Joanne Gaddy: The Leather Life Interview

(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #339, May 23, 2008)

PHOTO

Joanne Gaddy has been a visible member of Chicago’s leather community for many years. She served as Mistress of IML for about ten years and founded The Slater Society, a pansexual fisting group. She was in the Twin Cities recently to give two leather-related presentations: “Laugh ’til it hurts” at a PEPRMNT munch, and a fisting demonstration for MSDB’s THE LAB.

How did you get started at all this?

I came into it sideways. I left my ex-husband a little over 20 years ago and met a gay man, and he and I became friends. One day he was going to an early fundraising meeting for Chicago House, which was a residence for people living with AIDS. I told him I’d be happy to go with him if they didn’t mind a straight female. Well, I was, of course, welcomed with beyond-open arms. It was at Thom Dombkowski’s house [former Chief Judge of the International Mr. Leather contest].

We were working at a table with two of the Chicago House board members, and one of them called me the next day and said, “Would you consider doing minutes of board meetings?” So I started doing that, which led me to meeting a couple more leathermen. I’m also a member of MENSA, and I joined the MENSA gay special interest group and met another bunch of leathermen there.

One year one of the guys I met at Chicago House, Bill Eskelson, told me, “You’re volunteering at IML.” And I said, “Okay.” This was the first year they had an office, and they had a sweet little bottom girl in the office that somebody had recommended. Well, that office didn’t need a sweet little bottom girl—who had no office experience, either. Wednesday night before IML, the first thing they used to do was photo badges. I was in the orientation and Bill came to me and said, “Can you turn on a typewriter?” I went into the office, turned on the typewriter for the girl, and then I did all the badges. Well, within a day I was told, “By the way, you’re running the office next year.” I said “Oh. Okay.”

Another friend who was involved with IML had one of those electronic BBS things, and he kept telling me I had to log into it. Finally one night I did, and I discovered a posting from a straight man about the Chicagoland Discussion Group (CDG). And I remember sitting in front of the computer, going “Straight people do this? You mean there’s a chance I might, like, get laid, too, and get to play?” So the leather community has changed my life.

Why did you give up being Mistress of IML?

I went out on medical disability, and I did IML a little bit after that, but my health was such that I just couldn’t do it anymore. I have scleroderma, an autoimmune disease in the same family as lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. The body produces too much collagen. It’s mostly attacked my digestive system. During the last surgery a couple years ago they took out my esophagus entirely. As my gastroenterologist said, “Your esophagus will give you a lot less trouble on the pathologist’s table.”

How did you get your start in fisting?

Chicago Hellfire Club used to do SMU, or SM University. At one of the SMUs I saw two very experienced fisters do a demo and I was like, “I want that.” It was just so amazing. And then along the way I had a female partner, and she taught me about vaginal fisting, and I fell in love with that. It’s truly one of the most intimate and intense things you can do. You know, feeling someone’s heartbeat inside their body is just fucking awesome.

How does MENSA interplay with leather?

Somewhere in the late ’80s or early ’90s I started doing programs at MENSA gatherings called “Intelligent SM.” So I’m kinda single-handedly responsible for bringing a lot of kinky MENSAns out of the closet. There really is a very significant crossover between intelligence and kink. I’m frequently telling people in the kinky world to join MENSA and vice versa.

You’re now doing weddings as an ordained clergyperson with the Church of Spiritual Humanism.

A girlfriend from the kinky community and her fiance wanted to get married at Sinsations a year ago, and they asked if I would get an online ordination and marry them. After doing that wedding I wound up with two more kinky couples and then I got an e-mail from somebody who found me on the Spiritual Humanism site. I decided I was making this a business and started advertising on wedding sites and in run programs.

A friend designed my vanilla website, and as soon as we get a chance he’ll be doing my kinky website. It’s going to be Power Exchange Weddings. For the vanilla site I’ve got a clergy robe and stole, which of course makes me look totally angelic—which is just hysterical. For the kinky site we took a picture of me in the clergy robe and stole, but it’s open, and you can see the corset and I’m dangling handcuffs and a whip. “Let the mistress marry you.”

No Minnesota Contestant at IML XXX

(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #338, May 9, 2008)

Consider the noble leather contest—alive and thriving in some places, moribund in others.

It will be a blowout year in Chicago as the International Mr. Leather (IML) contest celebrates 30 years this coming Memorial Day weekend. As in years past, many Minnesotans will be among the crush of leather aficionados cheering for competitors from across the nation and around the world—and turning the host hotel (Chicago’s Hyatt Regency on Wacker Drive) into the world’s largest leather bar for the weekend. (Details at <www.imrl.com>. And hurry, because at this writing the host hotel is almost sold out.)

Unfortunately, no one representing Minnesota will be walking across the IML stage this year as a contestant. In recent years the only functioning Minnesota leather title, and the only source for an IML contestant representing Minnesota, has been Mr. Minneapolis Eagle. This year that contest has not yet been held. What gives?

Minnesota has a long history of sending contestants to each year’s IML. And in 1997 one of them—Mr. Minnesota Leather Kevin Cwayna—went on to become that year’s International Mr. Leather.

Now, eleven years later, Minneapolis Eagle owner Ed Hopkins hasn’t been able to find enough contestants to hold this year’s Mr. Minneapolis Eagle contest in time to send the winner to Chicago to compete in IML. It’s not for lack of trying—the first call for Mr. Minneapolis Eagle 2008 contestants went out around the beginning of the year.

When I talked to him, Hopkins sounded a bit bewildered and frustrated by the lack of contestants. But at this point, he still wants to be able to present the contest. (He told me, “I always really enjoy that evening at the bar.”) He now plans to hold the contest sometime this fall.

Things are both better (nationally) and worse (locally) for the women’s leather community. The International Ms Leather (IMsL) contest has experienced an amazing rejuvenation in the last two years. But there hasn’t been a functioning women’s leather title based in Minnesota since the end of the last century.

But who cares, right? They’re just beauty contests anyway, aren’t they? Actually, no, they’re much more—although I have nothing against a nice beauty contest, either.

Leather contests have been around as long as they have because they serve several community functions. Whether in a bar in Minneapolis or in a theater in Chicago, San Francisco or Los Angeles, contests build community by being an out-of-the-ordinary shared community experience. For leather-related business owners and sponsors, leather contests can be good ways to build and strengthen their businesses.

Obviously, each leather contest can have only one winner. But, win or lose, everyone competing in a leather contest experiences a significant rite of passage. For contestants, the act of competing is a declaration both to themselves and to the community that they want to be involved and here’s what they have to offer.

Leather contests and leather titles are an important source of, and often a gateway to, community leadership. I have personally seen this happen over and over. Both locally and nationally, I can point to any number of people making things happen in their communities—and tell you in which contest I first saw them compete.

I recently participated in a dinner-table discussion sparked by the news that the Mr. Minneapolis Eagle contest had been postponed. Others who see the value in leather contests and titles wondered why Minnesota has so few of them, and what it would take to revive them here.

Reference was made to the Mr. Los Angeles Leather title (as shown in the 2004 documentary Mr. Leather), a citywide leather title competition featuring the winners of nine different leather-bar titles. Why couldn’t Minnesota set up the same kind of leather title network?

Of course, the Mr. Minneapolis Eagle title could be an integral part of such a network—but perhaps other Twin Cities bars would be interested in sponsoring a leather title. And what about bars or organizations in Duluth, Rochester, Mankato, or elsewhere in the state? Winners of those contests could then go on to compete for a statewide Minnesota leather title. And, while we’re at it, how about revitalizing a women’s Minnesota leather title as well?

Sounds great—almost like the way things used to be around here. The Mr. and Ms Minnesota Leather titles once were run by the community. (This was before my time, so I’ve only heard stories.) In my early years in the Twin Cities leather community there were many titles and many contests, and I have columns and photos documenting them. And then, for whatever reason or reasons, it all went away, and only the Mr. Minneapolis Eagle title was left. Now, after nine titleholders, it too is on hiatus—I hope only temporarily.

So I’ll still be at IML, and I’ll still be cheering, but I won’t be able to cheer for a contestant representing my state, let alone my hometown. I can only hope that someone from Minnesota who attends IML will be inspired, or will inspire someone else, to compete for the title of Mr. Minneapolis Eagle this fall.

Correction

In my column in Lavender issue 332 (Feb. 15, 2008) I incorrectly said the 2009 Leather Leadership Conference would be in Detroit. The 2009 conference will be in Atlanta, with Detroit hosting the conference in 2010.

Keynote Excerpts from Leather Leadership Conference 12

(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #337, April 25, 2008)

PHOTOS: keynote speakerss

The twelfth annual Leather Leadership Conference was held April 11-13, 2008 in San Francisco. The jam-packed weekend included three major keynote speeches (as well as 49 workshops and panel discussions).

Friday evening’s opening keynote speaker was noted leather author and publisher Race Bannon (filling in for Guy Baldwin, the originally announced opening keynote speaker, who was unable to attend the conference due to illness). In his speech, Bannon discussed recent trends in the leather/BDSM/fetish community, including:

• the prevalence of the Internet as a communications tool

• the continuing generational divide

• pansexuality reaching equilibrium after more than a decade of growth

• increasing role fluidity among gay men (Top? Bottom? Switch!)

Bannon then noted another important trend: people seem to be getting kinkier, as evidenced by expanding lists in online profiles of what people are into sexually. Bannon offered a theory that might explain this phenomenon:

“In the 1980s and 1990s, Giacomo Rizzolatti, a neuroscientist and a professor of human physiology, and some other scientists were doing some research on the brain activity of monkeys when performing a task, like reaching for a banana. The researchers observed certain neurons firing in the brain. Then they noticed something they were not expecting.

“The same neurons fired when the monkey only watched someone perform the action. Rizzolatti named these neurons ‘mirror neurons.’ Subsequent research has observed these mirror neurons in primates, some birds, and—sure enough—humans. Therefore it seems logical that mirror neurons allow humans simply observing someone doing something to truly experience at least some semblance of what the person is experiencing.

“Consider the first trend that I mentioned: the dramatic influence of the Internet and technology. We see other people’s kink—via profiles, porn, often in real time via chat or webcam—and, assuming that the mirror neuron theory is correct, we actually experience the feelings and sensations in much the same way we would if we were actually doing it. This brings about an energizing twist in those kinks in ways that were more difficult to elicit before this technological age of ours came about.”

Saturday morning’s breakfast keynote speaker was Michael Thorn, editor and publisher of Instigator Magazine. He called the community to focus more on quality and less on quantity:

“What we’re doing is watering down our fucking gene pool. This ‘bring your neighbor to SM101, we’ll teach ‘em flogging’ just strikes me as a desperate need for safety in numbers—validation. ‘I’m a freak, maybe a bunch of us together can be safe.’ That’s not leadership, guys, it’s just desperation.

“Maybe what we need to do is shore up our numbers, tighten our ranks, take care of the brothers we have now. It’s like a Master who has a gaggle of slaves. If they’re sloppy and messy, no one’s interested. But if these guys are hot and tight, believe me, other guys will go up and say ‘Please, Sir, can you teach me to be like that?’

“Gay boys wait in lines around nightclubs to get in, knowing there’s a chance they might not. There’s an exclusivity thing that people are drawn to. And this all-encompassing-all-the-time is not getting us anywhere.

“I’ve come to believe that at the root of all our problems is self-esteem. Sure, we’ve got a boatload of pride, but when it comes to safety in numbers, are we really thinking out of the box on this one? This desperate need for validation is literally destroying our scene. If we could actually learn to concentrate on quality, just for awhile, instead of quantity, maybe we just might attract others who appreciate that as well.”

Sunday afternoon’s closing keynote speaker was author and radical-sex activist Patrick Califia, who talked about the challenges facing the leather/BDSM/fetish community:

“So, here we are, dealing with psychiatry, religion, homophobia, misogyny, fear of pleasure, body shame, disability, the ambivalent role of capitalism that’s happy to sell us our clothes but doesn’t really want to back us when it comes to our civil rights.

“I think it’s very hard when an activist is faced with this kind of fruit salad of issues to think that you could do anything about any of it. So I’m giving to you all my blessing and my permission to only pick one thing to work on at a time. That’s very important. Whether you feel like you can:

“Speak to classes of students;

“Talk to doctors, nurses, psych students or high school students about some issue of sexuality that people need more education about;

“Write a letter to the editor if there’s a crackdown on prostitution;

“Show up at hearings of libraries or city boards;

“Work with the police department or elected officials;

“Develop devout spiritual values and alliances with other-minded religious people like the folks at the Metropolitan Community Church;

“Collect and preserve our history;

“Continue our exemplary efforts at HIV prevention and fundraising for breast cancer.

“Anything you can do on any of those issues helps us to move forward. And more than that, it helps you to move forward—because it gives you a higher cause, something to live for other than just meeting your survival needs. And I think that’s what’s called ‘happiness.’ ”

Sex and Politics

(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #335, March 28, 2008)

This issue’s column was inspired by, and is dedicated to, Eliot Spitzer.

What, you may ask, is the former governor of New York doing in a leather column? He’s serving as a good example of a bad example. The leather/BDSM/fetish community can learn much from his recent misadventures. We ignore these lessons at our own peril.

It was dizzying to watch how quickly Spitzer went from being spoken of as a possible presidential contender in a few years to being spoken of as Client 9. Eliot Spitzer now joins Larry Craig, David Vitter, Rudy Giuliani, James McGreevy, Mark Foley, Bill Clinton, Gary Condit, Gary Hart, and many other powerful male politicians (yes, so far they’ve all been male) who have been the subject of sex scandals.

Our society is obsessed with the combination of sex and politics, and also with the combination of sex and religion (as in Ted Haggard, Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker). When something goes wrong with either combination it can create scandal—and we as a society are so absolutely, totally disgusted by sex scandals that we absolutely, totally can’t get enough of them. Since scandal sells newspapers and grabs television-viewing eyeballs, the media are only too happy to cater to our loathing.

What is there about sex and politics, or sex and religion, that’s such a hook for so many people? Whether politics or religion, the people at the center of sex scandals are always powerful people. Wait a minute—sex and power . . . playing with sex and power . . . does that sound like anyone we might know? Like, maybe, us? The National Coalition for Sexual Freedom (NCSF) conducts a “Sex and Politics” workshop and has even gone so far as to produce a very attractive t-shirt emblazoned with “Sex and Politics” (along with the NCSF logo).

NCSF, the Woodhull Freedom Foundation and other leather/BDSM/fetish community organizations and think tanks spend a lot of time contemplating sex and politics, and how to change things for our community’s betterment. Along these lines one long-term goal that has been identified, and is now starting to be acted upon, is the decriminalization of BDSM activity. But as we craft our strategies to achieve this and other community goals, it might be instructive for us to look especially closely at the somewhat frenzied nature of the current socio-political climate—the ocean in which we, along with the rest of society, are all swimming.

For example, instead of merely garden-variety internet prostitution, what if the governor had been caught being involved with, say, a professional dominatrix? Or even a pro-dom—another male? Would he still be governor? Would the shame have been less? Or would it have been even worse?

All we as a community can do with the above questions is to speculate, of course, because we all know how unlikely it is that any of our elected representatives in Washington or elsewhere would do anything so depraved as to utilize the services of a pro-domme. Certainly none of our elected representatives or officials are involved in BDSM, are they?

All kidding aside, I expect one day we’ll find out how the above hypothetical situation plays out for real, when a congressman or senator is caught in flagrante dungeon. We have already seen what happened when The Washington Post outed one of the UN weapons inspectors in Iraq as being a member of the BDSM community. If there can be that much of a media firestorm for someone who wasn’t an elected official . . . .

On the other hand, what if someone who was a proud member of the leather/BDSM/fetish community were to run for public office and win—and then be popular enough to be re-elected? That has happened for several openly gay politicians, including Representatives Barney Frank, Gerry Studds and Tammy Baldwin. Frank and Studds even both survived their own political scandals. (The man who led the charge in 1990 to expel Frank from Congress was, incredibly enough, Larry Craig.)

Maybe it all comes down to shame and secrecy. Right now in the public mind leather/BDSM/fetish sexuality is in the same category as prostitution and other scandalous things—in much the same way Trent Lott once put gay people in the same category as kleptomaniacs. That was in 1998, and Lott discovered a large segment of the population did not agree with his comparison, because by that time many people had decided that being gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender was nothing to be ashamed of.

In much the same way, I think the day is coming when leather/BDSM/fetish sexuality will be nothing to be ashamed of. If part of what gets us there is working to decriminalize BDSM, we have our work cut out for us—but we need to do it. Both our community and society at large will be better for it, because so many members of our community have so much to offer the wider society. If politicians professing to be God-fearing Christians have made such a mess of things over the last few decades, it might take a bunch of people formerly known as “pervs” to make things better.

Self-Made Leather

(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #334, March 14, 2008)

When I tell people I’m a leather columnist, many often assume I write about those cute little wallets they once constructed at summer camp from a Tandy Leather kit. Well, not quite.

But I don’t mean to disparage the practice of leathercraft. Where, after all, would the leather/BDSM/fetish community be without it—without people who know how to turn a hide into all the things that rock our world?

Charles Tandy, the entrepreneur behind Tandy Leather (and later Radio Shack), knew the value of leathercraft. His father’s business was a supplier to the shoe repair industry, and young Tandy suggested during World War II that leathercraft might offer new possibilities for growth of the business. Tandy noted that “leather was used in large quantities in army and navy hospital units and recreation centers. Leathercraft gave the men something useful to do; and their handiwork, in addition to being therapeutic, had genuine value.”

If it worked as recreation for soldiers in hospitals and kids at summer camp, you might find it fun, too. Disclaimer: Your humble columnist is not a leathercraft expert—far from it. But I have many friends who enjoy our community’s special flavor of leathercraft, along with the related hobby of toycraft.

Let’s look at toycraft first. At the last several Knights Tournaments, the Knights of Leather’s annual run, very popular classes in toycraft have been taught by local leatherman Bobbie Smith. In the classes he has shown many happy campers how to make their own leather/BDSM toys, such as floggers, restraints, blindfolds, gags and so on. The classes on Saturday have been followed by show-and-tell sessions on Sunday morning at which campers have displayed their creations, often with accompanying demonstrations.

Another member of the local BDSM community, Redline, has written and self-published a limited-edition book of BDSM and kink construction projects. Smith and Redline’s basic message: If you can’t find (or can’t afford) what you need, why not make it yourself to your own specifications? That way, you get exactly what you want—and it’s one-of-a-kind besides.

Assuming you have an idea for a fun new toy and you’d like to exercise your leather/BDSM/fetish creative bent, where can you find the raw materials? They’re all around you—the kitchen, the basement, and the garage can be good sources of “pervertibles,” ordinary items that, with a little ingenuity, can be turned into something much more fun.

If you can’t find what you need around the house, try your local hardware store, lumberyard or farm-and-fleet store (especially good for equestrian items). Or, for stuff you truly won’t find anywhere else and that often defies description, there’s always Ax Max Surplus, a local favorite of creative Twin Cities shoppers for many years. Wander the aisles of any of these stores and let your imagination run wild.

Now let’s talk about crafting leather items to wear. Unless you suddenly inherit a sewing machine capable of working with leather, you’re probably not going to choose a vest for your first project. But there are plenty of things to make that don’t require sewing: for example, armbands, wristbands, gauntlets, harnesses and even restraints.

To create these items you’ll need raw materials: leather and hardware (eyelets, rivets, studs, snaps, welded rings, lengths of chain). You’ll also need a few simple tools for cutting leather, punching holes, and attaching the hardware. A great local resource for leathercraft supplies is Gray’s Leather in south Minneapolis (<www.graysleather.com>).

Before you start an actual project, you might want to practice using your leathercraft tools on scrap leather. Then, when you feel comfortable, plan what you want to create and go for it.

Choose something relatively simple, like an armband, as your first project. Start with a strip of leather (probably belting). Measure the circumference of your arm to know how long to make the strip, allowing for overlap of the ends if necessary, and cut the strip to the proper length.

Now either punch holes in the leather and lace it around your arm with rawhide lacing, or install one or more snaps. Then, if you like, attach decorative studs, lengths of chain, or a pattern of welded rings or eyelets.

The crafting itself can be a fun and satisfying activity, and when you craft your own leather accoutrements the monetary savings can be significant. But even better, you enjoy the satisfaction that comes with wearing and using your own unique, custom-designed and custom-built creations.

MSDB premieres two new educational series

Two new series of educational seminars are kicking off in the next few weeks. On Saturday, March 29, MSDB presents the inaugural event in its new series of intensive workshops: “Killer B’s Invade Minnesota!” Presenters Padre Pugno and Mademoiselle B will focus on “bondage for sadism and humiliation” and “advanced decorative rope bondage.” For more information visit the events pages at <www.mdsb-mn.org>.

Then, on Wednesday, April 2, MSDB begins The LAB, a series of educational events being held the first Wednesday evening of every month. April’s topic is Wrestling, presented by Ellie and Forrest. Future planned topics include fisting, yoga and CBT. For more information, e-mail <thelab@msdb.org>.

New Giant Leather Pride and Rainbow Flags

(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #333, February 29, 2008)

On February 16, I was at Vera’s Cafe in Minneapolis for what I thought would be a routine meeting of the Minnesota Leather Pride planning committee. Instead, to my surprise and delight, I was privileged to see history in the making.

Minnesota Leather Pride committee members at the meeting witnessed the signing of an agreement between Minnesota Leather Pride and Twin Cities Pride (formerly known as GLBT Pride/Twin Cities). The agreement is historic because it is the first official collaboration between the two groups.

The objects of their collaboration are the giant (approximately 76 feet by 29 feet) rainbow and leather pride flags that are carried up Hennepin Avenue every year as part of the Ashley Rukes GLBT Pride Parade. The flags, commissioned by Colin Spriestersbach and created by Carl Gscheidemeier (aka Allison Brooks), made their first appearance in the parade in 1998, and since have become beloved community institutions. But for several years both flags have been showing wear. So both are slated to be replaced—the leather pride flag in 2008 and the rainbow flag in 2009.

According to the agreement, both new flags will be jointly owned by Twin Cities Pride and Minnesota Leather Pride. Twin Cities Pride will be responsible for care and maintenance of the new rainbow flag and Minnesota Leather Pride will be responsible for care and maintenance of the new leather pride flag. (Similarly, any monies collected in the flags as they make their way along Hennepin Avenue during the Pride Parade, or at other events, will benefit the organization responsible for the flag into which the money is thrown.)

“This agreement is in keeping with Twin Cities Pride’s goal of reaching out to, and forging ties with, other local community groups,” said Twin Cities Pride president Bill Nienaber. Sam Carlisle, longtime member and chair of the Minnesota Leather Pride committee, said of the agreement, “We’re happy to be working with Twin Cities Pride. For a long time our two groups have been working independently toward the same goals. With this agreement we’ve joined forces to continue developing pride in both the GLBT community and the leather community.”

The agreement calls for the existing flags to be decommissioned and donated to historical organizations for safekeeping. Plans call for the existing leather pride flag to be donated to the Leather Archives & Museum (LA&M) in Chicago, while the existing rainbow flag will be deposited in the Twin Cities Pride archives, a part of the Tretter Collection, at the University of Minnesota. After decommissioning, both of the original flags will be displayed only as part of history presentations.

Why is this important? Why is it historic? For one thing, it shows the genius behind the original flags created in 1998—they were an idea whose time had come, and the fact that the flags are being replaced shows that they are still significant and meaningful symbols for their communities. Besides ensuring that twin giant flags will continue to be part of the Pride Parade every summer, the agreement also opens the way for taking the flags to other places and events.

But, even more than that, the agreement represents a bridge between two communities that are natural allies, and both communities are strengthened in the process. The agreement represents cooperation rather than separate co-existence. For me, as a gay leatherman, it’s a nice coming-together of two groups, both of which I feel reflect parts of my identity. It’s nice to see each group recognizing the other as valuable and worthy of cooperation.

Assuming the new leather pride flag can be procured in time for this year’s Pride Parade, a decommissioning of the old flag, and initiation of the new one, is planned as part of the parade. It probably will be an emotional, memorable and historic moment—much like what happened during last year’s parade when a plaque was presented to Gscheidemeier thanking him for his efforts in creating the existing flags.

This year, taking a cue from the current debate over marriage equality for gay men and lesbians, the theme of Minnesota Leather Pride is “Tie the Knot.” The Minnesota Leather Pride committee is planning its usual full schedule of Leather Pride events, and will be offering another in its continuing series of collectible Leather Pride dog tags.

The Twin Cities Pride theme for 2008 is “Free Your Mind.” In addition to its literal meaning, the theme coincidentally also serves as a reference to the pioneering Twin Cities gay-rights group FREE (Fight Repression of Erotic Expression). Founded in May of 1969 (please note: that’s pre-Stonewall), it survives to this day as the Queer Student Cultural Center at the University of Minnesota, making it the oldest college-student-run queer organization in the United States. More details of this year’s Twin Cities Pride activities will be announced in the days and weeks ahead.

Baldwin, Thorn to Headline Leather Leadership Conference 12

(Leather Life column published in Lavender Magazine, Issue #332, February 15, 2008)

And check out podcasts of LLC XI

April. San Francisco. Leather. Any questions? Why would you not be there?

If you plan to be there, register soon—prices go up after Feb. 29. And whether or not you plan to attend, check out the growing library of Leather Leadership podcasts from last year’s conference (details later in this column).

Now in its twelfth year, the Leather Leadership Conference (LLC) is one of the leather/BDSM/fetish community’s premier leadership-development resources. Each year’s conference is a weekend-long program of speakers, seminars and exhibits aimed at developing the leadership, mentorship and community-building skills of the community’s members. Additionally, the conference seeks to create a greater sense of connection among community groups.

This year’s conference has a one-word theme—with a double meaning: “Arouse!” The primary aim of the conference’s San Francisco-based organizers is to arouse, excite and challenge attendees as leaders and as members of the leather/BDSM/fetish community. In addition, conference organizers hope, according to the conference website, to “bring some of the sexiness and edge of what we do into the conference.”

Both of the major conference speakers announced to date (a third speaker is still to be announced) have been known to arouse controversy on occasion. The conference’s opening keynote speech will be delivered by noted psychotherapist, author and Radical Sexuality activist Guy Baldwin. For more than 40 years Baldwin has served the community as a psychotherapist, titleholder (International Mr. Leather 1989), author (Ties That Bind, SlaveCraft, The Leather Contest Guide), lecturer and presenter of many workshops and seminars through the U.S. and Canada.

Saturday’s featured speaker will be Michael Thorn, Instigator Magazine’s Editor-in-Chief. Instigator is an outspoken and often provocative chronicle of “the next generation of global men’s fetish,” and editor Thorn is described on the magazine’s website as “a dirty fucker and relentless crusader for your right to be different. Able to burn a candle at 3 ends and still have his fist elbow-deep in yours.”

The “Arouse!” theme of this year’s conference is reflected and extended in the planned program categories (“tracks”): Evolve (organizational development/vision), Involve (event planning), Arouse (case studies/activism), Embrace (outreach/volunteer development), Ignite (high end/advanced seminars), Transform (personal enrichment/individual skills), and Influence (media/legal/professional/branding).

For more information about the conference, or to register, visit <leatherleadership.org/llc12/>. The registration fee is $109 until Feb. 29, $134 until April 10, and $145 at the conference.

Host hotel for LLC 12 is the Holiday Inn Golden Gateway, conveniently located in the center of downtown San Francisco (and steps away from the historic California Cable Car turnaround). A special conference room rate is available until March 20.

Podcast Library from LLC XI Keeps Growing

Regardless of whether or not you’re attending LLC 12 in San Francisco, how about improving your leather self while you’re working out, commuting or just relaxing? It’s as easy as downloading one or more of a growing library of free podcasts from Leather Leadership Conference XI, held last year in Minneapolis. The 10 podcasts available include speeches by Barbara Nitke, John Pendal and Laura Antoniou, plus a number of workshops. For a link, visit <leatherleadership.org>.