What’s Santa Gonna Bring Me for Christmas, or How I Learned to Like What I Want!

The Holidays are Desire on steroids. At few times of the year is Desire so much front-and-center in our lives. It is part of the lushness and bleakness of this time. You want so much, and you are disappointed so quickly. You want to experience love if you don’t have it, or more love if you do. You want to feel warm, cozy, secure, and happy with all the twinkling and glittering around you. But you know that all this twinkle and glitter is ephemeral—it will freeze and fall away in the January cold and darkness. That is why I want to share with you the wisdom in this entry in my blog on WordPress—to help you keep the warmth you want. Afterall, isn’t that really what Desire is all about?

Here is an excerpt from The Manly Pursuit of Desire and Love, Your Guide to Life, Happiness, and Emotional and Sexual Fulfillment in a Closed-Down World. (Belhue Press 2015). If you want to read more, go to my website, www.perrybrass.com or Amazon.

From CHAPTER 2.

18 things You need to Know About desire Before you read this Book

“They say I am queer, prince, but I can tell what people are like. For the heart is the great thing, and the rest is nonsense.” The Idiot, Fyodor Dostoevsky.

1. Desire is deeper than simple horniness, want, and hunger. Desire is you asking for completion, identity, and enlargement. It is a large component of consciousness.

2. It is a key to the deepest parts of yourself. The parts we often label your “soul,” or your “spiritual” feelings, or the basic aspects of your own ego and character. I will refer often in this book to the “Deep- er Self,” that is, that engine of your own deepest imagination working through experiences, where the keys to all of your feelings, personality, and drives lie. I will talk about the Deeper Self, how to connect with it and use that connection to bond with other people. How to experience huge joy and happiness from this connection, and expand with it.

3. Destroying and/or obstructing desire can lead to depression.

4. Desire has many facets, branches, and streams to it, often illuminating deeper parts of your experiences and personality, which you have either forgotten or have chosen to deny.

5. Being able to share desire with another person is what leads to genuine intimacy.

6. Understanding how desire works (and how it is repressed), allows you to understand much of the nature of yourself, as well as society’s own nature.

7. The spiritual aspects of desire are often repressed because they are so powerful. Many people who cannot deal honestly with these aspects often find extreme shame in them.

8. Desire is a part of consciousness, and yet runs deeper than consciousness.

9. The boundaries we put around desire very much constitute our own images of ourselves. Changing these boundaries (as well as seeing the boundaries for what they are) can be very important to you, and can become part of your own life changes.

10. A lot of what we call “therapy” is about either reinforcing these boundaries, or acknowledging them without actually opening them up to your own Deeper Self: that most basic inner part of you.

11. Love is more than physical desire but is a part of a greater desire that exists within your Deeper Self.

12. All of consciousness is understanding desire, not simply rejecting it.

13. Much of what we call “art” is about expressing desire.

14. Understanding desire and its place in your life can break harmful cycles of loneliness, depression, guilt, and shame.

15. The deepest love and feeling is allowing someone into your own “field of desire.”

16. This field of desire brings you back to a state of both vast consciousness and the genuine blissful innocence that many if not most of us seek through religion.

17. Desire as a sensual and psychological expression of your Deeper Self can be extended to reach into all parts of your life, and make you very happy.

18. Shame, guilt, self-consciousness, and self-abnegation, enforced on us by parental and social taboos, repressive religion, job requirements, or other aspects of society, systematically destroy our ability to understand the power of desire and how it fits into our real lives.

Perry Brass: Blocked by the Impregnable Fortress of Facebook, or How Much Does Facebook Hate Books?

My Facebook page is “no longer available.” This means that my 2,200 Facebook friends will have to go someplace else to find out about my books, and what I am doing as a writer. I learned 2 weeks ago that I have been permanently “blocked” from Facebook. Why, frankly, I have no idea except that it must have to do with the books I write and publish that have been banned “forever” from being advertised on Facebook because of their titles and possibly their covers—namely, The Manly Art of Seduction and the follow-up book The Manly Pursuit of Desire and Love. Both of these books are available on Amazon. The Manly Art of Seduction has gotten great reviews, was an Amazon bestseller in several categories, received a Gold Medal IPPY award and other awards, and is now available as an audio book on Audible.com, and in Portuguese. It is currently being translated into Spanish.

The book banned on FaceBook

After I was told by the completely faceless “Facebook Team” that The Manly Art of Seduction violated Facebook’s usage code because of the word “Seduction” in it, and that I could never advertise this “product” on Facebook, I tried futilely to appeal their decision (since you have no idea where this decision comes from: you never actually deal with people with names). I explained that there are dozens, maybe hundreds, of books, movies, and TV programs with the word “Seduction” in it. It was ridiculous.

I was told that there was no appeal—this decision would stand forever. After I posted word about this on my Facebook pages, friends suggested that I could still put up information about the book on my page, and it would be a good idea to include the cover in my profile picture. I did. Nothing happened.

Still, hope springs eternal, and I figured that my follow-up book The Manly Pursuit of Desire and Love which did not have the word “seduction” in its title would be permissible. It wasn’t. After I tried to “boost” a post about The Manly Pursuit (this is Facebookese for advertise the book) I was told, point blank, by the famous Facebook Team, that the word “desire” itself was not allowed in any advertisement of any product on Facebook, therefore advertising this book was also not permitted. In both situations, the books were categorized as banned products, like sex aids or enhancers, and advertising them was refused on Facebook.

This was done by people who hadn’t read or researched the books—like Salmon Rushdie’s horrifying fatwa. Or maybe by computer robots that set off an alarm, or in some backroom in India which decided it was not going to allow books of this sort into any country.

Being busy, as writers are, I did post word about these books (and other books of mine) on my Facebook page, and I’m sure it got onto the pages of my 2,200 Facebook pals. Then for the last month I didn’t even go on Facebook.

I was in Cuba for 10 days, from Feb 9 – 19, and when you are on that island, Facebook is off limits. At a hotel with Wifi in Havana, I tried to log into a friend’s post mentioning me, but got a message that Facebook and Cuba are not on good terms. Afterwards, I spent three days in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, with friends, and during this time forgot about Facebook completely.

When I got back, I was too busy catching up after being away to pay attention to Facebook. I also came down with bronchitis (I’m still being treated for this), which put me away from Facebook and my pals there even longer. Then, about a week ago, after getting a slew of Facebook emails directing me to log onto the pages of friends sharing updates with me, I started hitting links that would send me directly into Mark Zuckerberg’s empire.

When I did, I got this message.

We removed the content that was posted

            Under this was a link to this message:

We restrict the display of nudity. Some descriptions of sexual acts may also be removed. These restrictions on the display of both nudity and sexual activity also apply to digitally created content unless the content is posted for educational, humorous or satirical purposes.

We remove content that threatens or promotes sexual violence or exploitation. This includes solicitation of sexual material, any sexual content involving minors, threats to share intimate images and offers of sexual services. Where appropriate, we refer this content to law enforcement.

To learn more about the kinds of messages and posts that are allowed on Facebook, please review the Facebook Community Standards.

 

I couldn’t figure this out. Why were some of my 2,400 Facebook friends’ posts being removed so that I could not get to their links? After enough attempts with my friends, I tried my own page, and realized it was the opposite. I had now been completely blocked.

Totally, absolutely, blocked from Facebook.

As in, I cannot even get onto Facebook to protest being blocked.

I started Googling like mad what to do when you are blocked from Facebook, and learned a few things. Facebook has recently instituted a new policy that it can block anyone at any time without warning or notice. In addition, it is enforcing a new series of “global community standards,” meaning anyone in any country can now complain about your content. So if, in say, Timbuktu, someone is offended by your “content,” it can be blocked by the “Facebook Team.”

This has meant that if in, say, Australia, as recently happened, someone is “offended” by an image of middle-aged barechested Aboriginal women showing their painted nipples, this kind of image can be censored—and even blocked. I guess this means that my books and I no longer stand a chance.

Facebook also states that A), only they can remove the block, so it’s totally futile to appeal it. B) If, somehow, they do decide to remove the block on you and your page, they will do so in their own time with no communication with you.

And C) even better: The actual cause of the block will never be known to you.

Now this may not mean much to people who regard Facebook as ridiculous and a waste of time (something Facebook works to keep happening; or as Mark Zuckerberg has always maintained: “We want to keep you there”), but in reality it is at this moment the world’s largest social media organization. And, in our Brave New Post-bookstore World, for many people a major route to “discoverability” for books and other kinds of information.

I also discovered through Google (using a backdoor into Facebook) that the site also has a new “Unpermitted Link” engine. Using a product’s link, you can do a search for products not allowed on Facebook, and they will (graciously) remove these links off your Facebook page. The only problem is that when I tried to do this with Amazon links for my books, I got this:

We removed the content that was posted

 (Meaning: I cannot get into Facebook to unblock myself—in any way. So, go back to Square One, dope.)

Check . . . and mate.

There is a longstanding history of homophobia involved with this—I have seen straight (i.e., heterosexual) “dating” books openly advertised on Facebook that guarantee success with the opposite sex (usually meaning women), and that are plainly exploitative. I have seen countless ads for men’s underwear and women’s “scanties” that make anything I’ve posted (as well as my book covers) look like stuff from the Daughters of the American Revolution. But we are dealing here with permissible products and my books are not in that category.

I also know that Facebook has a history of harassing gay men and their sites, a good example being the Australian magazine DNA which has received numerous warnings simply for showing on their covers barechested guys in Speedos. Many of my friends have also received warnings from Facebook regarding pictures they have posted showing stuff like an uncovered fanny or two. One of them showed photos of a pool party with a guy in all fun being thrown in and losing his suit—so we saw a little bit of skin from the rear. He was warned severely by Facebook for doing this.

The interesting thing is that I have never received any kind of warning. Not once. So this makes me feel that this action might have been pre-emptive. Rather than go through any kind of dialogue with me (something corporations like Facebook hate, thus their huge walls of protection), they simply blocked me before I could do anything.

I have also heard that it could be that my Facebook page was hacked—in effect unallowable stuff (usually “porn”) could have appeared on my page when I was in Cuba and unable to do anything about it. However, I was given no warning of this (see above about No Warning) so if my page was hacked, and then blocked, I’m now in even worse shape with Facebook.

In other words, I’ve been hacked, I’ve had no warning about it from Facebook, and I’ll have to figure out how to be unhacked as well.

A new wrinkle: every time I have tried to access any Facebook page—even for “guidance” from Facebook on these “issues”—I have been told that I have to log in with my password. When I have tried it, my password has been rejected, and I’ve been told I have to change the password. They have allowed me to change the password, and using the new password to see if there is any change in the block, I am told that a new password must be used every time I try to log in. Then I am directed to the same message:

We removed the content that was posted.

            What this means for other Facebook users, especially writers, is clear to me: You can have what you do censored at any moment. This will be done to protect any “innocents” who might stumble on your page, and the judgment to do this will be done by people you will never see in countries where America’s more open culture and freedoms are anathema.

I feel bad about this, because people all over the globe have come to me through Facebook as I am an openly gay writer in the US. Some of them have read my books on Kindle or other media, and I am gratified for this. I am not a “pornographer,” although my work is sexually frank—but certainly not any more frank than any number of other commercially available books. The covers of my books often feature barechested men, but then so do thousands of book covers, especially of women’s romance books.

The real problem here is simply homophobia on a corporate level, censorship of course, and people applying “community standards” that have no place in an open society. This is really shameful.

There is something else to understand here, and it is very important.

Facebook is not a free service. It is a huge, multi-national corporation making billions of dollars off advertising, and the reason it can charge this kind of money is because of the content you provide if you are a Facebook member. (In fact, they can use this content in any way they wish.) You are using your time to provide this valuable content and your attention. Facebook is selling that attention to advertisers. (I repeat, as Zuckerberg says: “We’re going to keep you on the site.”)

In this vein, strangely, and completely contradictory, Facebook still sends me regular requests to get back onto their site, to update my pages, to “see what your friends are doing,” to “visit your page,” even as I am being completely blocked. They WANT you back to create more content—to boost more ad revenue—on their “free” site.

Therefore the argument that as a “free” social networking service they have the right to do what they did to me is spurious. I am providing them with the content they need, and the attention they want, as every member is, and for them to do what they did—to “pull the plug” with no warning or explanation, because they have to power to do so—is reprehensible. It is something you’d expect from a corporate monopoly and dictatorship. It is really disgusting, and I think people should understand that.

If you are a Facebook member, please feel free to post the link to this piece on your page. And remember, not only is Big Brother and his little friends watching you and judging you, but at any moment he can do to you what he did to me.

Long time poet, playwright, author and activist Perry Brass has published 19 books, and is the author of the bestseller The Manly Art of Seduction, How to Meet, Talk to, and Become Intimate with Anyone, King of Angels, a gay, Southern Jewish coming-of-age novel set in Savannah, GA. His newest book is The Manly Pursuit of Desire and Love, Your Guide to Life, Happiness, and Emotional and Sexual Fulfillment In a Closed-Down World. The Manly Art of Seduction is now available as an audio book through Audible.com, and in Portuguese. You can reach him through his site, www.perrybrass.com or here.

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10 Ways to Make Internet Dating—and All Dating—Really Successful.

 

Author Perry Brass at the Brooklyn Book Fair, 2014.

Huge numbers of people now meet on the Internet, and often they find their Internet dating experiences disastrous. This, unfortunately, is also true for a lot of their other dating as well, including “fix-ups,” that is dates arranged by other people, the regular old “blind dates” that most people either fear or find funny in a bitter, ironic kind of way—and then hate, as well as many “fantasy” dates. These are the dates that feel like they’re going to be heaven, then end up in hell.

 

Here are 10 important things to think about before you go on any date, whether it’s an Internet thing, the efforts of well-meaning friends, or the someone you spot on the street, at church, or anywhere and are fortunate enough to connect with.

 

• Dating is hard—and unfortunately our own life history makes it harder. Dating in adulthood is difficult because of your own expectations. If you remember high school and college dating it was easier simply because you didn’t have the expectations that every date was going to end up as something “serious.” There is a lot of stress here, as in what you look like and appear as, and what the other person looks like and appears as. Do you look like and appear as the person in your profile? Ditto for that person who has already become an “eye candy” fantasy element that you were able to connect with, and the fantasy suddenly exploded. He (or she) was just “too human.” He showed his bad side way too fast, even if his outside was initially pleasing.
• Try to get sex as far out of your mind as you can on that first date. This isn’t always easy, but it’s important. In other words, as soon as he or she walks through the door, don’t have her (OK, we’ll call him “her,” since I’m writing for both genders) already naked and propped up on a pillow. If you get sex out of the equation, a lot of other things can walk in, and these things can lead to a genuine, satisfying sexual attraction. How is that? Face it, we are attracted to people who show us things that please us, like a real sense of humor, an appealing interaction with life, compassion or a feeling for others, a lack of fear, and the cool, sweet presence of curiosity and adventure. Psychologists call this “investiture.” When you allow yourself to invest some of your real emotional self in another person, they also become sexually more enticing to you. This investiture may not happen on the first date, but might on the second or third as both of you allow yourselves to reveal more of your important inner material to one another.
• But, an important bit of advice: Don’t offer too much of yourself immediately. A lot of people feel that they have to “get it all out in the open” to make sure the other person is not scared off by all of your hidden warts and past misdeeds. They spill out all their dirty laundry from the past, their endless health problems, their feelings of inadequacy, their sensitivities and history of problems. In other words, they unload every bit of baggage to you, when you barely know their names. You might be able to do that at a 12-Step meeting, but you don’t need to do it on a first date.
• However, a little bit of honesty can go a long way—and it should. Offer just an inner peek at yourself, a keyhole view that basically invites your date to want to see more. You can pick some part of you that makes you seem more rounded, interesting, and human. This is not a job interview, although in our 24/7 hard-sell environment, it has become that for many people. Remember: You don’t have to be constantly perky, optimistic, and bright. You can have moments when a darker side of you comes out—but just keep them as moments.
• You don’t have to make every single point in spades: This is especially true for men, but I find that women now do it as well. Part of the inherent territorialism of men is that they too often lay out their opinions and immediately pounce on anyone contradicting them. Retract. Realize that within every difference of opinion are some elements of truth. People love being told, “ I think you’re right about that.” Use that expression a lot. As I wrote in The Manly Art of Seduction there is something wonderful about learning that you are not always 100% right—that is, in seeing another side of an opinion, feeling, or experience. Open yourself up to discovery, even if it’s only to say, “Uh huh?”
• On the other hand, allow yourself to be strong by being centered, and allowing someone else to be pulled into that center. So don’t belittle other people, even in your mind—you’ll be surprised how easily others pick up on even your unexpressed feelings. Just realize that in a dating situation people easily become unnerved and some of their lesser sides, even their worst ones, can surface. So allow yourself to feel comfortable with yourself, and then bring that other person into your own, more secure area of comfort.
• Don’t expect perfect dialogue from other either one of you. In The Manly Art of Seduction, I talked about how TV dialogue—written by professionals—has skewed so many people’s ideas of what real conversation should be. They think that everyone, including themselves, should always be fun, witty, sparkling, and have a whole arsenal of zingers. Frankly nobody is, except on TV. Awkward moments are wonderful. They invite a moment for a genuine touching closeness to take place. Try taking someone’s hand. When she stops talking, or you have, just relax. Now you can provide a sanctuary of quiet and closeness that in a noisy world is perfectly welcome.
• Learn how to smile and invite others in with that smile. Smiling is wonderful and contagious. But too often we confuse the salesmen’s high-voltage, 100-watt grin with a real smile. I advise people to look at the light in another person’s eyes, not directly at his eyes but just at that light, and smile because you’re connecting with it. These are moments of quiet romanticism. They’re beautiful. They can make any date.
• Grooming, clothes, and the rest of our physical-appearance package are important parts of showing who we are—in that we are taking some effort to look good. But remember, in a dating situation, all of these should be used to invite someone to come closer to you, and not as a way of holding them at arm’s length. So you don’t have to be up-to-the-minute on the latest in style—this is not Fashion Week in New York. But it’s your time to be yourself as your better self (not even your best, remember that). If you are going to wear a fragrance, keep it as low key as possible. Make him or her have to get closer to you to smell it. And don’t wear anything that becomes more of a show than you are—keep that in your closet for another occasion.
• Be honest, but don’t slam the door in anyone’s face. You can honestly say, “I’m not sure that I came off really well tonight, but I’d like to see you again.” Or, “We really didn’t get to know each other, but I think there’s room to know each other more.” In other words, don’t push a situation that may not be there, but try to open it up gently. Also remember that there may something about a person that you just don’t “get” on your first date. It may take a few days, or even weeks for that thing to find its resonance with you. Maybe it was the way she talked, or was really interested in you, or was—and you knew it—overcoming a lot of her own shyness and reticence just to be with you. So don’t shut the door hard by making her feel that it’s over, when it really isn’t. Dating, like wine, needs a little time to “breathe” in the glass. Give yourself that time.

 

Perry Brass is the author of the bestseller The Manly Art of Seduction, How to Meet, Talk to, and Become Intimate with Anyone. His next book will be The Manly Pursuit of Desire and Love, How Connecting with Your Own Deeper Self Can Bring You Happiness, Sexual Satisfaction, and Save Your Life in a Difficult World. The author of 18 books, he is a regular contributor to the Huffington Post and a past contributor the Good Men Project. You can connect with him through this contact form, or through his website, http://www.perrybrass.com. You can also friend him on Facebook, or through his fan pages there.

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Perry Brass on The Manly Art of Seduction at the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art

The second episode of my new video blog, Publishing Myself, produced by Darrell Perry, shot by Jonathan Lane, is up on You Tube. I think it came off really well. It was done at the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, during its fabulous “Stroke” show curated by Robert W. Richards. So the blog will keeps this great show alive in the eyes and minds of a lot of people. I was fortunate to get the full cooperation of Leslie-Lohman to shoot in their beautiful space and show some of these wonderful images. This video blog deals with my book The Manly Art of Seduction, How to Meet, Talk to, and Become Intimate with Anyone, and some of the more important concepts in the book—touching, valor, and the wonderful concept of “unbidden” gifts, that is, things that come to you unasked and that you give freely. I hope you enjoy this episode, and that you’ll subscribe to my blog on You Tube so you’ll get a notice when the next episode comes out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f57RVJbaakA&feature=youtu.be

 

Bradley Manning: Who Wouldn’t Want To Be A Woman, Except to Be A Man?

French classical painter Jean August Dominique Ingres presents Zeus as the ultimate Daddy.

 

I found the latest wrinkle in the Bradley Manning saga to be really dismaying: his revelation that he wants to “transition” into being a woman named Chelsea, or as we say, become transgendered. The Army is going to give him a huge amount of grief over it, but probably not as much as I would give him.

First of all, let me say that I definitely believe in the reality of transgenderism—that is there simply are people who are born into the wrong bodies, or at least the wrong mentality that went with their bodies. Strangely enough, the veracity of this seems more real to me regarding women who transition into manhood than men who transition into womanhood.

Why is that so?

Because I find the almost universally accepted expectation of femaleness still umpteen times more confining than the same expectation of maleness. Or, as one F to M trans person said: “I realized I was an ‘outie,’ while being female is an ‘innie.’” She—now he—wanted to push out of the female role, wanted to play with hammers and nails and not dolls, loathed what was the enforced passivity of the female role, and hated the obsessions of women: how they look, how they “feel,” and how they act. She didn’t want to “feel.” She just wanted to be, and not have to think about it, the way men, classically, are trained not to think about it.

Or maybe they just don’t.

Maybe it’s another byproduct of testosterone.

But the truth is, you see, I have always been a transgendered man. Inside me is a gorgeous spectacular woman who happens to have a male head on her. Maybe even two male heads: if you include the one down below my regular head. Since the time I was sixteen years old, after a suicide attempt at fifteen (pushed into it by my violent schizophrenic mother and her family in Savannah, GA, as well the kids at my high school who started a whispering campaign against me) I have realized this simple truth: in order to be the man I was going to be—flagrantly accepting and enjoying myself, as I was—I would have to turn into what I called a “spy” for myself.

I was the foreign country of pure queerness, sending out a mercenary into the “straight world,” who would report back to my own inner self—my very real inner self’—in order to promote and survive and in a hostile world.

The question is: who was that inner self, and how did he (or she) evolve enough to become the present me? It took me a long time to understand this, as I’m sure it’s taking Bradley Manning, another spy certainly, if there ever was one. But in the evolution I discovered that this gorgeous female inside me could become this amazing guy who would define “maleness” itself, under his very own rules.

“Maleness:” that is the thing now escaping us. And poor Bradley, it’s escaping you too.

I first began to understand maleness as I came out into the underground queer tribe of the mid-1960s, when you had to sneak into gay bars that were usually hidden inside seedy buildings, down dark streets where you could be bumped off for the wrong wink at the wrong time. But there was this spark between queer men that we passed on to each other, that emotionally nourished us because we didn’t have acceptance of any other sort yet: including self acceptance. We were truly underground. We were moles. We made James Bond look like chicken shit. You had to be tough as nails to survive or you died. Gay kids now who kill themselves: God, do I feel for you.

But I realized back then that if you got through adolescence, there was the reward of having all these brothers around you who could recognize you and keep you going. Now in our age of “gay networking” and the totally bland mainstreaming and corporatization of queer life (if it exists at all anymore)—when everyone is emotionally starved on a high-caffeine Starbucks level (and I hope you get what I mean when I say this)—that queer brotherhood which was so important to me is out in the cold and the dark.

It’s sad. I broke all the rules of manhood and made my own up. To me as a young queer, the male gender was rich, romantic, exciting, affectionate, powerful, and mobile. You could move with it any place. You could pee against any tree. You could become the tree. New York, as my own silver daddy Walt Whitman called it, was “the city of orgies.” It was a place where having balls was fun. Now men here are castrated by corporate life, desperate to get married because they cannot receive any kind of emotional support outside marriage, sports nuts because only Derek and A-Rod can give them the kind of homoerotic charge they’re too scared to find in real life, and so isolated that they are killing themselves at a faster rate than they are killing each other. They are also killing women, a fact which is really sad: 80% of all homicides against women are done by their boyfriends or a male they know. When cops see a female corpse, the first thing they say now is: “Where’s the boyfriend or husband?”

So, Bradley, I don’t blame you for wanting to become a woman. But why don’t you become a man first? My kind of man. Wild, impetuous, romantic, secretive, horny as all get-up for the juices of life. Liberate yourself, and then see if you need to take hormones to do that.

Perry Brass has published 16 books including bestselling The Manly Art of Seduction which starts off with the assumption that “men are not supposed to be seductive.” Which of course is all the fun of being it. And, King of Angels, a gay Southern Jewish coming-of-age novel set in his native Savannah, in 1963, the year of J.F.K’s assassination, a date whose 50^th anniversary we are celebrating this year. King of Angels was a finalist for a 2013 Ferro-Grumley Award for LGBT fiction. You can learn more about him at his website, www.perrybrass.com.

Keep “Seduction” in Your Pocket

Now you can keep Perry Brass’s “37 Sure-Fire Ways to be Seductive with a Man” in your pocket. Perfect 4-sided card sized format. Your pocket, your purse, your overnight bag. Send: a check for $3.00 to Belhue Press, 2501 Palisade Avenue, Suite A1, Bronx, NY 10463. You’ll get “37 Ways” + a coupon to buy “The Manly Art of Seduction” for only $12. Or, send us $13, and you get both. “37 Ways” is the perfect, affordable I-love-you present for anyone who’s always looking but having a hard time finding that important someone. Perry is the acknowledged authority on seduction, how it works, how it changes you and your life. You won’t be disappointed.

More Odd Numbers: 23 More Ways to be Seductive with a Man

"The Manly Art of Seduction, How to Meet, Talk to, and Become Intimate with Anyone" by Perry Brass

OK, I know that I came up with “37 Ways to be Seductive with a Man,” and it seems that just 37 is not going to be enough. So here are 23 more. Since a lot of women have written to me about the previous “37 Ways to be Seductive with a Man” post, I have specifically tailored these ideas for women to use. But I hope that my gay readers will try them just as seriously.

 1)            Say his name in a way that is deliciously suggestive. Most men either rarely hear their names spoken at all or even fear hearing it (after all, at work why say someone’s name who’s there unless it’s either to dress him down or make him feel on the spot). But make him feel like his name is a magic incantation, or a password to something wonderful. Example: “Christopher . . . guess what I’d like to do?”

2)            Call him and tell him you’ve missed him. Don’t email him: emails are so business. Don’t text him. Texts are so teenage. But actually call him, and make sure he knows that you mean it, and you mean business too—but in a really great way.

3)             Learn a lesson from dog trainers: Make him feel that you are a reward for everything he does. In other words, never let him associate you with punishment. Good dog trainers know this in spades. So, if you’ve had a bitch of a day, make sure there’s real space between the bitch and him.

4)            Remember something about him and repeat it. It can be his mother’s name, that he’s allergic to shellfish, that he likes having his feet tickled or his nipples slightly pinched, that he hates oatmeal and loves hamburgers. The important thing is that you remembered it. Write it down after you see him, if you need to. In fact, make a list of these things and refer to them. Ask him about his mom: “How’s Elizabeth doing?” or “How about just burgers tonight?”

5)            Tell him what you want: This is especially wonderful in the sex department. A lot of men are too shy to ask you if there’s something that you really like to happen. So tell him what you’d like him to do, as in: “I love having my back kissed.” “I love having my ass played with.” “I love having my ears nibbled.” “I love to get laid outdoors.” “I love watching you do things naked.”

6)            Ask him what he’d like. But not in a demanding way. Don’t make him feel that if he’s too shy to let out what really turns him on, then he’s a loser. Just repeat the request at some point later, but in a softer and more reassuring way.

7)            Feed him something that he’d really like. Especially out of your hand. There is something about feeding a man that makes him feel incredibly taken care of. So many times now food is confused with either stress (as in the idea of the “Business Power Breakfast”—really, who wants these twits around you at breakfast? Yuk!), or with relieving stress, as in guys who slug down a dinner at Bennigans and a beer after an awful day at the office. So, give him a chocolate-covered strawberry directly from your fingers, or your navel. One of my favorite ways to eat ice cream is slathered on his sex organs. It gives him a tingly shiver, and me too. And nothing adds to the flavor of ice cream like a man’s cock.

 8)            Ask him how much he would like to submit to you. Men who are assertive and commanding all day, who have to be Masters of the Universe at work, find that being completely submissive sexually is . . . well, fantastic. It gives all that hard-working testosterone some time off. A little B & D can go a long way, and he’ll either love the chance to experience it, or just say that he’s not interested—at the moment.

 9)             Ask him how much he would like you to submit to him. (But with boundaries around it!) You’re giving him a huge amount of license doing this, but as with a license to drive, you do have to obey the rules. So tell him that you are in for a little slavery, but in a nice way. (As in No Hard Hitting, No Marks, Nothing Mean and Disgusting.)

 10)             One day when he arrives at your place, give him a moment to breathe, and then suddenly be all over him. He’s sitting, and you’re now on his lap, kissing him, holding him, and making him feel that you are the very atmosphere he’s hot and bothered for. So many guys feel that sex has to be this cat-and-mouse game that takes too long and is too complicated. Make him feel that you aren’t playing games with him.

 11)            On the other hand, don’t do this too often. Allow him a time to be all over you: it’s his turn now to be aggressive. However, if for some reason, he can’t, don’t get huffy about it and demanding, but—let him know that a little aggression on his part would be very welcome.

 12)            Get him naked, lying facedown on your lap. That’s it: like a little boy submitting to be spanked. But, don’t spank him, at least not a lot. Guys love this. They revert to kidhood again. Play with his spine, his butt, the backs of his legs (very sensual places), his neck, and the backs of his ears. Caress his hair. He’ll come back for more.

 13)            Experience times when he’s completely naked and you’re clothed, or half clothed. Make him feel that he’s now a plaything: guys go crazy for this. Most of the time, it’s outside the Male Role to be the plaything. And all men fantasize about being it. They do.

 14)            Try making love with your clothes on, or at most of them on. Clothes can be very sensual, and provide a kind of erotic friction that turns up the heat—the Victorians were famous for this, having a good lay while still in half corsets, and those long knickers that men wore. If things get too hot, take something off, like your shoes and socks.

 15)            Stop making love for a while and have a snack. Something light, and sexy in its own right, like slices of melon with prosciutto. The juicy, salty, sweetness of food like this can be very stimulating.

 16)            Don’t rule out talking dirty, but don’t ever let it get vulgar. In other words, say something like “I’d really like it if you sucked my (tit, cock, ass, etc.)” but don’t say something like “Suck my tit! Suck my cock!” unless you really want to get into turbulent waters. It may be such a turn-off to some men that they never come back. A lot of men who live and die for porn don’t want it taken outside of their imagination, so remember that.

 17)            On the other hand, ask him if he’d like to share his favorite porn scenes with you. Ask, but don’t demand. Everyman has a “secret world,” and if he wants to let you in, great. But don’t barge in. At a certain point, he may open up to you about it.

 18)            Tell him you want to take a shower together, if you haven’t done it before. Water and soap are . . . well, water and soap. You can provide everything in between. Also, in the shower, play a few games, like spitting water on him. Directly at him, but not in his eyes. Also, showers are perfect places for “water sports,” if you are into them. But, if you have to ask what “water sports” are, then maybe you’re not ready for this.

 19)            Tell him how nice he smells. And if he doesn’t smell that way, make sure he does smell that way by rewarding him for smelling nice. This may mean getting into the shower, or giving him some cologne that you want him to wear. (Nothing overwhelming, just some nice light male fragrance with a hint of lemon or vetiver in it.) Also, many men have a smell that is simply their smell, and it can drive you nuts—especially a crotch, underarm smell, or fresh summer perspiration odor. So let him know it.

 20)            When you’re out, buy him a drink first. And always offer to pay for something—no matter who he is or how rich he is, it makes a man feel very good that you are offering to pay for something, even if the invitation has come from him.

 21)            When you’re at a bar, make him feel that you are taking care of him, like, for instance, pass him the peanuts or whatever is out there for nibbles. Then nibble a bit on him, too. There’s something about sticking your tongue in a man’s ear at a noisy bar that drives any man more nuts than the peanuts. It adds a refreshing ocean sound to an abrasive environment. Hell, the peanuts can wait.

 22)            When the two of you go out alone, never order something he hates: that way he can taste everything on your plate. If he’s one of those of tight-assed types who can’t bear to eat anything off someone else’s plate, cut off a piece of something and put it on his, saying, “I’d really like for you to taste this.” It shows that you want to share with him, and this in itself is very conducive to intimacy.

 23)             But don’t force the issue if he refuses. In fact, don’t force any issue with him unless you feel so strongly about it that you’re ready to renegotiate the relationship. What you want to feel is that you can enjoy everything you can with him, and don’t worry about the other parts. That’s what your other friends are for. One of the worst mistakes people make with their sexual/romantic partners is wanting them to be casual friends. They aren’t; when they do become this, then most of the heat goes out of the relationship and the question is: do you really want that?

The perfect way to be seductive with a man is to read The Manly Art of Seduction, available as a very popular Kindle book, also available on Nook, Smashwords, Diesel Books, Apple Ipod, and other formats. Or, you can read it in plain old black-and-white print through Amazon, many lgbt bookstores, and independent bookstores throughout America—ask for it. You can read more about famous gay author Perry Brass at his website, perrybrass.com, where he is also always available to answer questions (decent ones: don’t ask him if he’s as hot as his books. He embarrasses easily.)

Perry Brass: That Rock and That Hard Place Finally Meet at the LGBT Center

It began fairly innocently enough: a group called Siege Busters, composed of a few people (I gather) ardently against the Israeli blockade of Hamas-led Gaza, wanted to have a party (or program) at the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender Community Center on West 13th Street and they wanted to call it “Anti-Israeli Apartheid Week.” Siege Busters had actually met at the Center before, and the person in the Center office responsible for booking rooms, in the Center’s long-standing tradition of inclusiveness (which it actually has, despite some posturing by Center critics to the contrary) booked the room.
News of the meeting/party was put up on the Center’s website, and from there all heck broke loose. Several well-placed and well-heeled supporters of the Center, which it needs, because, after all, the Center is in New York and not Nebraska, went into a screaming fit. They organized a phone blitz on the Center’s staff, threatening the new E.D. of the Center, Glenda Testone, and other staff members that if this offense to Israel were allowed to take place, they would “reconsider” all of their past support for the Center and cut off every penny to it in the future. Primary among them was porn-star entrepeneur Michael Lucas, who ran an email blast to his several thousand nearest-and-dearest asking them to “Boycott the LGBT Center,” stating of course that Israel is America’s only democratic ally in the Middle East (no lie) and that only in Israel are gays and lesbians given any real chance for personal freedom and freedom from injury and possible death, as they are in the rest of the Arab-Moslem world. (Again, no lie: you can slice this and dice it as many ways as you wish, but it is the unfortunate truth.)
At this point, all this protest (or threatening) rose to a truly high-pitched, full-blast alarm Code Blue level, and the amount of support, in pure dollars, that the Center was threatened with losing was too considerable to wiggle around. Since it cost the New York LGBT Center somewhere in the vicinity of $75,000 a day just to keep its doors open (we are talking about a large facility, open every day of the year, in the most expensive real estate in North America, with a staff of 70) and we are in an extremely tough economic environment when state support for social service organizations is iffy to say the least (and the Center is very much a social services organization, doing vitally necessary social services to everyone in our community from the very young to the very old), this threat could not be taken casually.
The Center caved, and Michael Lucas immediately sent out another email crowing and glowing about it, even though Lucas was simply one of the more front mouthpieces for the group that threatened the Center. Lucas by the way has had a very contentious history with the Center, even though his level of celebrity is something that the Center in the past has courted. This has given Lucas even more narcissistic fuel (and as a matter of disclosure, several years ago I did invite Michael to be on a panel with me at the Center, discussing pornography as an art form, an invitation which he initially accepted and then very much publicly rejected, because he was having a very well publicized feud with Out Professionals, another Center constituent), abetted by the fact that his partner, Richard Wenger, was president of the Center board for several years and during his tenure was responsible, with the former E.D. of the Center, Richard Burns, for bringing in another generation of Center supporters, who could be described as younger, wealthier, and much more directed toward their own agenda and generation. In other words, if you found yourself outside of their scope, don’t apply.

When I got Michael Lucas’s email about boycotting the Center, my first thought was to send out another email (that would definitely not reach Lucas’s thousands) asking everyone to support it. The Center, despite its limitations on resources, is the only open organization of its sort in New York. No other organization even comes close to its openness: dealing with its staff has been a phenomenon of openness compared to any other cultural/ethnic/religious/political organization in the city. Not only is it incredibly financially reasonable to deal with—in other words, try going to the 92nd Street Y and tell their staff what you want to do and wait for them to explain money to you; but planning a meeting or event there is simplicity itself. Again, try going to a Catholic church, or any synagogue or church for that matter, or a local YMCA, or even a New York city school or library, with your needs and see what the reaction is.
Sure, I know the Archdiocese is exceptionally open to queer meetings, but the point is basically all you have to do is just walk in to the Center office, state what your purpose is, find a free date on their calendar, put down a deposit that could barely get three people into Starbucks, and you’re in.
Also, and extremely important, the Center is the only place of its sort in New York that you can simply walk into: no membership cards, no one at the door asking you what your mission or problem is, no ID is requested, nothing. So you have this motley crew of street people and Upper East Siders, the extremely hip and the extremely ragged, all brushing elbows with each other, with no regard to any previous element of categorization except for the fact that you agree to treat other users of the Center with respect and moderately human sensitivity.
(Both of these qualifications have never been easy to find in New York, but they are found most of the time at the Center.)
So the Center has found itself in the worst bind it has been in since the great NAMBLA (North American Man/Boy Love Association) controversy in 1989, when Allen Ginsberg wanted to perform there as a NAMBLA supporter, and was banned from doing so by the Center—and later NAMBLA became the first gay group ever to be totally banned from its facility.
This has given NAMBLA supporters a lot of fuel for their own feelings of being aggrieved, and it always brings up that old ghost in the closet of being the only group, historically, that has been categorically excluded from the Center. However, since the Center now has a large parents constituent and parents of all stripes (gay and straight) trust their kids to go to Center events, the specter of a bunch of “dirty old men” lurking around in raincoats stalking young innocents always comes up with a lot of big red neon around it.
This same specter is true for Siege Busters waving the flag of Israeli apartheidism: what Israel has done to its Palestinian neighbors and even citizens is not humane, but the Palestinians have been adamant in their refusal to recognize Israel’s right to exist. So, in both instances, you can go round and round with these ideas and still end up with nothing.
My own feeling was that Siege Buster should have been given a forum to talk about their side of the issue (or problem), without fanning fires using a term like “Israeli Apartheid.” Some of my friends, who are totally pro-Palestinian, ardently believe that the UJA (United Jewish Appeal) should be forced to register in the U.S. as a “terrorist organization” because it supports Israel. This to me seems like insanity, but I’m sure they will scream loud enough about it, just as Israel’s supporters will.
All of this only makes me want to support the Center as the one place that should and could allow a backdrop for this discussion. I frankly hate the “I’m going to take my bat and ball and leave the playground” attitude of people attacking the Center, even though there have been times when I’ve felt exactly the same way. But, after a little reconsideration I have come back to it, and realized what a stake we all have in it, or should have if we gave it any thought.

(One last request: I hope I have got all the names right here of the constituent organizations I have mentioned; it’s sometimes hard to keep them straight without a program. Second disclosure: Michael Lucas also contributed a blurb to my previous novel Carnal Sacraments, which I was tickled pink to get: being a writer and publicity whore myself, I’ll do anything to get my egregiously worthy books into the hands of readers, an attitude that I’m sure Mr. Lucas and I completely share. Thank you, Michael.)

Perry Brass has published 15 books including erotic classics like Mirage, Angel Lust, Warlock, The Substance of God, and Carnal Sacraments, as well as How to Survive Your Own Gay Life. As an activist, he joined the Gay Liberation Front in 1969, right after Stonewall, becoming an editor of Come Out!, the world’s first gay liberation newspaper. In 1973, he helped start the Gay Men’s Health Project Clinic, the first clinic for gay men on the East Coast, strongly advocating the use of condoms a decade before the onslaught of HIV. His newest book is The Manly Art of Seduction, How to Meet, Talk To, and Become Intimate with Anyone which is a guide to leaving passivity and getting what you want—nicely. He can be reached through his website, http://www.perrybrass.com.

2010 in review

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is doing awesome!.

Crunchy numbers

The average container ship can carry about 4,500 containers. This blog was viewed about 21,000 times in 2010. If each view were a shipping container, your blog would have filled about 5 fully loaded ships.

In 2010, there were 6 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 22 posts. There were 4 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 592kb.

The busiest day of the year was November 29th with 96 views. The most popular post that day was 37 Ways To Be Seductive With A Man, .

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were google.com, en.wordpress.com, ask.reference.com, search.conduit.com, and search.aol.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for how to be seductive, how to be seductive to a man, seductive talk, how to be seductive to my boyfriend, and being seductive.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

37 Ways To Be Seductive With A Man, May 2007
9 comments and 1 Like on WordPress.com,

2

Tea Room Sex, A Blast from the Old Past? December 2007
2 comments

3

The Manly Art of Seduction Gets Banned on FaceBook January 2010

4

Discovering Manhood and the Work of Branden Charles Wallace March 2010

5

Malachy McCourt and I discuss aging . . . and fawking. March 2010
2 comments

Malachy McCourt and I discuss aging . . . and fawking.

 

Malachy McCourt and Perry Brass at Lincoln Center Barnes & Noble

Last night, Monday, March 22, 2010, I took part in an event at the Lincoln Center Barnes & Noble called—of all things—”Nifty After Fifty,” sponsored by the Greater New York Independent Publishers Association and produced by Francine Trevens. Fantastic evening. We got about 175 people there, mostly eager to hear Malachy McCourt, our guest of honor, talk in his sweet-and-salty Irish-tweed spun voice about the simple things of life that usually aren’t. He compared same-sex marriage to Adam and Eve—an idea that would make many Fundamentalists croak. Because . . . when Adam “lay” with Eve, she had all of his DNA in him (who else’s?) . . . so “he was just about fawking himself, right—now how different is that from same-sex love and marriage?” Malachy talked about “fawking” pretty often. “Fawking,” the Irish version of carnal knowledge, always sounds so much more picturesque than the American reference to it which sounds . . . OK, vulgar. There were also scenes from a few short plays that deal with getting older and hating it (let’s be honest: you don’t have a choice in this, but you can make the most of it) from Francine’s new collection of plays, Short Plays Long to Remember. “Short Plays” contains “Bar None,” my one-act about the Mattachine Society, an early gay rights group, opening the bars in New York to gay men in 1966: something most have long forgotten.

Prior to this, a bar owner in NYC could have his license revoked simply for serving booze to anyone who even appeared queer. Of course this law was rarely enforced because so many bar-keeps routinely paid off the cops, which in turn kept the Mafia happily in the bar business.

Other readers on the program were Norman Beim, Kat George, Francine L. Trevens, Andrea Troy, Marni K.Connelly, and Kay Williams.

Norman is a playwright and Kay was an actress before becoming an author (not that you can’t do both) so they read from two of Norman’s plays wonderfully. And Malachy read from “The Rocking Horse” by Daniel P. Quinn—I think you could hear Malachy McCourt read the Yellow Pages and get a kick out of it.

There was also a song, or two, from singer/lyricist Michael Colby and pianist Annie Lebeaux on a sparkly new hybrid Yamaha piano (does this mean it’s also a car?). 

As my part of the evening, I gave a talk entitled “The Erotic Life After 50.” It was actually more about The Manly Art of Seduction, but, hey, shameless self-promotion is something that gets most authors either on the bestseller list or somewhere in author hell where the company is Shakespeare and Voltaire. Why complain?

So, if you didn’t make it to B & N on a really crummy, rainy but fun night, here’s what I said.

If 30 years ago someone had told me that at 62, I’d be publishing a book called The Manly Art of Seduction, How to Meet, Talk to, and Become Intimate with Anyone, I would have said . . . of course, what else would I be doing at 62?

I came from a generation where seduction—that is, real seduction, not the TV Jell-O version of it—was a way of life. And I grew up in the Deep South where we not only depended upon the kindness of strangers, we invited it whenever we could find it.

The truth is seduction has been a wonderful part of my life, but it took me a while to figure out how it works, and how I can explain it to others so it will work for you, too. We live in what I call the “culture of rejection,” and often older people feel the sting of this. We’re overlooked, we feel rejected, and sometimes it feels that even attempting to initiate any kind of action is futile. This leads many of us into erotic shutdown: we feel that we are either too old or too “smart” to be seductive or allow ourselves be seduced.

This is sad, because the loveliness of your own inner self, which has no actual age, is being denied. Much of the Manly Art of Seduction is about being open to this authentic self inside you, and letting it open you to the seductiveness of the world—and of yourself. In other words, the seductive you is waiting to come out, and it—or you—will be successful at seduction, once you connect with it.

First, some definitions: Seduction—that’s simple: an invitation to intimacy.

Intimacy: a real closeness energized with the deeper aspects of yourself, and of someone else.

The Manly Art of Seduction gets you in contact with this deeper self through mind exercises and actual experiences. You will use this contact to give you the confidence to achieve closeness and go as far with it as you want to, or circumstances allow you to.

The world is not perfect—and neither are you—so you may strike out sometimes. But—and this is very important, so stay awake—as you become better at the Manly Art, you will find more men attractive and also attracted to you. Therefore, as you become more open to the inner beauty of yourself, a lot of other men will become attractive as well, and many of them, as you follow the techniques of The Manly Art of Seduction, will start to approach you now.

The Manly Art, using scenarios and exercises, explains how to approach men, speak to them, what’s really happening in a seductive conversation, and how to touch men physically and emotionally, becoming more intimate with them, negotiating possibilities. It also shows you how to keep rejection fears away, and maneuver a relationship into warmer and more satisfying waters.

Realistically, I tell you don’t expect clear weather all the time—there are some horses in fact who don’t want to be led to any kind of water. And I’ll tell you how to dive out of a situation just as I’ll tell you how to enter it. But there is one lesson I want you to keep no matter what: as you get closer to the real you that our relentless commercialism works so hard to keep you isolated from, you’ll learn not to reject yourself. So you’ll never beat up on yourself, feel hurt inside, and walk away.

This is at the core of the Manly Art. Now how you go from your inner self to your outer one, and then from you to him, or her, or her to her, or . . . well — seduction is universal — is laid out clearly with questions after most chapters for you to answer. So that the book also becomes a journal for your progress in Seduction.

One of my main goals is to open seduction up to everyone, especially people who feel left out, who often end up spending the night alone and feel self conscious about themselves because they are either too shy or have some aspect of themselves that they feel ashamed of. So I have a chapter on disability and seduction, as well as on weight and how we deal with that in a society obsessed with youthful slimness. I also included chapters on seduction across race lines and class lines, which sometimes feel like an even tougher barrier. And also issues like erectile dysfunction, penis size, seduction and married men, straight men, threesomes, and seduction within a relationship where sex has either become stalemated or nonexistent.

Since one of the keys to successful seduction is making yourself available, I have a chapter on seduction over dinner at your place, even if you can’t cook and your home looks like a gang of Neanderthals just left it, or what do you do when you go to his place and he’s acting like romance is just not on the menu. Turning cold potatoes into a hotter dish is at the meat of the Manly Art, but the most important thing is knowing that you are at the center of it and can bring someone else into it and love every moment of it.

If you’re intrigued about the Manly Art of Seduction, I’m co-leading a workshop on it with Jerry Kajpust on April 29, and will be happy to talk with you more about the workshop, too

PS. I want to thank Bart Greenberg from the Lincoln Center B & N’s Community Relations staff for making this event possible. Bart is the friend of many communities, and a great pal to have in the book world.