BijouBlog

I remember pledging allegiance to the flag, starting in kindergarten. I never really understood at that time some of the words (“and to the Republic for which it stands,” what?), and even why we were looking at a piece of cloth attached to a pole.

When I worked at the public library when I was I high school, one of my jobs was to raise and take down the flag.

I got yelled at by the head librarian because I put the flag on a bench to fold it (technically it did not touch the ground) because no one was available to take the other end in order to fold it in a specific triangular shape.

One of my nightmares was my failure to take the flag down (it was supposed to be down by sundown). The flag was up all night on the pole. Oh no!

The United States has changed, of course, since the 1960s, and e pluribus unum really emphasizes the pluribus. So many subcultures have created their own flags as concrete symbols of their most significant values.

The gay leather BDSM subculture has carried its own flag in the wake of the gay liberation movement that occurred after Stonewall.

The flag was designed by Tony DeBlase, otherwise known as Fledermaus, a major mover and shaker in the gay leather/BDSM world at that time, in many ways shaping many of its values and their public expression in a variety of publications, especially Drummer and Dungeon Master magazines.
 

Tony first presented the design at the International Mister Leather event in Chicago, Illinois, on May 28, 1989.

Initial reaction to the flag was mixed.

According to DeBlase's article A Leather Pride Flag,

"Some, particularly on the east coast, reacted positively to the concept, but were quite concerned, some even offended, that I had not involved the community in helping to create the design."

The original flag is on display at the Leather Archives and Museum.

According to Marcus Schmoger, DeBlase’s wish was that there are diverse interpretations of the symbolism of the flag.

One of the most familiar ones is from Stacey, Ms. National Leather Association International 1996:

The red heart is for love, the white stripe for purity in an open, honest and understanding relationship, the black stripes for leather  and the blue ones for denim, both materials that are frequently worn in the scene.

Another interpretation:

Black, the color of BDSM followers; blue: for the followers with a jeans fetish; white, solidarity with the novices of the BDSM scene; the heart: BDSM has nothing to do with raw violence, but is practiced with mutual respect, consent, and understanding.

My fear of the flag really transmuted into a different emotion, a combination of pride and excitement, when I participated in several gay pride parades with the Chicago Hellfire Club. The front of our cohort carried a large leather flag, but we also carried (on poles) larger versions of hankies that represented different fetishes (so many colors!)

Thus, the main design of our cohort was flags, carried slowly and steadily, while other club members circled about wielding our floggers and paddles and whips.
 

And let's just say all our flags were up all night, and the next night.

Check out our collection of gay fetish movies, including the uber-leather/BDSM movie, Born to Raise Hell, and the exciting Dungeons of Europe series.

Tony DeBlase himself appears in our bondage flick, Rope that Works, which deftly integrates the erotic and the educational. Tie me up, Tony!
 

 

It started in Chicago, as long ago as 1972 (only a few years after the Stonewall revolutionary event), on a pool table at the Gold Coast Bar. The first leather contest. The winner was John Lunning.

Chuck Renslow, now a legendary figure, was the driving force in the development of the whole gay leather culture. After this event, he soon discovered that one way to put a public face on what was going in the backrooms and other shadowy places was by founding what some claim was (and still is) a “leather beauty contest.” Think: kind of a Mr. America take-off but add bdsm-related gear and activities; anything to grab the audience's attention (and cocks). In fact, one anecdotal source claims that at the first contest “slaves” were dragged onto the stage.

Soon the contest became so popular that it outgrew the bar, and in 1979 the first official International Mr. Leather contest occurred at a local hotel.

A dozen candidates in full leather and swimwear (changed to jockstraps in later years), paraded before an audience of about 300 men.

David Kloss, an oil rig worker (now that's once macho occupation!) representing The Brig bar in San Francisco, won the first title.

According to Jack Fritscher in the September 1979 issue of Drummer Magazine:

“The other men, daring to put their pecs and ass on the world’s toughest Chorus Line, were: Terry Hunter, Carol’s Speakeasy, Chicago; Reg Simpson, RR, Miami; Donald Rahn, Foxhole, Denver; Stan Masterson, Landmark, Daytona Beach, FL; Daan [sic] Jefferson, Gold Coast, Chicago; Jim Kazlik, Wreckroom, Milwaukee; Harry Shattuck, South Town Lumber Co., Denver; Bill Maggio, Harder Than Hell Productions, Chicago; Jesse Capello [second IML Runner-up], Café LaFitte in Exile/Coral Bar, New Orleans; Durk Dehner [first IML Runner-up who was a Drummer model from Lou Thomas’ Target Studio, and future founder of Tom of Finland Foundation], American Uniform Association, L. A.; Bruce Wachholder, Touche, Chicago; David Kloss, the Brig, San Francisco. The judges were Chuck Gockenmeyer, General Manager of Leatherman Inc, New York; Robert Dunn, Advertising Director, Drummer magazine; Dom Orejudos (Etienne); Tom Gora, In Touch magazine; and Lou Thomas, Target Studio, New York.”

The list above seems a roll call of both men and organizations who have now become iconic in the leather community.

The contestants, Jack Fritscher wrote in the September 1979 Drummer Magazine, typified “the new homomasculinity.”

The seventies were indeed the era of “gay macho,” popularized (and perhaps even satirized in the Village People phenomenon). But rather than just thinking of it as an era of “guys gone wild,” one also needs to understand that also during this time guys into leather/bdsm were establishing their own communities. The seventies saw the foundation of the Chicago Hellfire Club (its first Inferno event took place in September 1976 to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the Club). Other organizations that began in this period was M.A.F.I.A. (a club for guys into fisting) and Rodeo Riders, a social group for guys who enjoy sex, gear, and each other in a variety of social settings. These three clubs are still going strong now!

Chicago, with is unique mix of Midwestern communal values and gritty individualism, apparently was the ideal place for this movement to take shape.

Thanks to jackfritscher.com and the Leather Archives & Museum for much of the material in this blog.

If you're in or traveling to Chicago for this year's IML, don't miss Men's Room at the Bijou, presented by the Leather Archives, on Saturday May 23!