Cottaging

[TimeAtTheBar]

Is very much still a thing.

My best friend is an older gay man, long term single. Several times a week he visits the ‘naughty toilets’ at several locations around our (small, conservative) town to, er, get his needs met. It’s a whole thing. There are websites and an app to arrange encounters, but you can also just go to these locations on the off chance and there’s a system/signal.

I’m very open minded but I do find it pretty shocking. Also I didn’t know opportunist cottaging was still a thing with the advent of Grindr etc.

He is obviously horrified by the creeping trend for unisex toilets. And it got me thinking that this behaviour is EXACTLY why they are a horrible idea.

Men are just SO different from women. Different motivations, different needs, different boundaries. This drive to pretend we are exactly the same and can pick and choose which one we are is fundamentally a big fat lie.

Im just posting for thoughts really. A post on another thread (the one about wtf moments) made me think of it.

I also have another friend who is happily single but uses Grindr for one off encounters several times a week and from what they both say this is standard behaviour for many gay men. It’s not just the risk of assaults in mixed spaces, it’s the behaviour of men in general, gay or straight.

@SphincterSaysWhat

What the hell? Have I missed something?

Cottaging has always been and continues to be part of gay culture (obviously not all gay men partake). I think it must be quite liberating to have that choice to be honest. I remember being at a gay bar with a couple of friends in the 90s and when I needed the toilet, they insisted on coming with me, instructed me not to use the womens as that was used for other stuff and stood guard outside while I used the mens.

I've been meaning to talk about this, as a 60-something 2nd wave Lesbian. Gay men and Gay women have nothing in common, other than same-sex attraction. Gay men, no matter how effeminate, are men, and their behaviors even more so. So saunas, cottaging, causal sex in a long-term relationship etc are male behavior.

Lesbians do not do this. The old lesbian joke: What does a Lesbian bring on a 2nd date? A u-haul (to move in) is/was absolutely true. Lesbians yearn to get together, build a nest, buy a cat, be joined at the hip, have long intense discussions (save me) be each other's best friends. They are women, even the butch lesbians wants this.

And this is why though het women were shocked we older lesbians weren't surprised when it came to trans, women were thrown under the bus, especially by gay men.. Most of the lesbians from my generation have harsh words for gay men, especially after what support we gave them during the AIDS epidemic.

So wake up ladies. I left the LGBT around 2015 when it became 'queer' I could see what what happening and it wasn't to lesbians' benefit. Now I only care for and about women's rights and orgs. Full stop. We need to help young girls gay, bi or straight need to grow up strong, love their bodies, assert their sexual boundaries and say 'no' firmly to porn-saturated culture.

If I could I'd give every teenage girl a copy of Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch and Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex.

My local library had to close their publicly available toilets because of cottaging, holes drilled in cubicles etc. Of course, when they closed the men's they had to close the women's as well, cos discrimination.

Ironically, complaints led to them opening one self-contained, unisex toilet, for which you need to ask the entry code at the desk. I know someone who works there and they've had instances of one person asks for the code and then meets their "ahem" friend and they both go into the toilet.

Most of the lesbians from my generation have harsh words for gay men, especially after what support we gave them during the AIDS epidemic

I often think about how much support lesbians gave gay men in the 80s / 90s and how they must feel abandoned by a lot of them now. You’re right, gay are men first and foremost, with the drives and privileges of men and most don’t seem concerned about what is happening to women as a result of this ideology.

*gay men are men first and foremost

Look at you claiming to not understand what laws are. Precious.

Games have rules, so obviously rules and laws are not the same thing, and laws vary nationally anyway… so?

Our local pool switched to unisex changing rooms about 3 years ago - I think as it’s a university-owned facility that was probably in response to early identity politics in the student body, but actually as (according to DH) it was not uncommon to find men fondling each other in the showers I am so so grateful my children don’t need to experience that.

I though you’d start talking when I called you out. Well done 😀

@FunnyTalks I did it once, flashed the lights in a known dogging car park, except back then I didn't know it was used for that. I'm not sure who was more petrified when I screamed, me or the bloke staring through the window screen.

🤷‍♀️

Omg we need details

@QueenHippolyta
"And this is why though het women were shocked we older lesbians weren't surprised when it came to trans, women were thrown under the bus, especially by gay men.. Most of the lesbians from my generation have harsh words for gay men, especially after what support we gave them during the AIDS epidemic."

You are so spot on. And I havent heard your view much, but it reflects my experience. I'm not a lesbian, just a normal older het woman with plenty of gay male friends. Or at least I thought they were friends. During this whole trans debate over the last few years this has upset me the most - I supported them with their causes, yet they can only parrot at me "TWAW". And of course they are not.

There's a lay-by bear here used for such purposes, in very inclusive though, straight, gay, trans. I was given the heads up to avoid!

So important that this is said.

The acronym LGBTQ+ really just has L at the front as a decoy, all it stands for is men doing whatever they want and everyone else can either applaud them or shut up. The LGBTQ school clubs and lobbyists and charities exist to work against the interests of all women, lesbians included.

It's absurd to think that only gay men are involved in this sort of thing. Cottaging and swinging are massive with straight people. Gay men are also, by and large, very conservative in their behaviour as most straight people.

Well it certainly seem to be biological.

There are a few straight people who do this sort of thing, but no, the percentages are not comparable.

You are so right, Queen.

As a non-lesbian feminist, I think because we'd supported gay rights so fervently, we believed that gay men would support us when we needed help. Lucky we didn't hold our breath.

I mean there's still AIDS you know.

🙌

I'll just throw this in.

www.southwarknews.co.uk/news/burgess-park-court-injunction-stopping-men-having-sex-in-bushes-is-homophobic-says-peter-tatchell/?utm_