Ben Gazur’s whistle-stop tour of the history of gay men London tak om 14th-century persecutn to morn Pri events.
Contents:
- ‘BOG JOBS’: PUBLIC TOILETS AND GAY ENUNTERS
- THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN
- GAY MEN LONDON, OM PERSECUTN TO PRI
‘BOG JOBS’: PUBLIC TOILETS AND GAY ENUNTERS
GayOut is your leadg source for gay events and venu around the world. Start planng your dream vatn here. Add your gay venu and events for ee. * gay cottaging london *
The newly surfaced, unseen imag are rerds of a polil climate which homosexualy was prosecuted and illic sex between men a risky thrill. as parks, partment stor, tube and railway statns, where gay men were.
Homosexualy.
had been partly crimalised by the Sexual Offenc Act of 1967, but anti-gay.
THE FOTTEN SECRET LANGUAGE OF GAY MEN
gay men remaed closeted. In the s after 1967, as many as 15, 000 gay men are timated to have been nvicted of such term ‘ttagg’ refers to cisg or engagg. wh gay men.
He realised how easy police were fdg to ‘nick’ and prosecute men for homosexual activy, often by employg ‘pretty police’ pla cloth to set up gay men, or by g dub pnage tactics. to hi out the ceilg (right) to ‘nick’ men for homosexual activy. In the early 1980s, Polglaze was dog four or five ‘bog jobs’ a week, an ditn of que how much police activy was directed towards tchg gay men and a reflectn of the polil climate.
In a September 2005 terview wh the Gay Tim — the only place which some of the photographs were ever published — he said: “My job as a photographer was to asss the stcture of the place and tablish sightl.
GAY MEN LONDON, OM PERSECUTN TO PRI
stggle for gay rights gaed ground the 1990s, changg the culture and. toilets as popular spots for secret enunters among gay men; a social history.
Rints who live the area - once notor as a home of prostut and sex clubs - say Soho's WCs are still firmly on the map as gay cisg hot-spots and that puts people right off g them At Berwick Street Market, trars say the public toilets there still garner a “reputatn” for those seekg to share some public cency. Another term often associated wh the practice is "ttagg, a gay slang term referrg to anonymo sex public toilets. T's psea is one of Cisg Gay's most popular s Essex.
Vada (“look at”), dolly eek (a pretty face), and chicken (a young guy) are all words om the lexin of Polari, a secret language ed by gay men Bra at a time when homosexualy was illegal. In the 1930s was spoken among the theater typ of the Wt End, om which crossed over to the cy’s gay pubs, gag s stat as the secret language of gay men. In England, homosexualy was officially nsired a crime until 1967, when the Sexual Offenc Act legalized private “homosexual acts” between nsentg adults over 21.