Outsiders, freaks, rebels, queers, etc., are continually being driven out of the city by the New Normal. City life is becoming evermore standardized--sex is contained in a luxury glass box, the erotic is sublimated into food porn, and "Meatpacking" stands not for flesh, but the mere packaging of desire, sanitized for your approval.
As the Leather Fest's director, Robert Valin, put it, “The gay leather men put that place on the map.” The leather scene has deep roots in the Meat Market--but today its history has been wholly erased, as old-schoolers like Lenny Waller remind us.
The neighbors have fought against the Leather Festival from its beginnings. This year, with the High Line wielding its charms, queer-phobia has won, making MePa safe for hetero-normative brands of hedonism and exhibitionism to prevail.
Today, the Standard Hotel's guests waggle their willies at non-consenting High Line park visitors--yet queer sexuality is bad for the hotel's image.
Food fetishists argue that their gluttonous sublimations are somehow less about sex than those of leather fetishists.
Smut is allowed only if it's wrapped in polished glass or couched in cute references to upscale foods, replaced by a vanilla version of the once-raw sexuality that found refuge in this part of town.
photo: NY Fest, by Alex Blevins
This coming weekend, instead of learning about something like safe bondage techniques, you can attend a Tea Seduction, "an aphrodisiac afternoon tea served with all the foods that stimulate the senses and arouse the appetite."
At Meatpacking Uncorked "chic boutiques will flow with a large selection of wines... tasting and shopping in the district will be infused with... sexy and sophisticated spectacles."
MePa billboard, photo: Blaise K
What if all the freaks, queers, artists, outsiders, perverts, and punks crashed this party, refusing to be erased?
Further Reading:
Lenny & Leather
Men in Leather
4 comments:
They can't erase us--we are bloggers!!!!
The piece on the google photographs is amazing--horrfying too.
Excellent essay, Jeremiah.
I hate that The Standard is now setting, well, the standards in that neighborhood.
Is there any fight left?
apparently, there is no fight left. as this entire situation has been met with the chirping of crickets.
i went to the leather fest in year 2000. i was surprised (& offended), by the #'s of FAT men in bikinis. this is a gay event? in new york? hello!!! what are they thinking? it seems the straight billboard (the boy in jeans) is more of a positive gay statement. ironic, is this not? thats why this leather event is on the outs.
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