Dirty Sexy Comics
Dirty Sexy Comics is an upcoming documentary that explores gay erotic comics, past & present, tracing the roots of the artform and the gutsy, creative men behind them! Dirty Sexy Comics is an upcoming documentary that takes a look at gay erotic comics, the many talents behind them and their impact on gay culture/lives. I spoke to director Robert Chandler about his project.

Why is documenting the history of gay comics important?

The history of gay comic is important because it’s the history of the gay movement. These people were documenting our lives before it was legal to do so. And gay erotic comics creators were showing us as we really are, what we desired and what we idealized. But there were risks. In the United States, it was a federal crime to mail a gay erotic drawing through the post office. And there wasn’t a FedEx back then.
These guys portrayed gay desire honestly, not just the sanitized version of our lives that we sometimes put out as we beg straight people to like and accept us. These were comics by gay men for gay men.

What is the biggest obstacle faced by the artists?

These guys faced so many challenges. They risked arrest, losing their jobs and being shunned by everyone they knew. Into the 1970s people stopped hiding. There were still risks, but because of these brave men, there was a booming underground gay erotic comics scene. Many of these guys were doing a page or two in porn magazines, which were booming after postal regulations loosened.

But it’s completely easy even now. The guys at Class Comic still have to worry about their books being seized at the US-Canadian border. Talented erotic artists are still dismissed as smut producers and are dismissed even among gay people. These creators have to worry about how doing erotic work will hurt other aspects of their careers. It’s a shame that even as comic books are getting respect as an art form, gay erotic comics and their creators go ignored despite their talent and courage. It’s puritanical.

How far back do you intend to go (historically)?
If you look at current superhero comics, your research will continually bring you back to Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. When it comes to gay erotic comics, all roads lead back to Tom of Finland. Tom loved drawing comic stips in Finland as a boy in the 1920s. He never forgot his love of comics when his work became erotic. His art is beautiful and he’s a gifted storyteller with an knack for making sexual connections fun and playful. Just about everyone working in gay erotic comics has been influenced, directly or indirectly, by Tom of Finland.

Fortunately, Tom’s work has gained a level of respect over the past few decades. I hope to see the same thing happen to the greats in the gay erotic comics field that followed him and expended the art form.

How long have you been interested in this subject?

I’ve been a comics fan since my dad got me a 3-pack of Marvel comics from the grocery store. I’ve known I was gay since I was 14. I was excited to learn that there were comics creators who shared my sexual identity and my love of comic book art. My two worlds came together when I saw a copy of the Meatmen anthology books at A Different Light bookstore when I was around 20. It was such a thrill to see so many diverse and talented artist telling stories about all kinds of hot sex and doing it so beautifully. It was thrilling and liberating. It helped me form my identity as a gay man and I’ve been hooked ever since.

I want to know more about these guys and share what I find in my documentary. With all the wild artists, unapologetic sex and provocative visuals, it’s guaranteed to be a great ride.

Check out the Kickstarter here: www.kickstarter.com/projects/1286422278/dirty-sexy-comics-the-uncensored-story-of-gay-erot

www.huffingtonpost.com/savas-abadsidis/dirty-sexy-comics_b_6215394.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices&ir=Gay+Voices

HRC Cincinnati Hosts the Workplace Equality Program

HRC’s Beck Bailey, deputy director of employee engagement in the Workplace Equality Program, was on-hand to share best practices on how employee resource groups can build a vibrant ally program.
HRC.org

www.hrc.org/blog/entry/hrc-cincinnati-hosts-the-workplace-equality-program?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss-feed

Rev. Al Sharpton Blasts Ferguson Decision; Officer Darren Wilson Gives First Interview: VIDEOS

Andy Towle

www.towleroad.com/2014/11/sharptonwilson.html

But I'm a Bartender…
I spent my 20’s making no apologies for my overt sexuality. After all, if straight guys could construct their entire social lives around the hunt for tail, then why couldn’t I? Especially since I was so good at it…

Wedding rings and shared real estate meant as little to me as DJ’s and mixology. All were distractions from the task at hand–or rather, the ass in front of me waiting to be conquered. This glorious pursuit of dick gave me purpose, fixed my perceived deficiencies… made being gay tolerable. And if you happened to call me out on my often-lecherous ways (though can they be called that if you’re young and cute), I would simply respond, But I’m a bartender…

You see there’s a moment in every gay person’s life when they must make a very personal choice–not about whether or not they are in fact homosexual (sorry right-wingers, not even gonna go there), but instead, about whether or not to acknowledge this truth and ‘come out’. Personally, I always knew that I was different, but it wasn’t until I was 22 and had spent nearly a year binge drinking with the intent to blackout and or stumble into some darkly lit NYC gay bar just in time for last call, that I found myself confronted with this life-altering decision.

Of course, being the entitled – perhaps even a little spoiled – Gen Yer that I am, the reward of living in my truth wasn’t nearly enough to warrant the public scorn and, or questioning of my manhood that I assumed would accompany such a big reveal. As with report cards and good behavior while I was growing up, I needed a tangible incentive to justify the effort. There was no gay marriage, or NPH-style surrogate babies at this time, but it wouldn’t have mattered at all; I knew what my dangling carrot was, and it had little to do with the thought of sharing real romantic love with a partner, or building an open, honest life.

No, when I was wading through the choppy waters of self-discovery, weighing my options and deciding if life as an out gay man was for me, my PRO’s list consisted of only one thing… pure, unadulterated man sex. I fantasized incessantly about the cornucopia of pleasure that would now be open to me- tall, lean guys, small, thick ones, white ones, black ones, brown ones… and for half the work it took to sleep with women.

Every fantasy about armpits and rounded shoulders, tree trunk legs and hairy butts- everything that I was told was gross as a kid (after all, only women’s smooth, curvy bodies were sexy)… Every hot guy I had ever imagined naked as a teen– or wondered what his taint looked like or how big his nipples were- these were the ONLY thoughts that flooded my mind. Like Madame Bovary or Diane Lane, I was caught up, rapt by the potential of lust, and willing to give up everything to pursue it.

In essence, my libido became a life preserver, floating me past thoughts of suicide and, or worse, of living like one of those truck stop closet cases. When difficult moments in the journey would arise (ie. coming out to my parents or high school buddies, getting harassed while drunkenly holding hands with a trick on Houston St), I would calm and fortify myself with the thought that even though public opinion might be cruel, this was but a small price to pay for achieving sexual nirvana.

Yes, I actively encouraged myself to reap the precious rewards of a birth-rite that seemed to carry with it so many unjust punishments. Guilt and shame became aphrodisiacs (I am Catholic after all), insecurity and uncertainly morphed into lust-driven momentum. While my straight friends were now dealing with the questions that face anyone who leads a linear, socially acceptable life (career planning, health insurance) I thought only of how I could keep the party going and get paid for it. Of course, not wanting to send my grandma to an early grave, I figured I’d settle for what seemed like the next best thing to prostitution- bartending.

DISCLAIMER- I am in no way calling bartenders hookers – at least not all of them. I am only saying that for myself, at the ripe ole’ age of 22, the conscious decision to start slinging drinks in gay bars was made, not because I gave the slightest f**k about what was in a mojito or how a stout was properly poured (I still drink Bud Lights and vodka crans)… Not because the lure of nightlife with its multimillion dollar sound systems and thumping club beats was simply too much to resist (I’m somewhat deaf and have never been able to hear variations in sound quality)… I got into this business because I knew I could get paid to flirt, and to indulge the only thing that was ever on my mind- chasing dick.

Again, no thoughts of a partner, or finding true love, or even what my version of a ‘healthy’ gay life would look like; just a constant pang as primordial as my heartbeat, a need to see every penis that was denied to me growing up. To reap what I was owed for having been dealt such an embarrassing ‘affliction’. To dive headfirst into a pool of men and never EVER come up for air.

Now, somehow along the way, I did manage to maintain several rewarding, if highly dysfunctional relationships, and despite my one-track mind, I even made some real gay friends. But ultimately, nothing ever came as close to assuaging my inner turmoil as a quicky with a go-go boy behind the keg cooler, or a wild night working the Back Bar for Folsom, or a sexy, shy Midwesterner out by himself on Underwear Night.

Alas, I’m a little bit older now, and things are quite different than they were during my unforgettable 12 Years a Whore. I’ve experienced the earth shattering love described by singers and poets (and still have the scars to prove it). I’ve come to peace with my sexuality, at last seeing it as a blessing as opposed to something that needs to be paired with an incentive. Hell, now I even catch myself imagining my husband’s eyes on our wedding day, or the birth of our surrogate twins, or our Christmases with his family in Vermont.

Basically, I’ve made room for other passions in my life, and most importantly, I’ve stopped being ashamed of who I am; so constant conquering – and or being conquered – no longer has the same hypnotic pull over me that it once did.

But even with this Norman Rockwell-ization of my life (or as some of my SF friends might call it, this surrender to conformity and patriarchal social constructs), I refuse to disavow my decade of dick hunting. So what if my introduction to my sexuality played more like Porky’s than Brokeback Mountain? So what if I achieved official gropey uncle status by the age of 25?

This desire is what got me through one of the most difficult transitions of my life; what incentivized a choice that I needed to make in order to survive. And just like it did at age 22, the thought of a hot, sweaty, naked man is still enough to bring a smile to my face no matter what’s going on. Well, that and the decade of memories that I have working with some of the greatest guys, in some of the coolest joints in the country. Because at the end of the day, I may have mellowed out a bit, but I am and will always be a bartender at heart.*

*Once again- I repeat. Not suggesting that all bartenders are whores, sluts, or even necessarily promiscuous. Some truly do care how to properly muddle an Old-Fashioned. I am not one of them.

www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-liberti/but-im-a-bartender_b_6214830.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices&ir=Gay+Voices

HRC’s Workplace Equality Team Attends Boehringer-Ingleheim’s LGBT Brain Exchange

HRC Deputy Director of Employee Engagement Beck Bailey attended  Boehinger-Ingleheim’s annual “Brain Exchange” hosted by the LGBT business resource group Working With Pride at the BI headquarters in Ridgefield, CT.
HRC.org

www.hrc.org/blog/entry/hrcs-workplace-equality-team-attends-boehringer-ingleheims-lgbt-brain-excha?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss-feed

PHOTOS: This New York Firefighter Was Once A Gay-For-Pay Adult Film Star, But Who’s Counting?

It’s a good thing Jonathan Jesensky had dreams of becoming a firefighter and not, say, a politician. The 33-year-old New Yorker just joined the squad as a rookie, but not before starring in about ten gay porn films over the years.

You might know him better as Jonathan West, the hunky tattooed former military man who performed in such box office hits as Semper Bi, Ripe, and Paramedics. But now he’s gone straight (in more ways than one), though he doesn’t seem to be very ashamed of his past.

Neither, it should be mentioned, does the city of New York or his fellow firefighters.

The NY Daily News tracked down one NY smoke-eater whose response was, “Whatever, I don’t care. I haven’t met him yet, but I don’t care.”

And really, why should he?

If Jesensky is competent on the job, his past career choices shouldn’t make any difference to anyone.

The Daily News points out that, “The city’s uniformed forces do not hire people with a serious criminal past for law-enforcement jobs. But the city’s strict civil service law — which includes age and fitness requirements — does not bar candidates who have posed nude or starred in X-rated films.”

But it’s still worth a trip down memory lane to fully appreciate, don’t you think?

Dan Tracer

feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/6nAQDt_f7h0/photos-this-new-york-firefighter-was-once-a-gay-for-pay-adult-film-star-but-whos-counting-20141125

First Full Trailer For 'Jurassic World' Debuts: VIDEO

Sean Mandell

www.towleroad.com/2014/11/first-full-trailer-for-jurassic-world-debuts-video.html