BijouBlog

I enjoyed sex with this guy off and on for some time in the nineties (both “vanilla” and BDSM), and one time when we were making out in his van he began to blow in my ear. The action itself doesn't really get me a woody, but as part of the whole erotic foreplay it definitely added something to the experience as a whole. 

Now, the ear itself doesn't strike me as being particularly erotic, but what it is supposed to do, transmit sounds, can add so much excitement, especially in BDSM sensory play. I used to like (and still do, but I am the “binder,” not the “bindee”) being bound and hooded and hearing the dominant sound of boots walking around the dungeon, For me, the sound of power is the sound of hard-heeled boots, and I've noticed lately that men's boots and shoes usually possess rubber heels to mute the sound. Why? I wonder, when the same does not apply to women's footwear (that's another blog). 

And of course there's dirty talk, which can occur even in more conventional sex scenes. Or doing it with music in the background. It takes great mental concentration and keen listening to try and time your orgasm to the climax of Wagner's Liebestod (I know from experience.) 

Overall, some people experience reality through hearing, some are more visual, some are more tactile. Still, what about more directly physical interactions with the ear itself? 

Blowing in the ear combines both a tactile and a hearing sensation, but then there's also guys who like to nibble on the ear (something my cat does, in her case a sign of affection as well as impatience, play with me, feed me). 
 

Maybe it's getting down to something really primal, the nibbling, but the ear of course features significantly in so many other cultural contexts. 

As a child, I was fascinated by the pointed ears of Spock, and all those elves and fairies sported them as well. Perhaps just changing slightly a feature of the ear was enough to evoke images of otherworldly power and knowledge. (And to set the record straight, Tolkien's elves, regardless of the movie's visualization of them, did not have pointed ears. See Appendix F of The Return of the King.) 
 

And let's not forget the legendary Carol Burnett who would tug on her ear at the end of each show (one time I remember she pulled an earring off while doing so!). It originated as a signal to her grandmother because Carol in her early days at the Gary Moore Show couldn't shout out, “Hey, Nanny, are you watching?” She always knew her beloved “Nanny” was watching her famous granddaughter, and even after Nanny passed, she kept that signal as a way of connecting with that memory. 
 

Cutting off the ear was a punishment in the medieval and early modern periods, especially for offenses regarding religion. For example, in the seventeenth century the Puritan William Prynne was condemned to this punishment for heresy by the Anglican ArchbishopWilliam Laud, interesting, for one might think the other side would want him to hear their version of truth. But perhaps Laud thought it was appropriate because he led the faithful astray because they heard the Puritan's sermons. 
 

Are you still listening? One can hear, but not listen, so often in this frenetic culture where words disappear in cyberspace in a nanosecond. 

Take the time to really listen, and maybe try and remember and share your own unique, erotic ear experiences (but save the earwax stories, ew! I recently experienced an issue with that substance). 

And Bijou Video offers unique “dirty talk” audio CDs from those Old Reliablerough trade guys in the Sexcessories section of our website.

Check them out, along with other auditory delights at BijouWorld.com and BijouGayPorn.com. 
 

 

The online lgbtq magazine Queerty points to footage of a gay pool party from 1945! The story about how this footage came to be is quite fascinating. Apparently after some extensive research on the actual films which were discovered by Geoffrey Story, it turns out the party took place in the back yard of a St. Louis mansion owned by the wealthy Buddy Walton and his partner. 

Buddy was apparently a famous hairdresser (yes, well, a cliché, but that's what many gay men did during this time) to stars like Rosalind Russell and Lana Turner, and another famous person: Abigail Van Buren of Dear Abby fame. 
 

And Buddy and his partner (pictured to the left, with his partner Sam Micotto and dowagers of St. Louis society) were wealthy, and they possessed the resources, most conveniently a large, private estate, to create havens for their lives and the lives of those like them who loved men. 

After the complex social experience of serving in WWII, many guys and girls from rural areas and small towns (America at that time was still a little less than 50 percent rural) interacted with so many different people (even people of different races and ethnicities, unusual for that time) and often to their surprise and shock discovered their true sexuality. 

The experience was life-changing, but the cultural norms that shaped the social environment of small town American remained, and the emphasis after the war was on heterosexual home and family, getting back to “normal.” The Cold War and the ensuing fear of communism threw up more barriers and exacerbated by a fear of the “other.” The Hollywood where Buddy Walton found fame was a target as many actors and actresses were blacklisted, accused of being threats to America. 

Still, these guys managed to be gay in a world that was not always allowing them to be both gay and happy, that is, pursuing their American right to happiness. They put up the pennant of different colors and in their own way get back to nature. Because who they are is fun and lovely and natural in the deepest sense. 

Enjoy the links, and enjoy more pool parties and guys kissing at BijouWorld.com, BijouGayPorn.com, and on our YouTube channel full of vintage gay porn clips, including this one on classic gay romance!

 

It seems like every month there's a megamillions or powerball lottery ticket craze, and even though the chances of winning are apocalyptic odds (I think it was one in three million), people buy tickets. I bought one, which was miniscule compared to the many who play every day and calculate odds and pick numbers using esoteric formulas. 

Ultimately, it's a matter of luck, who archetypally has been characterized as a woman, the Roman Goddess Fortuna. She is related in function to the Greek Three Fates, who determine the course of events by the slightest thread, literally, as they are depicted as spinners. Clotho spun the “thread” of human fate, Lachesis dispensed it, and Atropos cut the thread (thus determining the individual's moment of death). These figures eventually became the Lady Luck many invoke as they gamble at casinos! 
 

These goddesses were so powerful that even Zeus, king of the gods who became the source of law and order and justice, submitted to Fortune and the Fates. 
 

The Hebrew YHWH, like Zeus, supposedly the source of justice, tells Job, who thinks he is the victim of a horrible fate he does not deserve, that basically the way the universe works is a mostly violent mystery, and gives images of a nature “red in tooth and claw” such as sea monsters and lions. 

Maybe those who think they can somehow beat the odds are influenced by science and mathematics rather than superstition, because I've heard that the “numbers don't lie.” Well, maybe in a math problem in itself, but even though scientists have discovered certain inexorable natural processes, like gravity (thank you, Isaac Newton), someone like Einstein came along to blow the “God is in his heaven, all's right with the world” Deism apart with this theory of relativity. 

On the social level, our obsession with celebrity feeds into our desire to beat those supposedly insurmountable odds. So many think they are talented and want to be discovered, and shows like American Idol with its elaborate (and public) audition process are part of that explosion of “everyone can be famous,” and everyone can be famous if his or her youtube video goes viral. These seekers of fame and fortune may think they are beating the odds, but I think it just emphasizes that a person is one in a multitude in the cyberuniverse, which changes by nanosecond. 
 

Gone are the days when someone like Lana Turner (a Hollywood sex goddess of the 1940s and 1950s) was discovered at a soda fountain, when a discovery was really a one-of-a-kind event, which I think made the Susan Boyle phenomenon, who blasted into fame on Britain's Got Talent, so different and thus more exciting in our age of one-second, often meritless fame. 
 

 

And speaking of breaks, just think about how some of the most famous gay porn stars of the past made their way in a genre that didn't enjoy during that time a wide public audience. The pioneering directors and producers like Arch Brown, Steve Scott, and Toby Ross were discoverers themselves, not just of talent, but of expressing a sexuality that has been so long hidden. 
 

But the gay porn stars of the past, like many of the Hollywood legends, often came from humble, obscure origins but got that break (of course, they were, and again, a matter of luck, a generous endowment granted by the Fates). Al Parker worked as a butler and an aide to Hugh Hefner before making his debut in Brentwood's Challenger and going on to become a porn superstar and, later, director and producer. 
 

In many cases, the desire may not have been, hey, I want to be a porn star, but if one has a great body and a certain size dick, and is stripping in a club (likeJamie Wingo and Scorpio), maybe that venue would be the “big break.” In fact, Scorpio tried to get into modeling, but his stripping gig, according to him, killed his chances. 
 

Yet Fortune, capricious, is still inexorable, and AIDS decimated so many of these men. Science and medicine discovered the cause, while a culture of homophobia claimed the virus was God's justice and blamed the victims. Both interventions were too late for so many. Since then, as in so many other crises, we've changed the future (we are so close to a cure), but at the tragic cost of the past. 

Never again, we say, about so many natural and human evils, but ultimately, but even what turns out to be good is often a chance discovery. 

All I can say, is, may luck be a “lad” for you, as was the case with me, when I met my late partner totally by chance in a bar, and that night I wasn't even there to meet anyone. He actually went home with someone else, but the next day he called me, and the rest for both of us became our history.

 

 

In March 1965, the sex education magazine Sexology, which came out in the early 1930s as the brainchild of Hugo Gernsback, addressed still at that time risque subjects such as female orgasm, lesbianism, homosexuality, and, showing the increasing interest in Eastern culture, the Kama Sutra. 

The physical culture movement, which really took off in the early part of the last century and which fed into the homoerotic muscle/physique magazines of Bob Mizer and others, had condemned prudery about sexual issues but still held up heterosexual marriage as the ideal situation in which to enjoy sex. 

Sexology reflected most of the psychosocial attitudes of that time, but after the famous Kinsey Report, when this issue came out, previous views about sexuality that relied on social conceptions of "normality" and prudishness about the body's physical functions were beginning to come under serious scrutiny. 

Gernsback, actually more famous for publishing the first science fiction magazine, Amazing Stories, was still the publisher and editor-in-chief when this issue came out. 
 

In 1965, the United States was beginning to more fully experience a cultural revolution, especially in larger cities. The Baby Boomers had become young adults who were questioning the 1950s ideals about gender and sexuality, while the dissemination of the birth control bill created, especially for women, a view that emphasized the pursuit of individual happiness (which could mean a healthy, enjoyable sex life) rather than traditional values that emphasized church, kitchen, and children. 

Homosexuality was still a taboo subject, and homosexual acts still illegal in many states, but under the influence of a more confessional culture that was beginning to allow for a more open discussion of feelings, people were finding an outlet to seriously discuss it in magazines like Sexology. It was no longer just a “dirty” subject to titillate or even shock as in the pulp fiction of the 1950s or the gossip rags like The Hollywood Reporter. 

Even though the medical consensus, more specifically psychologists and psychiatrists, still considered homosexuality a “condition” or “problem” or even “disease” which needed to be treated, there were glimmers that this interpretation could be misguided, and that a homosexual person could not pretend to be or become a heterosexual. The letter discussed below (which is the question of the month, “Homosexual Anxiety”) from this issue shows that so many gay and lesbian persons ended up in heterosexual relationships and then marriages because it was the social norm, to often disastrous results. 
 

A 23-year-old man writes to Dr. Rutledge, concerned that even though he is sexually active with women, he has often masturbates while thinking of men. He also notes he did not have gay sex while in the military (interesting, which could imply it was not unusual to do so!). He is afraid he will “fall” into homosexuality, and he wants to experience “normal” feelings again. 

The doctor's response pretty much shows that the idea that sexual orientation is learned or conditioned was still prevalent, and sadly, for him it is still a “problem” with three possible causes. He claims gender confusion because of emotional problem in childhood (thus the boy thinks he is a girl), a typical stereotype during that time. Remember, this was long time before medical science began to understand transgender people, and that gender identity could be something different from sexual orientation. 

He then claims - and this is where he could be grasping at the idea that maybe, just maybe, being gay is not a choice - that because of a problematic heterosexual family dynamic that “they turn their natural sexual interests toward the same sex rather than the opposite sex.” He does blame the family, but perhaps he is hinting that one could naturally be gay, and that a person could who identifies as gay is doing so to make one's life easier (quite a claim in this period!) because one does not have to worry about pregnancy and financially supporting a family. (Those are also reasons why many people, especially women, had been joining religious orders for centuries, but the price was no sex at all!) 

Rutledge finally claims that extreme stress could cause one to have gay sex, in that case, a temporary aberration. Overall, he wants the person to get psychological help. 

Now, this response these days doesn't particularly strike one as being enlightened in light of our medical discoveries, but just ten years later the American Psychological Association declared that being gay was not a problem or condition or abnormality, and that steps should be taken to remove its social stigma, which the writer of the letter (one might assume in these days he was bisexual) definitely feels. 

And one should also take into account that another article in this issue affirms the physical and especially psychosocial importance of the female orgasm, long a taboo subject, and quite revolutionary for a generation whose mothers and grandmothers were taught to see the sex act as something fundamentally “dirty” and revolting to be endured only for the sake of producing children. 

And, more significantly, one of the lead stories is an actual interview with a lesbian, even if the title, “How I Became A Lesbian,” implies that it is more a learned or developed behavior than an orientation. 

Sexology ceased publication in 1983 after Gernsback sold it to another publisher, but its legacy lives on in countless other sex educators who counsel many, encouraging an open, diverse climate that celebrates the amazing spectrum of sexual and gender expressions and relationships - even while their work is hampered or put at risk by the recent upsurge in regressive reactionary movements against sex educational classes and books, against legislation protecting the rights of transgender people, against reproductive rights, and other anti-LGBTQ/anti-sex/anti-bodily autonomy agendas.
 

Love bites, literally! 

To clarify, in this blog, when I use the term “bites,” I don’t necessarily mean it in the sense of “bite me,” like someone saying something or someone “sucks.” 

I repeat: Love bites, literally! 

My cat who is probably the most spoiled creature on the planet lately has been getting into the habit of nipping at me, mostly to get me up in the morning. But cats will often give their owners love nibbles. And I get plenty of them, especially when I wear shorts (she likes legs). In fact, one time after I finished doing my usual “get rid of the morning woody” activity, she nipped me in the thigh. Perhaps she was stimulated by my action. I’ll see if she does it again some time. Still, nipping in cats (as opposed to more aggressive biting), can be a characteristic of nonsexual play among kittens, or as I mentioned above, a sign of affection for a cat’s owner. 

Now, I remember as a child, if a child bit another child, someone was in big trouble. This action seems to produce great consternation, especially if said behavior keeps occurring at day care centers when the parents aren’t around. In this case, biting is aggressive and nonsexual. The biting behavior implies somehow that the child lacks certain “civilizing influences.” Dogs and cats bite, but not people, that is. 

People do bite, however. What is taboo in public becomes almost a norm in sexual play, where boundaries blur or even break, and the participants enjoy the danger and excitement of transgressing said boundaries. The skin is a boundary, perhaps the most tangible one; to bite, to fuck, to suck, to rim, to jack off, is to stretch that boundary to the limits in an aggressive way, and when any sex act ultimately produces the discharge of cum, that fluid represents in its viscosity and liquidity a dissolution of boundaries. 

Blatant biting occurs in both straight and gay porn. For example, in the scene We Haul from the Bijou classic Erection Set, a duo in jeans and jockstraps enter a warehouse and fuck hard and fast, on a ladder and in a wheel barrel! Spanking, finger-fucking and mutual j/o, too, are had before the older of the two men humps his youthful partner hard. The overall emphasis in this last scene is on fucking butt, tit-licking and biting, and large cum shots which are filmed in slow-motion and repeated in several angles.
 

Even the ostensibly lesbian Ida (continually lamenting her spinsterhood) in the movie Mildred Pierce uses biting imagery sarcastically (a masterful peformance by Eve Arden) in an interaction with the dumpy (and probably gay) accountant, Mr. Jones, saying in response to his petulantly laments about her constant interruptions, “It's only because I want to be alone with you. Come 'ere and let me bite you, you darling man! Ruff!” Ida’s overall caustic manner perhaps lessens the impact of the violent imagery here, but her language takes on a deeper dimension when one remember a previous scene when the mercenary Wally comes on to Mildred. His kisses resemble bites, and Mildred ends up telling him to stop “howling,” that is, cut his wolf-like sexually aggressive behavior. 

Perhaps the most familiar bites are the ones Dracula administers. Dracula, straddling the boundaries between life and death, bites his victims and drinks their blood (in the Bible and in many other cultures, physical blood equals physical life). How does he lure his victims? Through sexual aggression. In all the diverse stories about Dracula, sex and death intermingle literally in blood, the discharge of a bite. 

To experience more love bites (including some in a scene from the classic porn Gayracula featured in the Bijou original compilation Scared Stiff) watch movies instantly on our streaming site, bijougayporn.com, and use the coupon code for 35% off DVDs at bijouworld.com!