Saturday, August 23, 2008
Looking Back at 1964
Recently I visited the GLBT Historical Society home in San Francisco. It was a group visit and a volunteer explained to us the collection of their many thousands of documents and memorabilia. While listening to him, I realized that I had three publications to contribute to their collection.
The first two items are copies of One magazine. One, based in Los Angeles, was one of the first homosexual publications in the US. I bought my first copy, in 1964, while still living in Toronto. One had lots of trouble with the US postal authorities that accused them of disseminating pornographic written material through the mails. Nonetheless, they managed to send their publication even to foreign countries. After reading a few copies, I decided to write a story for this publication about my cruising adventures in Mexico. My story was called Papacito and the Jotos (Daddy and the Queers) about a Mexican police detective who shakes down homosexuals. During my first four-month-stay in Mexico, I ran into a lot of these “detectives,” some of whom were probably detective-impersonators. But since a small mordida (the famous Mexican bribe) would take care of the mess, it was simply the cost of doing business. In those days, it was far better than a possible jail sentence in other countries, including the US and Canada. Naturally, I did not use my own name. The editors assigned me the pseudonym Gary Teller.
My second article, published by the same magazine in 1965, from my new home in San Francisco, was titled The Hustlers in Our Midst. It could have been written in 2008 with two exceptions. The age of the former hustlers, now sex workers, has risen considerably, and street hustling is almost defunct, at least in San Francisco. In 1965, I was in my early thirties; even then I did a lot better with paid sex workers then with “freebies.” In the long run, this has actually been of great advantage. As I grew older, I did not feel that because of my age I had to pay for sex.
The third article for Vector, the San Francisco publication of SIR (Society for Individual Rights), one of the earliest gay male organizations in the US, was published in 1965. I titled it “I Give You My Word As a Homosexual,” lamenting even then the flakiness of gay sexual activities. After the article was printed, a number of older men explained to me that the flakiness (this word was not in vogue then) was a result of the terrible oppression we all had to endure. Forty-two years later I wrote in my blog about the very same subject. Now I am convinced that when it comes to sex, homosexual or heterosexual, many people will do whatever they feel they have to do to fulfill their carnal desires, with little or no regard to social mores.
Well, in a way, for gays, the world is a better place now. The Mexican police do not routinely shake us down; the postal authorities are not harassing us; the hustlers of yore are now sex workers, in most cases more professional and, as a group, even somewhat affluent. Only the sexual flakiness stayed with us!
Recently I visited the GLBT Historical Society home in San Francisco. It was a group visit and a volunteer explained to us the collection of their many thousands of documents and memorabilia. While listening to him, I realized that I had three publications to contribute to their collection.
The first two items are copies of One magazine. One, based in Los Angeles, was one of the first homosexual publications in the US. I bought my first copy, in 1964, while still living in Toronto. One had lots of trouble with the US postal authorities that accused them of disseminating pornographic written material through the mails. Nonetheless, they managed to send their publication even to foreign countries. After reading a few copies, I decided to write a story for this publication about my cruising adventures in Mexico. My story was called Papacito and the Jotos (Daddy and the Queers) about a Mexican police detective who shakes down homosexuals. During my first four-month-stay in Mexico, I ran into a lot of these “detectives,” some of whom were probably detective-impersonators. But since a small mordida (the famous Mexican bribe) would take care of the mess, it was simply the cost of doing business. In those days, it was far better than a possible jail sentence in other countries, including the US and Canada. Naturally, I did not use my own name. The editors assigned me the pseudonym Gary Teller.
My second article, published by the same magazine in 1965, from my new home in San Francisco, was titled The Hustlers in Our Midst. It could have been written in 2008 with two exceptions. The age of the former hustlers, now sex workers, has risen considerably, and street hustling is almost defunct, at least in San Francisco. In 1965, I was in my early thirties; even then I did a lot better with paid sex workers then with “freebies.” In the long run, this has actually been of great advantage. As I grew older, I did not feel that because of my age I had to pay for sex.
The third article for Vector, the San Francisco publication of SIR (Society for Individual Rights), one of the earliest gay male organizations in the US, was published in 1965. I titled it “I Give You My Word As a Homosexual,” lamenting even then the flakiness of gay sexual activities. After the article was printed, a number of older men explained to me that the flakiness (this word was not in vogue then) was a result of the terrible oppression we all had to endure. Forty-two years later I wrote in my blog about the very same subject. Now I am convinced that when it comes to sex, homosexual or heterosexual, many people will do whatever they feel they have to do to fulfill their carnal desires, with little or no regard to social mores.
Well, in a way, for gays, the world is a better place now. The Mexican police do not routinely shake us down; the postal authorities are not harassing us; the hustlers of yore are now sex workers, in most cases more professional and, as a group, even somewhat affluent. Only the sexual flakiness stayed with us!
Labels: Looking Back at 1964
