The three legged stool: A short fugue on Community

About thirty years ago I came out and began playing with other men. I did not acknowledge a Leather Community; in fact, I doubt there really was one at that time outside of the men who congregated at the two local Leather bars in Seattle, Sparks and the J and L. To me "Leather" meant Drummer Magazine, a publication that I would peruse often at the Gay bookstores in Seattle. The images, the articles, the classifieds, they defined my early ideas of Leather.

Years after I began to play I began to see Leather outside the context of sexual expression. I became aware of the active role that Leathermen and Leatherwomen in the Northwest were playing in addressing the AIDs epidemic. I also became aware of a din rising louder and louder calling politicians to acknowledge the disease. These voices began to demand faster response to address the body count that included friends and lovers.

I made the conscious decision to join the Leather Community in the late 80s. My decision was based on the role that this Community could play in three aspects of my life:

1. The Leather Community was about sexual expression. I could better understand my growing appetite for perverse play by associating with other Leathermen. I could explore my deviant appetites and discover new perverse pleasures. Leather was a key to unlocking my entire body to sexual pleasure.
2. The Leather Community was concerned about health issues specific to Gay men. At that time health in our Community focused primarily on AIDS. I recall the three-tiered list of sexual practices in the Seattle Gay News: safe, possibly safe, and unsafe. I entered a Community that was on the forefront of debunking this information. People were not afraid to investigate practices that could actually protect us from infection while maintaining a sex positive lifestyle.
3. The Leather Community was actively involved in politics. Leathermen and Leatherwomen wanted visibility within the greater community in the 80s. They wanted to be seen in the March on Washington and in Gay Pride festivities around the country. Visibility emphasized the need for politicians to act quickly to address the AIDs epidemic, to provide funds for the development of medications, and quicker access to those medications. In the early 90s, defeating Jesse Helms became the locus of politic involvement. And here in the Northwest "Hands Off Washington" was the rallying cry, a successful campaign to limit conservative groups from influencing legislators from passing prejudicial laws against GLBT people in this state.

In reflecting on the Community I entered decades ago, I see it as founded on these three principles. Titles, fundraisers, and events all focused around these three principles. Sex, health, and politics.

Today I look at the Leather Community in an effort to understand my position within it. While all things must change, a necessary part of life, I question the principles of my Community today. While sex is still very much an integral element of social gatherings, I question the weight that we have given remedial education. Workshops and classroom instruction have supplemented the man to man mentoring that fueled my growth as a player years ago. Instead, we sit in rows and watch as a self-proclaimed expert shows us how to have fun. Sex as a passive observer.

I ask myself what we are doing to address health issues. We have new strains of sexually transmitted diseases. Many members of the Community who are HIV positive struggle to find insurance or financial means to pay for medications. Many of us are aging and face issues different from those faced in the 80s. What are we doing today to address these issues? While some are trying to rally members of the Community to address health issues, where is the solidarity that existed during the AIDs crisis? 

Are Leathermen afraid to actually discuss political issues today? The recent election would suggest that we are indeed afraid of each other when engaged in political dialogue. Many have strong feelings about the effect of the class struggle in this country and its effect on our Community. Recently a political issue arose in the Northwest dealing with racial issues. In spite of requests from Leather sisters to take a stand, many men remained silent for fear of ostracizing others on the opposite side of the camp. At one time a basic question asked by many judges at Leather contests focused on the political involvement of the title candidate, "Who are your senators and representatives?" Political involvement was an essential part of being considered a Leatherman in the Community. Are we still a Community that believes in political involvement?

Sex, health, politics. This is the three legged stool that supported the Leather Community that I decided to join decades ago. But are these principles integral to the Community to which I belong today?