I have mentioned this little story in one of my posts recently.

Briefly, I hooked up with a pretty cute college dude using Grindr. It turned out that the guy was very critical of the guys who were hooking up for sex. They were shooting over indecent pictures of themselves via Grindr, and all of that was disgusting and what not.

So, I grew interested in this. It turned out that the dude I met was generally not interested in either dating or sex or friendships. When I asked him, why was he contacting guys on the Grindr (he chatted me up), he grew silent. He knew all the things he did not like and all the things he did not want but could not name a single thing he was hoping to achieve by chatting the other guys up, and meeting them afterwards.

Long story short, he was afraid of sex. Unlike those of us who grew up without the endless porn stream on the net, and who were very much looking forward to hooking up with other guys for sex, this dude was simply scared out of his wit. He did not know how to do all those things that he saw on the net. There was no one around to show him the ropes, and he felt that everybody was expecting him to perform like a professional porn star!!!

I never thought that all this free porn/dating/apps and the technology we have would scare guys into complete inaction and negativity.

I went down the memory lane, and thought of all the things that happened in my youth with the dudes who used to be as inexperienced and "new" at it as I used to be in my time and day. Yet, virtually, no one was scared, and everyone was happy to give it a try with a dude of his liking. If it went alright, we went for more. If it didn't, you gave it another try. I do not recall anyone complaining that their experience was not as stellar as they had hoped it would be.

Sure, the size queens would go around bemoaning the fact that the top could have been 'bigger', and the tops would go around complaining that the bttm dude was too sensitive, and unable to take any serious pounding, but there had been no negativity about any of this... .

Just venting, I guess...

KD

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Thanks for sharing this. FWIW, as one who came out just as the AIDS crisis was starting in the early 1980s I remember being "afraid of sex" in the sense that some of the safe-sex messages that I was hearing were pretty sex-negative. At times there was quite a bit of confusion and exaggerated fear; some of the guys I met were afraid to even touch another guy's cum or would only do mutual j/o and things like that. I think some of us from those days developed a fear of intimacy.

I was lucky enough to meet some guys to show me the ropes, and I never judged myself by porn magazines or the porn I had on VHS tapes. Of course I had some bad experiences -- the time when the poppers spileld up my nose? Ugh. -- but there were good ones, too.

Not much to add except you gotta hope that people keep things in perspective and have some healthy self-esteem.

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Yup. I see your point. I cannot think of anyone who was not afraid of catching a major bug in those days, and in many years to come, too.

In the meantime, the panic has abated. We are all (again?) encountering the guys who only go bare, and are willing to take incalculable risks.

On the other hand, quite a few guys understand that the life must go on, and are comfortable with the notion of safe(r) sex.

In the above case, the guy was simply showing performance anxiety. And rejecting any idea of overcoming it, too. Frankly, a guy who claims that he has never had a "bad" experience probably has never had sex in his life.

A number of my buddies and I were actually looking forward to enjoying the freedom of independent college living, which really translated into having as much sex as we were able to get. I can't think of anyone who got deterred in the slightest by the fear that the sex was not going to be awesome, and/or that it would be a "bad" experience.

It was just sex. At times, it used to be amazing. Pretty often, it was quite OK. The other dude got off, I got off, we messed around a bit, and moved on, too. Nobody would spend any time sweating it.

KD

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I can see where growing up with porn everywhere could make a guy overly anxious. The giant cocks - sex lasting for hours - when in reality most guys are 5 - 6 inches and what is it the studies say - most guys last 2 - 5 minutes of actual sex? But when growing up they see the performance in porn it makes them afraid they won't be about to match that.

For those of us who grew up when porn was usually a magazine we did not have those mental pictures to compare ourselves with.

We learned about sex fooling around - the good - the bad and the embarrassing.

Another issue I think for a lot of the younger guys - when we grew up we saw our buddies naked. Pissing on a tree when playing outside, changing / showering after gym, going swimming - we thought nothing of changing in front of each other and it led to a comfort level -

Now there are no showers after gym class and even changing to go swimming they wrap a towel around themselves or change 1 at a time in the bathroom - so there is an extra anxiety about just being seen naked....

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I was going to say that too. So many younger guys have never seen their friends naked and will not even piss next to each other. We had to take showers every day in junior high and high school so everyone was naked. There was a YMCA near my home town that had a naked night once a week. We would go skinny dipping at the lake and when I was in Boy Scouts. Now guys will not even piss unless it is in a stall or if there are dividers between urinals. They do not even know what it means to let it all hang out. There is a surfer beach in Santa Barbara and the guys go to great length to change from their wet suits into their street clothes so no one will even see a butt cheek. I have gone to a naked gathering in Malibu every year and there are some younger guys that now go there and they love it. The Faultline bar in Los Angeles has a weekly underwear night and the older guys get down to their tighty-whiteys. Younger guys will only do so if they are alone and someone encourages them. If they are with friends, it is out of the question.

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There is so much more sensitivity to being naked now - I understand that these days kids have to grow up with "stranger danger" but being afraid to change in front of a buddy?

Sure it was a bit scary the first day of 7th grade gym class - the 9th graders looked so big and hairy compared to us - but you got over it. Thankfully constant masturbation and fear kept anyone from getting fully hard - but it was something you had no choice in.

And in some ways it was educational - you realized that there were all sizes and shapes - and for most of us we accepted that we were not the biggest - but we also were not the smallest.

There was lots of non-sexual nudity - showers - skinny dipping - changing - if you got to a friends house and he was not ready to go you would just sit in his room and chat while he showered and got dressed - you saw him - he had seen you - life went on.

The almost fear in some of the younger guys about being seen - I do wonder if all the porn they grew up with have made them feel like they will never "measure up".

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yeah, the group shower stalls, open locker rooms., the towel was for drying, who wrapped up in it? Stop by a friends & change clothes, get ready for a swim? Who thought twice about it? Skinny dipping- ok, some might worry about being seen publicly, but then that was also part of the fun! giggle & hide until they passed by...
A gym i used to go to had the big shower room., was almost funny to see some younger men covering up., but i was sad when they installed curtain walls around each shower head a couple years ago. looks tacky & awkward. (& ruined the view!)

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At least with our school gym towels it would have been impossible - there was not enough towel to wrap up in! You were lucky if there was enough towel to get MOSTLY dry enough to put clothes on!



Exactly - go to a buddies house and his Mom would send you up to his room - if he was in the shower or changing you just sat there and talked to him and waited for him to get ready. After all you were both guys so what did it matter?

Skinny dipping was usually done in a place where there was little or no chance of getting caught - but you went bare if either you did not have a suit with you or you all just wanted to do something "naughty" - you wanted to "break the rules" - and again no one thought a thing about it.

Although I do remember one time with a bunch of (as far as I know) straight buddies - we were skinny dipping and rough housing - dunking each other - the usually stuff of boys. One buddy snuck up behind me to dunk me - as he pushed me under water I felt his soft cock against my ass - I was instantly hard and thankful we were in a lake so no one could see - it was almost 20 minutes before I dared get out of the water!

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There is a surfer beach in Santa Barbara, CA that used to be fun to watch the "straight" guys change from regular clothes into their wetsuits and then out of them later on without a care in the world right next to their cars talking to their friends. The last few times I was there, they kept towels on so you could not see anything or went into the porta potties to change. WTF happened????

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WeHoSlut -

I have no idea. Growing up we never worried about friends seeing us change or anything like that. It was open season of viewing each other - we changed in front of each other - there were no dividers at the urinals - you just did not think about it with friends.

Now guys go into the stalls to pee they are so nervous about someone seeing their weiner.

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