NYSocBoy's Beefcake and Bonding

Bug Hall was nine years old when he won the role of scrawny Alfalfa in Little Rascals (1994), a modernization of the 1930’s shorts, but heavy on heterosexual romance. He was asked to appear in his underwear (and he loses it, off camera).

Then, after some minor girl-gawking in The Big Green (1995), The Stupids (1996) and The Munsters’ Scary Little Christmas (1996), he starred in Safety Patrol (1998), an unusual teen nerd comedy in which The Girl is an ally rather than a goal.

After transferring to a new school, Scout (Bug Hall) instantly acquires a girlfriend, cheerleader cum valedictorian Hanna (Alex McKenna). His heterosexuality established, we can get on to the main plot arc: a desire for homosocial fulfillment. Bug joins two all-male gangs, a lunch-table full of outcast Barneys, including the gay-vague "Walt Whitman," and the school's Safety Patrol, a goose-stepping paramilitary organization involved mostly in extortion and bullying. Its leader is the evil Kent (Philip Van Dyke), the principal's son.

When the Safety Patrol frames Scout for a series of petty thefts, he realizes who is true friends are, and sets out with the Barneys and Hanna to catch the real crook. In the process he remakes the Safety Patrol. No significant buddy bonding, but gay characters, sort of.

Becoming less awkward as he moved through adolescence, Bug took roles reminiscent of Mark Lester’s twenty years before, as naifs who nevertheless are swept up by strong, unconscious heterosexual passions. He played a fourteen-year old who gets his girlfriend pregnant in the indie film Skipped Parts (2000), a high school journalist who begins to “notice” the brainy girl-next-door in Get a Clue (2002), a fan obsessed with an older writer (Candace Bergen) in Footsteps (2003), and a high schooler struggling to lose his virginity in American Pie Presents: Book of Love (2009).

He was usually asked to appear in his underwear, or in a skimpy swimsuit.

As an adult, Bug had a lean physique, with a tight ribbed chest and ball-shaped biceps (not to mention rugged good looks). He also did quite a bit of buddy-bonding, in Arizona Summer (2003), in Fortress (2012), and in some of his television appearances; it's actually hard to find a movie or tv appearance where he DOESN'T hug a male friend.

No gay characters, but in Mortuary (2005), he played the homophobic bully who harasses Grady (Rocky Marquette).

And lots and lots of shirtless, underwear, bulge, and swimsuit shots -- it's hard to find a movie or tv appearance where he DOESN'T display his fine physique.

So it was interesting to see the "evidence" of Bug taking the next step, allegedly posting nude pictures of himself on the internet. Tattoos, Prince Albert, the whole nine yards.

Next stop: frontal nudity in a movie?

You can see the nude photos on Tales of West Hollywood.

When I first started out in grad school at Long Island University, I couldn't live in Manhattan right away: everything there was frightfully expensive, $900 to sleep on someone's couch, $1000 for a walk-in closet in someone's bedroom. So I moved into a graduate student apartment near the campus: four bedrooms, a bathroom, and a living room-kitchen area.

You were assigned roommates. Mine were all heterosexual: Huang, a slim Taiwanese guy who talked on the telephone loudly at 4:00 am; a beefy Turkish guy who mostly stayed in his room, and Max from Brooklyn. Cute, rather muscular, and THE MOST OBNOXIOUS PERSON ON EARTH.

1. He played VERY LOUD rap music all day and all night. He would leave the apartment with the music still blaring from his room.

3. He smoked -- in a nonsmoking apartment -- got drunk every night, and had the annoying habit of calling everyone "Negro," when they weren't black.

For that matter, it was annoying to hear Black English coming from a white guy: a'ight, I axed her, word, I'm a bust a cap, chill out, peace out.

4. He brought girls into the apartment to spend the night, and in the morning they walked around in bras and panties.

5. When there were no girls, he invited eight male friends over, to smoke, drink, call each other "Negro," have LOUD discussions of the "tits" on various "honeys," and eat all of the food in the refrigerator, including my food.

6. He walked around wearing only a towel.

Well, that part was ok.

The rest of the story is on Tales of West Hollywood.

Are you interested in seeing the 13-inch long penis of Grigor Rasputin, the mad monk of Imperial Russia, pickled in a jar?

Or a painting by Vera Donskaya-Khilko of Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin dueling with erect penises? Putin is better equipped, with two penises.

Then you should check out the Tochka-G Museum of Erotic Art in Moscow.

Yes, in Moscow.

It has more than 3,000 X-rated paintings, drawings, and sculptures dating from ancient times to the present, like this very well endowed Indian mystic who has discovered a new way of doing yoga.

Or a sex parody of the Flemish children's comic Suske and Wiske.

But it's not about porn, it's about liberation, about starting a conversation about sexuality and desire in puritanical Russian society.

It might not last long; objections are coming fast and furious, from the government, from the Russian Orthodox Church, and from passersby who duck their heads inside and yell "Think of the children!"

Curator Alexander Donskoi has accumulated mostly heterosexual art, though there's a lot of gay interest.

Like 2 six-foot tall penis sculptures.

I'm sorry, I can't find any way to show you the penis sculptures and Rasputin's pickled penis.

See also: The Russian Beefcake Museum; and the Top 12 Public Penises of Russia.

I love the Louvre. I could go every day. But everybody else on Earth, literally, wants to visit, too. It gets 8,000,000 visitors per year, so if you're not careful, you'll be caught up in the crowds.

1. Go on Wednesday or Friday evening (they're open to 9:45 pm). Or else Christmas Eve; you'll have the place to yourself.

2. Buy your ticket online, and pick it up at a FNAC store.

3. Don't go through the crystal pyramid; try the Passage Richelieu, off the Rue de Rivoli.

4. Skip the Big Sights. The Mona Lisa looks like the Mona Lisa, and the Venus de Milo looks like the Venus de Milo. Target!

People have been going to the Louvre for beefcake since 1793. In the 1920s, Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald spent afternoons looking at the penises on statues.

Here's a perfect 3-hour beefcake tour.

6:45 pm: Having picked up your ticket and had a quick snack, go through the Passage Richelieu, and wander around in the French sculptures for about 15 minutes. Look for Julien's Wounded Gladiator and Desjardin's Captive (above).

7:00 pm: Go up two flights to the Second Floor, and the German, Dutch, and Flemish paintings. Finding the beefcake here takes a little work, so it's best to do it at the start, when you're not tired yet. Look for Malouel's round Pieta with the naked Jesus, Carl Van Loo's portrait of Neptune, and Van Dyck's Amor and Psyche. About 20 minutes.

7:20 pm. Next stop, the French paintings in the Sully Wing. You're looking for Oedipus and the Sphinx (Ingres), the semi-nude Echo and Narcissus (Poussin), Berthelemey's Creation of Man, Couder's Fight Between Hercules and Antaeus (top photo), Pierre Subleyras's Charon, with a nude backside (left), and Francois Boucher's Venus Demanding Arms for Aeneas.

More after the break

And the piece that hangs on every gay man's wall, Flandrin's Young Man Nude by the Sea.

About 40 minutes.

8:00 pm: down to the First Floor, turn right, and stop for a snack at the Cafe Mollien, by the Mollien Staircase (regular snacks are essential to the successful museum experience).

8:15 Turn right again to the Denon Wing, and the Italian Renaissance paintings. Jesus on the cross, Pietas, Saint Sebastians, miscellaneous saints, demons, and muscle gods from everyday life.

You're looking for Magegna's Martyrdom of St. Sebastian, the androgynous John the Baptist of Leonardo da Vinci, Perugino's St. Jerome Supporting Two Men on the Gallows, Clovio's Rape of Ganymede. About 45 minutes.

9:00 pm: Downstairs to the Ground Floor again, and the Etruscan Antiquities. The beefcake is big, blatant, and ubiquitous, though somewhat more common in the Greek antiquities. 1/2 hour should be enough time to gawk at the Apollos, Ares, satyrs, torsos, Hermes Tying His Sandal, and The Torment of Marsyas.

Save a few minutes for the Italian Renaissance sculptures, especially Michelangelo's Slaves.

9:30 pm: Believe me, you don't want to spend more than three hours at any museum, or you'll come down with image overload. Retrace your steps (the best part of any museum visit) to leave through the Passage Richelieu.

9:45 pm Head north toward the Pyramides Metro Station, have dinner at Naniwa-Ya (11 Rue Sainte-Anne), and then stop in at the Til't Sauna (41 Rue Sainte-Anne) to look at real-life penises.

See also: A Beefcake Tour of France and A Beefcake Tour of the Musee d'Orsay.

Have you ever noticed that some guys look better with their clothes on? Seeing them naked doesn't add to their charm, and may even detract from it.

Clothes were originally designed as ornamentation, after all, to increase your attractiveness by giving the illusion of muscle, by drawing attention to the face or crotch, and by adding color and contrast.

Here the black tie and sweater contrasts beautifully with the pale skin and reddish-blond hair. Nude, the paleness would be overwhelming.

After years of beefcake-watching, I'm quite sure what this guy is packing. It won't be impressive. But the bright-red, ribald t-shirt is a perfect counterpart to his expression of farmboy innocence.

With a sharp, severe face and sculpted physique, seeing what his penis looks like would be anticlimactic.

Keeping it hidden can be more erotic than openly displaying it. The mystery is half the fun. Hairy or smooth? Muscular or slim? Mortadella or Kielbasa?

Uniforms, symbols of status and authority, are especially flattering. This uniform accentuates the guy's chest and draws attention to his shoulders. Meanwhile his gun draws the eye downward to his rather impressive bulge.

The full post, with nude photos, is on Tales of West Hollywood.

Plains, September 2016

I'm having a terrible month: my father is sick, my boyfriend has moved away, and my classes are going horribly. Depressed, I go jogging, and then stop into the gay-friendly coffee house for a post-jog smoothie.

Bruce is standing in line with a friend!

Not the Bruce I know now, chubby and bald, fighting health problems and chronic depression. The Bruce I knew in college in Rock Island: tall and slim, with a sharp face, blue eyes, unruly dark-blond hair, a short beard, an impish smile.

The Bruce I knew in 1979, when we were 19 years old, full of pep and optimism, ready to take on the world.

I am so shocked that I just stand there, staring.

This guy doesn't just look like Bruce from 35 years ago. He has the same stance, the same gestures, the same bemused, sardonic expression.

Years slip away. I want to go up to him and ask about the assignment in Modern American Literature class. I swear I hear "Shadow Dancing" playing in the background.

Gaining control of myself, I stand in line behind "Bruce" and his friend.

They are talking about science fiction! Bruce loved science fiction.

I've rekindled lots of old relationships since moving to the Plains: my Dad's old navy buddy, my grade school boyfriend, the nephew of my first sexual experience. This must be a relative.

But Bruce doesn't have any children. He has a sister; it must be a nephew..

"Bruce" and his friend get their orders -- coffee and chocolate-walnut bars -- and walk past me to the tables. I stare. "Bruce" ignores me. The friend smiles.

They are both in their 20s, probably college students. The friend is of medium height, rather cute, with short brown hair, prominent eyebrows, and an attractive "lost boy" expression.

I get my order and sit across from them, close enough to hear their conversation without drawing attention to myself. Bruce's profile on Facebook lists no nephews. Nobody of college age on his friend list.

This makes me more anxious to talk to this guy, to find the connection with my Bruce from 35 years ago.

Of course, I'm not about to walk up to him and say "You look just like someone I knew 35 years ago." I don't want to draw attention to my age, and besides, it's the oldest pickup line in the book. I'd get sneered at.

Besides, I'm afraid. Could this be my Bruce, zapped to the future in a weird time warp?

The full story, with nude photos and explicit sexual situations, is on Tales of West Hollywood.

"

This is the physique of a pizza chef.

Richard Brose may not be a household name today, but he was a regular guest star on 1980s tv. Whenever a casting agent needed a man-mountain, especially for a Sylvester Stallone parody, , they would "call Richie."

He was working as a bodyguard at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas when Arnold Schwarzenegger's Conan the Barbarian became a mega-hit (1983), and Universal Studios opened an "Adventures of Conan" attraction. They needed a Conan. Richie auditioned, got the job, and kept it for the next ten years.

In 1984, Pee-Wee's Big Adventure was casting a scene where Pee-Wee Herman rides his bike through a movie studio, disrupting a lot of movies being filmed. Richie got the part of "Tarzan."

For the next 6 years, he often drove down from the San Fernando Valley for guest spots on tv:

He played a wrestler on Night Court (1985).

"Chesty" on Trapper John, M.D.(1985).

"Rambo Type Man" on Misfits of Science (1985).

"Hambro" on Hunter (1986).

A Hunk on Perfect Strangers(1986).

A fitness trainer on Charles in Charge (1988).

But his real love was cooking. He opened a restaurant in Antelope Valley, and in the 1990s he relocated to Vancouver, Washington to open New York Richie's. He now owns several pizza places in the northwest, but he returns to show biz from time to time. He played Batman at Magic Mountain, and in 2006 he became an associate producer of Being Earnest, an adaption of the gay-subtext classic.

No indication of whether he's gay or not, but not a lot of gay men flee Los Angeles for the haven of LaGrande, Oregon.

Born in 1960, Willie Aames was a television fixture from 1971 through 1990. The only question is, when precisely did he turn from "cute kid" to a bodybuilder that drew the attention of every gay male teenager with access to a remote?

Was it when he played troubled T. J. Latimer in the angst-ridden Family (1976-77)?

Shipwreck survivor Fred Robinson in The Swiss Family Robinson (1975-76)?

As early as his brief sitcom appearance as Paul Sorvino's kid in We'll Get By (1975)?

Certainly by the time he landed the role of troubled Tommy Bradford in Eight is Enough (1977-81), Willie Aames and his muscles were superstars.

In 1979 Willie became even more famous for his semi-nude and nude screenshots in the Blue Lagoon rip-off Paradise, but gay teenagers were more interested in Zapped! (1982), in which he and Scott play lovers. Well, college students crazy about girls who nevertheless can't stop grinning at each other.

Intensive buddy-bonding with the dreamy Scott Baio on Charles in Chargefollowed (1984-1990), though in order to keep viewers focused on Scott's dreaminess, the producers had to minimize Willie's buffness. They made his character, Buddy Lembeck, stupid, the butt of jokes rather than the source of sighs.

Willie thankfully never sang, but that didn't keep the teen magazines from going into hysterics about his incredible talent -- by which they meant physique.

After Charles, drug and alcohol addiction took their toll, and Willie's acting career fizzled. A stint as Christian fundamentalist superhero Bible Mandidn't help him regain his followers or his fame. In 2005, he produced, wrote, directed, and starred in The Public Life of Sissy Pike, about a Christian fundamentalist girl.

I'm guessing he's not a gay ally.

There are nude photos of Willie Aames on Tales of West Hollywood.

When I was a kid in the 1960s, my favorite comic titles were Harvey (gay-vague Casper the Friendly Ghost), Disney, Archie, and the Gold Key jungle adventures.

Comics featuring Warner Brothers cartoon characters Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, and Bugs Bunny were low on my list.

The art was amateurish, with minimal backgrounds, or just blank space (this is one of the best covers).

The plots were boring slapstick.

And instead of the anarchic outsiders of the cartoons, the characters were stable, stolid suburbanites, with houses and jobs and girlfriends. Porky was a single dad, raising his nephew, Cicero.

But sometimes Bugs and Porky or Yosemite Sam teamed up for adventure stories. Maybe they stumbled upon a haunted inn. Or they answered a job ad for "undersea explorers" Or a telegram arrived about "trouble at the ranch." Buddy-bonding, captures, and nick-of-time rescues followed.

A continuing series had Bugs and Porky working as Indiana Jones-style adventurer-archaeologists, investigating the myth of Pegasus or discovering a lost civilization hidden under the ice of Antartica. With no girlfriends in sight, and no damsels in distress to be won.

Even when there was no buddy-bonding, the adventure stories offered opportunities for gay misreadings. In "The Kingdom of Nowhere" (Porky Pig 4, 1965), Porky wins a contest to re-name a Medieval kingdom (he suggests Boovaria). But he must fight the other winner, the Black Knight.

When I first read the story, probably in my boyfriend Bill's room in third grade, I didn't realize that this small, short-haired person grabbing the king's rump was supposed to be the queen. I thought he had a tiny boyfriend.

When Porky and the Black Knight learn that, as an added bonus, the winner will marry the Princess, they drop out of the contest and run away. Porky, because he already has a girlfriend.

But why does the Black Knight run away? Could it be that he doesn't particularly care for girls?

Later we get an explanation: the Black Knight was really his girlfriend Petunia in drag! Porky exclaims "No wonder you weren't interested in winning the hand of the princess!"

But this quick-fix doesn't detract from the image of a boy not interested in girls.

And it adds a new question: why, precisely, did Petunia disguise herself as a man?

For that matter, why are Bugs and Porky so comfortable in drag?

See also: Andy Panda and Woody Woodpecker.

I've been re-watching My Name is Earl (2005-2009), about a lowbrow ne-er-do-well (Jason Lee) trying to reform by going through his list of misdeeds and righting them, one by one. He's assisted by his dimwitted brother Randy (Ethan Suplee) and a series of friends and antagonists.

More gay subtexts than the gay-free Raising Hope, even two gay characters. But not a lot of beefcake. Until we got to the Season 2 premiere.

Earl's ex-wife Joy (Jaime Pressley) steals a truck, not realizing that there is a guy locked in the back. In order to get him out without revealing their identities, Earl and Joy order him to take his shirt off and use it as a blindfold. Later we see him in his underwear as Joy chases him across a field.

Lots of shots of the guy's muscular physique!

Wondering who he was, I looked him up on the IMDB, and found Josh Wolf (1974-), a comedian who has also appeared on Raising Hope, and as himself on Chelsea Lately and his own talk show on CMT (2015-).

On Shark after Dark, Josh and fellow comedian Courtney Davis tried to survive New York City naked.

He is happy to receive admiration for his chest from gay men, and he tweets:

Do people who think being gay is a choice want to sleep with everyone all of the time but they just choose not to?

I don't know what that means, but it sounds gay positive.

If you were a kid in the early 1990s -- or even if you were a teenager -- you probably watched Ghostwriter (1992-95), the most popular PBS series of all time. Instead of the raucous muppets of Sesame Streetor the conflict-less Mr. Rogers, it had a group of multi-ethnic kids solving mysteries in a rather realistic Brooklyn,New York. Sort of like the 1990s version of The Electric Company, but here the problems were grittier: gangs, kidnappings, drugs, arsonists, corruption, and even divorce.

Their benefactor was Ghostwriter, a being who manifested to Jamal (Sheldon Turnipseed) one night. Invisible, unable to speak, he communicated by rearranging letters on signs, in books, even in sentences the kids wrote down. At first he didn't know who or what he was -- a ghost, an earthbound spirit, an alien -- but gradually he remembered a few things: he was the ghost of a man, he lived over 100 years ago, and he didn't like the sound of dogs barking.

The Ghostwriter team consisted of three boys and three girls, all in late childhood or early adolescence:

1. Jamal
2. Alex (David Lopez)
3. Rob (Todd Alexander Cohen), replaced by Hector (William Hernandez).
4. Lenni (Blaze Berdahl)
5. Gaby (Mayteana Morales, Melissa Gonzales)
6. Tina (Tram-Anh Trang)

Alex and Tina commence a hetero-romantic relationship, but none of the other characters express any heterosexual interest. There is significant buddy-bonding between Jamal and Hector, however, and beefcake, as Jamal begins to noticeably muscle up, providing rare teen beefcake for PBS.

William Hernandez is gay, and the only one of the boys still involved in acting. He appeared as himself on MTV's The Real World (2004-2005) and later appeared in the gay comedy A Four Letter Word (2007).

David Lopez attended Rutgers, and upon graduating moved back to Colombia.

Todd Alexander and Sheldon Turnipseed attended NYU together. Both seem to have dropped off the map.

The biggest mystery -- who was Ghostwriter -- was never revealed during the series. But 20 years later, in a March 2013 article, writer Kermit Frazier tells us: he was a runaway slave who was teaching other slaves to read in the woods, when he was killed by slave catchers and their dogs. His spirit was trapped in the book that Jamal found

Today Scott Baio is a bitter, right-wing blowhard who regularly makes homophobic and Islamophobic comments and is a passionate supporter of the Orange Fuhrer. But when I was living in West Hollywood in the late 1980s, he had the goods.

Charles in Charge premiered in 1984, with 24-year old Scott Baio as a rather dorky college student working as a live-in nanny to three bratty kids. After one season, it was cancelled.

It returned in first-run syndication in 1987, hipper and sexier, with a new, softcore-porn rendition of the opening song:

Charles in charge of our days and our nights.
Charles in charge of our wrongs and our rights.
I want --- oooh --- I want Charles in charge of me.

The kids were no longer bratty -- one was a teenage supermodel. And Charles was a confident A-Gamer.

Who had a chest, and wasn't afraid to use it.

And a bodybuilder boyfriend named Buddy (Willie Aames).

I never went to tv show tapings, unless I had out of town visitors. They were tacky and touristy. But I went to Charles in Charge several times, just to gawk at Scott and Willie.

Scott was so fey, and the gay-subtext buddy-bonds were so intense, that everyone in West Hollywood assumed he was gay.

Well, maybe bisexual: he was linked with Heather Locklear, Melissa Gilbert, Leslie Ann Warren, Nicolette Sheridan, and Nicole Eggert, who stated that she lost her virginity to him in 1989, at age seventeen.

But the gay rumors were ubiquitous. Most were the standard backstage hookups and closeted dates, but there were others -- vulgar and raunchy, about abuse, domination, and humiliation. They make you feel sorry for the guy.

Here are 10 most interesting rumors about Scott Baio's gay hookups and dates:

1. His first gay hookup was with Eddie Mekka, who played Carmine on Laverne and Shirley.

2. A three-way with his cousin Jimmy and Ricardo Montalban, the star of Fantasy Island.

3. When he was on Happy Days, Henry Winkler (Fonzie) asked him to "sit on it."

The full list, with nude photos and sexual situations, is on Tales of West Hollywood.

I'm starting a new prize for the worst heterosexist movie of all time.

Heterosexist movies have no gay characters or gay subtexts, plus a hetero romance. That is, most movies churned out by Hollywood. It's hard to choose between so many contenders, but I have a suggestion: Knowing (2009), which is not only aggressively, over-the-top heterosexist, but just plain awful.

In 1959, a classroom of absurdly over-enthusiastic children draw pictures of the future to put in a time capsule (wait -- that's not what time capsules are for). Except one girl draws long rows of numbers instead.

In 2009, depressed cosmologist John (the hideously ugly Nicolas Cage) asks his advanced astronomy class to write their term papers on whether things happen for a reason, or are just random coincidences.

So basically, evolution or intelligent design? For astronomy students! That's absurd. Didn't anyone read this script?

John has an absurd amount of baggage: dead wife, obnoxious son, preacher papa who he hasn't talked to in years, probably due to that evolution/intelligent design thing.

The time capsule opens, and John gets ahold of the rows of numbers. He deciphers them as the dates, and death tolls, of every major disaster from 1959 on the near future. She was predicting them!

John tries to stop the next disaster by acting like a terrorist and tries to pick up The Girl by acting like a raving lunatic (it works). Coincidentally, she has an obnoxious daughter. All four try to unravel the mystery, especially the last date, a few days from now, with EE instead of a death toll.

Turns out that aliens have been telepathically communicating with kids, giving them long rows of numbers to demonstrate that they know what will happen in the future, and that a global disaster is coming (EE= "Everybody else").

Ok, that's the dumbest warning in history -- long rows of numbers that no one can interpret. And besides, why warn someone if they can't do anything about it except die?

All of John and The Girl's histrionic machinations come to naught -- the world ends anyway. So the movie was not only heterosexist, but completely and utterly pointless.

The kicker: the aliens rescue the son and daughter, and maybe some other kids, along with their pet rabbits, drop them off on a world with wheat fields and a tree, and leave.

Wait -- they leave? Those kids are going to need food and shelter!

I get it. Boy and Girl and rabbits, ancient fertility symbols. They're Adam and Eve in a new Eden.

At least the aggressively heterosexist kick in the pants ends the agony of sitting through this mess.

Substantial beefcake can make up for the most inane plotline and the most absurd sacralization of boy-girl romance, but here there isn't any.

There's a collegiate hunk named Sean sitting in the classroom (played by Liam Hemsworth), But, when he's asked to discuss the sun, all he can think of is "It's hot." An advanced astronomy student? Too ludicrous to appreciate his hotness!

If you search for "Gareth Yuen" on Google Images, you get someone named Dwayne Cameron instead.

The obnoxious son is played by Chandler Canterbury, now 18 and kind of cute.

But that's not nearly enough to distract you from the agony.

We have a winner: the worst heterosexist movie of all time.

No matter how you guard against it, if you live in the United States, sooner or later you will be forced to watch a football game.

It's a national obsession, especially among heterosexual men. It's all they think of from August through February, and they believe that it's all you think of, too. So you will be interrogated on favorite teams, favorite players, favorite plays, asked how the game went last night, and invited to watch.

Of course, there are reasons you may want to hang out with guys who watch football. They tend to be more muscular than your run-of-the-mill straight guy, and they like hugging and grabbing each other at every point.

The snacks are good, too.

If you go to or watch all of the available football games played from August to February, you will devote 12 hours a day, every day, to The Game. No one can do all of that, so straight guys usually confine themselves to one game per day, and read the newspaper or watch ESPN to find out the other scores, so they can discuss them incessantly with their friends.

1. Professional football is played by members of the NFL (National Football League), which is divided into two conference of 16 teams each. Each team will play 24 games during the season, plus a playoff to decide who is best in each conference.

That's a lot of games, but don't despair. You just need to memorize who won in the last few games played by teams from cities in your state (or, to be on the safe side, adjoining states). Unfortunately, the two conferences aren't divided by geography, so you'll just have to scan to find them.

For instance, when I lived in Dayton, masquerading as heterosexual only required me to know about the Cincinnati Bengals, the Cleveland Browns, and maybe, to be on the safe side, the Indianapolis Colts. Now I live on the Plains, so all I have to know about are the Minnesota Vikings, and to be on the safe side, the Green Bay Packers and the Chicago Bears.

Memorize the names of the some of main players -- called quarterbacks -- so you can ask "How did ___ do last night?" For the Minnesota Vikings, that's Teddy Bridgewater and Christian Pounder.

The Superbowl, in January or February, is the big event of the year, with the best teams of the two conferences squaring off. You should know who won for the last five years: Seattle Seahawks, Baltimore Ravens, New York Giants, Green Bay Packers, New Orleans Saints.

2. You should also know something about college football. Colleges are divided into four Divisions by the National College Athletic Association (NCAA). You only have to know about Division 1, the 128 biggest colleges, which is divided into 11 Conferences. Unfortunately, they're not divided by geography, either, so figure out the ones that are closest to you (in Minnesota, the Golden Gophers).

You also might want to know about the Big Ten, which actually has 15 members: Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Michigan State, Minnesota, and so on.

Be careful around Christmastime: that's when the various conferences decide which team is better at "bowl" tournaments, and there are dozens of them, most with silly commercial names: The Hyundai Sun Bowl, the AutoZone Liberty Bowl, the Chick-fil-a Peach Bowl, etc.

Straight guys will be following all of them, but the only you really need to know about is the Rose Bowl (January 1st), in which the Big Ten and the Pacific-12 conferences pair off.

3. If you're ready for the advanced stuff, try showing off your knowledge of high school football! They are divided up into divisions and ranks, too.

Rock Island High School, my alma mater, is nationally ranked at 7120 and state ranked at 217. It's in the Western Big Six.

Do you have a headache yet?

Think of it this way: all of the statistics, rankings, divisions, and conferences boil down to a group of extremely muscular men piling up on each other, grabbing each other's butts, adjusting their crotches, and then getting naked in the locker room.

Almost makes it all worthwhile.

See also: Hating Sports.

Rock Island, August 1975

"All entering sophomores invited to try out for junior varsity football," Dad reads from a brochure that came in the mail.

"That's nice," I say, immersed in a course catalog.

"You dropped out of wrestling and judo," he points out. "You have to play some kind of sport in high school."

"Is that a rule? I don't like sports. Besides, I'm going to be busy with orchestra, jump quiz, Spanish Club, Writers' Club..."

"Yes, it's a rule! And stop pretending that you don't like sports. You're a boy, aren't you?"

"Well...I wouldn't mind the track team, I guess."

"Why not football?"

"No way!" I exclaim. "Football is gross!" Of all the sports I hate, football is the worst. Guys pounding each other into a pulp over some stupid little ball. Why don't they just give everybody his own ball -- that way they wouldn't have to fight over it.

"Football players always get the cutest girls," Dad says, assuming that I, like "every boy," decide on courses of action solely on their likelihood of acquiring girls.

"What kind of date can I go on in Intensive Care?"

"Don't get smart! It won't hurt you to try out, at least."

When Dad says "Jump," you say "How high?" I have no choice but to try out.

The full post, with nude photos, is on Tales of West Hollywood.

I'm all for subtexts. This blog is about finding gay connections in texts where the writer, director, and fans are all yelling "No, no, no!" And I've found them in dozens of children's tv shows, from The Flintstones in the 1960s to Adventure Timetoday.

It's easier to find them in juvenile media, where the heterosexist mandate of ending every story with a boy-girl kiss is not so aggressively policed. All you need is:

Two characters of the same sex who display little or no heterosexual interest, and have a passionate, intense, exclusive relationship.

Some character pairs have been bandied around for years as emblems of gay subtexts, but unfortunately, they just don't cut it:

1. Batman and Robin (Adam West, Burt Ward) from the 1960s tv series. The Dynamic Duo may have been domestic partners in the 1940s comic books, but by the 1960s they were presented as a heterosexual father and his heterosexual adopted son.

Lack of hetero interest: No
Exclusive: Yes
Passionate, intense: No

It was still fun to watch Robin being a "damsel in distress," threatened by the villain and rescued by "my hero" Batman.

Especially in the first season, before they censored Robin's skin-tight briefs.

2. Shaggy and Scooby, Scooby-Doo. You already know what they look like, so here's Robbie Amell as Fred in Scooby-Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster (2010).

Scooby-Doo is multi-generational cartoon/movie series about four teenagers and their semi-sentient dog (the titular Scooby-Doo) who solve paranormal mysteries. The beatnik Shaggy and Scooby often go off exploring on their own, and jump into each other's arms. But come on -- it's a guy and a semi-sentient dog!

Lack of hetero interest: Yes
Passionate, intense: No
Exclusive: No. They're part of a group.

3. Bert and Ernie, Sesame Street. This one gets a lot of play, including a petition to have the two get married on the air.

But have you actually watched this show? Ernie is Bert's annoying, tag-along little brother. Of course they love each other, but there is no passion in their relationship. And I don't even think that they live together; they are too young. There must be a parent off-camera somewhere.

Lack of hetero interest: Yes
Passionate, intense: No
Exclusive: Yes

4. Peppermint Patty and Marcie of the comic strip Peanuts have often been envisioned as a lesbian couple (here on a episode of Family Guy). But in the strip, they are portrayed as heterosexual friends. Each has a crush on Charlie Brown, as well as other more fleeting heterosexual romances. And their interactions are neither passionate nor intense. The only hug I can remember occurs when Marcie's mother makes Patty a skating outfit.

Lack of hetero interest: No
Passionate, intense: No
Exclusive: Yes

5. Bart and Milhouse, The Simpsons, shown here as adults, after Milhouse bulks up. Certainly the two are inseparable buddies, and Milhouse has many gender-atypical traits. He's even characterized in his permanent record with the antiquated phrase "homosexual tendencies." But he has a major crush on Lisa, and Bart has had any number of girlfriends.

Lack of hetero interest: No
Passionate, intense: No
Exclusive: Yes

But don't worry, there are still dozens of juvenile media characters for whom the gay subtexts ring loud and clear. Let's start with Spongebob Squarepants and Patrick.

Plains, February 2017

I like hookups, but they're a lot of work. You have to find the guy, interview him, deal with stupid or annoying questions, clean your apartment, take safety precautions, do 100 push-ups so you're buffed when he knocks on the door. Then you have to be on top of your game for an hour of socializing and sex.

But beefcake watching -- looking at cute guys with no intention of approaching them -- is simple. No preparation or strategizing necessary. Didn't shower this morning? Feeling cranky or depressed? Got a runny nose and a sore throat? Not a problem. Just go where the cute guys are, and gawk away.

On the Plains, the beefcake is plentiful, and the heterosexuals, assuming that no gay men exist outside of New York and San Francisco, don't get insulted when another guy looks at them. You still have to be careful: face-crotch-face, no eye contact unless you know them -- but it's not a major crisis if they notice you looking.

Today is my long day -- on campus from 9:00 am to 8:00 pm, teaching four classes including one three-hour night class, breaks only for my office hours and the gym. It's a heavy schedule. But fortunately, it provides for ample beefcake-watching.

9:30 am.

A big class, 98 students in a giant lecture hall. Not a lot of muscle: mostly first years, fresh-faced twinks. My favorite is Ryan (not his real name): medium height, slim, glasses, unruly black hair, shy, scared. He needs nurturing.

He's absent today.

3:30 pm

Enough time for the campus gym and a little course prep.

I look forward to running around the indoor track, where the basketball players divide into shirts vs. skins: endless tight bare torsos!

Today there are about six basketball games going on down there. They're all fully clothed!

This is getting serious.

The full story, with nude photos and explicit sexual situations, is on Tales of West Hollywood.

Gay boys all but ignored 20-year old John Stamos when he was playing streetwise Blackie on General Hospital (1983-84). Not many watched soap operas, and his pleasantly slender physique seemed bit too androgynous as Nautilus-toned man-mountains came into style. Besides, he had a girlfriend.

Some started to notice when John starred as aspiring rock star Gino Minnelli on Dreams (1984-85), which aired after Charles in Charge on Wednesday nights. It offered lots of shirtless shots -- by this time John had joined a gym -- plus buddy-bonding episodes like "Friends" and "Boys are the Best." But it only lasted for 12 episodes.

After 25 episodes of You Again? (1986-87), playing Jack Klugman's estranged teenage son -- which was switched around so often that no one saw it -- John finally found a place in gay teenagers' hearts in Full House (1987-95) on the TGIF ("Thank God it's Friday) block of kid-friendly Friday-night shows.

He played Uncle Jesse, who moved in with his brother-in-law Danny (Bob Saget) and another male friend, Dave (Joey Gladstone), to help raise Danny's three daughters after his wife died.

Alternative families are a standby on tv, but aside from the basic non-heteronormative family structure -- and John's smile -- there was little for gay teenagers to like.

He rarely took off a shirt -- when he did, the moments were mostly cute rather than hot. Only one episode showed him in a swimsuit.

Nor did the friendships result in much buddy-bonding. The guys all got girlfriends, and the daughters got boyfriends, and gay people were not mentioned, ever, even though the show was set in gay mecca San Francisco.

In an Advocate interview, John states that he wasn't really aware that he had gay fan at the time -- "people weren't as out back then." But he's made up for it since, as one of the most gay-friendly actors in Hollywood, even when depicted in TV Guide. He played a gay wedding planner in the tv-movie Wedding Wars (2006). He engaged in a same-sex kiss for charity at the GLAAD Awards.

When The Office refused to air a joke in which a character pretends to be gay by imagining that he was "in a steam room with John Stamos," the blogosphere assumed that the screen hunk had objected -- but he quickly proclaimed that he had nothing to do with it, he loved the joke, and he would be more than happy to film any attendant fantasy sequence.

Speaking of singers that you couldn't avoid hearing during the 1970s, I spent my entire three years at Rocky High and most of my four years at Augustana College running in the other direction while Barry Manilow's syrupy love! love! love! love! crooning spewed forth from transistor radios, car radios, the p.a. at school, record stores, tv...but there was no escape.

Ninth Grade:
"Mandy": I remember all my life, raining down as cold as ice, sending Mandy away.
Well, he got that right -- all my life, I've remembered that song, no matter how much I don't want to.

"It's a Miracle": It's a miracle, a true-blue spectacle, that he is in love.
At least he's over Mandy.

"Could it be Magic": baby take me, high upon a hillside, high up where the stallion meets the sun...come, come, come into my...
This is the first song I heard that I knew was about having sex, although I wouldn't be asking anyone to come, come, come into my....for a few years.

Tenth Grade:
"I Write the Songs": I write the songs that make the young girl cry...I am music, and I write the songs...
Rather full of himself, isn't he?

"Trying to Get That Feeling Again": he sees a doctor to get a pill, because he's gone up, down,all around, trying to get that feeling again.
You just need to relax, Barry. It can be tiring going...um....up, down all around.

"This One's for You": This one will never sell, they'll never understand, I don't even sing it well.
He's got that right.

Eleventh Grade:
"Weekend in New England."Last night I waved goodbye, now it seems years -- I'm back in the city, where nothing is clear.
I'd rather be in the city than stuck in a small factory town in the Midwest.

"Looks Like We Made It": Do you love him as much as I love her, and will that love be strong when the old feelings stir?
What they've made is a successful breakup, but then the old feelings come back. Mandy, again?

Twelfth Grade:
"Daybreak"It's daybreak if you want to believe, it's daybreak, no time to grieve.
Repeat 38 times. Don't try to figure out what it means.

"Can't Smile without You": can't laugh, can't sing, finding it hard to do anything.
So that's why! Quick, get back together!

"Even Now": Even now I think about you when I'm climbing the stairs, and I wonder what to do so she won't see.
You still thinking about Mandy? It's been four years!

"Copacabana": this one has a plot, about a showgirl with two boyfriends who shoot each other, so she goes crazy, and continues to come to the Copa, even though thirty years have passed and it's now a disco. Sort of a Miss Haversham thing. Cool.

When I was in college, his new songs started moving down the Top 40 charts.

Freshman:
"Somewhere in the Night": You're my song, music too magic to end.
Wait, I thought Barry was music, and wrote the songs?

"Ships": We're just out of sight, like two ships that pass in the night.
He's saying this to his father as they walk along the beach?

Sophomore:
"I Don't Want to Walk Without You."
We already know that he can't smile, laugh, or sing, so walking is a logical extension.

"Bermuda Triangle." It's a region where planes disappear and weird things happen. So Barry sings about losing his girlfriend in the Bermuda Triangle, except he means she got stolen away by another guy.

Junior:

"I Made it through the Rain."And I found myself respected by others who -- got rained on, too.
At Augustana, we didn't say "I got rained on." We had an earthier expression.

I don't remember hearing any more Barry Manilow songs after that, but apparently he's been releasing an album every couple of years: Greatest Hits, Greatest Hits of All Time, A Swinging Christmas, Barry Manilow Sings Sinatra, Night Songs, Duets, The Essential Barry Manilow. And performing live. And not using the word "gay."

Oh, didn't I mention it? He sang about ladies, but he never was seen on the arm of a lady. Everyone assumed that he was gay, but he never said anything, for fear that his fans were homophobic.

According to People magazine, in 2014 he married his manager, Garry Keif (not pictured; this is just a random muscle hunk walking along the beach with him).

See also 12 Songs I Hated.

Plains, February 2017

I've dated or hooked up with men in 38 states and 20 countries, I've met them in art galleries, restaurants, museums, movie theaters, monasteries, doctor's offices, bookstores, comic book stores, department stores, bath houses, sex parties, bear parties, and on the street.

But tonight I'm going to try to meet men in a completely new and different place:

A straight bar.

For the first 55 years of my life, I never set foot in a straight bar, not even when I lived in Ohio and Upstate New York. You couldn't meet guys there -- you couldn't even check out the beefcake without angry rednecks yelling "What are you looking at?" And what if a woman tried to pick me up?

But on the Plains, there are no gay organizations except for a student club, no meeting places except the gay-friendly coffee house, which is not great for cruising. And Grinder is getting old, with the constant "Top me, Daddy!"

Besides, most of the gay men in town are "post-gay" -- fully assimilated into the straight world, with mostly straight friends, hanging out at straight venues. So, logically, where do they go to meet men?

Twice in a row, when I stopped into the Red Rock, the student bar-restaurant downtown, to grab a sandwich, I hooked up almost immediately -- without even trying! I can only imagine my success if I give it my best shot!

9:00 am Saturday

I haven't gone to a bar to cruise -- look for guys for dates or hookups -- for years. I remember many Saturday nights in West Hollywood, at Mugi, Basgo's, the Gold Coast, or the Faultline: blaring disco music, semi-darkness, the smell of cigarette smoke and poppers, of guys with beer bottles popping up from their crotches. The interview -- the grope -- the joy of getting that phone number. The agony of having the guy you like snatched away.

Giddy with anticipation, I spend most of the day preparing, checking every detail.

No sore throat, sinus problems, cold sores, or flatulence. No sex for at least 24 hours. Get a hair cut.

Buy snacks and beverages to offer him.

Clean apartment. Change the sheets -- use the good ones. Hide the valuables. Jar of condoms and "trick towel" ready.

Research current events and the local sports team for conversation topics.

3:00 pm

The gym. No cardio. Blast the chest and biceps.

5:00 pm

Light dinner, mostly easy-to digest carbs. Shower, shave, mouthwash.

Cruising outfit: very tight black t-shirt, tight jeans, black shoes, leather jacket. Carry keys, breath mints, handkerchief, money, driver's license, pen for writing down phone number.

9:00 pm

Show time!

The full story, with nude photos and sexual situations, is on Tales of West Hollywood.

Bug Hall: Always Undressed

Fall 1997: Gay Panic and the Obnoxious Roommate

The Russian Penis Museum

A Beefcake Tour of the Louvre

The Joy of Guys Who Aren't Naked

A Time Traveler from 1979 Brings Me Guys

Richie Brose: 1980s Beefcake Star Opens a Restaurant

Willie Aames: From Buddy to Bible Man

Bugs and Porky meet a Drag King: Warner Brothers Comics

Unexpected Beefcake on "My Name is Earl"

Ghostwriter: Urban Teen Muscle

The Top 10 Gay Rumors about Scott Baio

The Worst Heterosexist Movie of All Time: "Knowing"

How to Survive a Football Game

The Naked Goldenboys at Football Try-Outs

5 Cartoon Couples That You Thought Were Gay, But Probably Aren't

Searching for Beefcake on the Plains

John Stamos

I Spent My High School Years with Barry Manilow

Cruising in a Straight Bar