The sentinel study on the Tearoom trade, , ie sex in public bathrooms by closeted homosexuals was done in 1970 at washington University in St Louis. I started there in 1972, and I was in the closet at the time.
The article discusses the ritual, and chronicles evidence that the encounter would never get past the first tap without recipricating signals from the cop.
In other words, extensive research demonstrates that entrapment was the operative word.
While it is very satisfying seeing a Conservative Senator fry, Perhaps it would be good politics for Outringht to express sympathy and a principled stance that no harm equals no foul.
My take from the Outright members who have spoken is that there isn't unanimity as to whether he was entrapped or not. I happen to think that what he did was nasty, but not a crime, since it required reciprocation from the police officer to get to the level of physical contact.
However, I also don't think that trolling for public sex is long for this world, and the fact that said conservative senator was such a hypocrite underscores the negative effects of the GOP's corrosive homophobia on gay people of Republican persuasion. When even the "libertarian" Republican Paul has a legislative history of raging homophobia, it's not surprising that this sort of self-destructive behavior pops up in the gay folk that the GOP seems to hate so much.
Cheers,
Brian
Philip Berg <philip@...> wrote:
The sentinel study on the Tearoom trade, , ie sex in public bathrooms by closeted homosexuals was done in 1970 at washington University in St Louis. I started there in 1972, and I was in the closet at the time.
The article discusses the ritual, and chronicles evidence that the encounter would never get past the first tap without recipricating signals from the cop.
In other words, extensive research demonstrates that entrapment was the operative word.
While it is very satisfying seeing a Conservative Senator fry, Perhaps it would be good politics for Outringht to express sympathy and a principled stance that no harm equals no foul.