A guy decked out in leather from Muir Cap to boots can be captivating for his perceived virility and masculinity.
Gay men who are attracted to leather probably felt like I did, back in my youthful, single days:ġ. Blecchhh.įrom the perspective of a “former” gay leatherman - and I say “former” because I have completely lost interest in gay leather activities, parties, gatherings, “runs,” contests, so forth and so on - let me share my perspective. While I enjoy wearing leather regularly for its protective properties, warmth, and style, I know that there are a lot of gay men who would not be caught dead in any hide of any animal - much like I would not be caught dead in a pair of men’s dress shoes or sneakers. So why do gay men find leather attractive?įirst of all, not all gay men find leather attractive. The post it went to was about what masculine gay men find attractive, which is a different issue. It makes sense that we’re attracted to experiencing that triumph in fantasy as well as real life.This question, “why do gay men find leather so attractive?” was entered into a search engine and brought a visitor from Ottawa, Canada, to a post on my Blogger version of this blog. If done with the help of PrEP and antiretrovirals, a condomless sex act can be a sort of triumph over the fear of HIV, a terror deeply ingrained in many of us. A new sexual era was dawning, and its porn changed with the times.įor gay men today, bareback sex can be a mentally and emotionally freeing practice. In 2012, PrEP was introduced, which helped underscore the fact that condoms were not the only way to prevent HIV. At this time, gay men’s attitudes toward condoms had already grown cold, and their use of condoms was consistently declining. “I’ve given away porn DVDs at bars and the boys say ‘Oh, this has condoms? I’m not interested.’ ”Īccording to Pam, she started to see a shift toward bareback porn around 2010. Bareback is a higher standard to pass, and so Magic Condom scenes may be the better business move. (An amateur pornographer can rent a hotel room for a weekend and shoot crazy raw sex scenes, and not necessarily get in trouble for it.) NakedSword, which works in multiple states, has to adhere closely to state law for protecting their performers and providing safe working environments. Companies of its size, which generally already self-regulate in order to protect talent, are also under more scrutiny to follow the law when it comes to performer STI testing and safety. Pam, who’s shot both condomed and bare, a large majority of new gay scenes being produced today are bareback (indeed, only two U.S.-based studios, GayHoopla and GayRoom, still use condoms 100 percent of the time), and the obviously condomed variety “can be hard to sell.” “I’ve given away porn DVDs at bars,” she says, “and the boys say ‘Oh, this has condoms? I’m not interested.’ ” But that doesn’t mean they weren’t unknowingly watching the occasional rubber anyway: Pam estimates that she could shoot upward of 50 Magic Condom scenes in a given year (though this is declining as true bareback becomes a more established practice).įor Pam’s productions with a large, established studio like NakedSword, condom use is a business decision, not a social statement. Today, we’re getting to a point where most gay porn studios are making some bareback movies, and many are tossing condoms entirely.Īccording to mr. This has meant a rise in condomless (or “bareback”) sex among gay men generally and a parallel shift toward bareback sex scenes in gay porn. But with advances in HIV treatment-notably PrEP, the drug regimen that prevents HIV infection, and the medical consensus that “ undetectable = untransmittable” for those living with the virus-the risk of passing HIV can be reduced to essentially zero. From the onset of the AIDS crisis until fairly recently, the gay side of the industry has tested less and used condoms more frequently, making rubbers a standard presence in scenes and performer HIV status a more private matter. That’s because straight studios have long relied on frequent STI testing in order to produce movies without them. When you think of straight porn, condoms are probably not the first image that comes to mind.
What to Do When Your Kid Is Reading a Book That Makes You Uncomfortable The Forgotten Gay Cable Network That Changed LGBTQ History Madison Cawthorn Thrusting His Naked Body on Another Man’s Face Doesn’t Tell Us Much About His “Gayness” This post is part of Outward, Slate’s home for coverage of LGBTQ life, thought, and culture.