I was talking with my housemates last night and discovered something interesting: Some straight and not very narrow at all folks don’t understand the mystique and history of queer bathroom cruising.

Once upon a time , pre 1992 or so there were computers but they were very expensive. The interweb was mostly there too, although it was not nearly the same sort of user friendly place it is now. You didn’t have links to click around on. You had to use a text based terminal and know the right commands to type. There were bulletin boards, but those were very unfriendly as well unless you crested a serious learning curve.

There were places you could go as a young gay person to meet people for relatively instant “relationships”… my preferred choice was IRC (Internet Relay Chat), and NNTP (Network News Transfer Protocol).

It wasn’t until the birth of the real web, with all of its NCSA Mosaic-y goodness were somewhat more easily accessible by SLIP and PPP. It was only easily available first in college computer labs, then rolled out to consumers as the prices started to become reasonable.

The WWW is now a fun, easy, and relatively safe place to meet folks.

Before that, I suppose there were telephone chat/”party” lines, though those were always expensive, and generally unavailable to young gay folk, because the parents pay for the phone lines and this sort o thing tends to set off alarm bells.

Obviously there have been gay bars for a long time, though fairly inaccessible to younger folks.

So, what did a younger queerling do for quick access to a member of the same sex for a quick exploration of the adam and steve birds and bees variety? (And, after all, why shouldn’t they? Their straight friend’s are making out under the bleachers, going to 3rd base at the back of the bus, and having all out orgies whenever the parents are out of town.) Library bathrooms. Highway rest stops. Public parks.

These places are hidden but known. They are out of the way places that one can go, with known but–at that magical age of self-perceived invincibility–manageable risks of disease and possible beatings.

There was even a pre-interweb version of Yahoo Local for queers, called the Damron Guide, which–along with restaurant listings, bars, hotels, and the like–offered ratings and locations of queer cruising spots. Some were labeled quiet, some were labeled safe. Most were labeled AYOR (at your own risk), due to police presence, known bashings, etc.

I carried a Damron guide with me on my few travels to other states to visit family, attended band camp, yadda yadda.

One of the housemates sort of gasped and said “That’s like a Jewish underground during the war!”

Kinda sorta yeah. I certainly don’t pretend that I grew up in the worst time, but I was just becoming sexually active when AIDS got a proper acronym. I was never hurt badly, but I was pushed around a bit and psychologically abused by my ignorant peers who might drive through the nearby Cheeseman Park in Denver and see my car at lunch as I picnicked with my chosen friends after school. But it was not an easy time either. I came of age during Amendment 2 and Colorado was known as the Hate State. There was a government supported effort to deprive me of my rights as a person who simply grew up the way I did. <irony>Thank goodness that doesn’t happen anymore</irony>

Blah blah so my point is that at one time, these were open/secret places where queers could go for sex. Today, its more of a fetish or nostalgia thing. For me, the idea of trying to get laid in public is generally dangerous, rude, and sexually compulsive. The internets make it easy, fast, and safe(r) to get sex.

So this Senator from Idaho. What the hell was he thinking? In an airport? Post 9/11 in an airport? Disn’t his pal Steven’s teach him about the series of tubes through which he could get dick delivered safely and quickly to his hotel room?

I’ll go ahead and throw judgments out there because of who he is and what he stands for publicly: He is a vocal supporter of anti-gay legislation. And he is married. And he got caught trying to wag his weenie in the bathroom of an airport with other guys. I have no tolerance or compassion for this asshole. Whether or not he ever chooses to identify as gay, NO ONE has the moral or legal authority to say that queers deserve anything but equal rights and protections as their straight friends, family, or random strangers (That goes for you too, Obama, Hillary, and Edwards. Fuck your civil unions. Separate but equal is not equal.)

His soapbox has crumbled, and whatever ridicule is laid on him is richly deserved.