Gay Spaced Out?
From the Bat Cave to KFC: Gay Spaces in the Philippines
By Frolic Tan Lopez

Any person found guilty of any of the offenses covered by this articles shall be punished by arresto menor or a fine not exceeding 200 pesos, and in case of recidivism, by arresto mayor in its medium period to prision correccional in its minimum period or a fine ranging from 200 to 2,000 pesos, or both, in the discretion of the court.

The somewhat overlook at the gay space, particularly at “male homosexual activity in public and semipublic locations is a central but seldom explored dimension of gay culture around the world,” states William Leap, professor of anthropology at The American University, who edited Public Sex/Gay Space.  “The majority of existing research emphasizes the impersonality of such erotic interaction and underscores the element of danger involved.  While never denying the danger of anonymous public sex in the age of AIDS, (there is a need to) go beyond narrow moralisms about the need to regulate unsafe sexual practices to discuss the significance of sex in public."

SPECTER OF FEAR

Writing for the National Review (Beds, Bathhouses, and Beyond: The Return of Public Sex), Rod Dreher noted how the traditional concept of gay space, especially as it pertains to public sex, has been changed by the Internet.  “The Internet is making (things) possible, e.g. finding out where orgies are being held in your city on any given day is as easy as checking the Dow,” Dreher writes.

This is most certainly true in orgiastic gatherings organized early on in IRC and mIRC, with such channels as #gaysex, #gaybareback, and #bimanila, and later in, among others, Guys4Men.com (e.g. “Hot Jocks in Ortigas, One Nyt Only – Send Face Pics for Verification”; “10 Tops, in Need of 5 Bottoms, Venue TBA”; or “By-Invite Orgy – Send Face Pics First, Wait for Approval”), Fridae.com (e.g. “Join Hot Men in Makati”), and LifeOut.com (e.g. “Find Hot Men Do It in Your Area”).

True to its original intent, the Internet helped make the world smaller – in the case of creating gay space, it made not just the creation of space easier (e.g. in Guys4Men.com, “First Batch: 3pm; Second Batch, 8pm”, and “FYI – Change of Venue, Bottoms Still Needed”), but also highly temporary (e.g. interchangeable hotel rooms along Makati Avenue or condominiums in Ortigas Center versus the earlier beat more defined and space-limited beats in Ayala Avenue or Gold Cinema), so that, nowadays, the beat can be anywhere anytime.

In the US, for example, “During the first wave of the AIDS epidemic, some city governments, including San Francisco's, closed the gay bathhouses, where public, anonymous sex was common, and which therefore served as incubators of the plague.  This time, though, it is much more difficult to devise measures to crack down on public sex.  For one thing, many barebacking parties occur in private residences.  For another, a man craving anonymous sex need not risk arrest by prowling in public toilets or city parks for his fix; he has only to log on to the Internet, where willing partners and private locations for trysts are only a few mouse-clicks away,” Dreher says.

Similarly, as was the case in Makati City before Ayala Avenue was developed, cops closed the beats – still happening now in, among others, gay venues in E. Rodriguez and in Cubao in Quezon City, and at rundown cinemas in the city of Manila, though not to promote safer sexual practices, but because of the owners’ inability to buy off the same cops, in most cases.  All the same, the Internet has delimited the need for these spaces, as the act can now be organized sans the cops’ awareness through the Internet.

In this scenario, the bigger concern is in promoting safer sex.  True, Guys4Men.com adds in orgy ads a safer sex manifesto, but it has no way of monitoring its implementation, really.  According to Gabriel Rotello in Sexual Ecology: AIDS and the Destiny of Gay Men (1997), and as quoted by Dreher, "people will have to accept the fact that the unlimited, unstructured pursuit of absolute sexual freedom (is) biologically disastrous for gay men.  (It only takes) a small number of gay men who engage in unprotected sex with multiple partners to keep the (HIV) epidemic alive.”

With most profiles of chat room members organizing and participating in the orgies self-described as “Sometimes” and “Most of the Time” safer sex practitioners, as opposed to “Always,” then, really, the worry remains.

Dreher believes not just in focusing on “social condemnation… as the the only realistic measure that can be taken to combat this behavior,” but in “holding gay-male society accountable for the nihilistic, erotomaniacal subculture that sustains the killing and dying.”

But Frank N. doesn’t completely concur.  “Yes, there’s that need to make MSMs, especially those using the gay space, traditional form or not, responsible for their actions in (these spaces),” he says, “but a change in attitude (of the general populace).”

Frank N. can cite over 50 gay spaces that once were, or still are in use now, and he “completely understands why such will never be removed, no matter the moralizing of the society.”  “The thing is, a gay space will always be created no matter what,” he says.  “Accept that, and take steps, instead not in closing a space that will just mushroom elsewhere, but in giving the knowledge to those who frequent there to look after themselves while there.  That, really, is the only thing that can be done that won’t be taken the wrong way.