Four for Thursday.

(April 1999). So, here's the deal with these strips: it should come as no surprise to you that gay men sometimes have public sex. Back when I first came out, this was a new thing to me, and I was fascinated with it - but gay culture then was sort of anti-sex, and slut shaming was pretty constant. This was fading by the 2000s, but you still did NOT want to be considered a bathroom slut. Having said that - everybody did it. There was a fourth floor bathroom at the Univ of Arizona (now you know) that was ridiculously active, and being the self appointed Great Gay Cartoonist, I thought I had something to say about it.

What I had to say wasn't particularly provocative, but I did feel right in talking about this openly to what was a largely heterosexual audience. And my gay readers HATED me for this - so much angry email about things I should not be talking about. There's very little actual joke here, and what there is, is Tad and Chuque giving each other shit. Looking back I can't say for sure that it succeeded at all, but I do admire taking that risk. I don't think I'd be brave enough to do that one these days.

That last strip was the kicker - I didn't want to end on a joke, and I thought I'd already said what I had to say, and I figured that if I was trying to normalize it then that was the way to go. But that was the last straw for some people, and my strip got put on hold for a week.