#hiv gay dating

[stargazerlillian]

Once again thinking about how “Doctor Doctor” first aired in 1989 and had a main cast of characters consisting of the following:

- A very silly main character who is also very competent at his profession and knows when to step up and be serious (Dr. Mike Stratford)

- A black man with an iconic laugh as well as a doting wife and son who he loves very much (Dr. Abe Butterfield)

- A woman whose inner life is as complicated as her love life (Dr. Dierdre Bennett)

- An uppity wisecracking heart surgeon who happens to be Jewish (Dr. Grant Linowitz)

- An English professor who teaches classical theater and happens to be openly gay (Richard Stratford, Mike’s brother)

The best part? The show never makes a big deal out of it. There are no “very special episodes” dealing with any of the character’s identities. The show simply portrays them as people just living their lives. It doesn’t matter who or what they are - at the end of the day the main four characters are doctors just trying their best to heal the sick. And I just think that’s nice.

[nocontexthorny]

[alexisnotstraight]

In Qatar a Mexican man was arrested then tourtured for being gay.

Manuel Guerrero, a Mexican gay man that has been living in Qatar for 7 years, was arrested on February 4. Guerrero arrived to a date with a man he met on grinder, it was a fake profile created by the police itself. They platned a quarter of a gram of methamphetamine on him.

Since then Manuel has been deprived of sufficient water and food, has been denied a lawyer, has been forced to identify more LGBTTTIQ+ members from his phone contacts, has been forced to sign documents in arabic without translation, has been forced to watch other people detaind being whipped and has also been denied the medication for HIV.

Due to his dual nationality, México can't interfere.

#QatarDebeLiberarAManuel

#QatarMustFreeManuel

[bethanydelleman]

People talk about Rent having problems, I'm sure it does, but rewatching it as an adult who has gotten much, much more accepting of it's content, I think it was absolutely brilliant for it's time. I grew up in a very conservative home, Rent was my first positive exposure to most of the pairings and expressions of queerness contained within and the way it exposed me was so smart.

What's amazing to me is that we have an avatar for the audience in Mark Cohen (like he's literally behind the camera), but unlike other media where he might have taken the audience by the hand and introduced them to all these people who are so different from the norm, he accepts all of them as normal without explanation. He's living with someone who has AIDS, he's friends with a gay man who is dating a drag queen, and his ex-girlfriend is bisexual, he doesn't blink at any of it. He treats his ex-girlfriend's girlfriend like any other ex's new partner, which may not seem radical now but my only other exposure to this situation was Ross on Friends and let me tell you it was not handled well.

I found the same-sex pairings uncomfortable at the time, but the writers gave me a great heterosexual couple to root for and root for them I did, even though they were a current and a former drug addict, both HIV positive, one was a sex worker (and everyone is just accepting of her being a sex worker!) Again, I was brought up very conservative, identifying with that couple was entirely new to me. These were people who I was supposed to accuse of moral failings but instead I just wanted them to find happiness. That is an accomplishment!

Also, the songs are just one banger after another. Honestly.

[drdemonprince]

Hello! You have opened a fascinating door into kink communities I didn't even know existed. Thanks for that. I was describing some of your steamworks adventures to my partner, who works as a Disease Intervention Specialist (aka DIS, a government healthcare worker who administers free/low-cost STD testing and then attempts to track down and notify+test the recent sexual partners of any infected individuals). (He brings some INSANE stories home from work and gets to give sex ed talks at the local Christian college using a model penis that actually ejaculates--but I digress.) He was horrified by the hypothetical situation where an infected person could have blindfolded sex with an unknown number of nameless strangers. It's hard enough trying to track down partners when the patient only knew them by their Grindr username. How do you have safe sex in these situations? Some STDs can be transmitted via skin-to-skin contact even with a condom. Do venues like steamworks enforce any rules around testing/protection/etc.?

If your partner is 'horrified' by the actual sex lives of the populations he ostensibly serves I think he needs to read more from harm reductionist thinkers and queer activists from a variety of past eras and work on processing his feelings of judgement to ensure it doesn't impact his actions in that line of work.

The books and Melancholia and Moralism, Saving Our Own Lives, and Beyond Shame: Reclaiming the Abandoned History of Radical Gay Sexuality are good places to start.

If you're having anonymous or blindfolded sex in cruising spaces, one route of managing risks is to assume that every person there could be infected with STIs you do not have and to plan accordingly. Vaccines, condoms, PreP, testing, and education are just some of the tools at one's disposal, and one should always be cognizant of the risks that one is consenting to. Steamworks has sexual health educators and testers present within their space regularly, but they don't gatekeep based on serostatus, health status, drug regimen or use of protection -- doing so wouldn't be feasible and would be problematic on multiple grounds.

I don't believe the goal of a public health initiative or a life well lived is to eliminate all risk, or to regard the presence of any infection in any human body as unacceptable, but rather to empower people to make informed decisions about the level of risk they are comfortable confronting, or that is worth the numerous benefits to them.

Personally, I was in far greater danger when I didn't have access to such spaces. Cruising spaces make negotiating sexual consent far safer than privately dating and hooking up with someone, and Steamworks are vitally important queer community spaces, and for me are well worth the trade off. No one should have any illusions about this ever being an experience that they can eliminate all risk from, rather they should anticipate it and plan for it.

I think "safe sex" is an unhelpful framework to pursue because it is so binary and can't ever be guaranteed. What does safety mean? Which types of exposures do we consider to be "unsafe"? Am I unsafe if I encounter another person who, like me, has had a cold sore before, like 80% of the population? Or someone who has a strain of HPV I am vaccinated against? What about if I have an encounter with somebody with a cold? I'm "safer" being fucked by an HIV positive person who is undetectable and wearing a condom than I am having barrier free sex with a long term partner who cheats. I can't even know I'm taking a risk in the latter case; at Steamworks, I'm assuming my risk level to be on the high end and planning accordingly.

I understand that testing and tracing are important parts of public health for our populations. It was vitally important when monkeypox broke out. Maybe Steamworks should collect member emails and alert them if there was a reported transmission on a night that they visited. Though even then, there are some negative public health implications to dozens of people panicking. But there is no means of eliminating all risk entirely or tracing all human sexual behavior and I would be myself pretty horrified if there was.

[qqueenofhades]

When Hob said "I think I have been stood up", I full on expected the barkeeper to react to that as if Hob's date hasn't showed and telling him not to be worried because he has seen many couples fight and make up afterwards and is sure Hob's relationship will survive it. Like, I was genuinely so surprised when the barkeeper talked about "friends" haha

Okay okay okay okay but. I gotta say something SO IMPORTANT about this from my position as Tumblr Old and Local Queer Historian, because.... yes. And that is:

That scene takes place in 1989.

Why is that important, you say? Well, because this is the end of an entire decade of the AIDS crisis. There has been endless fearmongering and conservative attempts to paint gay men explicitly as disease-ridden degenerate pedo Threats to Your Community who might infect your children with AIDS and make them dirty homos by so much as LOOKING at them, pretty much. They are literally toxic people, they are generally shunned, nobody knows what to do and is terrified of the fact of how quickly AIDS patients usually die with no effective treatment. And oof it makes me feel Some Kinda Way for Hob, born in the middle of the Black Death and who was haunted by that shadow all his life, experiencing this as a queer man in the 1980s. Like, he almost certainly lost several friends to it at least, watched them die, probably went in there to the wards when few other people would, both because he's immortal anyway and he doesn't think it's right to leave them alone.

Anyway, in the UK, it was literally only 2 years before, in 1987, when Princess Diana opened the first dedicated AIDS unit at London Middlesex Hospital, and publicly shook hands with a man who had HIV -- which was shocking because many people still thought you could get it through casual physical contact. So while on the surface, Hob looks like your average 1980s douchebro -- he's got the brand new Porsche, the slicked back hair, the giant brick cellphone, the works -- he is still going into public to have a date with a man he is in love with, regardless of whether either of them will ever admit that or act on it. (And given how 1889 ended, if Morpheus does show up, they ARE kinda gonna have to talk about it in some way.) Hob is, in this moment, incredibly vulnerable. Emotionally and socially for sure, and if the local macho assholes clock him as a Fag, probably physically too.

So that conversation when Hob says he's been stood up is absolutely LOADED with subtext, things he isn't saying, and things the bartender understands about him and tries to support. They're British, so by nature they're not huge on talking about their feelings, but Hob says he's been stood up. He doesn't use pronouns, he doesn't say it was by a girl, and if the bartender used the word "couple," it would generally presume that he too thought Hob’s date was a girl. So he goes for the most careful, also-has-a-long-queer-history use of "friends." He implies it's more than that, but he doesn't say so or put Hob on the spot for probably dating a man, because again, it's not safe.

After that is when Hob orders a drink, and the bartender tells him that people in this country can do anything if they have money. He's trying to subtly communicate that this is a safe place and he won't judge, and Hob picks that up immediately, which is why he is so shocked to hear that the White Horse has been sold and is going to be torn down for condos. Hob is losing not just the one place he can be assured (well, until now) of meeting his Stranger, but a place that has been subtly communicated to be safe for him personally, as a queer man in 1989. That is undoubtedly part of why he immediately refuses to countenance the idea of this actually happening, buys the pub, makes giant signs, hangs out in the New Inn until Dream actually does come back, etc. So like... there is so much going on in that scene, and maybe only 25% of it can be said aloud. Which I think is absolutely critical for you younguns to understand, so. Yeah.

[hellomynameisbisexual]

Bisexual erasure. “When bisexuality is ignored, discriminated against, demonized, or rendered invisible by both the heterosexual world and the lesbian and gay communities. Often, the entire sexual orientation is branded as invalid, immoral, or irrelevant.”

what does it Look like?

- Assuming that two women together are lesbians, two men together are gay, or a man and a woman together are straight

- In most scientific studies, bisexuality is lumped in under “gay” or “lesbian” identities

- Many LGBTQ+ organizations don’t offer programming for bisexuals

- Questioning someone’s bisexuality if they haven’t had sex with both men and women.

what does it sound like?

- “I’m not interested in dating you because you’ve only dated men.” (Implying that I’m actually straight)

- “Bi women are more likely to leave you for a straight relationship.”

- “He’s only ever dated men, so he’s obviously gay.”

- “There’s no point in coming out as Bi if you never plan to leave your current relationship. You just want attention.”

what are the consequences?

- Bi erasure leads to bi phobia (discrimination, anger, blame, and hypersexualization).

- Bi people have *significantly* higher health risks than any other sexual identity group, including alarmingly high rates of depression and suicide.

- Bi women experience much higher rates of domestic violence.

- In the ‘80s and ‘90s bi people were blamed for spreading HIV. and we are still blamed for the spread of other STI’s.

what can I do?

- If you want to help, here’s what you can do:

- Check your own biases When someone says something shitty about bisexuality, correct them—even if a bisexual person isn’t present

- Ask your local LGBTQ+ orgs to offer bi/Pan programs

- Donate time or money to bi-specific organizations.

- Resources: Bisexual Resource Center (BiResource.org) Bi Plus Organizing US (@BiPlusOrgUS) Bi Pride UK (BiPrideUK.org) BiPhoria! (biphoria.org.uk) American Institute of Bisexuality (bisexuality.org) “Greedy: Notes from a Bisexual Who Wants Too Much” by Jen Winston “Look Both Ways: Bisexual Politics” by Jennifer Baumgardner “Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body” by Roxane Gay

[pieheda]

So, I realized only after watching the Todd In The Shadows video AND the hbomberguy video that I, too, have caught James Somerton just making shit up.

I’m not going to cite actual video titles because he changes them all the time anyway so why bother, but he has one that’s about Angels in America and Rent. This is my jam, I’m a theater gay, so I watched them - and immediately felt like the main thesis would fail an English 101 class. The thesis was “people have the misperception that Rent was made before Angels in America, and why is that?” which is not a thing that people believe, actually. At least, not people who know how google works and can just look up release dates. I found myself thinking that maybe he and some friends were surprised at this, and he decided it was a widely held misperception. But I kept watching the video, and when talking about how popular Rent was when it premiered on Broadway, he said that it was taboo to even mention AIDS at the time.

That is completely untrue. I was an adult in 1996 when Rent was released on Broadway, and AIDS was no longer a taboo subject in the US. There is plenty of data out there to support this, but I think it’s particularly compelling that in 1993, the movie Philadelphia, about a man suing his employers for firing him upon learning that he has HIV, was an enormous box office hit. It won Tom Hanks and Bruce Springsteen both Oscars, for Best Actor and Best Original Song. The Oscars aren’t very daring, perhaps you’ve heard. They aren’t big on giving out awards for things that everyone is terrified to talk about.

In another video that is cited by Todd in the Shadows, I realized that I had ALSO caught James making shit up in that one. When I watched the video for Red, White, and Royal Blue, James said that all these straight women wanted gay romance without sex and I laughed and said “they most definitely do not want that”, because I’m a fan girl and I’ve seen AO3. No research needed to debunk that, most if not all women who knowingly consume gay romance absolutely want there to be some fucking. The only person who would complain about that would be some exceptionally clueless homophobe who accidentally stumbled into this movie.

Both of those things, when I saw them, made me shake my head and say “that’s just not true.” I even commented on the Rent video.

What I did not do is think hard about what exactly is going on here. My opinion of Somerton went down with each of those discoveries, but it wasn’t very high to begin with; I never have liked his presentation style, because of how often he talks down to the people he’s discussing or to his audience. But frankly, there’s a lot of content out there that plays free and loose with the facts or starts with a bad premise (“people have this misperception” with no evidence of that isn’t far off from “Marvel fans on twitter hate this movie!” followed by only 5 tweets cited in the article). I just accept that people lie on the internet, I didn’t expect better. I didn’t stop to consider that gays really should do better, particularly we should not lie to one another about gay culture and history, and ESPECIALLY not when claiming to be doing what we do for the purpose of uplifting gays. I didn’t google to see if there were other issues with him, because if I had I would have learned about him getting into it with Jessie Gender and wouldn’t have given him a view ever again.

We’ve reached such a garbage state that I overlooked that. Seeing everything he’s done all lined up in these two videos had a real impact on me. Todd is absolutely right that it’s abominable to add to all the misinformation in the world, and hbomberguy is right that it’s particularly egregious for James to rob from gay writers who don’t have the funds and attention that James does. But it’s especially bad to just make shit up about gay history and the current state of gay acceptance, particularly when James constantly had the perspective that it’s always bad and gay men always have it the worst. Most likely the “everyone hates gays like me especially” was a calculated choice to create an attitude of persecution within his fandom so that they would accuse anyone calling him out of homophobia. But misinformation about acceptance is ALSO harmful to our community. It’s harmful to go around believing that people are out to get you when they aren’t. The cost of damaged mental health is ALSO important.

And he coldly exploited that because there’s a stupid fucking app that is tailor made for grifters to make cash hand over fist by confirming their audience’s worst fears and creating new anxieties in them. It’s absolutely ghoulish.

[gunsatthaphan]

~ Monthly BL Breakdown: January 2024 ~ 

✨ Happy February!!! 🎭

Disclaimer: ALL shows can be streamed here or here, as well as on Youtube and other platforms. For more info on where to watch what, check out this post! 

New breakdowns are coming at the end of every month - feel free to add stuff! -> previous breakdowns

What came out this month? (green = seen/currently watching)

🌟 BL Drama no Shuen ni Narimashita: Crank In Hen - January 2nd (Japan) 

🌟 Ossan's Love Returns - January 5th (Japan) 

🌟 Refund Love - January 7th (Thailand) 

🌟 Time The Series - January 9th (Thailand) 

🌟 Intern in My Heart (BL side couple) - January 10th (Thailand) 

🌟 Sukiyanen Kedo Do Yaro ka (Although I Love You, and You) - January 11th (Japan) 

🌟 Beside You (mini series) - January 11th (Thailand) 

🌟 I Wish You Love - January 21st (Thailand) 

🌟 Happy Ending - January 23rd (South Korea)

🌟 Love for Love's Sake - January 24th (South Korea)

Monthly likes/dislikes

👎🏻 I've been catching up on some KBLs from last year this month and sadly most of them were very disappointing. I put a few on my watchlist that generally had good reviews but yeah let's just say I'm glad I didn't miss anything in the last 2 years lol. The only one I liked was Love Mate, the rest was pretty much pointless. Hopefully the upcoming ones will be better 🤞🏻

New series & movie announcements

🎥 Beating Again (dance-themed, starring Kaownah K., Earth K. and others) - Date TBA (Thailand)

🎥 Unknown - Date TBA (Taiwan)

🎥 The Book Store - Date TBA (South Korea)

🎥 Term Begins - Date TBA (Thailand)

🎥 Mafia Prince and the Bookworm - Date TBA (Thailand)

🎥 Black Forest - Date TBA (Thailand)

🎥 Go Alone With Me - Date TBA (Thailand)

🎥 Can I Love You? - Date TBA (Thailand)

🎥 The Shining Star - Date TBA (Vietnam)

🎥 At My Fingertips (Unintentional Love Story spinoff) - Coming May 2024 (South Korea)

🎥 Connecting To You - Date TBA (Taiwan)

🎥 The Star (movie) - Coming March 2024 (Thailand)

🎥 What's the Nong? - Date TBA (Thailand)

Other news from the BL world

❗️ Actors Mike Chinnarat, Fluke Pusit, White Nawat, Pluem Purim and Lee Thanat have left GMMTV.

❗️ After Korean actor Choo Youngwoo won an award for "Best Rookie Actor" at the recent KBS Drama Awards, he came under fire for not mentioning his participation in the BL You Make Me Dance which launched his career and earned him the award.

❗️ Actors Jin Hoeun (All Of Us are Dead), Kwon Hyuk (The New Employee), Byun Junseo (Perfect Marriage Revenge) and Nam Yoonsu (Extracurricular) have been confirmed to star in the upcoming BL Love In The Big City, which portrays the life and love of an HIV-positive gay writer.

❗️ ZeeNunew and GeminiFourth won an award respectively for "Best Thai Artists" at this year's Seoul Music Awards.

❗️ The Chinese BL Stay with Me is getting an audiobook. The series furthermore recently confirmed its second season, further details are unknown.

❗️ Over a year after its initial premiere, the Thai BL To Sir, With Love won "Popular Foreign Drama” at this years's Vietnam Face Of The Year Awards.

❗️ The Thai BL Playboyy will no longer air on youtube after the suspension of the channel due to explicit sexual content. The show will continue to exclusively air on Gagaoolala, as well as RakutenTV.

❗️ Actors EarthMix had a cameo appearance in Ossan's Love Returns; they will star in the Thai adaption of the same name later this year. Details about the production are still unknown.

❗️ MileApo (KinnPorsche) were announced to star in the upcoming series Shine. The show is an extension/spinoff of Man Suang and focuses on Khem and Chatra's story in more detail.

Upcoming series & movies for February

👉🏻 Anti Reset - February 2nd (Taiwan)

👉🏻 Perfect Proposal - February 2nd (Japan)

👉🏻 City of Stars - February 2nd (Thailand)

👉🏻 Love Syndrome: The Beginning - February 8th (Thailand)

👉🏻 Baka Pwede pa? - February 9th (Philippines)

👉🏻 1000 Years Old - February 14th (Thailand)

👉🏻 My Strawberry Film - February 16th (Japan)

👉🏻 A Secret Love - February 17th (Thailand)

👉🏻 Unknown - February 24th (Taiwan)

👉🏻 Wedding Impossible - February 26th (South Korea)

👉🏻 Kiseki Chapter 1 & Chapter 2 - February TBA (Thailand)

[sheriiam]

Since today marks the 53rd year since the first Pride parade took place, let's dive into the history of the "progress" of our Pride flag.

This new flag is called the Intersex-Inclusive Progress Pride Flag, created by Valentino Vecchietti of Intersex Equality Rights UK in 2021. It is an update to the previous Progress Pride Flag created in 2018 by Daniel Quasar.

The original pride flag was created in the 1970s by gay activist Gilbert Baker, friend of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California. The flag made its debut at the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade celebration on June 25, 1978. Baker used eight colors―

― hot pink for sexuality, red for life, orange for healing, yellow for the sun, green for nature, turquoise for art, indigo for harmony, and violet for spirit.

Why Was Pink Removed From the Pride Flag?

The original hot pink color was removed from the pride flag because the fabric was difficult to find.

The Progress Pride Flag was created with the inspiration of other pride flags—specifically, the Philadelphia Pride Flag from 2017 and the trans flag.

The Philadelphia Pride Flag had black and brown vertical stripes added. The trans flag, created in 1999, is pink, baby blue, and white. Both of these flags inspired the design of the new pride flag.

Black and Brown Represents People of Color

The Philadelphia Pride Flag was designed by the Philadelphia Office of LGBT Affairs and was done in partnership with advertising agency Tierney. It was introduced at a City Hall ceremony in June of 2017. The flag showed the traditional six rainbow colors in horizontal stripes, with a black and a brown stripe atop them.

The colors black and brown were added to the Progress Pride Flag to represent people of color (POC). This was an important addition because people of color have often been left out of the queer narrative despite being the driving force behind the movement.

With the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, culture at large began to shift in a much-needed way towards acknowledging the vital roles that people of color have had in our society. The pride movement background is one of many areas where POC, particularly Black people, did not receive the recognition they deserved historically. Adding colors to represent them on the flag is one way to change that.

Additionally, the black and brown stripes are meant to represent people living with HIV/AIDS, those who have died from it, and the stigma around the virus that is still present in our society now.

Pink, Baby Blue, and White Represent Trans People

Transwoman Monica Helms created the trans pride flag, which first flew in a pride parade in Phoenix, Arizona back in 2000. Monica Helms is a transgender activist, author, and U.S. Navy veteran.

Traditionally, the colors pink and baby blue have been used to represent whether a baby is a boy or a girl. Here, the colors denote those genders. The color white represents people who are transitioning, intersex, or identify outside of the gender binary.

The word "progress" in the new flag isn't only about adding the new colors to it. It's also because of the shape, which differs from the original design of horizontal stripes only. The Progress Pride Flag shows the white, pink, baby blue, black, and brown stripes in a triangle shape, with the old six-color rainbow stacked next to them.

This was done intentionally to convey the separation in meaning and shift focus to how important the issues represented on the left are.

The placement of the new colors in an arrow shape is meant to convey the progress still needed. Quasar spoke publicly about how work is still needed in terms of POC and trans rights. This arrow design is meant to highlight that.

Although the Pride flag continues to evolve, the most recent update includes a yellow triangle with a purple circle inside it to represent the intersex community. It now serves as the most up-to-date LGBTQIA+ flag.

[steddieunderdogfics]

Idk if I’m doing this right, but for Monday here are couple fics for the challenge:

Three Weddings and a Funeral by materialism, sparklyslug

https://archiveofourown.org/works/40426446

It’s a part of a much larger series, but this was the first I read of it and oh is it a fic worth reading.

Turn Your Back on Mother Nature by gr0gu

https://archiveofourown.org/works/39346095

This one I’m currently reading so I haven’t read the full thing yet, but already just 3 chapters in am I more than satisfied. I tried to hit the kudos button multiple times now lol

Three Weddings and a Funeral by materialism & sparklyslug

Rating: Explicit

35,572 words, 4/4 chapters

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply

Tags: Voyeurism, Non-Consensual Voyeurism, Weddings, Closeted Character, Alcohol, Drunkenness, pining like mega pining, Mutual Pining, HIV/AIDS crisis reference, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Oral Sex, Minor Eleven | Jane Hopper/Mike Wheeler, Everyone is Queer, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Future Fic, Eddie Munson Lives, Gay Eddie Munson, Bisexual Steve Harrington, Fantasizing, POV Steve Harrington, Minor Argyle/Jonathan Byers, Character Death, tender sharing of ice cream, Light Dom/sub, Light BDSM, Spanking, Anal Sex, Masturbation, Facials

Summary:

Steve Harrington falls in love and gets married. Not in that order. Some other stuff happens along the way too. But those are the two big things. That first one especially. (Or: celebrations of life)

AND

Turn Your Back on Mother Nature by gr0gu

Rating: Teen and Up Audiences

16,996 words, 4/4 chapters

Archive Warning: Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings

Tags: Canon Compliant, Period-Typical Homophobia, Sharing a Bed, Saving the World, Steve Harrington Being an Idiot, the three 'S'es, Internalized Homophobia, Gay Eddie Munson, Drinking and Smoking, Bisexual Steve Harrington, Tending to Wounds, Drunken Confessions, Coming Out, Fluff, Sleepy Cuddles, Making Out, Sexual Identity, Sharing Clothes, all the love languages, Happy Ending, Bonus Chapter, D&D, Love Confessions, First Time, giggly sex, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Food as a Metaphor for Love, Getting Together, Fix-It

Summary:

It wasn't supposed to go like this. Steve was supposed to work with Robin at the Family Video, flirt with the many many girls who came to browse the expansive selection of VHSes, go on some dates, and hopefully find The One. It was supposed to be a notably upside-down free year. And, hey, for what it's worth? He wasn't supposed to be pinned down on a mattress by Eddie Munson either. And he certainly wasn't supposed to be enjoying it. But that's getting a bit ahead of things…

Thanks for the rec!

Know a fic that deserves extra love? Submit through our asks or the submission box!

[happiness-of-the-pursuit]

WIP Wednesday: But Make it Different

Hi y'all!

First off, thanks for the tags! Second, this is going to be a bit of a different WIP Wednesday post.

@affectionatelyrs and I are planning to post our epistolary roommates fic VERY soon. I wrote part of a message from Henry to Alex that had to be deleted, but instead of it living forever in a doc, I've included it here. I felt they were important to share, because they're actually useful resources :)

I had to cut a few because of Tumblr's limit on links. They're below the cut because they make the post super long, but this does give you a sneak peak into the fic :)

Thanks @sparklepocalypse @affectionatelyrs @xthelastknownsurvivorx @magicandarchery @captainjunglegym @leojfitz @junebugclaremontdiaz @14carrotghoul @violetbaudelaire-quagmire @wordsofhoneydew @suseagull04 @itsmaybitheway @bigassbowlingballhead @firenati0n @eusuntgratie @leaves-of-laurelin for the tags!!! I've been enjoying your snippets so much in my email and I need to go interact with them here now :)

I'm late, so I won't tag too many people, but here you go @read-and-write- @kiwiana-writes @littlemisskittentoes @cactusdragon517 @emmalostinwonderland @msmarvelouswinchester @rockyroadkylers @gayrootvegetable @gay-flyboys @inexplicablymine @galitzine-nick and @songliili :)

Bisexuality Resources:

Queer Community 101:

Dating Apps:

Sex-related resources:

[waitmyturtles]

Only Friends and More: Watching Asian Queer Shows About Asian Queer Male Sex As a Cishet Woman

Hello! It's Turtles here, your resident cisgender female, heterosexual, South-and-Southeast-Asian-American mama.

I'm joining in partnership with my fellow cishet female elder and very dear friend, @lurkingshan, in taking a minute today to talk to our fellow cishet girlies about the world we are being exposed to via a show that we're holding near and dear to our hearts: Only Friends.

As my friend Shan has written today, Only Friends is presenting a number of paradigms regarding queer sex -- specifically what I will call from here on out, Asian queer male sex -- and how us as cishet women understand, digest, and possibly even judge this sex.

Shan referred to a phenomenon this week that some of us drama clowns saw percolating across our dashes: that Boston's encounter with Top in episode 2 of Only Friends was being described in some circles as an assault.

Shan does a great job to explain a very important point: the interpretation of that scene is dependent on the lens from which that scene is viewed. For instance, a non-Asian cishet female gaze on that scene might very well interpret that scene as a potential assault. A non-Asian cishet female might be using her social understanding of the rules and boundaries of sexual engagement that she embodies and has been raised with throughout her life to come to that interpretation.

What Shan delves into is the importance of identifying what your specific lens is before passing judgment on that scene and other scenes of Asian queer male sex in Only Friends. And, Shan suggests -- hey, try stepping out of that lens for a hot second, and give another interpretation a shot.

In other words: if you are a white, American, cisgender heterosexual female -- and you are watching a show about an Asian queer male community -- by checking your lens in watching this show, you can begin to understand that you may not have the familiarity, the comfort level, and the coded language (verbal and non-verbal) fluency to fully interpret what is being communicated and depicted in totality in this show.

Asian queer male sex looks and behaves vastly differently than sex for cishet females. The language used to engage in Asian queer male sex, the assumptions made about how sex comes about between two or more people, the way sex is approached, the way sex is talked about among friends -- is wildly, vastly different from the way cishet women engage in and about sex.

You know who knows a lot about this? The 100% Asian queer male writing and directing team behind Only Friends. Jojo Tichakorn, Ninew Pinya, Den Panuwat, and Best Kittisak are all Asian queer males. They are the team -- the artists, the darlings, the ASIAN QUEER MEN -- who are giving us this show.

If you a regular reader around here, you'll know that I gave y'all a little homework before Only Friends premiered.

I asked y'all to watch Gay OK Bangkok.

Jojo Tichakorn and Backaof Noppharnach's Gay OK Bangkok, to be exact.

Just like Only Friends: Gay OK Bangkok was about Asian queer men. It was about Asian queer men having sex. Asian queer men having relationships. Having throuples. Dealing with relationship problems. Dealing with HIV. Dealing with dating. Getting tested. Dealing with their jobs and salaries. Dealing with heartache. Experiencing joys of first love. Being there for their heartbroken friends.

Gay OK Bangkok showed us life's joys and life's ugliness -- through the eyes and experiences of out, gay, Asian queer males.

Gay OK Bangkok was VERY GAY AND VERY ASIAN.

We are so lucky to have Gay OK Bangkok as a reference for understanding how sex comes about in Only Friends. Gay OK Bangkok gave us insight into the language that Asian queer males use -- again, verbal and non-verbal -- to engage in sex. It showed friends taking men away from each other for the purposes of romance and sex. It showed hook-ups, drinking, partying, dating. It showed Asian queer males waking up in bed with multiple men. It showed Asian queer males waking up with a man next to them, and maybe not knowing that guy's name. It depicted only Asian queer males doing this.

What Shan asks us to do, when we're watching Only Friends -- or other shows about Asian queer males having love and sex, which are all of our BLs from Asia -- is to understand that if we are cishet women watching these shows, that we are NOT Asian queer males, and we have to check ourselves to not bring our own judgments of how we ourselves engage with sex and love, because we do that differently than Asian queer males.

We can learn about how Asian queer males have sex through our shows. Through Gay OK Bangkok, through Jojo's magnificent The Warp Effect, and through another show that I highly recommend -- that many people thought was problematic, and which I thought was one of the best BLs I have ever seen: Make It Right and Make It Right 2.

Let me tell you about my experience watching Make It Right. Again: cishet Asian female mama here. I knew, going into 2016's Make It Right, that it was known infamously for starting with what a majority of the BL audience called a "problematic" start. The two main protagonist couples, Tee/Fuse, and Frame/Book, start out their sexual experiences in a way that cishet females may call "dubious." Tee first sleeps with Fuse when Fuse is drunk. Frame sleeps with Book after Book messages Frame on a chat app -- Frame goes into Book's room and jumps on Book's body.

Make It Right was written and directed by two Asian queer males: New Siwaj (Until We Meet Again, A Boss and a Babe, etc.) and Cheewin Thanamin (Bed Friend, Why R U, Secret Crush On You, etc.)

When I was watching Make It Right, I messaged my dear friend @bengiyo in a kind of wonderment. I wrote to him, literally, "Sooooo -- I am REALLY LIKING Make It Right so far." Almost as if I wasn't supposed to like it, for all the times I had read about its infamous reputation.

Ben wrote back to me, and he wrote such a compelling, gorgeous message, that I had to center my review of Make It Right around that message. He wrote:

"[New and Cheewin] understand that many early sexual experiences [for boys] are with other boys. And Make It Right asks what life could be if they just didn't turn against each other for it."

Let me tell you something. I would not have ever gotten that on my own as a cishet female. I needed to talk to a queer elder to understand the entire depth of what I was watching in MIR and MIR2.

I wrote in my review of Make It Right that the "problematic" nature of how TeeFuse and FrameBook needed to be contextualized from the perspective of Asian queer males. The word "problematic" here is a judgment. In fact -- for MANY Asian queer males -- drunken hook-ups might be a common way in which one is first exposed to sex. And through Make It Right, New and Cheewin showed us how young Asian queer males -- who are coming to terms with themselves, their minds, their bodies, and their attraction to others -- manage these exposures for the first time.

It was gorgeous to watch. And to learn. And to be exposed to a new-to-me culture of sex and love that I was wholly unfamiliar with as an Asian-American cishet woman.

I want my fellow cishet women who are watching Only Friends to understand that you are in the very BEST hands in Jojo Tichakorn and Ninew Pinya to watch some parts of a culture of Asian queer male sex unfold before your eyes. Like I said before, Jojo has a track record of creating shows about sex that we can trust, in Gay OK Bangkok, in The Warp Effect, and more. Only Friends is going to get into tough, very tough territory -- territory that will include Asian queer men having sex with other Asian queer men, often in scenarios that one might want to jump to judge negatively. I trust Jojo implicitly and explicitly in his storytelling -- in this instance, in stories rooted in toxic behavior -- because he's earned my trust in his past shows.

Before you pass judgment about the sex that you will see in Only Friends, no matter the context: understand that what you're watching comes first and foremost from the perspective of Asian queer males, as written and presented for a majority Asian audience. There are going to be nuances you will miss. (I'll miss them, too.) There will be verbal and body language you will not understand. That is okay. But before you pass any negative judgment: check yourself, check your lenses, check your privileges, and hold yourself accountable before you pass judgment on anything you see.

This got long, but let me suggest -- no, let me exhort you -- to please do your homework while Only Friends is still airing.

1 ) Read @bengiyo's incredible post about Loving Queer Men. Listen and THINK when Ben asks you: do you love queer men when queer men are ugly, or catty, or -- in Boston's case -- horny, or maybe even "cheating"? And ask yourself: from what place/lens/perspective would you call Boston's actions "assault" and/or "cheating"?

2) Read @williamrikers's incredible post about consent among queer men in shows about Asian queer men having sex. This is SUCH an important read, from a queer male perspective, on the sheer joy and delight of watching queer men on screen have sex and depicting queer joy in having queer sex. Root yourself in this lovingness!

3) Watch Gay OK Bangkok.

4) Watch Make It Right and Make It Right 2.

5) Ask yourself what "sex-positive," "accepting," and "accountable" mean to you as a cishet female, especially if you watch shows about Asian queer males, and Asian queer males having sex (and especially Asian queer males having sex outside of relationship settings, and when Asian queer males are having sex with multiple partners, as we are seeing in Only Friends).

6) And finally: if you are a cishet female fan of the shipped pairings of Only Friends, ask yourself if you are truly comfortable watching your favorite Asian actors have fictional sex with other men who are not in their pairings. Ask yourself: "what makes me uncomfortable about this?"

The growth that I have gained from watching Asian BLs -- shows about Asian queer men in love and sex -- has had such a positive impact on my life, that I cannot wait to share this joy and acceptance with my children as they grow up. I will show my children Bad Buddy and The Eclipse. I will show my kids Gay OK Bangkok, so that they may know that there are thriving communities of queer people around the world that we can be allies with. I'm going to teach my kids about acceptance, perspective, and relativity. And to my fellow cishet girlies, I say: it's never too late. I came to BLs when I was already a mom. It's never too late to grow up and into loving and standing up for our queer brothers, sisters, and non-binary siblings -- and to afford all communities that are not our own the joy of living their lives freely, without the auspices of judgment and discrimination.

(Special thank yous and shout-outs are in order for @bengiyo, @neuroticbookworm, and @wen-kexing-apologist for reading this through and offering insight. Thank you, dear friends.)

[jacquiarno]

It’s Bisexuality Visibility Month (also Suicide Awareness Month), and the biphobia has been constant and intense, even in our own bi spaces, mostly from fellow LGBTQIA+ people.

Bi women have been told they are tainted for being with men, that we are dirty and dick obsessed. We’ve been told we are perverted fetishists by both cis and trans lesbians, with even gay men joining in on the insults, with one even threatening violence towards bi women if they come near lesbians. We even got told we deserve to be abused, raped, and murdered by our male partners because that’s what we deserve for dating men.

Bi men are being accused again for being HIV carriers, with gay men saying they are only good for sex because they will end up leaving them for women. One trans man said he would kill himself if a man started dating a woman after him, not leave him for one but just start dating again and that person being a woman.

I haven’t seen insults directly about non-binary bisexuals, but I’m sure there would be and a lot of hate lumps us all together. All this hates stings me but I can’t imagine the pain of all this for non-binary, trans women, and trans men dealing with it all, and it makes me so disappointed and angry that fellow trans people in this community are hurting them.

Pride Month a lesbian wrote “I wish god would eradicate all the bisexuals” while another wrote “For Pride Month let all the bi people disappear” with both having thousands of likes and comments agreeing. Now during Bi Visibility Month, a non-binary lesbian with feminist in their profile posted “Happy bi visibility month, I hope they find a cure soon 💖”. While continuing to mock us after.

Our allies and so-called LGBTQIA+ advocates have been silent and have even participated in bierasure, laughing at us when we point it out, saying “It’s not that serious.” “Lol the bis are getting upset over nothing again”. Only the bisexual advocates and pages have spoken out against the hate.

The B in LGBTQIA+ is suppose to be for bisexual but this community says and treats us as awfully as the bigots do to all of us. Bisexual is the sexuality that is attracted to two or more genders, that we have the ability to love anyone regardless of their gender. But we’re treated as greedy, perverted, hyper sexual, unfaithful, which from bigots you understand and usually brush off, but from those within the community who go through similar prejudice and should understand, sharing the same ignorant mindset.

These spaces are suppose to be our safe havens as well, but are just as dangerous. We try making our own spaces and even that is invaded by these people, we are beyond exhausted. We need the other members of the community that aren’t biphobic to speak out more and shut these people and this hate down. Because the lack of empathy from this community is frightening and all this in-fighting will allow the bigots to pick us a part more easily.

[queerasfact]

Queer Calendar 2023

We put together a calendar of key (mostly queer) dates at the start of the year to help us with scheduling - so I thought I’d share it around! Including pride and visibility days, some queer birthdays and anniversaries, and a few other bits and bobs. Click the links for more info - I dream one day of having a queer story for every day of the year!

This is obviously not an exhaustive list - if I’ve overlooked something important to you, feel free to add it in the reblogs!

January

3 - Bisexual American jazz-age heiress Henrietta Bingham born 1901

8 - Queer Australian bushranger Captain Moonlite born 1845; gay American art collector Ned Warren born 1860

11 - Pennsylvania celebrates Rosetta Tharpe Day in honour of bisexual musician Rosetta Tharpe

12 - Japanese lesbian author Nobuko Yoshiya born 1896

22 - Lunar New Year (Year of the Rabbit)

24 - Roman emperor Hadrian, famous for his relationship with Antinous, born 76CE; gay Prussian King Frederick the Great born 1712

27 - International Holocaust Remembrance Day

February

LGBT+ History Month (UK, Hungary)

Black History Month (USA and Canada)

1 - Feast of St Brigid, a saint especially important to Irish queer women

5 - Operation Soap, a police raid on gay bathhouses in Toronto, Canada, spurs massive protests, 1981

7 - National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day (USA)

18 - US Black lesbian writer and activist Audre Lorde born 1934

12 - National Freedom to Marry Day (USA)

19-25 - Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Week

March

Women’s History Month

1 - Black Women in Jazz and the Arts Day

8 - International Women’s Day

9 - Bi British writer David Garnett born 1892

12 - Bi Polish-Russian ballet dancer Vaslav Nijinsky born 1889 or 1890

13 March-15 April - Deaf History Month

14 - American lesbian bookseller and publisher Sylvia Beach born 1887

16 - French lesbian artist Rosa Bonheur born 1822

20 - Bi US musician Rosetta Tharpe born 1915

21 - World Poetry Day

24 - The Wachowski sisters’ cyberpunk trans allegory The Matrix premiers 1999

April

Jazz Appreciation Month

Black Women’s History Month

National Poetry Month (USA)

3 - British lesbian diarist Anne Lister born 1791

8 - Trans British racing driver and fighter pilot Roberta Cowell born 1918

9 -  Bi Australia poet Lesbia Harford born 1891; Easter Sunday

10 - National Youth HIV & AIDS Awareness Day (USA)

14 - Day of Silence

15 - Queer Norwegian photographer and suffragist Marie Høeg born 1866

17 - Costa-Rican-Mexican lesbian singer Chavela Vargas born 1919

21-22 - Eid al-Fitr

25 - Gay English King Edward II born 1284

26 - Lesbian Day of Visibility; bi American blues singer Ma Rainey born 1886

29 - International Dance Day

30 - International Jazz Day

May

1 - Trans British doctor and Buddhist monk Michael Dillon born 1915

7 - International Family Equality Day

7 - Gay Russian composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky born 1840

15 - Australian drag road-trip comedy The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert premiers in 1994

 17 - IDAHOBIT (International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, Intersexism and Transphobia)

18 - International Museum Day

19 - Agender Pride Day

22 - US lesbian tailor and poet Charity Bryant born 1777

22 - Harvey Milk Day marks the birth of gay US politician Harvey Milk 1930

23 - Premier of Pride, telling the story of the 1980s British activist group Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners

24 - Pansexual and Panromantic Awareness and Visibility Day; Queer Chinese-Japanese spy Kawashima Yoshiko born 1907

26 - queer American astronaut Sally Ride born 1951

29 - Taiwanese lesbian writer Qiu Miaojin born 1969

June

Pride Month

Indigenous History Month (Canada)

3 - Bisexual American-French performer, activist and WWII spy Josephine Baker born 1906

5 - Queer Spanish playwright and poet Federico García Lorca born 1898; bi English economic John Maynard Keynes born 1883

8 - Mechanic and founder of Australia’s first all-female garage, Alice Anderson, born 1897

10 - Bisexual Israeli poet Yona Wallach born 1944

12 - Pulse Night of Remembrance, commemorating the 2012 shooting at the Pulse nightclub, Orlando

14 - Australian activists found the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands in 2004

18 - Sally Ride becomes the first know queer woman in space

24 - The first Sydney Mardi Gras 1978

25 - The rainbow flag first flown as a queer symbol in 1978

28 - Stonewall Riots, 1969

28 June-2 July - Eid al-Adha

30 - Gay German-Israeli activist, WWII resistance member and Holocaust survivor Gad Beck born 1923

July

1 - Gay Dutch WWII resistance fighter Willem Arondeus killed - his last words were “Tell the people homosexuals are no cowards”

2-9 - NAIDOC Week (Australia) celebrating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture

6 - Bi Mexican artist Frida Kahlo born 1907

12 or 13 - Roman emperor Julius Caesar born c.100BCE

14 - International Non-Binary People’s Day

23 - Shelly Bauman, owner of Seattle gay club Shelly’s Leg, born 1947; American lesbian cetenarian Ruth Ellis born 1899; gay American professor, tattooist and sex researcher Sam Steward born 1909

25 - Italian-Australian trans man Harry Crawford born 1875

August

8 - International Cat Day

9 - Queer Finnish artist, author and creator of Moomins Tove Jansson born 1914

9 - International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples

11 - Russian lesbian poet Sofya Parnok born 1885

12 - Queer American blues musician Gladys Bentley born 1907

13 - International Left-Handers Day

22 - Gay WWII Dutch resistance fight Willem Arondeus born 1894

24 - Trans American drag queen and activist Marsha P Johnson born 1945

26 - National Dog Day

30 - Bi British author Mary Shelley 1797

31 - Wear it Purple Day (Australia - queer youth awareness)

September

5 - Frontman of Queen Freddie Mercury born 1946

6 - Trans Scottish doctor and farmer Ewan Forbes born 1912

13 - 1990 documentary on New York’s ball culture Paris is Burning premiers

15-17 - Rosh Hashanah

16-23 - Bisexual Awareness Week

17 - Gay Prussian-American Inspector General of the US Army Baron von Steuben born 1730

23 - Celebrate Bisexuality Day

24 - Gay Australian artist William Dobell born 1889

30 - International Podcast Day

October

Black History Month (Europe)

4 - World Animal Day

5 - National Poetry Day (UK)

5 - Queer French diplomat and spy the Chevalière d’Éon born 1728

8 - International Lesbian Day

9 - Indigenous Peoples’ Day (USA)

11 - National Coming Out Day

16 - Irish writer Oscar Wilde born 1854

18 - International Pronouns Day

22-28 - Asexual Awareness Week

26 - Intersex Awareness Day

31 - American lesbian tailor Sylvia Drake born 1784

November

8 - Intersex Day of Remembrance

12 - Diwali; Queer Mexican nun Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz born c.1648

13-19 - Transgender Awareness Week

20 - Trans American writer, lawyer, activist and priest Pauli Murray born 1910; Transgender Day of Remembrance

27 - Antinous, lover of the Roman emperor Hadrian, born c.111; German lesbian drama Mädchen in Uniform premiers, 1931

29 - Queer American writer Louisa May Alcott born 1832

December

AIDS Awareness Month

1 - World AIDS Day

2 - International Day for the Abolition of Slavery

3 - International Day of Persons with Disabilities

8 - Pansexual Pride Day; queer Swedish monarch Christina of Sweden born 1626

10 - Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners host Pits and Perverts concern to raise mining for striking Welsh miners, 1984

14 - World Monkey Day

15 - Roman emperor Nero born 37CE

24 - American drag king and bouncer Stormé DeLarverie born 1920

25 - Christmas

29 - Trans American jazz musician Billy Tipton born 1914

[hellomynameisbisexual]

Bisexual erasure. “When bisexuality is ignored, discriminated against, demonized, or rendered invisible by both the heterosexual world and the lesbian and gay communities. Often, the entire sexual orientation is branded as invalid, immoral, or irrelevant.”

what does it Look like?

- Assuming that two women together are lesbians, two men together are gay, or a man and a woman together are straight

- In most scientific studies, bisexuality is lumped in under “gay” or “lesbian” identities

- Many LGBTQ+ organizations don’t offer programming for bisexuals

- Questioning someone’s bisexuality if they haven’t had sex with both men and women.

what does it sound like?

- “I’m not interested in dating you because you’ve only dated men.” (Implying that I’m actually straight)

- “Bi women are more likely to leave you for a straight relationship.”

- “He’s only ever dated men, so he’s obviously gay.”

- “There’s no point in coming out as Bi if you never plan to leave your current relationship. You just want attention.”

what are the consequences?

- Bi erasure leads to bi phobia (discrimination, anger, blame, and hypersexualization).

- Bi people have *significantly* higher health risks than any other sexual identity group, including alarmingly high rates of depression and suicide.

- Bi women experience much higher rates of domestic violence.

- In the ‘80s and ‘90s bi people were blamed for spreading HIV. and we are still blamed for the spread of other STI’s.

what can I do?

- If you want to help, here’s what you can do:

- Check your own biases When someone says something shitty about bisexuality, correct them—even if a bisexual person isn’t present

- Ask your local LGBTQ+ orgs to offer bi/Pan programs

- Donate time or money to bi-specific organizations.

- Resources: Bisexual Resource Center (BiResource.org) Bi Plus Organizing US (@BiPlusOrgUS) Bi Pride UK (BiPrideUK.org) BiPhoria! (biphoria.org.uk) American Institute of Bisexuality (bisexuality.org) “Greedy: Notes from a Bisexual Who Wants Too Much” by Jen Winston “Look Both Ways: Bisexual Politics” by Jennifer Baumgardner “Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body” by Roxane Gay