Gay Porn’s Bareback Momentum

ABSTRACT

A profound shift has occurred in the last decade in mainstream commercial gay pornography from condoms to “bareback” (condomless) depictions of anal sex between men. This article explores gay porn’s “bareback momentum” as demonstrated by the displacement of condoms in the 10 most visited gay porn Web sites (that have operated for 10 years or more). While all 10 began by releasing condom pornography, the study finds all except one (Falcon) have since gone bareback—represented visually as a timeline. The sites analyzed are, in order of popularity: Sean Cody, Helix Studios, Lucas Entertainment, Corbin Fisher, Bel Ami, Next Door Studios, Randy Blue, Falcon Studios, Cocky Boys, and Chaos Men. Textual analysis reads each site’s transition individually, yet connections between the sites are the article’s central concern, from which an emphasis on couples and break-up narratives is revealed. Falcon’s commitment to retain the condom is attributed to its brand identity.     

“We’re Not in Oz Anymore”: Shifting Generational Perspectives and Tensions of Gay Community,Identity, and Future

This essay analyzes the writings from a gay male intergenerational project, wherein the process of generating creative prose, poetry, and fiction are used to explore differing understandings of age, aging, and future across gay male cohorts in Chicago. The project suggests one’s age strongly informs one’s perception of power dynamics and one’s perceived access to power. Specifically, youthist logics and lingering cultural myths surrounding the aging gay male shape and constrain intergenerational relations. Furthermore, the study marks and theorizes an emergent generational divide in the conceptualization and articulation of “gay identity” as well as how this identity is understood in relation to “the gay community.” The essay concludes by examining the implications and potential of this research to expand models and logics for meaningful gay male intergenerational exchange, or a queered form of generativity.     

What We Can’t See? Understanding the Representations and Meanings of UAI,Barebacking, and Semen Exchange in Gay Male Pornography

Since the late 1990s, the use of condoms within gay male pornography has been on the wane. Moving from a niche category into more mainstream forms of commercial pornography, unprotected anal sex has become a dominant theme within this sphere of gay male sexual representation. However, while the definition of what constitutes bareback pornography may at first sight appear unproblematic, this article argues that meanings and understandings of unprotected anal intercourse (UAI) are not constant across all genres of gay male pornography. Using textual analysis and focus group methods, the authors demonstrate how subcultural understandings of UAI are dependent on a variety of textual factors. These include the age, body type, and racial identities of the performers; the setting, context, and mise-en-scène of the pornographic scene; and the deployment of power relations between the insertive and receptive partners.

The article concludes by suggesting that the recognition of the diverse representations of “barebacking” found in contemporary gay male pornography should influence the ways in which health promotion strategies address discussions of UAI and bareback pornography.     

Internet Pornography Use,Body Ideals,and Sexual Self-Esteem in Norwegian Gay and Bisexual Men

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between perception of own appearance, Internet pornography consumption, preferences for pornographic actors’ appearance, and sexual self-esteem in gay and bisexual men in Norway. An online survey of 477 gay and bisexual men showed that, despite the prevailing muscular and lean gay body ideal, many men with less ideal bodies also preferred to watch pornographic actors with body types similar to their own. Self-perceived attractiveness, having an ideal body type, and viewing Internet pornography in longer sessions each made a unique contribution to higher self-esteem as a sexual partner. Preferring to watch pornographic actors with ideal bodies was not related to sexual self-esteem. The findings underscore the importance for gay or bisexual men of both self-perceived attractiveness and being athletic or young and fit, for a positive self-evaluation of sexual performance and competence.     

Posing as art: the ambiguities of feminist body art and the misclassification of Natacha Merritt’s pornographic photographs

At the launch of the twenty-first century, the online pornographic photographs of Natacha Merritt, a young American woman (23 years old at the time), were categorised as art in two publications by art publisher Taschen, precipitating a critical acceptance of her work as such. This particular foray of pornography into an art context was briefly contested by one art critic; however, this relatively rare example of misclassification warrants further investigation in order to better understand the role played by what had, by the late twentieth century, become a pervasive post-feminist culture. Drawing on feminist media studies writing that analyses post-feminist modes of “self exploration,” and feminist art criticism on the ambiguities of feminist body art, this paper argues that Merritt’s “adult-oriented” online digital photographs are more persuasively situated within the increasingly prevalent online genres of the intimate blog and amateur porn. Acknowledging the risk of “collusion” inherent in feminist artworks that focus on the objectified female body, this paper concludes that a compelling critique of a post-feminist (pornified) culture resides in the reactivation of a politics of female sexual pleasure.     

Typology of Gay Consumers’ Interaction Styles on Complaining Propensity

The purpose of this study is to develop a typology of gay male consumers based on self-concept variables related to social interactions. Openness about sexual orientation, collective self-esteem, stigma-consciousness, and negative evaluation were used to identify clusters of gay male consumers. An initial test sample (n = 125) suggested a three-cluster solution, and a validation sample (n = 247) established reproducibility of the proposed typology. Three clusters with distinct interaction styles emerged: “confident gay,” “diffident gay,” and “guarded gay.” Additionally, the usefulness of the typology is demonstrated by comparing the clusters on the basis of complaining propensity. Typologies of each cluster and implications for research and practice are discussed.     

The Blunt Cutting-Edge: The Construction of Sexuality in the Bengali Feminist Magazine Sananda

This article focuses on the construction of one's relation to pornography in contemporary media by examining agony columns of young adult women's magazines. The analytical approach employed is a “close reading” from the perspective of queer theory, purposing both to “queer” the portrayals of heterosexuality and to critically review representations of non-heterosexuality. The focus is especially on the role of affects and emotions in moving subjects “toward” and “away” from porn and producing conceptions of gender and sexuality. On the one hand, the positive affects of excitement and interest are associated with men in the data corpus, whereas the negative affects of disgust and upset are usually connected to women. On the other hand, affects are absent when discussing queerness. The study thus offers an application of Ahmed's notion of the productive role of emotions both in expanding the idea of productivity from constituting ethnicity to establishing gender and sexuality and also in directing attention to the absence of affects or emotions in constituting norms.     

Older Single Gay Men’s Body Talk: Resisting and Rigidifying the Aging Discourse in the Gay Community

Previous research saw older gay men as subject to structural marginalization of ageism but yet possessing agency to interpret aging in diverse ways. I move beyond this duality, drawing on the theory of defensive othering to understand how older gay men live with the aging discourse in the gay community. Informed by grounded theory, I analyzed interviews with 25 self-identified single gay men aged 50 or above in England inductively. It emerged that many older gay men found it difficult to escape the discourse that marginalizes the aging body. Even when they argued they were the exception and “looked good,” they were discursively producing a two-tier system: they themselves as the “good older gay men,” as opposed to the other “bad older gay men,” who “had given up.” Such a defensive othering tactic seemingly allowed them to resist age norms from applying to them personally, but unintentionally reinforced an ageist discourse.     

Gay Men and Lesbian Women Who Become Parents in the Context of a Former Heterosexual Relationship: An Explorative Study in Italy

In Italy, homosexual people are not allowed to perform donor insemination/surrogacy or adoption, thus they become parents mainly in the context of previous heterosexual relationships. The current study examines the experiences of 34 gay fathers and 32 lesbian mothers with children from a heterosexual relationship. Data on homosexuality awareness, reasons for marriage and parenthood, and the coming-out process to children were collected. Most participants reported not being aware of their homosexuality when they married and became parents. The most common reasons for marriage were “love” and “social expectancy,” whereas parenthood was motivated mainly by the “desire for children and family.” Most participants came out to at least one child and reported a positive reaction. The most cited benefit of coming out was “openness/not hiding anymore.” The results suggest that the lives of gay and lesbian parents are shaped by their sexual minority status as well as by societal heterosexism.     

The Relationships Between Sense of Belonging to the Gay Community,Body Image Dissatisfaction,and Self-Esteem Among Australian Gay Men

Body image dissatisfaction has been linked to belonging to the gay community and poor self-esteem among gay men. This study was designed to explore the applicability of a moderation model and a mediation model in explaining the relations between sense of belonging to the gay community, body image dissatisfaction and self-esteem among 90 self-identified Australian gay men. Participants completed the psychological subscale of the Sense of Belonging Instrument, the Body Satisfaction Scale, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. Results supported the moderation model; the relation between body image dissatisfaction and self-esteem was found to be statistically significant only at average and high levels of belonging to the gay community. The mediation model was also supported; body image dissatisfaction partially mediated the sense of belonging–self-esteem relation. Educating gay men and health professionals about the possible negative outcomes of “belonging” to an appearance-oriented community is important.     

“Kind of like making porn of yourself”: understanding sexting through pornography

This article contributes to the existing literature on sexting and the “sexualisation of culture” by examining how women make sense of their sexting practices by thinking through pornography frames. In doing so, it draws on interview material collected for a study on adult women’s experiences of using digital technology in their romantic and/or sexual relationships. To the women in this study, their private sexual images—as created for the purpose of sexting—were acts of communication that could be both not-pornography and pornography depending on the private and/or public contexts in which they were shared and consumed. They did not distinguish between sexting and pornography based on the content of the images, but based on where they occur and who consumes them. Indeed, they argued that the same private sexual image could take on different meanings, as the predominant conventions within the given context of display and consumption guide the audience’s interpretation. A key argument put forward in this article is thus that, in aiming to understand complex social phenomena like sexting and pornography, we should look to how different types of sexual representations gain meaning within particular contexts as marked by certain conventions.     

“It Is What It Is”: Masculinity,Homosexuality, and Inclusive Discourse in Mixed Martial Arts

In this article we make use of inclusive masculinity theory to explore online media representations of male homosexuality and masculinity within the increasingly popular combat sport of mixed martial arts (MMA). Adopting a case-study approach, we discuss narratives constructed around one aspirational male MMA fighter, Dakota Cochrane, whose history of having participated in gay pornography became a major talking point on a number of MMA discussion/community Web sites during early 2012. While these narratives attempted to discursively rescue Cochrane’s supposedly threatened masculinity, highlighting both his “true” heterosexuality and his prodigious fighting abilities, they also simultaneously celebrated the acceptance of homosexual men within the sport that Cochrane’s case implied. Thus, we suggest that these media representations of homosexuality and masculinity within MMA are indicative of declining cultural homophobia and homohysteria and an inclusive vision of masculinity, as previously described by proponents of inclusive masculinity theory.     

On Being Gay in Barbados: “Bullers” and “Battyboys” and their HIV Risk in a Societal Context of Stigma

Limited research exists about gay men in the Caribbean region. A qualitative study was conducted to characterize gay men in Barbados, their HIV risk, and the impact of stigma on their lives. The 2 main groups of gay men (“bougies” and “ghetto”) reflect social class and level of “outness” in broader society. Homophobia, stigma, and buggery (sodomy) laws increase their HIV vulnerability. The need for anti-discrimination legislation and tools for self-development were identified for gay men to realize their strengths, develop their self-worth, and protect themselves from HIV.     

Homosexual not Homogeneous: A Motivation-Based Typology of Gay Leisure Travelers Holidaying in Cape Town,South Africa

ABSTRACT

The gay traveler, a segment of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) travel market, is perceived to be a homogeneous market segment as a result of the assumption that gay men have a unique “homosexual lifestyle.” This assumption is problematic as it conceals many other important variables, and it may hinder effective destination marketing. A Web-based electronic survey was completed by 469 gay male travelers, and attribute-based benefit segmentation was carried out by applying a hierarchical cluster analysis using Ward’s procedure with Euclidean distances. The typology is based on the push and pull framework; the motivations of travelers were assessed both in terms of their socio-psychological motivations and destination attributes of Cape Town. The typology empirically suggests that gay travelers are not homogeneous, and that sexuality influences the travel behavior of a minority of gay men. Consequently, not all gay travelers or activities by these travelers can be labeled as “gay” tourism.     

Still Trapped in the U.S. Media’s Closet: Representations of Gender-Variant,Pre-Adolescent Children

Many studies have examined representations of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in the U.S. media. Yet they have centered on portrayals of adults or teenagers. This investigation considered a potential LGBT population that has been neglected in media research, namely gender-variant, preadolescent children. Surveying the U.S. media at large but with an emphasis on television, the article reveals that gender-creative youth are nearly invisible. When depictions of gender-variant kids do appear, they often focus on either children who express extreme gender dysphoria or in some way signify the “tragic queer” motif (or both). The implications of these findings are discussed.     

Sexual Orientation Change Efforts and the Search for Authenticity

This article is based on structured interviews of a sample of 15 former participants in sexual orientation change efforts (SOCE), who currently identify as gay or lesbian. The primary research question for this study was, “What was the experience of self-identified gay men and lesbians who went through some type of SOCE and eventually asserted themselves as gay or lesbian?” The research concludes that participants sometimes identified as heterosexual during SOCE, but never changed their underlying homosexual orientation, and that suppression, disconnection, and a sense of inauthenticity were significant phenomena of this process.     

How Like Perceives Like: Gay People on “Gaydar”

When lacking explicit knowledge of someone’s sexual orientation, gay people commonly assess the likelihood that another is gay using their “gaydar.” The term gaydar is a playful mix of the word gay with radar, suggesting that one can sense, intuit, or perceive some set of characteristics in another that signal a shared minority status. While commonly mentioned, the exact criteria a gay person uses when employing their gaydar are little discussed. Drawing methodologically on a series of five focus groups of self-identified lesbians and gay men, this study explores the physical, visual, energetic, and conversational cues gay people consider when they employ the trope of gaydar. Specifically, interview subjects most often described their gaydar as triggered by the following elements: physical presentation, including mannerisms, dress, and voice; interactions, especially eye contact; a presence or absence of certain conversational social norms; and, intangibly, as a kind of energetic exchange.     

Pop,Porn, and Rebellious Speech

In Excitable Speech, Judith Butler contends that rebellious speech constitutes a “risk taken in response to being put at risk, a repetition in language that forces change.” With this in mind, this article examines the politics of employing and altering the language and imagery of “porn” in texts and multi-media performances of (post-)feminist (pop-)artists. The discussions about Elfriede Jelinek's novel Lust in the early 1990s exemplify the difficulties associated with transforming the language of pornography into rebellious feminist speech. The text received extensive media attention, but most critics felt ambivalent about Jelinek's attempt to create artificial, repetitious, pornographic speech and questioned the text's ability to foster any kind of “change.” At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the multi-media performances of Charlotte Roche and Reyhan Sahin aka Lady Bitch Ray again triggered discussions about feminism, pornography, body politics, and sexual expression. Their provocative pop-performances use multiple media outlets, TV, music, and electronic media. They are commercially successful and mainstream media understand them as challenging social conventions. This essay critically examines the politics of Jelinek's, Roche's, and Sahin's texts and performances and contextualizes the politics of their rebellious speech within discussions about social roles, gender, and sexuality.     

Rural Men,Sexual Identity and Community

The relationship between rurality and men's sexuality remain relatively unexplored. This study addresses the knowledge gap in the research literature by focusing on men who have sex with men in rural areas across Ontario, Canada. Employing a constructivist grounded theory methodology, interviews were conducted with 32 men across 28 geographic locales consisting of populations of less than 10,000 people. Men identified as gay, bisexual, queer/bisexual, or refused labels. These self-selected identifiers were then explored to determine how participants conceptualized and organized their sexual identities in relation to context. Participants held divergent management strategies that resulted in two general identity grouping: “natives” and “transplanters.”     

Chicks,Dicks, and Contradictions

This essay examines Playgirl as a rich, yet overlooked, archive in the history of American pornography. Although the magazine often is dismissed as the token attempt of a masculinist industry to equalize its representational politics, I argue instead that a significant synergy exists between Playgirl and entwined debates over pornography, gender, and commercialized sexuality in 1970s America. Employing established conventions of the women's magazine, Playgirl utilized that form toward granting women access to explicit images. Yet given its “better lifestyling” advice on how the sexually liberated woman might find empowerment by viewing male nudes, Playgirl's reluctance to display full-frontal nudity until the midpoint of its first year fashioned an initially compromised aesthetic. Not only were women interpolated as untutored viewers within this regime of genital obstruction, but models also were all but emasculated. Consequently, the degree of male exposure that could be handled by both viewers and models was questioned, critiqued, and debated across Playgirl's letters to the editor section, aptly entitled “In-ter-course.” As an artifact of sexual media history, Playgirl is invaluable because readers are able to trace throughout its pages the ways in which changing tides of gendered power began to problematize pornography's routine dichotomy between masculine subjectivity and female objectification.