(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #117, November 19, 1999)
PHOTO: B.D. Chambers
Of all the Fabulous Fetish Fabrics on the scene today, rubber is second only to leather in popularity. By the time you read this, rubber enthusiasts from around the world will have gathered in Chicago for this year’s Rubber Blowout weekend and Mr. International Rubber 2000 contest, and Mr. International Rubber 1999 (and former Minneapolis resident) Thomas Smith will have passed the sash to his successor.
I recently talked with B.D. Chambers, who represented Minnesota in the competition to select Mr. International Rubber 2000. Chambers is a local rubber enthusiast who is also a past president of the Atons leather club of Minneapolis, and who in 1998 was the first Mr. Minnesota Olympus Leather. We started by defining our terms: Just what exactly is meant by saying someone is “into rubber”? According to Chambers, “Rubber, like leather, encompasses a broad range. There are people who are strictly into latex, and the more tight-fitting they can find the better. Other people are into industrial gear, hazardous-materials and other protective clothing, or diving suits. And some people do all of them. Basically it’s an interest in clothing that is form-fitting and makes you sweat.”
What’s the attraction of rubberwear? Chambers says it offers “overall body stimulation. Particularly if you get into tight latex pieces and you use a good silicone lube underneath when you put it on, it will slide over your skin and hug your body in a way that even leather cannot. It’s like getting a full-body massage as long as you’re wearing it. Industrial gear, rain gear, and gas masks summon strong, aggressive, masculine images such as that of an oil rigger up on his rig—or, if you’re into sludge play, the sewer worker down in the ground. There’s also the sensation of the lack of sensation—when you get into gas masks and chemical-handling suits, you are cut off from the outside world, so you have the effect of a portable isolation tank. It creates its own bondage.” (There’s quite a bit of crossover between those into rubber and those into bondage.)
Chambers muses that the appeal of rubberwear can be almost primal: “You begin to recapitulate the womb. It’s dark. It’s warm. It’s moist. It’s constricted movement. All your sensations come to you second- or third-hand. It strikes some deep chord, some half-memory, of the womb. Especially the whole diving bit—when you start playing in a pool of warm water, well, let’s just talk about rebuilding the womb right there! And if you’ve got a partner who’s working with you in a scene and whom you can trust, there’s a great sense of intimacy and trust, and feeling secure and safe.”
Latex, unfortunately, can be expensive. And it demands a commitment to care and maintenance as well. A latex garment can tear, at which time there are two choices: “Invest in a good tire repair kit and learn how to repair it, or be prepared to buy new every time it rips.” And, as we all know from condom seminars, oil (even skin oil) will eventually destroy latex. Therefore, steer clear of Crisco and other oil-based lubes, and wash and rinse your latex wear after you’ve worn it. Dishwashing detergent works well for the purpose, although Chambers speaks highly of Dr. Bronner’s soap, an almond-oil-based castille soap available at health-food stores—“It cleans off the skin oils and lubes very nicely, rinses cleanly and leaves no residue, and it’s a very neutral soap that’s nice to work with.”
What about body hair and rubberwear? The general assumption has been that if you have body hair you don’t wear rubber, or else you shave, but Chambers disputes this. “If you have body hair, talc or baby powder will help get the latex on comfortably. Getting it off can be a challenge—I recommend, and this is my general recommendation for wearing rubber products—silicone lubes. A lot of people like Eros, which is from Germany. Another good one is Colt. Wet Platinum is the one I recommend overall, first of all because it’s less expensive, and secondly because it adds Vitamin E—which is an oil, so you’ll want to rinse it off after you’re through using your rubber. But I’ve noticed that the strictly silicone lubes tend to evaporate, so you can get the rubber on, but to take it off you have to step into the shower. The Vitamin E in Wet Platinum keeps the silicone from evaporating, and it does wonderful things to moisturize your skin. Apply the lube to the garment and just slide it on, and when you’re done wearing it the garment slides right off—even with body hair.”
Because latex clothing must be form-fitting, shopping can be difficult. Stock items are made to standard sizes, and if they don’t fit properly the only option may be to have pieces custom-made. Some local stores stock rubberwear (for example: Fit To A Tee Leather, Lava Lounge, and Sex World), and rubberwear can also be ordered by mail or over the Net. For industrial and chemical-protection gear, check out army surplus stores and second-hand shops on a regular basis. You’ll probably find pieces that appeal to you at prices that won’t empty your wallet.
For a great introduction to the world of rubber, visit www.latexpajamas.com. This entertaining, attractive, and well-written site contains pictures, stories, a Rubber Lovers Contact List, and links to vendors, clubs, and organizations all over the world.
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Friday, November 19
Atons Club Colors Night
7-10 PM, The Minneapolis Eagle
A fundraiser for next summer’s Gopher XIV run. Hors d’oeuvres, drink specials, door prizes, boot polishing available. $3 at the door. See the Atons website at www.starbase21.com/ATONS or call for more information.
Friday, November 19
Sixteenth Annual Blue Moon Ball
7 PM, The Main Club, 1217 Tower Ave., Superior, WI
Formal wear is suggested.
Sunday, November 21
Black Guard Chili Feed
X-X PM, The Saloon
One of the Twin Cities’ longest-running leather traditions. $X at the door.
Friday, November 19, 1999
Friday, November 5, 1999
Our Autobodies, Ourselves
(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #116, November 5, 1999)
PHOTO SUGGESTIONS: Need a picture of a hot rod to compare to a picture of a tattoo. You’ve got tattoo pictures from last issue, I’ll see what kind of hot rod pix I can come up with.
At the end of last issue’s column I asked the question: Why, after so many thousands of years of getting no respect, has body modification suddenly become so acceptable? What follows is certainly not the total answer to that question, but rather one facet of the answer.
When you were a kid, did you build model cars? I did. If you remember, most of these model cars came in kits that could be built in various ways: “stock” (as originally manufactured and seen on the dealer’s showroom floor), “custom” (customized with a different grill, wheels, taillights, etc.) or drag-racing (oversize slick tires, mag wheels, and a supercharger sticking out of a hole in the hood). And every model car kit came with a sheet of decals, so you could decorate it in your own unique way.
I always built mine stock and never used the decals—I wanted authenticity. One friend of mine, however, plastered the decals all over every car he built. For another friend, simply putting the model together and applying decals wasn’t enough—he had a heated X-acto knife with which he could cut plastic like butter. He did radical modifications to those kits and constructed some one-of-a-kind creations.
If the three of us guys got together today, and found we were all into “alternative sexualities,” I predict that the guy who loved applying decals would be tattooed from head to toe, and the guy with the hot knife would be into piercing/cutting/branding. And me? True to pattern, I have no piercings and no tattoos—not yet, anyway.
Almost since automobiles, trucks and motorcycles were invented, the American male has been carrying on a love affair with them. Sometimes the vehicles themselves are the “mistress,” the object of desire, while at other times they serve as “chick magnets,” an advertisement and declaration of a man’s masculinity. Despite efforts by the major auto manufacturers to build cars which are seductive to women, car culture has for the most part remained a “guy thing” over the years.
Whether it’s young boys with model cars or grown men with real ones, many of us tend to project a lot of ourselves onto our vehicles, and we want our wheels to make a statement about who we are, or at least who we wish we could be. A recent ad for a new sports car challenges the reader to “be the person the chat room thinks you are.” The Jaguar XK-E and the Corvette Sting Ray are two of the most unabashedly phallic cars ever built. It’s no coincidence that the colloquial term for a customized, sporty car is a “hot rod.” We wash them, we polish them, we decorate them with flames coming out of the hood as an advertisement for the power that’s in there. Come to think of it, there’s not that much difference between the bulge of many car hoods of the 1950s and the bulge in a pair of briefs in a Calvin Klein ad.
Well, maybe there’s one difference. The automotive stylists of the 1950’s knew there was an element of sexuality in their designs—Cadillac was famous for “Dagmars,” bumper guards which looked like female breasts and which got their nickname from a buxom female beauty of the day. (And Freudian psychiatrists had a field day analyzing the myriad ways Detroit decorated the rear ends of its cars, especially the way the exhaust pipe openings were enshrined—can you say “anal compulsive”?) But it was all very furtive and very hetero. By contrast, the Calvin Klein ads are purposely and unabashedly erotic and, more specifically, homoerotic. And they feature a real, albeit covered, human body—they don’t displace their sexuality onto a motor vehicle.
For centuries western civilization has been an environment where the human body has been viewed simultanously as a temple (which must be kept pure) and as a cesspool (so dirty we’re ashamed of it). For most of that time the human body has been hidden from view under huge amounts of clothing. As Cole Porter wrote in the 1930’s, “In olden days a glimpse of stocking/Was looked on as something shocking.” Since it wasn’t proper to publicly acknowledge that we had bodies, or that those bodies had a sexual component, sexual feelings and imagery were projected elsewhere. A few examples: automobiles, airplanes, skyscrapers, and even space missiles and bombs.
Of course, the next two lines of that Cole Porter song are “But now God knows/Anything goes.” Nowadays it’s hard to think of anything of which a glimpse would be shocking. One popular countercultural motto from the 1960s was “Let it all hang out.” The free-thinking, pioneering members of the early leather/SM community took that idea and expanded it to include not only letting it all hang out but decorating it as well. Thanks to their efforts, it’s becoming more permissible to use our own bodies to make the statement that formerly had to be displaced onto our cars. Instead of resculpting the sheet metal on our vehicles using acetylene torches, arc welders and body putty, we remold ourselves using liposuction, weight lifting, and plastic surgery. Instead of decorating our motorcycles with custom pinstriping, we decorate ourselves with custom pinstriping. Instead of driving chrome-laden cars, today our brightwork is the body jewelry in our piercings.
Is this healthy? Unhealthy? It can be both. Increased body-consciousness can be liberating for one person and enslaving for another. But the leather community has always valued authenticity, and it seems to me admirably straightforward to make one’s personal statements using one’s person, rather than through more oblique means.
One of the characteristics of the Aquarian Age (1960s counterculture again) is that humanity won’t require mediators to make contact with divinity. Some people think of this as not needing popes or priests or shamans to act as middlemen between us and God. But perhaps, on a more mundane but practical level, it also means that we won’t need to go through the convolution of making our cars act as stand-ins for our real selves.
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Friday, November 5
Minnesota Olympus Leather Contest Fundraiser
7-10 PM, The Minneapolis Eagle
Fantasy entertainment, a leather auction and drink specials. $2 at the door.
Saturday, November 13
Atons Leather/Levi Night
Drinks at 7 PM, dinner at 7:30 PM, Backstage @ Bravo (9th & Hennepin, Minneapolis)
Presented by the Atons, open to all. For information and reservations call the Atons Hotline.
Friday, November 12
AIDS Ride Fundraiser—Leather/Levi Night at the Theatre
Enjoy “Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead” at Theatre in the Round and help sponsor David Coral, representing the Leather/Levi/BDSM community in next summer’s Twin Cities-Wisconsin-Chicago AIDS Ride. (Coral plays the part of Guildenstern in TRP’s production of the show.) November 12 is Leather/Levi Night, but if you can’t make it that night you can attend any other performance of the show and benefit the AIDS Ride. Advance vouchers ($15) are required.
Friday, November 19
Atons Club Colors Night
7-10 PM, The Minneapolis Eagle
A fundraiser for next summer’s Gopher XIV run. Hors d’oeuvres, drink specials, door prizes, boot polishing available. $3 at the door. See the Atons website at www.starbase21.com/ATONS or call for more information.
PHOTO SUGGESTIONS: Need a picture of a hot rod to compare to a picture of a tattoo. You’ve got tattoo pictures from last issue, I’ll see what kind of hot rod pix I can come up with.
At the end of last issue’s column I asked the question: Why, after so many thousands of years of getting no respect, has body modification suddenly become so acceptable? What follows is certainly not the total answer to that question, but rather one facet of the answer.
When you were a kid, did you build model cars? I did. If you remember, most of these model cars came in kits that could be built in various ways: “stock” (as originally manufactured and seen on the dealer’s showroom floor), “custom” (customized with a different grill, wheels, taillights, etc.) or drag-racing (oversize slick tires, mag wheels, and a supercharger sticking out of a hole in the hood). And every model car kit came with a sheet of decals, so you could decorate it in your own unique way.
I always built mine stock and never used the decals—I wanted authenticity. One friend of mine, however, plastered the decals all over every car he built. For another friend, simply putting the model together and applying decals wasn’t enough—he had a heated X-acto knife with which he could cut plastic like butter. He did radical modifications to those kits and constructed some one-of-a-kind creations.
If the three of us guys got together today, and found we were all into “alternative sexualities,” I predict that the guy who loved applying decals would be tattooed from head to toe, and the guy with the hot knife would be into piercing/cutting/branding. And me? True to pattern, I have no piercings and no tattoos—not yet, anyway.
Almost since automobiles, trucks and motorcycles were invented, the American male has been carrying on a love affair with them. Sometimes the vehicles themselves are the “mistress,” the object of desire, while at other times they serve as “chick magnets,” an advertisement and declaration of a man’s masculinity. Despite efforts by the major auto manufacturers to build cars which are seductive to women, car culture has for the most part remained a “guy thing” over the years.
Whether it’s young boys with model cars or grown men with real ones, many of us tend to project a lot of ourselves onto our vehicles, and we want our wheels to make a statement about who we are, or at least who we wish we could be. A recent ad for a new sports car challenges the reader to “be the person the chat room thinks you are.” The Jaguar XK-E and the Corvette Sting Ray are two of the most unabashedly phallic cars ever built. It’s no coincidence that the colloquial term for a customized, sporty car is a “hot rod.” We wash them, we polish them, we decorate them with flames coming out of the hood as an advertisement for the power that’s in there. Come to think of it, there’s not that much difference between the bulge of many car hoods of the 1950s and the bulge in a pair of briefs in a Calvin Klein ad.
Well, maybe there’s one difference. The automotive stylists of the 1950’s knew there was an element of sexuality in their designs—Cadillac was famous for “Dagmars,” bumper guards which looked like female breasts and which got their nickname from a buxom female beauty of the day. (And Freudian psychiatrists had a field day analyzing the myriad ways Detroit decorated the rear ends of its cars, especially the way the exhaust pipe openings were enshrined—can you say “anal compulsive”?) But it was all very furtive and very hetero. By contrast, the Calvin Klein ads are purposely and unabashedly erotic and, more specifically, homoerotic. And they feature a real, albeit covered, human body—they don’t displace their sexuality onto a motor vehicle.
For centuries western civilization has been an environment where the human body has been viewed simultanously as a temple (which must be kept pure) and as a cesspool (so dirty we’re ashamed of it). For most of that time the human body has been hidden from view under huge amounts of clothing. As Cole Porter wrote in the 1930’s, “In olden days a glimpse of stocking/Was looked on as something shocking.” Since it wasn’t proper to publicly acknowledge that we had bodies, or that those bodies had a sexual component, sexual feelings and imagery were projected elsewhere. A few examples: automobiles, airplanes, skyscrapers, and even space missiles and bombs.
Of course, the next two lines of that Cole Porter song are “But now God knows/Anything goes.” Nowadays it’s hard to think of anything of which a glimpse would be shocking. One popular countercultural motto from the 1960s was “Let it all hang out.” The free-thinking, pioneering members of the early leather/SM community took that idea and expanded it to include not only letting it all hang out but decorating it as well. Thanks to their efforts, it’s becoming more permissible to use our own bodies to make the statement that formerly had to be displaced onto our cars. Instead of resculpting the sheet metal on our vehicles using acetylene torches, arc welders and body putty, we remold ourselves using liposuction, weight lifting, and plastic surgery. Instead of decorating our motorcycles with custom pinstriping, we decorate ourselves with custom pinstriping. Instead of driving chrome-laden cars, today our brightwork is the body jewelry in our piercings.
Is this healthy? Unhealthy? It can be both. Increased body-consciousness can be liberating for one person and enslaving for another. But the leather community has always valued authenticity, and it seems to me admirably straightforward to make one’s personal statements using one’s person, rather than through more oblique means.
One of the characteristics of the Aquarian Age (1960s counterculture again) is that humanity won’t require mediators to make contact with divinity. Some people think of this as not needing popes or priests or shamans to act as middlemen between us and God. But perhaps, on a more mundane but practical level, it also means that we won’t need to go through the convolution of making our cars act as stand-ins for our real selves.
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Friday, November 5
Minnesota Olympus Leather Contest Fundraiser
7-10 PM, The Minneapolis Eagle
Fantasy entertainment, a leather auction and drink specials. $2 at the door.
Saturday, November 13
Atons Leather/Levi Night
Drinks at 7 PM, dinner at 7:30 PM, Backstage @ Bravo (9th & Hennepin, Minneapolis)
Presented by the Atons, open to all. For information and reservations call the Atons Hotline.
Friday, November 12
AIDS Ride Fundraiser—Leather/Levi Night at the Theatre
Enjoy “Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead” at Theatre in the Round and help sponsor David Coral, representing the Leather/Levi/BDSM community in next summer’s Twin Cities-Wisconsin-Chicago AIDS Ride. (Coral plays the part of Guildenstern in TRP’s production of the show.) November 12 is Leather/Levi Night, but if you can’t make it that night you can attend any other performance of the show and benefit the AIDS Ride. Advance vouchers ($15) are required.
Friday, November 19
Atons Club Colors Night
7-10 PM, The Minneapolis Eagle
A fundraiser for next summer’s Gopher XIV run. Hors d’oeuvres, drink specials, door prizes, boot polishing available. $3 at the door. See the Atons website at www.starbase21.com/ATONS or call for more information.
Friday, October 22, 1999
Modern Body Mod: The Past, Present and Future of Body Modification
(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #115, October 22, 1999)
PHOTO SUGGESTIONS: On Wednesday I’ll be bringing in some photos of interesting and splashy tattoos.
Like VCRs, microwave ovens, PCs and cell phones, body modification (piercing, tattooing, etc.) has recently become commonplace in western culture. Unlike those newfangled devices, however, body modification is not even remotely new. In ancient Egypt a pierced ear was the mark of a slave, and for about five thousand years circumcision has been one of the world’s most popular body modifications. (I bet you never thought of it that way, did you? It qualifies.) But while circumcision has been accepted and even mandated by the Judeo-Christian culture, most other forms of body modification have been seen as sinful (defiling the temple, you know) and down through the years people who practiced body modification have been viewed with suspicion.
A few hundred years ago, the only men who either wore tattoos or had pierced ears were pirates. Such body modifications were the mark of outlaws and outcasts, someone who didn’t play by society’s rules. Pirates were feared and reviled; paradoxically, they were also romanticized at the same time. Oh, to be so swashbuckling and to live so dangerously! Women swooned and men were subtly envious.
Even in more recent times, tattoos still carried a less-than-savory reputation. The stereotype was that a tattoo was something drunken sailors (notice the nautical connection again) got while on shore leave, and when they sobered up they supposedly regretted it. They especially regretted it if they broke up with their girl after having her name tattooed on their arm. (Today’s drunken sailors can have their tattoos removed by laser technology, assuming they can come up with the money it costs.)
Body piercing got even less respect. While it was all right for a woman to have her ears pierced, it was still an outlaw thing for a man to wear an earring. As for piercing other parts of the body, for either sex it was completely unacceptable. If tattoos were the mark of an outlaw, body piercing was the mark of a savage. Certain American Indian tribes, notably the Nez Perce (which in French means “pierced nose”) had septum piercings, and certain African tribes did fascinating things with ear and lip piercings. But body piercing was something a “civilized” person simply wouldn’t think of doing.
Except, of course, for Prince Albert and his Prince Albert, which in Victorian times was known as a “dressing ring.” It was all strictly practical, of course—men of that era used dressing rings to keep their penis strapped tightly against their leg, thereby minimizing unsightly bulges in the fashionably tight trousers of the day. In Albert’s case the dressing ring offered a second benefit: supposedly he was uncircumcised, and by keeping his foreskin pulled back the dressing ring cut down on odor (wouldn’t want to offend the Queen, would we?)
Well, that was then. As the world’s odometer prepares to roll over to another big set of zeroes, body modifications like piercing (not just ears—anything and everything) and tattoos have become positively mainstream. Rather than being the mark of an outlaw, for some people they have almost become a statement of conformity. In today’s leather world your humble columnist, who has no piercings and no tattoos, finds himself becoming the nonconformist.
Why do people get tattooed or pierced anyway? The most frequent reason I hear is “It’s a way of asserting” (or “reclaiming”) “control over my body.” If someone is raped, or survives cancer, or gets out of a bad relationship, or comes out of the closet, they get a tattoo or a piercing as a symbol of celebration to themselves that they survived the ordeal, they’re still here, and now they’re in control. People also tell me they enjoy the natural high caused by the anticipation of getting the piercing or tattoo, and the excitement while it’s being done. That high can be quite addicting, leading people to do it again and again. Many people like the decorative and creative aspect of tattoos and piercings, and they can also be markers for what a person likes sexually. Having a nipple pierced, for example, can make it more sensitive, and the jewelry also draws amorous attention to the area.
If tattoos and piercings are becoming commonplace, what’s a person to do if they want to shock? The next hot thing in body modification—literally—is branding. Following the analogies above, branding goes beyond outlaw and beyond savage, all the way to animal. But I’m hearing more and more about it, and at least one advertiser in Lavender is already offering branding services. In ten years, will it be as ubiquitous as piercings and tattoos are today? Wait and see.
Scarification (cutting) is also becoming more popular. Cutting, knives, and blood sports in general seem to hold more attraction for women than for men. I never quite understood why until a local group of leatherwomen explained to me that women are forced by menstruation to become extremely familiar with blood—bleeding is a normal part of their life in a way that it isn’t for men.
If you’re contemplating some sort of body modification, use common sense. These procedures are not for amateurs; people have showed me tattoos they claimed they did themselves using a ballpoint pen, but this is not recommended procedure. And don’t try to experiment with branding by grabbing the rosette iron out of the kitchen drawer. Borrowing from the “this is your brain on drugs” frying-pan ads, consider what happens to an egg (or a hamburger) if you throw it in a cast-iron frying pan that isn’t hot enough, or that isn’t seasoned well. It sticks, and it’s a mess. Any questions?
Before you surrender to your passion, learn about what can go wrong (hepatitis from contaminated tattoo needles or ink, piercings that become infected or are rejected) and what can be done to avoid problems. That way you’ll be able to select a good practitioner instead of a questionable one. For all forms of body modification sterile procedure, expert technique, and scrupulous attention to detail are the essentials that make the difference between a fantastic, fulfulling experience and a tragic one.
Why, after so many thousands of years of getting no respect, has body modification suddenly become so acceptable? I have my own theories, as do many other folks, but we’ll save them for another column.
Mark Your Calendars
On Friday, November 5, a fundraiser will be held for the Mr. and Ms. Minnesota Olympus Leather Contest. The event will be at The Minneapolis Eagle, 7-10 PM. (While you’re marking that on your calendar, also mark that the contest itself will be held on December 10 and 12.)
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Friday, October 29
Minneapolis Eagle Halloween Weekend Party: Trick or Treat (Guaranteed)
For details visit The Minneapolis Eagle’s website at www.mplseagle.com.
Saturday, October 30
Minneapolis Eagle Halloween Weekend Party: Uniform Contest
Whether you like to wear ’em or watch ’em, come on down! For details visit The Minneapolis Eagle’s website at www.mplseagle.com.
Sunday, October 31
Minneapolis Eagle Halloween Weekend Party: Costume Contest
For details visit The Minneapolis Eagle’s website at www.mplseagle.com.
PHOTOS: A gallery of tattoos: Porn star Steve Cannon, Mr. Wisconsin Leatherman 1999 Andrew Sagan, and Ashley Rukes, perennial organizer of the Twin Cities Pride Parade. (Rukes’ tattoo is based on a design by your humble columnist.)
EDITOR: The picture of Steve Cannon is the one that also has me, but I was thinking you would just show Cannon’s arm and nipple piercing by putting another photo over my face and his crotch. That way this image would be shaped like an upside-down “L.” The guy with the boot tattooed on his back is Andrew Sagan, and the “Pride=Power” logo is Ashley Rukes.
I am giving you the picture of Steve Cannon as a second choice--the picture I really wanted to use is one of International Mr. Leather 1996 Joe Gallagher, who has a fabulous tattoo on his back. Every time he has his shirt off and turns his back on the crowd, they go wild! I was sure I had a photo of it somewhere, but I’ve not been able to find it. So I e-mailed Joe and asked him if he had one in electronic form, suitable for printing in a magazine, that he could send me. If I get it, I’ll forward it on to you. If all this happens, the caption should read as follows:
A gallery of tattoos: International Mr. Leather 1996 Joe Gallagher, Mr. Wisconsin Leatherman 1999 Andrew Sagan, and Ashley Rukes, perennial organizer of the Twin Cities Pride Parade. (Rukes’ tattoo is based on a design by your humble columnist.)
PHOTO CREDIT: You can still credit Sagan and Rukes to me. I’ll supply information about the Gallagher photo when I get it.
PHOTO SUGGESTIONS: On Wednesday I’ll be bringing in some photos of interesting and splashy tattoos.
Like VCRs, microwave ovens, PCs and cell phones, body modification (piercing, tattooing, etc.) has recently become commonplace in western culture. Unlike those newfangled devices, however, body modification is not even remotely new. In ancient Egypt a pierced ear was the mark of a slave, and for about five thousand years circumcision has been one of the world’s most popular body modifications. (I bet you never thought of it that way, did you? It qualifies.) But while circumcision has been accepted and even mandated by the Judeo-Christian culture, most other forms of body modification have been seen as sinful (defiling the temple, you know) and down through the years people who practiced body modification have been viewed with suspicion.
A few hundred years ago, the only men who either wore tattoos or had pierced ears were pirates. Such body modifications were the mark of outlaws and outcasts, someone who didn’t play by society’s rules. Pirates were feared and reviled; paradoxically, they were also romanticized at the same time. Oh, to be so swashbuckling and to live so dangerously! Women swooned and men were subtly envious.
Even in more recent times, tattoos still carried a less-than-savory reputation. The stereotype was that a tattoo was something drunken sailors (notice the nautical connection again) got while on shore leave, and when they sobered up they supposedly regretted it. They especially regretted it if they broke up with their girl after having her name tattooed on their arm. (Today’s drunken sailors can have their tattoos removed by laser technology, assuming they can come up with the money it costs.)
Body piercing got even less respect. While it was all right for a woman to have her ears pierced, it was still an outlaw thing for a man to wear an earring. As for piercing other parts of the body, for either sex it was completely unacceptable. If tattoos were the mark of an outlaw, body piercing was the mark of a savage. Certain American Indian tribes, notably the Nez Perce (which in French means “pierced nose”) had septum piercings, and certain African tribes did fascinating things with ear and lip piercings. But body piercing was something a “civilized” person simply wouldn’t think of doing.
Except, of course, for Prince Albert and his Prince Albert, which in Victorian times was known as a “dressing ring.” It was all strictly practical, of course—men of that era used dressing rings to keep their penis strapped tightly against their leg, thereby minimizing unsightly bulges in the fashionably tight trousers of the day. In Albert’s case the dressing ring offered a second benefit: supposedly he was uncircumcised, and by keeping his foreskin pulled back the dressing ring cut down on odor (wouldn’t want to offend the Queen, would we?)
Well, that was then. As the world’s odometer prepares to roll over to another big set of zeroes, body modifications like piercing (not just ears—anything and everything) and tattoos have become positively mainstream. Rather than being the mark of an outlaw, for some people they have almost become a statement of conformity. In today’s leather world your humble columnist, who has no piercings and no tattoos, finds himself becoming the nonconformist.
Why do people get tattooed or pierced anyway? The most frequent reason I hear is “It’s a way of asserting” (or “reclaiming”) “control over my body.” If someone is raped, or survives cancer, or gets out of a bad relationship, or comes out of the closet, they get a tattoo or a piercing as a symbol of celebration to themselves that they survived the ordeal, they’re still here, and now they’re in control. People also tell me they enjoy the natural high caused by the anticipation of getting the piercing or tattoo, and the excitement while it’s being done. That high can be quite addicting, leading people to do it again and again. Many people like the decorative and creative aspect of tattoos and piercings, and they can also be markers for what a person likes sexually. Having a nipple pierced, for example, can make it more sensitive, and the jewelry also draws amorous attention to the area.
If tattoos and piercings are becoming commonplace, what’s a person to do if they want to shock? The next hot thing in body modification—literally—is branding. Following the analogies above, branding goes beyond outlaw and beyond savage, all the way to animal. But I’m hearing more and more about it, and at least one advertiser in Lavender is already offering branding services. In ten years, will it be as ubiquitous as piercings and tattoos are today? Wait and see.
Scarification (cutting) is also becoming more popular. Cutting, knives, and blood sports in general seem to hold more attraction for women than for men. I never quite understood why until a local group of leatherwomen explained to me that women are forced by menstruation to become extremely familiar with blood—bleeding is a normal part of their life in a way that it isn’t for men.
If you’re contemplating some sort of body modification, use common sense. These procedures are not for amateurs; people have showed me tattoos they claimed they did themselves using a ballpoint pen, but this is not recommended procedure. And don’t try to experiment with branding by grabbing the rosette iron out of the kitchen drawer. Borrowing from the “this is your brain on drugs” frying-pan ads, consider what happens to an egg (or a hamburger) if you throw it in a cast-iron frying pan that isn’t hot enough, or that isn’t seasoned well. It sticks, and it’s a mess. Any questions?
Before you surrender to your passion, learn about what can go wrong (hepatitis from contaminated tattoo needles or ink, piercings that become infected or are rejected) and what can be done to avoid problems. That way you’ll be able to select a good practitioner instead of a questionable one. For all forms of body modification sterile procedure, expert technique, and scrupulous attention to detail are the essentials that make the difference between a fantastic, fulfulling experience and a tragic one.
Why, after so many thousands of years of getting no respect, has body modification suddenly become so acceptable? I have my own theories, as do many other folks, but we’ll save them for another column.
Mark Your Calendars
On Friday, November 5, a fundraiser will be held for the Mr. and Ms. Minnesota Olympus Leather Contest. The event will be at The Minneapolis Eagle, 7-10 PM. (While you’re marking that on your calendar, also mark that the contest itself will be held on December 10 and 12.)
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Friday, October 29
Minneapolis Eagle Halloween Weekend Party: Trick or Treat (Guaranteed)
For details visit The Minneapolis Eagle’s website at www.mplseagle.com.
Saturday, October 30
Minneapolis Eagle Halloween Weekend Party: Uniform Contest
Whether you like to wear ’em or watch ’em, come on down! For details visit The Minneapolis Eagle’s website at www.mplseagle.com.
Sunday, October 31
Minneapolis Eagle Halloween Weekend Party: Costume Contest
For details visit The Minneapolis Eagle’s website at www.mplseagle.com.
PHOTOS: A gallery of tattoos: Porn star Steve Cannon, Mr. Wisconsin Leatherman 1999 Andrew Sagan, and Ashley Rukes, perennial organizer of the Twin Cities Pride Parade. (Rukes’ tattoo is based on a design by your humble columnist.)
EDITOR: The picture of Steve Cannon is the one that also has me, but I was thinking you would just show Cannon’s arm and nipple piercing by putting another photo over my face and his crotch. That way this image would be shaped like an upside-down “L.” The guy with the boot tattooed on his back is Andrew Sagan, and the “Pride=Power” logo is Ashley Rukes.
I am giving you the picture of Steve Cannon as a second choice--the picture I really wanted to use is one of International Mr. Leather 1996 Joe Gallagher, who has a fabulous tattoo on his back. Every time he has his shirt off and turns his back on the crowd, they go wild! I was sure I had a photo of it somewhere, but I’ve not been able to find it. So I e-mailed Joe and asked him if he had one in electronic form, suitable for printing in a magazine, that he could send me. If I get it, I’ll forward it on to you. If all this happens, the caption should read as follows:
A gallery of tattoos: International Mr. Leather 1996 Joe Gallagher, Mr. Wisconsin Leatherman 1999 Andrew Sagan, and Ashley Rukes, perennial organizer of the Twin Cities Pride Parade. (Rukes’ tattoo is based on a design by your humble columnist.)
PHOTO CREDIT: You can still credit Sagan and Rukes to me. I’ll supply information about the Gallagher photo when I get it.
Friday, October 8, 1999
Drummer Magazine: End of an Era
(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #114, October 8, 1999)
But the Mr. Drummer Beat Goes On
PHOTO: Recently chosen in San Francisco are, left, new International Mr. Drummer Fraser Picard and, right, new International Drummerboy Woodie Barnes. Both are from the Mid-Atlantic region. (Many thanks to Mister Marcus, legendary San Francisco leather columnist, for supplying this photo.)
PHOTO CREDIT: “Mister” Marcus Hernandez
San Francisco recently held its annual leather bash which culminated in the International Mr. Drummer contest on Saturday, Sept. 25, and the Folsom Street Fair on Sunday, Sept. 26. By all reports this year’s contest was a rousing success; it was a crowd-pleaser and, according to Drummer Magazine editor Robert Davolt, the basket auction raised $7,000 for the winners’ travel fund. But even as the new International Mr. Drummer and Drummerboy (see accompanying photo) were being chosen, the magazine that started the contest, and gave it its name, was nearing the end of its run.
Publication of Drummer has been sporadic for some time now; the magazine has been for sale, but no buyers have come forward. The International Drummer contest has been sold to Mike Zuhl of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and at this writing negotiations for the other Drummer assets are continuing, but the outcome of it all will probably be that Drummer Magazine will no longer be published in its current form. It seems to me a rather ignominious end to what was once the leather magazine against which all others were measured.
Leather publications (and, to a certain extent, all gay publications and all publications in general) have been experiencing lean times recently. But how can a leather institution like Drummer, which has been around for years and which has been so instrumental in shaping our whole concept and culture of leather, be on the brink of extinction?
Here’s a history lesson about a seemingly unrelated topic: At the dawn of the 20th century most homes had pianos in the parlor, and people bought sheet music at the local five-and-dime store so they could play the popular songs of the day. The music industry made money from the sales of sheet music, and a song’s popularity was measured by how many copies of the sheet music were sold. Then the phonograph became commonplace, and the popularity of a song was measured by how many phonograph records were sold; sheet music sales took a nosedive from which they’ve never recovered. Along came radio, and (for awhile, anyway) record sales suffered—why buy the music when you can hear it for free? Today, of course, the music industry is again in turmoil over the same idea, only this time it’s MP3 files over the internet cutting into CD sales.
Could it be that Drummer and other leather publications are the sheet music of the 1990s? Much as Playboy proclaims itself “entertainment for men” (or for some men, anyway), leather magazines are entertainment for the leather community—as are leather contests, leather events, even leather bars. All these forms of entertainment are being affected by the brave new internet-driven world, but right now magazines like Drummer are being hit especially hard.
What people used to get from magazines—pictures, articles, one-handed fiction, personal ads—is now available for free (or at least for the yearly cost of AdultChek) on the Web. Davolt also points out that the internet is basically unregulated (i.e. uncensored) with respect to both content and geographic distribution—internet data can be sent almost anywhere and show almost anything. Meanwhile, Drummer and other publications must operate within a straitjacket of local, state, federal and postal regulations that limit both what they can include in their magazines and where they can or cannot sell them.
Drummer has been a magnificent invalid for several years now; in 1997 alone it posted major business losses. Davolt was named editor in January 1998, and during his 21 months at the helm the balance sheets improved dramatically, but in the end it just wasn’t enough.
Maybe it’s good that leather has embraced the Web. Maybe all that information flowing so freely will allow more people to follow their instincts, to learn, to participate, to enjoy, to build a stronger community. I hope so. But it’s sad that Drummer won’t be along for the ride.
Mr. International Rubber 2000/Rubber Blowout Weekend
Mr. International Rubber 1999 and former Twin Cities resident Thomas Smith invites everyone to Chicago the weekend of November 12-14 for the Mr. International Rubber Contest and Rubber Blowout Weekend ‘99. The contest begins at 8:30 PM on Saturday, November 13, with Khris Franis as emcee. Weekend packages include a welcome cocktail party, Rubber Buddies brunch, rubber swap and market, contest and show, Rubber Ball Beer Bust, and a T-shirt and poster. For weekend registration or contest application send your name, address, phone number and email address to Mr. International Rubber, Inc., Chicago, IL. (Rumor has it that at least one contestant will be from the Twin Cities area.)
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Saturday, October 9
Atons Leather/Levi Night
7 PM, Gasthaus Bavarian Hunter, 8930 Lofton Ave. N. (3 miles north of Hwy. 36 on County Rd. 15), Stillwater
Presented by the Atons, open to all. For information and reservations call the Atons Hotline.
But the Mr. Drummer Beat Goes On
PHOTO: Recently chosen in San Francisco are, left, new International Mr. Drummer Fraser Picard and, right, new International Drummerboy Woodie Barnes. Both are from the Mid-Atlantic region. (Many thanks to Mister Marcus, legendary San Francisco leather columnist, for supplying this photo.)
PHOTO CREDIT: “Mister” Marcus Hernandez
San Francisco recently held its annual leather bash which culminated in the International Mr. Drummer contest on Saturday, Sept. 25, and the Folsom Street Fair on Sunday, Sept. 26. By all reports this year’s contest was a rousing success; it was a crowd-pleaser and, according to Drummer Magazine editor Robert Davolt, the basket auction raised $7,000 for the winners’ travel fund. But even as the new International Mr. Drummer and Drummerboy (see accompanying photo) were being chosen, the magazine that started the contest, and gave it its name, was nearing the end of its run.
Publication of Drummer has been sporadic for some time now; the magazine has been for sale, but no buyers have come forward. The International Drummer contest has been sold to Mike Zuhl of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and at this writing negotiations for the other Drummer assets are continuing, but the outcome of it all will probably be that Drummer Magazine will no longer be published in its current form. It seems to me a rather ignominious end to what was once the leather magazine against which all others were measured.
Leather publications (and, to a certain extent, all gay publications and all publications in general) have been experiencing lean times recently. But how can a leather institution like Drummer, which has been around for years and which has been so instrumental in shaping our whole concept and culture of leather, be on the brink of extinction?
Here’s a history lesson about a seemingly unrelated topic: At the dawn of the 20th century most homes had pianos in the parlor, and people bought sheet music at the local five-and-dime store so they could play the popular songs of the day. The music industry made money from the sales of sheet music, and a song’s popularity was measured by how many copies of the sheet music were sold. Then the phonograph became commonplace, and the popularity of a song was measured by how many phonograph records were sold; sheet music sales took a nosedive from which they’ve never recovered. Along came radio, and (for awhile, anyway) record sales suffered—why buy the music when you can hear it for free? Today, of course, the music industry is again in turmoil over the same idea, only this time it’s MP3 files over the internet cutting into CD sales.
Could it be that Drummer and other leather publications are the sheet music of the 1990s? Much as Playboy proclaims itself “entertainment for men” (or for some men, anyway), leather magazines are entertainment for the leather community—as are leather contests, leather events, even leather bars. All these forms of entertainment are being affected by the brave new internet-driven world, but right now magazines like Drummer are being hit especially hard.
What people used to get from magazines—pictures, articles, one-handed fiction, personal ads—is now available for free (or at least for the yearly cost of AdultChek) on the Web. Davolt also points out that the internet is basically unregulated (i.e. uncensored) with respect to both content and geographic distribution—internet data can be sent almost anywhere and show almost anything. Meanwhile, Drummer and other publications must operate within a straitjacket of local, state, federal and postal regulations that limit both what they can include in their magazines and where they can or cannot sell them.
Drummer has been a magnificent invalid for several years now; in 1997 alone it posted major business losses. Davolt was named editor in January 1998, and during his 21 months at the helm the balance sheets improved dramatically, but in the end it just wasn’t enough.
Maybe it’s good that leather has embraced the Web. Maybe all that information flowing so freely will allow more people to follow their instincts, to learn, to participate, to enjoy, to build a stronger community. I hope so. But it’s sad that Drummer won’t be along for the ride.
Mr. International Rubber 2000/Rubber Blowout Weekend
Mr. International Rubber 1999 and former Twin Cities resident Thomas Smith invites everyone to Chicago the weekend of November 12-14 for the Mr. International Rubber Contest and Rubber Blowout Weekend ‘99. The contest begins at 8:30 PM on Saturday, November 13, with Khris Franis as emcee. Weekend packages include a welcome cocktail party, Rubber Buddies brunch, rubber swap and market, contest and show, Rubber Ball Beer Bust, and a T-shirt and poster. For weekend registration or contest application send your name, address, phone number and email address to Mr. International Rubber, Inc., Chicago, IL. (Rumor has it that at least one contestant will be from the Twin Cities area.)
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Saturday, October 9
Atons Leather/Levi Night
7 PM, Gasthaus Bavarian Hunter, 8930 Lofton Ave. N. (3 miles north of Hwy. 36 on County Rd. 15), Stillwater
Presented by the Atons, open to all. For information and reservations call the Atons Hotline.
Friday, September 24, 1999
What Are Fantasies? Leather Theater.
(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #113, September 24, 1999)
Regular readers of this column have often seen the words “fantasy” or “fantasy presentation” used in connection with leather contests or events. If you’ve ever wondered “What the heck is a fantasy?”—wonder no more.
A psychologist friend of mine is fond of pointing out that whatever our differences, and no matter what community (or communities) we belong to, “we’re all socialized the same.” Hence, the Miss America Pageant has the “talent competition,” drag queens have drag shows—and the leather community has “fantasy presentations.” This weekend, in San Francisco, Gary O’Neill will represent the Great Plains region (which includes Minnesota) at the International Mr. Drummer/Drummerboy Contest in San Francisco—the contest which annually presents the most stupendous fantasies of the leather year. (The only major leather contest which does not feature fantasy presentations is International Mr. Leather.)
Fantasies may take many forms, from simple (your basic flogging scene) to grand (anything by Ron Athey or, closer to home, a Michael deLeon extravaganza featuring the Ballet of the Dolls). I’ve heard fantasies described as “erotic skits,” but for me that’s too simplistic a definition. Fantasies are the leather/SM community’s form of theatrical expression. (If you have ever been onstage as part of a fantasy, you can legitimately impress people by telling them you have done performance art.) Over the years certain fantasy performances have become legendary—for instance, anyone who has ever seen one of Joey Kraly’s Bugs Bunny/Loony Tunes fantasies will never forget it.
A good fantasy a) makes you laugh, b) makes you think, or c) gets you, uh, “aroused.” A fantasy that does one of these three things is good, but two out of three is better and all three is a knockout.
A good fantasy has honesty and authenticity going for it. If I’m not into flogging, but I decide to present a flogging fantasy because that’s what I think my audience will like, it probably won’t work. If I’m really into flogging, on the other hand, I can present a fantasy that communicates my passion to the audience even if not every audience member is into flogging.
Like all theater, there are certain basic practical rules of stagecraft that can make or break a fantasy presentation, and staging skills gained during prior theatrical experience (high school, college, community, or professional) can be used to advantage. I’ve seen countless flogging fantasies where both flogger and floggee spend the entire fantasy with their backs to the audience; I was always taught that this is bad form, theatrically speaking. There’s also the question of who is the “hero,” or most important character, in the fantasy. Usually in a contest setting, the contestant should be the one to shine onstage, yet I’ve seen fantasies where the contestant simply lies there while various accomplices perform all the action (and get all the attention).
Just as Broadway has been overtaken with the spectacle of life-size helicopters on stage and crystal chandeliers which crash to the floor nightly, fantasies in recent years have fallen victim to what I call the “Biggest Prop Wins” phenomenon. I’ve seen a fantasy with a gallows that was eleven feet high, and I’ve seen one with a spider web (made of rope) that was eight feet in diameter—and which revolved. While those fantasies worked well, I’ve also seen fantasies that connected with the audience while using almost no props. Personally, I think that’s a greater (and certainly rarer) accomplishment. And it certainly makes it easier to “take the show on the road.”
If, after reading this, you’d like to try your hand at presenting a fantasy, let me encourage you. Maybe you could compete in a leather contest, or maybe you could present a fantasy in a noncompetitive atmosphere, such as a leather event or fundraiser. However you decide to do it, you’ll find an eager audience waiting to, as Chanel’s ads used to put it, “share the fantasy.”
PHOTO: Gary O’Neill, shown here in his Mr. Minnesota Drummer fantasy performance, will be representing the Great Plains region this weekend in the 1999 International Mr. Drummer competition in San Francisco.
Regular readers of this column have often seen the words “fantasy” or “fantasy presentation” used in connection with leather contests or events. If you’ve ever wondered “What the heck is a fantasy?”—wonder no more.
A psychologist friend of mine is fond of pointing out that whatever our differences, and no matter what community (or communities) we belong to, “we’re all socialized the same.” Hence, the Miss America Pageant has the “talent competition,” drag queens have drag shows—and the leather community has “fantasy presentations.” This weekend, in San Francisco, Gary O’Neill will represent the Great Plains region (which includes Minnesota) at the International Mr. Drummer/Drummerboy Contest in San Francisco—the contest which annually presents the most stupendous fantasies of the leather year. (The only major leather contest which does not feature fantasy presentations is International Mr. Leather.)
Fantasies may take many forms, from simple (your basic flogging scene) to grand (anything by Ron Athey or, closer to home, a Michael deLeon extravaganza featuring the Ballet of the Dolls). I’ve heard fantasies described as “erotic skits,” but for me that’s too simplistic a definition. Fantasies are the leather/SM community’s form of theatrical expression. (If you have ever been onstage as part of a fantasy, you can legitimately impress people by telling them you have done performance art.) Over the years certain fantasy performances have become legendary—for instance, anyone who has ever seen one of Joey Kraly’s Bugs Bunny/Loony Tunes fantasies will never forget it.
A good fantasy a) makes you laugh, b) makes you think, or c) gets you, uh, “aroused.” A fantasy that does one of these three things is good, but two out of three is better and all three is a knockout.
A good fantasy has honesty and authenticity going for it. If I’m not into flogging, but I decide to present a flogging fantasy because that’s what I think my audience will like, it probably won’t work. If I’m really into flogging, on the other hand, I can present a fantasy that communicates my passion to the audience even if not every audience member is into flogging.
Like all theater, there are certain basic practical rules of stagecraft that can make or break a fantasy presentation, and staging skills gained during prior theatrical experience (high school, college, community, or professional) can be used to advantage. I’ve seen countless flogging fantasies where both flogger and floggee spend the entire fantasy with their backs to the audience; I was always taught that this is bad form, theatrically speaking. There’s also the question of who is the “hero,” or most important character, in the fantasy. Usually in a contest setting, the contestant should be the one to shine onstage, yet I’ve seen fantasies where the contestant simply lies there while various accomplices perform all the action (and get all the attention).
Just as Broadway has been overtaken with the spectacle of life-size helicopters on stage and crystal chandeliers which crash to the floor nightly, fantasies in recent years have fallen victim to what I call the “Biggest Prop Wins” phenomenon. I’ve seen a fantasy with a gallows that was eleven feet high, and I’ve seen one with a spider web (made of rope) that was eight feet in diameter—and which revolved. While those fantasies worked well, I’ve also seen fantasies that connected with the audience while using almost no props. Personally, I think that’s a greater (and certainly rarer) accomplishment. And it certainly makes it easier to “take the show on the road.”
If, after reading this, you’d like to try your hand at presenting a fantasy, let me encourage you. Maybe you could compete in a leather contest, or maybe you could present a fantasy in a noncompetitive atmosphere, such as a leather event or fundraiser. However you decide to do it, you’ll find an eager audience waiting to, as Chanel’s ads used to put it, “share the fantasy.”
PHOTO: Gary O’Neill, shown here in his Mr. Minnesota Drummer fantasy performance, will be representing the Great Plains region this weekend in the 1999 International Mr. Drummer competition in San Francisco.
Friday, September 10, 1999
Fantasy Becomes Reality (Barely)
(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #112, September 10, 1999)
John Tatum, Mr. Michigan Fantasy 1999, was elevated to International Mr. Fantasy 1999 during the International Mr./Ms. Fantasy Contest held August 21 at the Guthrie Lab Theater in Minneapolis. Yes, against incredible odds and despite many major setbacks, the contest actually did take place as scheduled.
With all the strikes against it (almost no nationwide publicity, and no venue until very late in the game), the easiest thing would have been to cancel the entire weekend. Credit must be given to Wolf Productions and many other members of the Twin Cities leather community for sheer tenacity—they said there would be a contest, and there was. And in spite of the weekend’s events not being nearly as big as first envisioned, those in attendance seemed to be enjoying themselves.
Fantasy Weekend was started in 1989 in Omaha, Nebraska by Dustin Logan and Bob Ewing. It started as a “family reunion,” a gathering of past and present (and future) titleholders and other members of the leather/SM tribe. The whole idea of the weekend, in the spirit of Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney (“Let’s put on a show!”), was to raise money for charity by presenting an entertaining evening of fantasy performances in a non-competitive atmosphere (as opposed to the competitive atmosphere of a leather contest). With the exception of one year, the event was always held in Omaha.
In 1995 the weekend was refocused and became the International Mr. Fantasy Contest, which was envisioned as less political and more “fun” than International Mr. Leather. Competitors for International Mr. Fantasy, one per state, have tended to number around ten per year and have tended to be from the midwestern states (and Canadian provinces). For last year’s tenth-anniversary weekend, the “old-style” non-competitive Fantasy Show was held on Friday night, with the International Mr. Fantasy Contest taking place Saturday night.
Starting in 1999, Logan and Ewing decided to let the International Fantasy Weekend travel to a different city each year (as does the International Ms. Leather Contest, also based in Omaha), and the Twin Cities were the first stop on the tour. Wolf Productions, who had just made a spectacular showing with the Mr./Ms. Minnesota Fantasy Contest, seemed primed to do it again, only this time for a national audience.
So why did this year’s contest attract only two male contestants (and no female contestants) and very few audience members from out of town? Putting together this year’s International Fantasy Weekend presented problems that took much too long to solve, and which in turn created other problems. Basic arrangements, like where to hold the contest or what hotel would host the weekend, proved to be extremely time-consuming and fraught with problems. Not knowing the contest venue or host hotel makes it difficult to attract contestants or do any nationwide publicity. By the time those arrangements were made, it was less than three weeks until the contest. Media deadlines had long since passed, and prospective contestants and audience members would have flown to the Twin Cities on very expensive airline tickets.
For all the storm and turmoil leading up to it, the actual weekend was a pleasant surprise. Whether it was Friday night’s motorcoach bar crawl, Saturday night’s contest at the magnificient Guthrie Lab Theater, the Saturday night after-party, or Sunday’s barbecue picnic by the Mississippi, all the events had one thing in common: those in attendance were having a good time.
The contest itself was a good one, and a close one. Mr. Minnesota Fantasy 1999 David Page presented an elaborate airport-security fantasy, while Tatum’s fantasy told the story of a kinky pansexual birthday party. Emcee for the evening was Gary O’Neill, who was also the contest organizer and who can now turn his attentions to competing in this year’s International Mr. Drummer Contest as Great Plains Mr. Drummer 1999. Judges for the weekend were Cori Ander, the current International Ms. Olympus Leather; International Mr. Fantasy 1996 Ariq Robinson, who is also the current Mr. Ebony Leather; Ms. Minnesota Leather 1991 P.J. Knight; and your humble columnist, who is also Great Lakes Mr. Drummer 1994.
Ms. Minnesota Leather Contest to be rescheduled
First it was the Mr. Minnesota Leather Contest being cancelled (see last issue’s announcement). Now it’s the Ms. Minnesota Leather Contest—not cancelled, but postponed. Ms. Minnesota Leather was originally scheduled for the weekend of September 26-28, at which time it would have conflicted with the International Mr. Drummer Contest and Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco. I was recently told by event organizer Renee Indehar that it will not happen that weekend but will be rescheduled. More information will, I assume, be forthcoming.
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Saturday, September 11
Atons Leather/Levi Night
Time and location to be announced—call the Atons Hotline for details
Presented by the Atons, open to all. For information and reservations call the Atons Hotline.
John Tatum, Mr. Michigan Fantasy 1999, was elevated to International Mr. Fantasy 1999 during the International Mr./Ms. Fantasy Contest held August 21 at the Guthrie Lab Theater in Minneapolis. Yes, against incredible odds and despite many major setbacks, the contest actually did take place as scheduled.
With all the strikes against it (almost no nationwide publicity, and no venue until very late in the game), the easiest thing would have been to cancel the entire weekend. Credit must be given to Wolf Productions and many other members of the Twin Cities leather community for sheer tenacity—they said there would be a contest, and there was. And in spite of the weekend’s events not being nearly as big as first envisioned, those in attendance seemed to be enjoying themselves.
Fantasy Weekend was started in 1989 in Omaha, Nebraska by Dustin Logan and Bob Ewing. It started as a “family reunion,” a gathering of past and present (and future) titleholders and other members of the leather/SM tribe. The whole idea of the weekend, in the spirit of Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney (“Let’s put on a show!”), was to raise money for charity by presenting an entertaining evening of fantasy performances in a non-competitive atmosphere (as opposed to the competitive atmosphere of a leather contest). With the exception of one year, the event was always held in Omaha.
In 1995 the weekend was refocused and became the International Mr. Fantasy Contest, which was envisioned as less political and more “fun” than International Mr. Leather. Competitors for International Mr. Fantasy, one per state, have tended to number around ten per year and have tended to be from the midwestern states (and Canadian provinces). For last year’s tenth-anniversary weekend, the “old-style” non-competitive Fantasy Show was held on Friday night, with the International Mr. Fantasy Contest taking place Saturday night.
Starting in 1999, Logan and Ewing decided to let the International Fantasy Weekend travel to a different city each year (as does the International Ms. Leather Contest, also based in Omaha), and the Twin Cities were the first stop on the tour. Wolf Productions, who had just made a spectacular showing with the Mr./Ms. Minnesota Fantasy Contest, seemed primed to do it again, only this time for a national audience.
So why did this year’s contest attract only two male contestants (and no female contestants) and very few audience members from out of town? Putting together this year’s International Fantasy Weekend presented problems that took much too long to solve, and which in turn created other problems. Basic arrangements, like where to hold the contest or what hotel would host the weekend, proved to be extremely time-consuming and fraught with problems. Not knowing the contest venue or host hotel makes it difficult to attract contestants or do any nationwide publicity. By the time those arrangements were made, it was less than three weeks until the contest. Media deadlines had long since passed, and prospective contestants and audience members would have flown to the Twin Cities on very expensive airline tickets.
For all the storm and turmoil leading up to it, the actual weekend was a pleasant surprise. Whether it was Friday night’s motorcoach bar crawl, Saturday night’s contest at the magnificient Guthrie Lab Theater, the Saturday night after-party, or Sunday’s barbecue picnic by the Mississippi, all the events had one thing in common: those in attendance were having a good time.
The contest itself was a good one, and a close one. Mr. Minnesota Fantasy 1999 David Page presented an elaborate airport-security fantasy, while Tatum’s fantasy told the story of a kinky pansexual birthday party. Emcee for the evening was Gary O’Neill, who was also the contest organizer and who can now turn his attentions to competing in this year’s International Mr. Drummer Contest as Great Plains Mr. Drummer 1999. Judges for the weekend were Cori Ander, the current International Ms. Olympus Leather; International Mr. Fantasy 1996 Ariq Robinson, who is also the current Mr. Ebony Leather; Ms. Minnesota Leather 1991 P.J. Knight; and your humble columnist, who is also Great Lakes Mr. Drummer 1994.
Ms. Minnesota Leather Contest to be rescheduled
First it was the Mr. Minnesota Leather Contest being cancelled (see last issue’s announcement). Now it’s the Ms. Minnesota Leather Contest—not cancelled, but postponed. Ms. Minnesota Leather was originally scheduled for the weekend of September 26-28, at which time it would have conflicted with the International Mr. Drummer Contest and Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco. I was recently told by event organizer Renee Indehar that it will not happen that weekend but will be rescheduled. More information will, I assume, be forthcoming.
Upcoming Leather Events (for Calendar section)
Saturday, September 11
Atons Leather/Levi Night
Time and location to be announced—call the Atons Hotline for details
Presented by the Atons, open to all. For information and reservations call the Atons Hotline.
Friday, August 27, 1999
Transgender Leather
(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #111, August 27, 1999)
Okay, so you’re a proud member of the leather/BDSM community. If you’re reading this column, the probability is highest that you’re a gay white male (as is your humble columnist). But you, like your humble columnist, understand that something as wonderful as leathersex must be open to everyone regardless of age, race, sex, orientation, and so on. So you try to be open-minded and accepting, even of women at the Minneapolis Eagle or heterosexuals in a dungeon. (See previous columns on leatherwomen and het queers.)
You’re even trying to be open-minded about transgendered people in the leather/BDSM community. Here you may fall into one of two categories: either “I don’t know any, but of course they would certainly be welcome” or “My goodness, they’re everywhere—where are they all coming from?” Billy Lane was in last year’s International Mr. Leather competition, and he did very well, thank you. One of the judges at this year’s International Ms. Leather contest was Kate Bornstein, author of many books on gender issues including “My Gender Workbook.” You’ve seen transgendered people onstage assisting or competing in local leather contests, too, and sometimes winning them.
That’s fine, you say, it can be their community too. (How very generous of you.) I know people who espouse this line of reasoning, and follow it in the next breath with this disclaimer: “But of course I would never play with one.”
My first response to this is, why not? My second response is, how do you know you haven’t? Considering that much SM play is non-genital in nature, how can you be absolutely, positively sure that the person who flogged you last night (or the person whom you flogged) was not a trans person? Have you checked the chromosomes of everyone you’ve ever played with to be sure they matched the person’s outward appearance?
Suppose you found out the next day (or next month, or next year) that the person you played with last night was a trannie. Would you feel differently about the experience? About the person? Why or why not?
If you feel comfortable with trans people, congratulations—you can skip the next part of this column. If you don’t feel comfortable having trans people around, however, let me say this as gently as I can: Get Over It. Here are two different (and somewhat opposing) viewpoints to consider that may help you adjust your attitude:
Viewpoint #1: Think of a transgender orientation as a special asset instead of a liability. Consider that trans people are an interesting and diverse group. I seem to be getting to know more and more of them, so I say this from personal experience: They’ve seen a lot and been through a lot, and they have the stories to prove it. Their experiences at questioning something about themselves that most of us take for granted tends to give them a special insight into themselves (and others, and society in general) that can be refreshing to be around.
Viewpoint #2: The words “transgender” and “transsexual” are labels. People aren’t labels; if I look at a person and all I see is a label, I’m not really seeing that person. Instead of thinking of a transgender orientation as a special asset (as described above), don’t think about it at all. Focus on a trans person as simply a person, and try relating to them as you would with any other human being. You might be pleasantly surprised. Maybe you’ll make a new friend. You might even play together. Who knows what chemistry you’ll find once you get that pesky label out of the way?
One final note: Earlier I mentioned a book by Kate Bornstein titled “My Gender Workbook.” It is recommended reading if you are at all curious about gender issues—perhaps your own, or perhaps in order to better understand a newfound transgender friend. Before seeing this book I thought gender was basically either male or female, and transgender people either went from female to male or male to female. (And they always used hormones and surgery to make the transition). I now realize that it’s not that simple. Here’s just one example of a “nontraditional” transgender person: Joe knows he is male, in spite of the fact that he was born with a female’s body. Joe is so sure he is male, in fact, that he sees no need to bother with hormones and surgery. So just have respect for his gender choice—call him Joe, and call him “him,” and he’s satisfied.
Gender comes in many different flavors, and it will be a lovely day when people can taste them all and choose their favorite with no apologies, shame or stigma.
Mr. Minnesota Leather Contest cancelled
Late-breaking news: The Mr. Minnesota Leather Contest, which was scheduled for Labor Day weekend, will not be happening. According to Minnesota Leather Productions spokesman Colin Spriestersbach, “Minnesota Leather Productions will not be holding the event this year due to [a] lack of interest in the Leather community.”
Okay, so you’re a proud member of the leather/BDSM community. If you’re reading this column, the probability is highest that you’re a gay white male (as is your humble columnist). But you, like your humble columnist, understand that something as wonderful as leathersex must be open to everyone regardless of age, race, sex, orientation, and so on. So you try to be open-minded and accepting, even of women at the Minneapolis Eagle or heterosexuals in a dungeon. (See previous columns on leatherwomen and het queers.)
You’re even trying to be open-minded about transgendered people in the leather/BDSM community. Here you may fall into one of two categories: either “I don’t know any, but of course they would certainly be welcome” or “My goodness, they’re everywhere—where are they all coming from?” Billy Lane was in last year’s International Mr. Leather competition, and he did very well, thank you. One of the judges at this year’s International Ms. Leather contest was Kate Bornstein, author of many books on gender issues including “My Gender Workbook.” You’ve seen transgendered people onstage assisting or competing in local leather contests, too, and sometimes winning them.
That’s fine, you say, it can be their community too. (How very generous of you.) I know people who espouse this line of reasoning, and follow it in the next breath with this disclaimer: “But of course I would never play with one.”
My first response to this is, why not? My second response is, how do you know you haven’t? Considering that much SM play is non-genital in nature, how can you be absolutely, positively sure that the person who flogged you last night (or the person whom you flogged) was not a trans person? Have you checked the chromosomes of everyone you’ve ever played with to be sure they matched the person’s outward appearance?
Suppose you found out the next day (or next month, or next year) that the person you played with last night was a trannie. Would you feel differently about the experience? About the person? Why or why not?
If you feel comfortable with trans people, congratulations—you can skip the next part of this column. If you don’t feel comfortable having trans people around, however, let me say this as gently as I can: Get Over It. Here are two different (and somewhat opposing) viewpoints to consider that may help you adjust your attitude:
Viewpoint #1: Think of a transgender orientation as a special asset instead of a liability. Consider that trans people are an interesting and diverse group. I seem to be getting to know more and more of them, so I say this from personal experience: They’ve seen a lot and been through a lot, and they have the stories to prove it. Their experiences at questioning something about themselves that most of us take for granted tends to give them a special insight into themselves (and others, and society in general) that can be refreshing to be around.
Viewpoint #2: The words “transgender” and “transsexual” are labels. People aren’t labels; if I look at a person and all I see is a label, I’m not really seeing that person. Instead of thinking of a transgender orientation as a special asset (as described above), don’t think about it at all. Focus on a trans person as simply a person, and try relating to them as you would with any other human being. You might be pleasantly surprised. Maybe you’ll make a new friend. You might even play together. Who knows what chemistry you’ll find once you get that pesky label out of the way?
One final note: Earlier I mentioned a book by Kate Bornstein titled “My Gender Workbook.” It is recommended reading if you are at all curious about gender issues—perhaps your own, or perhaps in order to better understand a newfound transgender friend. Before seeing this book I thought gender was basically either male or female, and transgender people either went from female to male or male to female. (And they always used hormones and surgery to make the transition). I now realize that it’s not that simple. Here’s just one example of a “nontraditional” transgender person: Joe knows he is male, in spite of the fact that he was born with a female’s body. Joe is so sure he is male, in fact, that he sees no need to bother with hormones and surgery. So just have respect for his gender choice—call him Joe, and call him “him,” and he’s satisfied.
Gender comes in many different flavors, and it will be a lovely day when people can taste them all and choose their favorite with no apologies, shame or stigma.
Mr. Minnesota Leather Contest cancelled
Late-breaking news: The Mr. Minnesota Leather Contest, which was scheduled for Labor Day weekend, will not be happening. According to Minnesota Leather Productions spokesman Colin Spriestersbach, “Minnesota Leather Productions will not be holding the event this year due to [a] lack of interest in the Leather community.”
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