“I have to work early tomorrow. This is easy.”

When sharing their views and opinions with the rest us, most people tend to assume a somewhat idealized, polished, and palatable version of themselves. This makes the views expressed more acceptable, easier to understand, and more universally applicable.

An average dude is supposed to be working Mo-Fri, 9-5, having a decent middle class income that would allow him to spend a few dollars on patronizing popular and shiny gay bars, spas, clubs and other establishments where he supposedly enjoys all the hard fought for achievements of the nearly universal gay lib. Or at least, so goes the narrative...

The actual living conditions of many people do not fit into such stereotyped narratives at all.

The 'old' reasonably well paid industrial jobs allowing vast segments of the population to live relatively good lives while hardly facing any educational or professional challenges are now mostly the stuff of the urban legends we use to describe the lives of previous generations.

Many first world countries have greatly divided workforce. The relatively few on the top being generously paid while facing numerous challenges, long working days, full job insecurity, and many, many more on the bottom struggling to make the ends meet with an ever diminishing, somewhat mythical 'middle class' caught somewhere in-between and increasingly losing its practical relevance while feeling unwanted, not needed and generally superfluous.

Even a very well paid professional dude has to catch a 6 or 7am flight now and then, and cannot afford to hang in in his usual gay bar until the wee hours to hook up (or not?) with an available, willing and qualified guy. A 2-4 hour night sleep may not be a practical option for most guys.

A $7-$10 cover charge at the entrance is a small amount of money for a guy who is comfortable with his income. But burning a total of $20-$30 per night on drinks, cover, travel, etc., several times a week for a college dude who may be pretty tight with his funds actually makes frequent cruising the commercial venues a less attractive option for a number of guys out there living on tight budgets.

Yet, first and foremost, we live in a very connected world. Many people are being constantly flooded with all sorts of information about their friends, family, co-workers, people they know, via both social media and numerous apps. Starting a small talk, getting to know someone even very superficially in a bar or club before you move on to the business at hand often feels like adding yet another nail to your coffin. You simply and solely want to get your rocks off (and most likely, so does the other guy, too). You do not want to know what he opines on the refugees, Charlie Sheen's sex life or whatever else the contentious issue of the day may be. You do not want to go to his/your home, have drinks, shoot breeze, and hope that it'll work out just fine.

True, cruising for sex is very much about the instant, inexpensive, NSA if relatively risky gratification. Few people will ever completely and unreservedly subscribe to it only. But, in all honesty, relatively few men are really ready to rule it out completely, despite their frequent rhetoric claiming otherwise.

Men have been doing it for thousands of years this way with other men. And they will continue to do so for many more years to come.

Simply because we can.

KD

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