Adam Phillips

So many gay men have gone through this same experience. Some day, hopefully, being gay will be so uncontroversial that people won't feel any pressure, either internal or external, to try to be straight.

Thanks. I'm glad you're enjoying Brushfire, and yes, it will be finished before March is over. In the meantime, why don't you start on my longer (and first) story, Crosscurrents? It's finished, and most readers have found it a worthwhile read.

Thanks, Jeremy, for the comments about dialogue. I think in a way that many authors invest pieces of themselves into a number of their characters. It makes some sense: I'm the only person I can possibly know from the inside out, so to speak, so it would make sense for some of my fictional characters to be constructed from pieces of "self." And if I didn't have the open-minded life partners I do, I might well have been set for the kind of fall Jeff experienced.

I won't say that I always get it right, but in dialogue I try to "hear it in my head" before I write it. I want my dialogue to be faithful to the way people actually talk. I'm glad you liked the sex scenes. Some people complained that I had too much erotica in Crosscurrents, but I came to gay narrative looking steamy scenes,and I think it's perfectly legitimate to combine interesting storylines with steamy sex scenes.

Thanks, Joann. I appreciate your appreciation, and I'm glad you're liking the story. A moment of honesty: The sex scene wasn't difficult to write, because I was fantasizing about what it would be like to have an encounter with the real-life guy this fictional story is based on.

There's an Argentinian writer, Jorge Luis Borges, who wrote a book about scoundrels and thieves and thugs and murderers and liars. The English translation of the title is A Universal History of Iniquity. Yeah, shut up. Just because I'm a Texan and a math boy, that don't mean I never read anything. Anyway, as I called up my wife to lie about where I'd be the next couple of hours, I couldn't shake the feeling that what was about to happen to me belonged right in that book next to the story abo

One of the functioning phones my grandparents have in their house is a rotary phone. Still. Outside of that, they weren't common in my world, but I never felt stumped by them. I can remember a light going on once in my head, so to speak, when I was a kid as I realized, "Ohhh....this is why we say we DIAL phone numbers."

Cave porn; I like it.

I didn't want to continue to hijack Graeme's thread--which was about his son, not about the merits or evils of porn per se--but the discussion got me thinking about porn, and it also got me thinking about how difficult it is to devise reliable instruments to assess whether or not porn is harmful. Or helpful, for that matter. So I thought I'd just muse a little "out loud," so to speak, and invite others to chime in. It's all anectodal, and it's based on what I've experienced and seen others experience, so anything I say could be total crap. But I'm gonna say it anyway. Every male I know past a certain age has had at least some exposure to porn, and the vast majority has sought it out. And it's everywhere, and there's no way, short of taking the doors off rooms, installing video cameras in every corner of your house, and installing a tracking chip in your kid, that you can absolutely insure that boys past a certain age will have zero chance for exposure to porn. I've been looking at porn since I was thirteen. I still look at it. I'm now married and have two kids. I have another permanent intimate relationship outside my marriage, with my best friend from childhood, but that's also a stable and good thing. And both my wife and his know about it. And beyond that, my wife knows I look at porn sometimes. Hell, sometimes she even looks at it with me. It's not an obsession, and it's not something I feel as though I have to pry myself away from. I use it sometimes for enjoyment. What I'm trying to say is that I think I have a stable, responsible, and productive approach to my love life and sex life. I don't feel that porn damaged me as a kid or damages me now. I want to speak to the issue of porn's alleged tendency to desensitize viewers and the alleged tendency for vanilla porn to seduce viewers into rougher, vile porn--and then into vile real-world sexual activity. From there I want to look at its alleged characteristic of always portraying sex and relationship in toxic ways, its alleged without-exception degradation of women, and its alleged basis in power and abuse of power rather than in intimacy, or even in sex per se. First of all, it seems to me that these generalizations get applied across the board and universally, when they do, by extrapolating from people who have gotten fixated and harmed by porn or have done harmful things with others because of their use of porn, whether in its vanilla flavors or its more extreme, clearly toxic forms. In many other theoretical contexts we're well aware of the flawed logic of that kind of thinking; but because we're all so spooked by the awful things that can happen when sexuality goes awry and when there are predators out there ready to exploit people's sexuality, I think we're susceptible to panicked and less-than-clear reasoning on this. You want to talk de-sensitization? I think it's actually dangerous to characterize these potentially disastrous consequences of porn as something inherent in porn and in the porn-viewing experience. Because I think when people then view porn and realize that lo and behold the sky hasn't fallen after all, then they become de-sensitized to any kind of caution and assume that since the naysayers "lied" to them about what was going to happen, obviously porn is completely benign and there's nothing to watch out for. As for the supposed de-sensitization that porn causes rather than the de-sensitization that anti-porn propaganda causes, what I hear lies along two lines: First, the claim that extreme, toxic types of porn can desensitize a person to to the outrageousness of that toxic porn and to "normal," healthy sex and sexuality. Secondly, the claim that steady exposure to even "normal" porn will blunt a person's desire for actual sex and lovemaking, especially because in porn we typically only watch amazingly hot people doing sexual things, and our own sex lives are not always going to be filled with amazingly hot people. As for the first allegation, I'll make this self-observation. There are many kinds of porn that gross me out. Have I deliberately viewed some of these types? Sure. Usually only once. Depending on what it is, either the revulsion factor or the boredom factor kicks in pretty quickly. My point: When people go overboard on, god forbid, snuff porn, or scat, or s&m, or whatever...it's because there's something inside them that already leans in that direction. The icky porn did not take a "normal" person and pervert their desires. It's misguided to blame the icky porn for that. Does the icky porn amp up the desire of the person who likes it and make it more likely that he'll indulge in that in the real world? Nobody knows at this point, I think. But it seems at least equally plausible that if that a person could sate his desire for the icky thing by participating in it safely and vicariously through viewing icky porn, it might possibly make him less likely to do it in real life. And there's no way to test this out, because if there are people who are actually helped in this way, they are, obviously, unknown to us. We never see them or hear from them because their weird kink has no real-world visibility. As far as weirdness in porn goes, my opinion is that if it's not illegal or clearly dangerous, one person's "ick factor" is another person's fetish, and no big deal. For example: God knows why, but I have an "armpit thing." Hairy or shaved, male or female, armpits do it for me, lol. And I have no idea why. For some people that's gross. Others out there "get it." It's not all that uncommon. For others, feet get them off. I can't relate; feet do nothing for me. It seems weird. But whatever. In any case, my exposure to "porn armpits" has not translated into being obsessed with armpits in real-world sex and lovemaking. Likewise, watching hot people get sexual in porn has not blunted my desire for real world sex with real world partners. To be honest, my two lifelong sex partners are as hot as any porn star!! lol In my opinion, anyway. But I've also watched and enjoyed porn featuring "average" people. I watch porn, when I watch it, for a little sexual variety. A nice body I haven't seen before. The opportunity to watch someone else go at it. Whatever. It doesn't dominate my life or my sexual activity. And I guarantee that for those people it does dominate, there was something cooking inside them already, before they even started up with the porn. It seems unfair to condemn porn for that. Porn is not out there waiting to subvert you. It's that some people are emotionally predisposed for subversion. And if we were to denigrate, or worse, outlaw everything that some some people could be subverted/perverted by, then we'd have to outlaw a hell of a lot of good, or at least benign, things in our culture, not just porn. And as for more benign porn seducing viewers into more bizarre porn: I reject this contention on the same grounds that I reject the claim that there are "gateway" drugs that inevitably seduce the user beyond them and into worse drugs. The logic is obvious, and flawed. Of course users of hard drugs started with more benign drugs: the more benign drugs were easier to procure and less immediately dangerous! But it doesn't follow that all users of those more benign drugs are destined toward harder drugs. There are millions of disconfirming examples out there. I'm one of them. The same thing applies to porn. Next allegation: Porn portrays sex in unhealthy ways and is actually more about human beings exploting their power and victimizing others with it. This argument is often further focused by suggesting porn is particularly degrading of women. First, I'm gonna call bullshit. That's just not true. Male gay porn exploits women??? But let's leave that trivial objection behind: There is in fact a sizeable niche in the porn market produced by women and designed to feature hot straight models depicting intimate, mutually pleasurable sex. I've watched some of this: It's hot! I've watched it with my wife even. We both enjoy it. But there is plenty of porn not made and marketed like that which still features sex between men and women that is not explotive. Beyond that, an incredibly popular genre of of porn these days is the amateur video. There are mountains of amateur sex videos out there which depict basically healthy lovemaking, or more often, basically healthy lust, in which not even a HINT of abuse is going on. Now some people may think hair-pulling or spanking are demeaning...but again, they don't have to be. While spanking isn't a kink of mine, I don't mind a hard slap on the butt once in a while from either partner; it's actually kind of hot. And neither my wife or man consider it demeaning for me to do it to them. Context, and the particulars of the relationship under consideration, are everything. Beyond that, anyone who concludes from watching explotive, degrading porn that sex is about degradation and lording power over someone...well, that person already has screwed-up ideas about sex and power. For the rest of us, we recognize something that's screwed up when we see it. Furthermore, if we're talking about teenagers being exposed to this porn when their sexual attitudes are still under construction, I contend that it is the parents' responsibility to talk to their kids not just about the facts of life but also about what good, mutual lovemaking is all about, and about how our sex drives are not excuses for us to use, dehumanize, or manipulate people. The absence of degrading porn can't supply what parents don't, and the presence of degrading porn won't subvert a kid who has had positive values instilled and who has had a chance to practice these values in his everyday life. Of course there is degrading porn out there. There is porn for every flavor of sexual desire, from the healthy to the benign to the absolutely toxic. But healthy people don't seek out toxic porn. And toxic porn doesn't poison healthy people. And again, if we disallowed or denigrated every influence that poisons unhealthy people, we'd have many more and bigger things to crusade against than porn. Finally, and on a similar note...I just don't see that the majority of porn is about abuse of power. I just don't see it. No porn I've ever enjoyed has featured that kind of exploitation. Yes, I know that kind of porn is out there. But to claim that porn is all like that is just factually incorrect. And anyway, don't many of us from time to time do a little dominating-and-submitting play in sex? If so, what's wrong with it? And in an ordinarily healthy person, if looking at an s&m porn or a dom/sub porn is appealing, and if said viewer isn't out there victimizing the world (and whether that's the case or not can't be determined, because nobody even knows if that person is enjoying fantasy-only versions of that!), then what's the harm? I'll beat the readers over the head with it one more time: Almost anything can be used to reinforce an unhealthy person's unhealthy attitudes and practices. We shouldn't deride all those things, though. They themselves are not the problem, as demonstrated by the fact that most people don't have trouble with them.

I join Mark in expressing skepticism about desensitization and about the concept of a "gateway." I'm also very leery of the notion we have of addiction as something that people fall into out of nowhere. These things become realities in certain life contexts. If a young teenager is being guided by his parents into forging a life that is characterized by moderation and balance and a sense of self that isn't totally isolated from family and larger community, and a commitment to productive activity, then he's unlikely to be automatically snared by pornography and desensitized to sexuality. The whole "gateway" thing is a notion we've arrived at after the facts observed by looking at actual addicts and their paths toward addiction, and from there we've proceeded to view addiction as some looming threat to everyone who partakes or or partcipates in substances or experiences that some people have become addicted to. The key, I think, is to stay aware of your child, and while granting him reasonable privacy, to be aware of what he's doing, not let him isolate excessively, not let him focus his time and energies on only one thing, not to allow too much alone-time. These are things my parents did with us. My little brother had some difficulties with substances in college, but that's because he was trying to escape an experience from his past that he hadn't had the resources to resolve successfully when he was younger. He got through it, and he's fine now. Also...the whole thing about power is way off the mark. And quite frankly I'd dispute that porn consistently degrades women and glorifies abuse of power over them. Is there porn out there like that? Sure there is. There's also NON-porn out there like that. There's an element of political correctness to this regularly-seen indictment of pornography that simulatneously wearies me and makes me a little queasy. My boys are 3 and 7, and so this isn't a real issue for me yet, but I hope I have a clear enough understanding of what I'm supposed to be about that when the issue of porn inevitably comes up, I won't be cavalier but also won't go into a tailspin.

Way to go, Sharon. Just want to add my thanks for your support and e-friendship over the years.

I always have more than one book going. Here's one that I'm about halfway through: The Rented Mule by Bobby Cole. Cooper Dixon should have it made, with a beautiful wife, Kelly, two great kids, and a thriving business, the Tower Agency. But for Cooper, things aren’t turning out how he expected. He and Kelly are caught in a never-ending cycle of arguments—Cooper can’t remember the last time they had sex. And Cooper’s troubled business partner, Gates Ballenger, is scheming to sell the Tower Agency out from under him. When a gang of criminals is hired by a mysterious client to kidnap Kelly and set up Cooper to take the fall, Cooper’s life goes completely off the rails. The cops quickly zero in on Cooper as the prime suspect, and the combination of an attractive suburban mother, workaholic husband, and a million-dollar insurance policy makes the case primetime television fodder. Soon, Cooper’s face is plastered on every TV screen in the country. Cooper races against time to find his wife before the gang turns her over to their client, whose plan to take down Cooper is far more sinister than anyone could imagine. I'm enjoying the storyline. Unfortunately, the writing itself is flat and clunky, and it tends to beat the reader over the head stating the obvious. Clearly, nobody ever taught Bobby the "Show us, don't tell us" principle. I'd give it a 6 out of a possible 10. At least at this stage in the reading. Maybe on the Savik scale that translates into a 3.0. :-)

Interesting premise; interesting question. I'll add it to my list.

I wouldn't hold my breath for Michele to be another Angie. And of course, what makes Denny even more intuitive is that at this point, nothing overt has happened between Jeff and Fitz. Thanks for reading, Lisa.

Glad to be back and posting chapters to Gay Authors again, Mickey. Thanks for reading. And yeah, I think many gay and bi men go through versions of what Jeff is going through.

Actually, most biologists will tell you that evolution isn't "the survival of the fittest." It's not some natural form of eugenics. It's the "survival of the fit enough." There's a difference. Not every trait gets passed on because it was superior for survival. Many traits get passed on because they aren't detrimental to survival. And James is absolutely on the money that evolutionary adaptations serve the population rather than the individual.

Her pettiness obscures what might be a somewhat valid point, which is that in today's publishing world, it's difficult for new voices to get a hearing. That being said, it was poor form, it was sour grapes, it was a whine that makes me completely uninterested in checking out any novel that she might have to offer.

Board shorts. Even on the guys who look good in Speedos. For whatever reason, the look appeals to me more than Speedos. In the bedroom, I like briefs just fine. But out in the wild, unless it involves diving or competitive swimming or water polo or something, I like board shorts better than Speedos. Gives you a chance to focus on the guy's chest, and that's not a bad thing.

Yes. Well. I think maybe Mark's early comments at GA weren't always perceived as improving anything... And it'll be a cold day in hell before you ever get accolades from me. I'm still steamed about 1968. (You know I love you madly)

Hey, Jason. Welcome to this den of iniquity!

I've lived those tensions and that conflict, RLC, so I didn't have to reach too deeply inside to get some insight. I'm glad you think I managed to represent all that with some accuracy.

I have to admit, I enjoyed the hell out of the core imagery when I started writing this. As I mentioned before, Crosscurents was stifling me and I needed a break from it, so I just let go and started throwing my creative juices at this one. The results were rewarding to me. I'm glad you liked it.

If you've read any literary criticism, you know that there's a lot of debate about the degree to which the author's intent is germane to the meaning of the story. I have to admit that my take on what Denny said and how and why he said it is somewhat different from yours. But that's not to say that none of that's in there. The ideas and images that fill a writer's story are not uniquely his and are not his property. Or, to put it another way, we're all swimming in the same wide river. I'll explain that some time if you're ever suffering from insomnia. ;-)

I hope you've seen that a second chapter is posted.

Thanks, Breeze.