The Art of Going Out: Meeting Men for Dating or Sex in West Hollywood

Nowadays, with same-sex attraction easy to accept and easy to divulge, people just click on Grindr to get a guy who lives 500 feet away to drop by for a 10 minute blow job.

 Thirty years ago in West Hollywood, things were different. "Going out" was an art, a form of recreation, and a game designed to get a man into your life or you rbed.  There were some very specific rules.  Breaking any of them meant being exposed to HIV, bringing home a druggie or a theif, or worse, or getting the reputation of being a sleazoid or a slut.  Or losing at the game, and not getting a man into your bed.

1. Decide before going out whether you will approach or be approached.  This would very important later: the approacher had to make the first physical contact, ask for the date or hookup, and provide the bed.

Plus if you planned to approach someone for sex tonight, you needed a clean apartment -- bed made, with new sheets, new towels in the bathroom, no dirty dishes in the kitchen.

Plus some interesting magazines on the coffee table, some condoms and lube at the ready, and at least coffee for the next morning.

Plus you had  to tell your friends that you were going out, so they could arrnage for a casual "drop in" to see if everything was ok.

2. Go out on a weeknight between 9 pm and 11;00 pm.  Going out could occur on any night of the week, but weeknights were preferable.  Friday and Saturday were reserved for dates and parties; guys would might go to the bars to look at guys or as part of their dates, but they were not likely to be "going out," looking to meet someone new.  .

Why be done by 11:00?  You have to get home anyway, and after two hours without success, you start getting desperate, and make bad choices.

After you decided on a bar, based on your age and the kind of guy you were interested in meeting:

3. Go out alone.   If you went out with a friend,you might get involved with an unsavory competition.  Besides, when you go out together, you stay together until the end of the evening.  This was a cast-in-stone, friendship-breaking rule.  I suppose it originated because someone, at some time, was left at the bar and ended up victimized


.

4. Do not drink, or just one beer.  If you were intoxicated, you would make bad choices.  I used to buy a coke and make it last for the two hours.

5. As the approacher, make at most six circuits of the bar.  I always walked around the entire bar, mentally checking who I was interested in.  Then I would start a second cycle,and nonchalantly stop next to ghe guy I liked most.  If he gave me Attitude (refused to make eye contact), I would go on to the next, and so on.  At the end of the second circuit, I would wait ten minutes, and start again. 

After six circuits, you're starting to look desperate or too picky.  And maybe you are.

6. When a prospect makes eye contact, interview him for about five minutes before initiating physical contact.  The questions  were purely social: "Where are you from ?  How long have you lived here?  What neighborhood do you live in?  What gym do you go to? Did you see Dynasty last night?"  Only sleazoids asked about cock size, bedroom interests, or HIV status.  It was the epitome of gauche.

At the end of the five minute interview, you either said "have a nice evening" and moved on or sealed the deal with physical contact.

7. The physical contact goes: touch shoulder, touch chest, grope.  The kiss was optional, and not usually recommended, as it might give you the reputation for being a slut. The conversation could continue during the physical contact for as long as you liked, since the decision had been made.  But the approacher had to issue the invitation fairly quickly.

8. After the grope, the inviation must always be accepted.  Before 1990, the invitation would be for a date, with an exchange of telephone numbers.  After 1990, it was usually to go back to your apartment for sex. During the early 1990s, there was a gray area, where some guys were not aware of the change, or not ready for it; they were permitted to reject an invitation for sex, as long as they followed up with an invitation for a date.

9. After the invitation is issued, you must both leave the bar. The cruising is over.  You weren't  allowed to stick around, even to "chat with your friends." You weren't  allowed to go to another bar. You could go to a restaurant for a late-night snack, to a late-night bookstore to buy The Complete Operettas of Gilbert and Sullivan, or go home.

10. The next day, you must report to your friends. Was the bar good or bad?Enough hot guys? Too much Attitude? You had to describe your evening, what you did right, what you did wrong, ask for tips on how to improve your technique. After all, in a few days, or a week at the most, you would be back  out, playing the game again.