise your hands? The closet and shadow gay world pre Stonewall, where fitting in and “passing” had much to do with an emphasis on masculinity. But a more recent real cause was the pandemic of AIDS that ravaged and came close to destroying our culture. Prior to that scary time, there was less of a focus on hyper-masculinity, and a greater appreciation for sissies and carving out your own identity.  Then came the AIDS crisis and almost covertly, a celebration of gender non-conformance was replaced with an urgency to appear impermeable to illness and shame. Even a rudimentary look at porn from the ’70’s till now illustrates the emergence of the hyper-masculine ideal for gay men.

Addiction or not, what Brathwaite describes doing is exactly what more gay men need to do- make a choice and get honest with themselves about what they want. Step off the rat race of looking for intimacy in a hookup environment!

Personally, I don’t believe there is anything wrong with hooking up. Hooking up isn’t harmful, and nor is sex. I believe sex can be recreational and awesome. And sometimes a hook up leads to a more deep and intimate connection between two guys. But those are often the exceptions and not the norm. Developing friendships, dating, and being honest about what you want (like cuddling) will get you far closer to meeting your needs. Brathwaite is already on the right path if he stops using such impersonal modes of communications like texting to talk about important things like feelings. He writes:

 I sent him a text to the end that I assumed he had lost interest. He replied that he was simply busy so I added — perhaps with the intent of pushing him away before I was inevitably hurt — that I was “kinda crazy” and that I “kinda liked” him. I never heard from him again.

Imagine how different this may have gone, if rather than text anything, he had called, invited the guy to go have coffee or a drink, ad used the time to get to know each other more. No vague mention feelings was needed yet. Let the chemistry between two people do the hard work. The solution is getting to be face to face and let that happen.

In this era of immediacy, it is so easy to think that everything comes quickly. But intimacy doesn’t, trust doesn’t and love doesn’t. They are hard but worth the hard work.

Gay male culture is faced with a new obstacle to happiness in the form of Marriage Equality. Our lack of finding intimacy via hooking up will lead many to believe the answer is to just get married, and live happily ever after. Marriage is no guarantee of intimacy either. But that’s a great subject for another post.