by Esihle Lupindo
PROLOGUE
Sex is a vast language in which we’re all fluent across continents, dialects, cultures, borders, time, and sexualities. A universal language requiring neither translation nor translator. Sex is full of contradictions: so ubiquitous yet so private, almost as if it doesn’t exist. Despite any amount of danger or restrictive policing, it can never be disappeared.
Sex can be dangerous. It can be the passage from which a lifelong virus finds a home in your body. It can be the one thing that sends you to prison. It can be threatening to queerphobic-heterosexist-masculine-militant-nationalism that hides behind a fixed idea of culture or religion that will send you to eternal hell for the kind of sex you choose to have.
For this reason, sex becomes a practice and an idea for which one should be condemned because it “stains” your soul while it produces pleasure in your body. Athambile Masola, a scholar of Black women’s historiographies, reflecting on South Africa and the end of apartheid, shares that “we insist on being alive” despite the murderous [apartheid] regime. Sex, too, could also be understood as the mechanism through which “we insist on being alive.”
In the face of brutality, where fascist governments and world leaders want to enter our bedrooms and dictate the kind of sex we should have or how we should have it, the desire to fuck remains unbelievably unshaken. This desire persists despite pandemics forcing us to reconsider the consequences of such pleasure. Perhaps these harsh conditions lead us to the kinds of sex that are punishable in many parts of the globe. The sociologist Nthabiseng Motsemme (2007) reminds us that “we cannot ignore that part of sexuality is also about the search for pleasure, to abandon and surrender yourself to another. This basic human emotion cannot be ignored” (p.65).
Sex offers little safety. It strips you bare. It crushes the walls that you build up to keep the world out by letting someone in you. Sex is not polite. It is messy and the orgasming does not negotiate with you. The desire to hand myself over to another does not disappear because there is a perceived danger. Instead, the longing for sex might lead us to online spaces in a search. Search for another. Search for safety. Search for the thrill that comes from risk. The risk is omnipresent because the online space is no new world. It is a microcosm of the world we already know, live in, continue to destroy and reimagine. But online spaces are not idyllic. Far from it. The online space may be equally as dangerous as the offline space. The only difference is that the online space is a world living in our pockets. The offline space is just too large to be folded into our pockets.
In our hyper-digital era, governments such as the UK can sign bills giving them power to gain access to your digital history (Matharu, 2015), We find ourselves in a time when Queerphobic-heterosexist-masculine-extremist States that orgasm from the thought of terrorizing non-heterosexual desires and sexual practices:
- From China to Cuba, Jordon to Syria, Lebanon and Qatar among others, visitors, residents and citizens alike have severely restricted access to Grindr
- In the United Kingdom bills are proposed for the State to know “‘who, where, when and what’ of any communication – who initiated it, where were they and when did it happened”
- South Africa and Nigeria, two seemingly very different countries regarding queer legislation have queer people being kidnapped on Grindr.
- In the United States teenagers are kidnapped and almost murdered on Grindr and the perpetrators boast that he “intended to kill other gay men until he was either caught or killed himself”
We are confronted with these stories from across the world, we know that we are not safe. This knowledge is not just about individual queer people. It has to do with all of us. When we collect all of these stories from across the world the message is clear: we live in global sexual zones of terror. Yet, this does not deter us. We still choose to take the risk and use the internet to gain access to a wide pool of potential sexual partners. We want to share ourselves with others even when there is a likelihood that our digital activities are being monitored.
“Do you have a nice cock?”
There is nothing peculiar about me. I take the risk and seek my sex like no danger exists.
The men that I often attract in this Midwestern town are…interesting. They are often looking for something I am not certain I have or can give; they desire things that no one has asked for in my previous encounters.
On Grindr, for example, I have once had a man write to me: “White male cock sucker looking to suck cock. Please send cock pic when you need that cock sucked.”
Another, a really old man, older than my grandparents, said: “I am hosting and invite you to come over and cum in my mouth. Love young Black cock.”
Another asks, “Do you have a nice cock?”
After reading these messages, I do not know if I should be impressed that they are writing in full sentences or amazed at the revelation of having a cock. It is clear these men are in search of something, one thing: a cock.
In South Africa, I have a dick or a penis.
In America, I have a cock.
An unanswered question rushes to my head: Do I lose a dick when I cross the ocean and grow a cock? Does my dick grow back, and my cock disappear when I go home?
I don’t know. All I know is that I do not need to know you to have sex with you. I need your body and your touch—little, if anything else.
This is one such story.
Unknown & I
We meet over the phone; there is no complex interaction: I am horny and so is he, and it is enough to bring us together.
He is initially hesitant to show his face, but eventually, he does. Unknown is confident but he does not reach arrogance. I like this.
He looks at my face with careful attention, so careful very little could disturb him. He looks at it as if diligently studying it. Shortly he tells me how beautiful I am his head tilted, his hands buried in the pockets of his jacket.
He does not wait for me to be polite and tell him that he is also beautiful. Instead, he tells me that he is beautiful too. He was not looking for any of my approval. It was never a question. There is something about this certainty that I enjoy. I like the mystery about him too.
But I am nervous.
I don’t know him or what he looks like beyond the unclear “view-once” photo he sent and I opened without paying much attention. I have no details to give my friends as clues in case I am found dead beside my work. I know this is a great possibility. I have nonetheless decided Unknown is coming over and he seems okay.
My friend lives next door, and I am comforted by this reminder. Maybe he will hear my last breath. This is also the burden of being queer anywhere in the world: you carry death even when you want to fuck.
Unknown arrives, eventually. I don’t ask for his name and neither does he mine—I like this.
Unknown is pretty and shy, makes very little effort to maintain eye contact. Very few words escape his mouth. He just stands in front of me, behind the door that I locked after he comes in. He is slightly shorter than me, his head enveloped tightly in a durag.
He barely takes a seat.
I open the bedroom door and close it shut. He removes his black bomber jacket, kicks off his shoes, reaching over to kiss me. He stops for a moment, holding my gaze and tells me how soft my lips are. I smile, say nothing. I am not thinking about the texture of his lips, just the taste of his tongue—he tastes of cigarettes. I can’t determine the brand of cigarettes, but I enjoy the deposits of his tobacco-laced tongue into my mouth.
It reminds me of my first love. Here I am, a boy naked in my bedroom and thinking of my first love. We carry all the men we have loved, recklessly made love to and the ones we fucked in familiar and strange places to the ones we fuck now.
I bring all of the men I have ever been with to my bed; he does the same, including the women.
The sex is good, impressive, and that is rare.
I wish I could tell you what good sex is, but I can’t. My sociological training helps me understand that like everything else, good sex is socially constructed. It means different things to different people. But you know it when you experience it.
As soon as the sex is done, he gets dressed, underwear first, pants second and shoes last, and prepares to leave. The efficiency with which he pulls up his pants and wears his shoes and dashes for the door is impressive. Right before he leaves, he asks if he could return after two hours.
Yes.
A week later, I ask him to come over again.
It is cold outside; fall a premature exit. I have lost count of the months since he started coming over, but today is Friday the 17th of November. I look at my phone thirteen minutes before our set time, and I see it is 7 degrees Celsius outside with a skin-cracking wind, so I switch my air conditioner on.
The first thing he speaks of when he arrives is that it is nice and warm inside my apartment; he says he likes this. I am glad that he does; I did it for him as a person, not as a man that I am sleeping with. I wonder if he is as surprised as I am at how nonchalant I am or have become. He wouldn’t know. This moment between us is also an unveiling.
I noticed that the young boy and man I once was, the one who thought of sex as something to be shared between a beloved, is gone. I can’t place my hand on where that death happened. But it did. Uncertain whether like Adele “everything changed me” or like Nina Simone “the world has done its dirty job”. Regardless, I do not care very much.
I want to have sex, then this man can leave my house.
He loves to touch my body even after we are done having sex. He loves to follow the route on my butt crystallized by my stretch marks. I look at him every time he does this. I enjoy looking at him because there is still a kind of life that glistens on his face, this is something that I do not see often in other Black men. God, I don’t know if I have it either. Perhaps it is innocence since he admitted that he only started sleeping with men in the months preceding our first hook up.
The months go by quickly, and we continue having sex. He is shy but quickly blossoms out of his shell. He is getting more comfortable with me even though we still have not traded names.
He catches himself slipping into this comfort with me.
“Sorry, I am usually not this intimate with other people,” he says, scanning the floor for his underwear.
He often apologizes whenever he shares personal details or his dreams with me. I reassure him that it is okay, there is nothing to apologize for. In fact, apologizing is a kind of ritual to him. Whether it is apologizing for getting comfortable with me, for sweating after a steamy session during this Midwest cold, or for deriving pleasure from the sex with another man.
He always apologizes.
At the back of my mind, I am still intrigued by how we have been sleeping together for months now yet I still don’t know his name, nor does he mine. This is intriguing to me because it has never happened before, but it does not bother me. I share this with my friends.
In our everyday conversation with my friends, who are mostly queer, I tell them I have been sleeping with a man I met online for a couple of months now and yet we do not even know each other’s names. One of my best friends thinks that this is odd.
I respond with cheekiness, telling him that names do not affect the quality of sex that people have.
I cannot help but notice that each time he comes over, Unknown leaves something about himself behind.
One time, he tells me where he works; the next, he gives me an indication of where he lives. I take what he tells me, and I do not probe for further details. It seems irrelevant to me, irrelevant to this encounter we have. He is convenient for me. I seek nothing else from him. Unknown does not have to worry about me being a threat that will unveil his sexual practices involving other men. What he does outside of these walls has nothing to do with me.
A while into our arrangement, I ask that we take turns fucking each other.
The last time he came over was the first time he’d ever been penetrated. However, he declines this time around. Claiming that it was painful the last time.
I remember my first time too. I swore to never have sex again, so I understood why Unknown wouldn’t want me to fuck him again.
Instead of completely declining my request, he thinks about it. While on top of me, sweat dripping off his body, he says, “Maybe we are in the wrong positions if you want both.”
Before I could respond, he quickly retorts, “We could do a threesome if you are keen.”
I say nothing in response.
Before he leaves, he unravels about the sex we just had. He has never experienced anything like this. He promises, again, he will be back over the weekend. He fixes his durag, zips his jacket and puts on his shoes in preparation to leave. I am patiently waiting to walk him out the main door so he can make his way to his car, or to someone else.
Before Unknown could decide what to do next, I tease him and tell him I’m glad I helped him discover his joy parts.
“You really made me aware,” he replies in a stern but casual tone.
“I’m glad I’m a part of your awakening.”
Today he confesses that this session is our best session yet. I giggle slightly and say nothing else.
While having sex, it occurs to me that he has no idea what the difference is between gender, sexual orientation and sexual practice. In the middle of it, he says, “I’ve never experienced anything like this. You’re gonna turn me into a woman.” This is from experiencing anally induce pleasure.
In academia, we take for granted that gender/sex/sexual orientation/sexual practice isn’t basic knowledge.
On a different day, I am also wearing a durag. Unknown repeatedly tells me how much he likes me in a durag. “You look like a thug,” he proclaims, in a tone that suggests that this is a compliment.
I did not wear it for him. I have a durag on because I haven’t cut my hair in ages and I won’t until I’m home and see my favorite barber in exactly a month. I don’t tell him that I will be going home in a month.
I return to my dimly lit bedroom to discard the used condoms. I casually examine the condoms to ensure that they matched the number of rounds that we had. Today something else catches my eye: there’s blood in the condoms, blood in all of them.
I can’t really tell if the blood is inside or outside, and it does not matter. At least one of them has blood on the inside. For the first time since we started fucking, I write to him immediately after he has left, and it is not about or for sex.
I tell him about the blood, that he should have it checked out. I will go see my doctor as well.
I am ashamed, the thought of going to my doctor the next morning fills me with shame.
The last time I did, the doctor irritated me. He refused to learn from me, to accept that I knew more about sexual health considering that this is part of doctoral training and professional experience.
While consumed by this splashing future shame, Unknown writes back. “I saw the blood, I thought it was yours.”
This feels like we are heterosexual couple finding out about an unintended pregnancy:
I thought you were on some contraceptive.
I thought you were going to pull out.
I calm down and tell him again that I would also see a doctor to be safe, and he should too.
(Knowing the healthcare system in the United States and how a heterosexual man might think they will be stigmatized for sleeping with other men, I don’t know if he ever went to see your doctor.)
The next day, I get up early and call my doctor’s office. I am less worried about the likelihood of having contracted a sexually transmitted infection/disease, but ashamed. After a while, a gentle voice on the other end of the phone says, “Hello. This is the health center, and this is Coley speaking. How can I help you?”
I retell the story.
Without shame or judgment and Coley listens, like a faithful friend. After a few seconds of hearing her press her keyboard she asks me, “Would you like a male or female doctor?”
“I will take my usual doctor.”
Esihle Lupindo is multi-award-winning Fulbright scholar from South Africa and PhD candidate in Sociology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.He holds a BA, BA Honors and MA (with distinction) in Sociology. His MA examined the ways that Black Queer people create and make use of spaces in the aftermath of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). In this work, he shows that TRC was a missed opportunity to include Queer people in an important nation-forming moment. He is an educator, writer and researcher. He has extensive experience in sexuality, gender and health related work. He also has experience writing for national public presses and academic presses. Additionally, he has spent the last couple of years working with non-profit organizations in South Africa that work on sexual and reproductive health rights. His doctoral research seeks to examine how Black men living in South Africa who were born around the onset of the HIV/AIDS epidemic navigate and make decisions regarding their sexual health. This research focuses on Black men of all sexual orientations.
References
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Masola, A. (2024). The end of South African Apartheid: An interview with Dr.Athambile Masola. Black Perspectives. Accessed: 30 April 2024. Available: https://www.aaihs.org/the-end-of-south-african-apartheid-an-interview-with-dr-athambile-masola/
Matharu, H. (2015). Police ‘to be given powers to view everyone’s entire internet history’. Independent. Accessed 25 May 2024. Available: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/police-to-be-given-powers-to-view-everyone-s-entire-internet-history-a6714581.html
Motsemme, N. (2007). ‘Loving in a time of hopelessness’: on township women’s subjectivities in a time of HIV/AIDS. African Identities, 5(1), 61–87. https://doi-org.libproxy.unl.edu/10.1080/14725840701253761
Qambela, G., & Lupindo, E. (2021). Pandemics, routine death, and pleasure. Agenda, 35(4), 78–85. https://doi-org.libproxy.unl.edu/10.1080/10130950.2021.2055271
Reuters. (2023). Dating app abductions raise fears for LGBT+ safety in South Africa. Accessed 25 May 2024. Available: https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/dating-app-abductions-raise-fears-lgbt-safety-south-africa-2023-12-08/