Justin Sayre premieres The New Hanky Code

For those of you who’ve never heard of the Hanky Code, allow me to give you the SparkNotes version: back before you could just list your fetishes on your dating profile, gay men — especially those in the leather world — would signal their sexual preferences by putting different-coloured hankies in their pockets. Left for top, right for bottom.

While it’s expanded since its original conception, there a few central colours: red for fisting, dark blue for anal and yellow for piss. YELLOW. Not light yellow, not mustard, just regular fucking YELLOW. (Sorry, inside joke.)

Now that the world is more open to sexual fetishes, Justin Sayre, chairman of The Order of Sodomites, has proposed an update for the hanky code: using it to let potential partners know about your baggage.

For example, Sayre pitches to move grey from meaning “bondage” to “boring,” yellow to mean “commitment-phobic” and blue now means “withholding.”

Personally, I have a few other suggestions: fuchsia should mean “irritatingly self-promotional,” red should mean “needlessly combative” and cerulean should mean “annoyingly condescending over punctuation and grammar.”

Keep Reading

Two hands holding a ring on a purple background, under a pink filter. The image appears to be ripped and taped back together with pink tape.

Where are the queer divorce stories?

ANALYSIS: Messy, vulnerable narratives remind us that queer marriage isn’t always the happily-ever-after we hope for
An illustration of a man in front of bushes

After my breakup, I fucked straight married men in the bushes

In the dark, in the dirt, where all identities dissolve, I stumbled upon a new life
Two people seen from behind walking next to change-room doors

Department stores are dying. It’s the end of an era for anonymous sex

With Hudson’s Bay liquidating across Canada, a cruising hub is lost 
One person holding the other from behind, both with towels wrapped around their waists. The figures are shown from the shoulders down in black and white. Behind them, under a pink filter, is images of saunas.

Inside the history of Boston’s bygone gay bathhouses 

From sexual health support to discreet gathering place, bathhouses were once a small but important part of the city’s gay community