Does being gay mean being promiscuous?

[crazyfish]

I'm tired of people thinking that just because I happen to prefer sex with a certain gender that I should think a certain way, believe a certain way, have a certain political opinion, dammit use a certain cologne.

Here comes this blog post on the Lambda Literary website http://www.lambdaliterary.org/features/the-banal-and-the-profane/02/24/the-banal-and-the-profane-christopher-stoddard/

Apparently Chris likes to be fucked a lot. He likes it bareback. He's enjoying himself a great deal. More power to him. I like fucking too. However, he goes on to say this,

Quote
"Sometimes I fantasize about living a "straight" gay life: monogamous relationship, marriage, pairing my dog with that of a lover’s, buying a home, considering adoption. No more credit cards. No more partying. No more anonymous sex. But the thought is fleeting; I remind myself I’ve made a conscious decision to sacrifice textbook companionship and a safe, organized existence for a hedonistic, contemplative lifestyle, for better or worse."

Is wanting a settled life a "Straight" thing? God knows that American culture doesn't look kindly on promiscuity. The culture would have us believe that those who roam from bed to bed are irresponsible, immature, afraid of commitment. To some extent I agree with the unease about promiscuity, but at the same time I reject society's judgment. If you want to have unprotected sex with random people every two days until you're eighty, man oh man, all power to you. It's an impressive thing to aim for, but I'll admit, fundamentally terrifying.

But to say that this sort of lifestyle is part of being gay ... what do you think? Hugh Hefner is going still strong with his harem I hear. Wait, he just got married.

On another note, "... hedonistic, contemplative lifestyle..." Contemplative? For shizzle? Is that blog post about eating lamb burgers and invoking the essences of Venus supposed to be his take on a contemplative lifestyle?

Edited March 7, 2013 by crazyfish

[rustle]

Here we go with pigeonholes again.

 

The only thing gay about a lifestyle is sharing the same gender with your sex partner. Although I've enjoyed sex with women more times than I can count, I'm gay as a goose. Why? Because I've lived and screwed with the same man for 22 years. It is, and continues to be, a monogamous relationship. Does anyone deny I'm gay?

 

Yet, I don't go to the ballet, I despise most show tunes, and I don't dance. I taught heavy weapons sparring (nunchaku, staff, and European broadsword) and practiced MMA for years. A bottle of cologne would last me years. I thought I had no gay card to play, until I had to furnish a house from nothing, and was sitting on a pile of insurance proceeds. Every person who's set foot in our house has had the same reaction - WOW!

 

“To be nobody but yourself – in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you like everybody else – means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight – and never stop fighting.”

E.E. Cummings
1894-1962, Poet

 

This is the battle I choose. Pity those who surrender, or never take up the cause.

[crazyfish]

“To be nobody but yourself – in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you like everybody else – means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight – and never stop fighting.”

E.E. Cummings

1894-1962, Poet

 

This is the battle I choose. Pity those who surrender, or never take up the cause.

I agree with this wholeheartedly. I believe you are only certain of two things.  You're alive now. And you'll die.  The time in between life and death is entirely yours to fritter as you see fit: 1000 partners, one partner, no partner, whatever the fuck.   But still it's depressing, the labels, the smattering,the opinions, like uncontrollable weeds wreaking your garden and everyone else's garden.

[Zombie]

Apparently Chris likes to be fucked a lot. He likes it bareback. He's enjoying himself a great deal. More power to him ...  If you want to have unprotected sex with random people every two days until you're eighty, man oh man, all power to you. It's an impressive thing to aim for ...

 

 

Except you're probably not going to live to be a healthy 80 year old if you do this. And whatever else it might be "unprotected sex with random people every two days" is certainly not "an impressive thing to aim for".

 

It's Chris's choice if he wants to play Russian Roulette - AIDS and other STDs haven't just disappeared someplace else. Living with AIDS or antibiotic resistant syphilis is not an "impressive" lifestyle.

Edited March 7, 2013 by Zombie

[TetRefine]

Being promiscuous is far more of an age thing then it is a gay vs straight thing. I'm in college now, and there is no place more promiscuous then a college campus on the weekend. I have straight friends who sleep with a different girl every weekend, and I have straight friends who have a girlfriend and have never had sex with anyone else. I know gay guys who are sleep around a ton and others who are totally monogamous. So what do they all have in common? They are all young and horny, and the fact that they are gay or straight doesn't make a difference. One thing I realized is that straight people like to put up the facade of being monogamous, but the truth is they cheat like hell behind their partner's back. I have friends who have girlfriends, and when their girlfriends aren't around they are hooking up with other girls. People, especially young people, weren't made to be permanently monogamous. I just think straight people are less willing to openly acknowledge that fact as compared to gay guys who aren't expected to live a certain way necessarily. You can't make sweeping generalizations because the facts just don't support it.

 

I've been in both situations. I've had periods of one night stands with guys who's names I'll never know, and I've had long periods of monogamy. Does it really matter which life you choose as long as you enjoy it? In my opinion, no. The problem is, we place such a high spiritual and emotional value on sex, when it reality the only point of sex is to satisfy a basic need to reproduce. But somehow people have managed to spin it into some hugely emotional thing, and our culture makes promiscuity a dirty word, even though everyone does it, gay or straight.

 

So in essence, straight guys are just as promiscuous as gay guys, but they are less willing to admit it because of societal standards. 

[asamvav111]

No, It doesn't. It is just a dumb stereotyping.

Nothing more to add.

[crazyfish]

Except you're probably not going to live to be a healthy 80 year old if you do this. And whatever else it might be "unprotected sex with random people every two days" is certainly not "an impressive thing to aim for".

 

It's Chris's choice if he wants to play Russian Roulette - AIDS and other STDs haven't just disappeared someplace else. Living with AIDS or antibiotic resistant syphilis is not an "impressive" lifestyle.

True getting the STDS is no fun. Certainly not impressive.  But if you forget the issue of stds for a minute, I think it takes a certain willfulness/stubbornness to remain promiscuous till your old age.  

[crazyfish]

Being promiscuous is far more of an age thing then it is a gay vs straight thing. I'm in college now, and there is no place more promiscuous then a college campus on the weekend. I have straight friends who sleep with a different girl every weekend, and I have straight friends who have a girlfriend and have never had sex with anyone else. I know gay guys who are sleep around a ton and others who are totally monogamous. So what do they all have in common? They are all young and horny, and the fact that they are gay or straight doesn't make a difference. One thing I realized is that straight people like to put up the facade of being monogamous, but the truth is they cheat like hell behind their partner's back. I have friends who have girlfriends, and when their girlfriends aren't around they are hooking up with other girls. People, especially young people, weren't made to be permanently monogamous. I just think straight people are less willing to openly acknowledge that fact as compared to gay guys who aren't expected to live a certain way necessarily. You can't make sweeping generalizations because the facts just don't support it.

 

I've been in both situations. I've had periods of one night stands with guys who's names I'll never know, and I've had long periods of monogamy. Does it really matter which life you choose as long as you enjoy it? In my opinion, no. The problem is, we place such a high spiritual and emotional value on sex, when it reality the only point of sex is to satisfy a basic need to reproduce. But somehow people have managed to spin it into some hugely emotional thing, and our culture makes promiscuity a dirty word, even though everyone does it, gay or straight.

 

So in essence, straight guys are just as promiscuous as gay guys, but they are less willing to admit it because of societal standards. 

 

I agree. Western culture, American culture to be exact, makes sex into a huge unwieldy thing.  You must have sex early enough or you won't be seen as healthy, so the 24 year-old virgins are seen as weird.  But you can't have it too much or you're a fucking slut.  But if you have it, you must be having the greatest, the loveliest, balls-busting sex all the time, or you're doing it wrong, or living an unfulfilled life.  Sex is overblown and yet the culture is squeamish about it. 

[TetRefine]

True getting the STDS is no fun. Certainly not impressive.  But if you forget the issue of stds for a minute, I think it takes a certain willfulness/stubbornness to remain promiscuous till your old age.  

 

Only problem is, as you get older your choices of other promiscuous men to sleep with go down. I think as people get older, they become much less promiscuous (gay or straight). When you are young, virile, in shape, and good looking, people want to sleep with you. When you are older, out of shape, and saggy, not so many want to sleep with you. Its why most people are settled down with a long-term partner by the time their youth and looks start fading. 

[crazyfish]

Only problem is, as you get older your choices of other promiscuous men to sleep with go down. I think as people get older, they become much less promiscuous (gay or straight). When you are young, virile, in shape, and good looking, people want to sleep with you. When you are older, out of shape, and saggy, not so many want to sleep with you. Its why most people are settled down with a long-term partner by the time their youth and looks start fading. 

True, that is why it takes a certain stubbornness to remain promiscuous. As you grow older, you have to resort to creative thinking to get your booty.  So either you get rich/famous like Hugh Hefner or be a mendacious creep like Berlusconi, or you go jetsetting to Thailand or Philippines and wow the impressionable, poor young men with your dollars to get you want.  You know what. It works. Just don't get AIDS. or get oral cancer from the herpes virus or some other nasties. 

[rustle]

Only problem is, as you get older your choices of other promiscuous men to sleep with go down. I think as people get older, they become much less promiscuous (gay or straight). When you are young, virile, in shape, and good looking, people want to sleep with you. When you are older, out of shape, and saggy, not so many want to sleep with you. Its why most people are settled down with a long-term partner by the time their youth and looks start fading. 

Out of shape and saggy? Matt, have you been peeking in my windows again?

 

Anybody who lived through the gay plague of the 80's has a different perspective on promiscuity. Going to the same places over a period of time, watching the clientele waste away and disappear, only to find 75% of the folks you used to see had died; holding a friend while he cried, after he discovered he had a k-s lesion on his 20th birthday, and would most likely be dead within 6 months to a year...

 

Does it take willfulness and stubbornness to keep it up into old age? That, and a disregard for your survival instincts.

[TetRefine]

Out of shape and saggy? Matt, have you been peeking in my windows again?

 

Anybody who lived through the gay plague of the 80's has a different perspective on promiscuity. Going to the same places over a period of time, watching the clientele waste away and disappear, only to find 75% of the folks you used to see had died; holding a friend while he cried, after he discovered he had a k-s lesion on his 20th birthday, and would most likely be dead within 6 months to a year...

 

Does it take willfulness and stubbornness to keep it up into old age? That, and a disregard for your survival instincts.

 

Lol, you should close your curtains to keep me from looking. (I'm sure you can be that out of shape and saggy though).

 

As for the whole AIDS things, I definitely think thats removed from my generation completely. Most of us were born when the epidemic was dying down, and by the time we reached the point where we started having sex, it was a total thing of the past. We most likely didn't know anyone who had AIDS, or let alone had died from it. Where as the guys in their 40s and 50s saw entire groups wiped out in months. I'll admit, AIDS doesn't seem as real to me as it probably does to you or other older gay guys who came of age in the 80s. In my opinion, the whole AIDS and post-AIDS gay culture is a dividing gap between guys your age and guys my age.

[K.C.]

As for the whole AIDS things, I definitely think thats removed from my generation completely. Most of us were born when the epidemic was dying down, and by the time we reached the point where we started having sex, it was a total thing of the past. We most likely didn't know anyone who had AIDS, or let alone had died from it. Where as the guys in their 40s and 50s saw entire groups wiped out in months. I'll admit, AIDS doesn't seem as real to me as it probably does to you or other older gay guys who came of age in the 80s. In my opinion, the whole AIDS and post-AIDS gay culture is a dividing gap between guys your age and guys my age.

 

 

Omg, you really need to get your head out of the clouds.  Thinking that AIDS is removed from your generation is so disillusional.  Yes the number of cases had decreased but this disease is not gone! Far from it.  I see a lot of HIV/AIDS patients.  They are living longer with more advanced treatment but they are out there...

 

 

http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/factsheets/us.htm

CDC estimates that 1,148,200 persons aged 13 years and older are living with HIV infection, including 207,600 (18.1%) who are unaware of their infection¹. Over the past decade, the number of people living with HIV has increased, while the annual number of new HIV infections has remained relatively stable. Still, the pace of new infections continues at far too high a level—particularly among certain groups.

 

HIV Incidence (new infections): The estimated incidence of HIV has remained stable overall in recent years, at about 50,000 new HIV infections per year.² Within the overall estimates, however, some groups are affected more than others. MSM continue to bear the greatest burden of HIV infection, and among races/ethnicities, African Americans continue to be disproportionately affected.

 

HIV Diagnoses (new diagnoses, regardless of when infection occurred): In 2011, an estimated 49,273 people were diagnosed with HIV infection in the United States. In that same year, an estimated 32,052 people were diagnosed with AIDS. Since the epidemic began, an estimated 1,155,792 people in the United States have been diagnosed with AIDS ³

 

Deaths: An estimated 15,529 people with an AIDS diagnosis died in 2010, and nearly 636,000 people in the United States with an AIDS diagnosis have died since the epidemic began.³ The deaths of persons with an AIDS diagnosis can be due to any cause—that is, the death may or may not be related to AIDS.

 

Figure1: Estimated New HIV Infections in the United States, 2010,

for the Most Affected Subpopulations

 

  _____________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

I was coming of age in the 80's and was very promiscuous in my younger days.  The outbreaks did curb some of that activity but not all and to think that you can't be infected in todays day and age is so frightening.  I have seen first hand patients (they same age as you) fighting for their life with this disease. 

Edited March 8, 2013 by KC Grim

[Fishwings]

KC's statistics are right, but I can see where Tetrefine is coming from.

 

Depending on where you live in/what community you are apart of, HIV might not be that prevalent at all. It also differs disproportionately between ethnicities and people of different lifestyles. It is also a harder disease to be transmitted as other venereal diseases such as HPV or herpes because it needs specific conditions for transmission to be successful (your sexual position, what type of wounds, your viral load count).

 

However, HIV can also APPEAR to be much less prevalent because of the effectiveness of new antiretrovirals that have it way easier for people to hide their status. Also many people with AIDS just say they have cancer because they don't want the associated stigma.

 

In short, your location determines whether HIV might or might not be prevalent, and new technologies and the stigma that is associated with AIDS have made the incidence of HIV infections appear to be lower. But of course... it is obviously still around.

Edited March 8, 2013 by FishWings

[Y_B]

Ummm AIDS is very much still here and a serious concern.

 

The PROBLEM is our generation is so detached from reality as to think it's become a non-issue. We become more careless during sex because we think there's a cure for everything, with every advancement in medicine, we think we're free to do as we please because there's gotta be a pill for it. Well, in many cases, true, but it still SUCKS to get an STD and you can definitely still get HIV.

[Celethiel]

Rustle I don't doubt your sexuality, I doubt your age, No one can be 0 and be speaking on a forum

not to mention having any idea on sex

 

Sex, sexuality, and permiscuity is as varied as the individual because no person is like another person, especially opinions on the subject...

This includes Gay permiscuity and Heterosexual permiscuity... after all look at my father, strait as a rod, lived 56 years, and had 4 wives and I have no idea how many girlfriends and probably stepped out on all of them at least once.... the proceeded to say they were stepping out on him, and get ride of them.

 

Oh and btw, *eats the Crazyfish* Tasty

Edited March 8, 2013 by Celethiel

[crazyfish]

Either way, even though the drugs do manage the disease, you still don't want to live with the hassle of managing HIV everyday.  The drugs allow you to live longer, but eventually, the probability of viral resistance increases as you live longer and you might run out of cocktails to keep them buggers down.   

 

It's funny. We all have our own risk tolerance. The cost/benefit analysis is different for everybody. Live hot then crash and burn? Or live cold,and then still crash and burn on some other ailment? That's for you, yourself and you to decide.

 

Anyway, I don't believe being gay means you're promiscuous.  However, it is sad to see gay men accept for themselves damaging stereotypes like Christopher Stoddard does.  To use a religious term, that's just bondage. 

Edited March 8, 2013 by crazyfish

[rustle]

Rustle I don't doubt your sexuality, I doubt your age, No one can be 0 and be speaking on a forum

not to mention having any idea on sex

 

Sex, sexuality, and permiscuity is as varied as the individual because no person is like another person, especially opinions on the subject...

This includes Gay permiscuity and Heterosexual permiscuity... after all look at my father, strait as a rod, lived 56 years, and had 4 wives and I have no idea how many girlfriends and probably stepped out on all of them at least once.... the proceeded to say they were stepping out on him, and get ride of them.

 

Oh and btw, *eats the Crazyfish* Tasty

Cel, have I told you lately just how sexy your ears are?

 

Chronologically, I'm 55. But age is just a number, unless that number is under 18. Then, it's a legal issue.

 

 

Edited March 8, 2013 by rustle

[Zombie]

KC is right - sorry, no likes left And TetRefine is right when he says "we most likely didn't know anyone who had AIDS". Neither did the young guys in the 1980s. But TetRefine is dead wrong when he says "the whole AIDS thing ... that's removed from my generation completely".

The 2012 annual UN AIDS Report on the global AIDS epidemic reports that in the United States the incidence rate of HIV infection among adults 15–49 years old between 2001–2011 is merely "stable" i.e. the risks of getting AIDS in the US has not reduced over the last 10 years.

Most people perceive risk - but don't understand it. If you regularly have unprotected bareback sex with multiple partners it's reasonable to assume they do likewise. So when you're having unprotected sex with your next partner, in effect you're also having unprotected sex with each of their partners, and all of their partners partners and ... well, you get the picture. It's naive to think that all those guys - the ones you don't know about [see previous sentence] - come from healthy white middle America. They will include drug users and people from all ethnic backgrounds, quite possibly in other countries - yeah, people travel to exotic places and, guess what, they have sex there too.

And crazyfish is spot on when he says "Either way, even though the drugs do manage the disease, you still don't want to live with the hassle of managing HIV everyday.  The drugs allow you to live longer, but eventually, the probability of viral resistance increases as you live longer and you might run out of cocktails to keep them buggers down."

 

At the end of the day it's your choice guys. But don't delude yourselves that it's a risk free choice. Because it isn't. And the consequences for you if that risk turns to reality are just fucking terrible.

[rustle]

The risk remains the same. Meds have masked it.

 

True story: Before the AIDS epidemic, herpes became an issue. A co-worker stated,"I think herpes is the greatest thing in the world for encouraging people to get married and not sleep around."

[crazyfish]

Oh and btw, *eats the Crazyfish* Tasty

Wah, wah, please don't eat me 

[Celethiel]

Cel, have I told you lately just how sexy your ears are?

 

Chronologically, I'm 55. But age is just a number, unless that number is under 18. Then, it's a legal issue.

*Blushes to the point his ears turn red*

 

The risk remains the same. Meds have masked it.

 

True story: Before the AIDS epidemic, herpes became an issue. A co-worker stated,"I think herpes is the greatest thing in the world for encouraging people to get married and not sleep around."

 

Well look at the history of Sexual diseases, I mean The Pirate Blackbeard Blockaded Charleston to get medicines for the treatment of such things as the Clap (gonorrhea)... Sexual diseases have always been a problem for those who are permiscuis and by default those who are not, either to treat it, the fear of it, or because a frisky person who was such gave the disease to them.

 

Wah, wah, please don't eat me 

wells fish are healthy for you

[Rilbur]

While the conversation on AIDS is probably useful (yes, it's still happening, yes, it's deadly, yes you're an idiot if youignore it), we're starting to drift a bit.

 

To touch back on the original topic (or at least the topic title...), does being gay mean being promiscuous   No, not automatically.  But it's an assumption that's actually halfway logical.

 

To be blunt, men have higher sex drives than women (especially in the 15-25 age bracket), and a much lower reluctance (cost of entry, whatever) than they do to -- no pregnancy to worry about.  Men are more interested in sex, men are more driven to seek it out, and men are less likely to shy away from it for various reasons.  On top of which, while women in general have an emotionally focused sex drive (relationship to partner is what's important), men are much more strongly signaled by physical clues -- which is to say, a woman wants to please her man, a guy gets going because he sees something 'fun'.

 

It's no surprise that gay men tend to be more promiscuous -- tend to have more sex -- because their partner is going to be just as interested in 'getting it on' as they are, rather than being the restraining force.  Nothing immoral about it, just applied biology and sociology.

[TetRefine]

When I said my generation is removed, I DID NOT mean that it was gone. I'm not stupid. What I meant was that it isn't as prevalent to us as it was to the older guys. I didn't grow up seeing people wiped out left and right from the disease, so the issue is not as pressing to many people my age. Obviously I know I can still get it which is why I put on a fucking condom when I have sex. But it is not the forefront issue in gay culture anymore like it was in the 1980s. 

[JamesSavik]

The answer to this question is "Yes", "No" and "Maybe".

 

Yes. There are promiscuous gay people out there. They are usually not very well adjusted and probably won't identify themselves as gay. Go out. You'll meet one. They'll tell you that they are not really gay they just want you to **** their living brainz out. Living in the bible belt, I see this sort six times a day and a dozen times on Sunday. They are really messed up because they are trying to live in several mutually exclusive worlds at once- the gay hook up scene, marriage and/or religion. When these guys crash, they crash and burn. They leave a lot of devastation behind. When they get caught doing something UN-natural with six trucker and Billy-goat at a rest stop, they destroy or damage many lives.

 

 

NO. Sane gay people learned a lot of painful lessons from the HIV epidemic. I lost more friends than I want to even think about. In a way I am surrounded by a lot of ghosts. I've made myself pretty ill trying to figure out why I'm still alive and they're gone. It's a dumb ass virus. Why it kills Joe and Kevin and passes by Steve is simply a matter of probability and behavior. If you are SAFE, you probably won't be sorry.

 

The simple truth is that our behavior really has changed a great deal in the last few decades. More and more gay people are less and less willing to settle for Mr. Right-Now..

 

 

Maybe. How exactly do you define promiscuous? Four a decade? Four a year? Four a month? Four a week? Four a day?

 

I don't care for those sorts of value judgements. In the end, it's really nobody's business but your own. I have screwed around and not screwed around. I find that my life works best when I simply live it and quit keeping score.