October 3, 2025 • 48 mins
Imagine discovering a time capsule that reveals the birth of leather culture—the codes, practices, and fierce spirit of resistance that shaped our community. Larry Townsend's Leatherman's Handbook, originally published in 1972, was exactly that: a revolutionary document that dared to say "your desires are valid" when society labeled kinky people as mentally ill.
When Edge first discovered this book as a young leather person in the late 1980s, it was nothing short of "a lightning bolt of revelation." Now, after decades of being virtually unobtainable (unless you were willing to pay $400 for a used copy), this foundational text has been reprinted, allowing a new generation to connect with leather's origins.
The available edition combines both the original 1972 text and Townsend's 1997 Silver Jubilee commentary, offering a fascinating dual perspective—showing leather culture at its emergence and then through the devastating impact of the AIDS crisis. What makes this historical document so surprisingly relevant today is its portrayal of leather's political roots. The central figure wasn't the leather uniform cop but the outlaw biker—a symbol of defiance against constant police harassment and criminalization.
This episode explores what parts of Townsend's vision remain valuable today: the accessibility of leather identity (requiring minimal gear investment), the importance of community protection and solidarity, and the understanding that leather practices have always varied by region rather than following rigid "Old Guard" protocols. Edge doesn't shy away from acknowledging the dated elements—the rigid roles, exclusionary focus on cis gay men, and terminology now considered offensive—while highlighting how our community has evolved beyond these limitations.
Whether you're a leather history buff or simply curious about the foundations of kink culture, this episode offers both historical context and thought-provoking questions about what parts of our heritage deserve reclaiming. The Leatherman's Handbook wasn't just a sex manual—it was the blueprint for a community of resistance and mutual support that continues to inspire us today.
Ask Edge! Go to https://www.speakpipe.com/LTHREDGE to leave ask a question or leave feedback. Find Edge's other content on Instagram and Twitter. Also visit his archive of educational videos, Tchick-Tchick.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Let's talk about the Leink and BDSM.
My name is Edge, my pronounsare he, him, and I'm your host,
(00:46):
and in this episode we're goingto focus on the Leatherman's
Handbook by Larry Townsend, anincredibly important document
for our community and one thatwas out of print for a very long
time but which has beenrecently re-released.
As usual, I'll start by sharingmy experiences in relation to
this topic before we do a deepdive into the book itself and
(01:08):
thinking about what about itreally still resonates and
remains important for us, andwhat about it feels particularly
dated, and that's going to bethe whole of this episode.
I did not have any Ask Edgequestions, so this episode may
be a little bit on the shorterside.
However, I think it's a reallyimportant document.
(01:29):
I cannot stress enough howcritical this book was and how
important it was to theformation of the community as we
know it today.
So I'm hoping that, even ifit's a little short, it is
something you enjoy, because Ithink it's going to be a really
good episode.
And let's get started.
(01:52):
I started my journey as aleather person in the late 80s
of the last millennium Maybe theearly 90s, but it was very late
in the last millennium andobviously we did not have the
web.
We did not have the internet,we did not have the ready access
to information that we areblessed and cursed with today.
(02:14):
And so when I discovered theLeatherman's Handbook, it was a
lightning bolt of revelation.
A lightning bolt of revelation,it was fundamental to the
beginning of my journey.
It helped birth me as a leatherperson.
Now I wish I could tell youwhen I got it.
(02:35):
I wish I still had my book.
It disappeared from my libraryat some point.
I probably loaned it to someoneand never got it back, and I
kick myself for that.
At some point I probably loanedit to someone and never got it
back, and I kick myself for that.
I know that it was very earlyon in my journey and I have to
imagine I probably got it fromSecond Skin, which was the
leather store in New Orleans atthat time, because I can't
(02:56):
imagine anywhere else I wouldhave bought it.
This is not something thatwould have been in bookstores we
didn't even have Barnes andNoble back then, let alone
Amazon.
So I have to imagine I got itfrom the local leather shop,
which means I suppose I'dalready stepped into the
community to some degree.
I think I was actually readingthe Leatherman's Handbook 2.
(03:18):
I'm not entirely positive andI've tried to figure out how
many different editions thisbook has been through and when
the Leatherman's Handbook 2 cameout.
And I've tried to figure outhow many different editions this
book has been through and whenthe Leatherman Handbook 2 came
out.
I couldn't untangle thattimeline because the resources
available today require moreresearch than I'd like to do.
Here's what it comes down to.
(03:39):
I found this book.
It opened the door to me and Iwalked through.
The thing I most remember aboutthe book is not the insights
about the community.
I kind of feel like those partsof it the actual practical
how-to.
I wasn't paying a whole lot ofattention to the parts of the
(04:02):
book I remember most was theporn.
So throughout this book, at theend of every chapter, in the
middle of a chapter, townsendwill go into an erotic
pornographic story and this wasmy first access to kink porn.
And I can't tell you whichstories I really zeroed in on,
(04:24):
but I recall having certaingo-to stories in the book that
really, let's say they served mewell.
So even though I wasn't takingnotes out of it and in part by
that time I'm sure it feltpretty dated to the community I
was moving into by that time.
I was moving into the communityand learning more directly from
(04:46):
the leather folk around me.
I can't say that I actuallytook notes out of it, but I
certainly took images, fantasies, desires, the shapes of scenes.
I definitely imprinted thoseinto my erotic imagination very
deeply.
(05:07):
There remains as well, thissense of initiation that I
recall from getting this book.
I was so bewildered firstentering into the community,
because it's disorienting, let'sface it.
It's disorienting now foranyone stepping into the
community, and that's with allthis information readily
(05:30):
available.
I was so disoriented anduncertain, unsure who I was, how
I fit, what my place was, whatmy tribe was, what my community
was.
I just place was what my tribewas, what my community was.
I just I didn't know.
I didn't know.
(05:50):
I was moving through somedesire in me to find something.
And when I found this book Idiscovered, first of all, I'm
not alone.
Second of all, there's a wholecommunity, there is a tribe,
there is a place where I belong.
Third, it has a history.
It has a history that existedsince before I stepped into it.
(06:13):
So for all those reasons,picking up the Leatherman's
Handbook felt like coming intosomething, coming into the
community, coming into my own.
Somehow.
It felt very initiatory and Ivalue that.
(06:36):
I would do anything to have mycopy of the Leatherman's
Handbook back.
It is so resonant for me.
And here's what's interesting,right, I can't tell you, I can't
tell you when I got it, I can'ttell you what year it was.
I can't tell you what I read.
I can't tell you when I got it.
I can't tell you what year itwas.
I can't tell you what I read.
I can't tell you what I learnedfrom it.
I remember the things about itthat I valued.
(06:57):
I know, if nothing else, it wasincredibly important to me.
And you know I collect all kindsof leather books.
I have Leatherfolk, I have theReal Thing, I have Urban
(07:22):
Aboriginal.
I have tons of books aboutleather because I'm kind of a
bookish guy and because in thelong ago, in the before time,
that's what we did we read books.
We didn't have the web.
So I have a lot of books andthe one that just feels most
missing is this book, and I wasso thrilled to see that it had
(07:46):
been re-released.
It is a reprint of the Jubileeedition, right?
So the Leatherman's Handbookwas originally published in 1972
.
This is the Silver Jubilee.
It's a 1997 edition and I wasso thrilled because I had looked
for the book.
I'm like I need the Letterman'sHandbook on my bookshelf.
(08:07):
Well, you know what To buy itbefore this release.
To buy it, you'd find usedcopies that went for like $400.
And as much as I value it, I'mnot spending $400 for an old,
beat up paperback book.
That was just not going tohappen.
So for I don't know a decade ormore I've been longing for this
(08:34):
book and did not have itbecause it was not available.
It was not in print and theused copies were exorbitant.
So I was just over the moon whenI found out that it had been
reprinted and bought itimmediately, and before I
decided to really talk about it,I did a short little video on
my social media about it just tolet people know it was out, and
I decided, before I reallytalked about it, I need to spend
(08:57):
some time rereading it.
And that's what I've been doingover the past several months,
because I don't have all thetime for reading that I used to
have, but I would spend a littlebit of time each morning
reading a chapter or a part of achapter, with this podcast in
mind, with an understanding thatI wanted to share what I saw
(09:17):
with all of you.
So the whole arc of my personalexperience with the
Leatherman's Handbook is this Ifound it and found myself.
I lost it and continued on myjourney.
I missed it and looked for itand did not find it.
And then I found it again and Ipromise you it will have a
(09:41):
place on my bookshelf now and myname will be written in that
cover and people, if someoneborrows it, they will return it
to me because I will not losethis book again.
And for now, it's this sort ofreminder of my beginnings and
it's this reminder of who wewere.
And what's interesting you'llsee in the next segment is I
(10:02):
rediscovered things that are sotimely, that are so perfect for
the world we live in today, thatit's re-release seems really,
really fortuitous.
And that's my story about theLeatherman's Handbook.
I wish I had more details toshare about the hot stories.
I wish I could tell you thespecific things I learned, but
(10:23):
we're talking about memoriesthat are over 30 years old
probably 35 years old, oh Godand they're fuzzy.
They're fuzzy, but theemotional resonance is crystal
clear.
This book is important to meand that's why I want to share
it with you.
Not that it's going to beimportant to you, not that you
(10:44):
may even ever read it, but Iwant you to know about it
because it's an important partof our story.
And so, with all that beingsaid, I'm going to move into the
next segment, where we reallygo into what makes this book so
important.
See you soon to what makes thisbook so important.
(11:11):
See you soon.
Let me start by framing thisbook and how radical it was.
Now, if you are a loco like me,a leather person of a certain
age, then this entire episodemight evoke a kind of nostalgia,
because there's a very goodchance that if you've been into
leather for a long time, you'veencountered Townsend before Now.
If you're younger and byyounger I mean younger in
leather, not necessarilychronological age this is going
(11:35):
to be an important introductionto a key text, a key figure in
our community and its history.
The book was originallypublished in 1972, and the
edition that's been reprinted isthe 1997 Jubilee Silver Edition
Silver Jubilee Edition and thatmeans it's a kind of palimpsest
(11:56):
.
We have the original text, butbeside it, in parentheses and
italics, townsend is adding innotes from the perspective of
1997.
And so in this one book you geta simultaneous view of two
points in our history 1972, thebeginning when our community is
emerging out of the shadows andinto a kind of openness where
(12:18):
people can find it more easily,and 1997, the height of the
HIV-AIDS pandemic.
And both of those incrediblyhistoric moments are in this
single text and you get to seethem both operating as Townsend
narrates them both.
This book was the first entrypoint available into Leather
(12:44):
life.
So before 1972, there was nohandbook.
Before 1972, you wandered intoa leather bar and looked like an
idiot because you didn't knowwhat you were doing, and then
maybe stumbled along and foundsomeone to teach you and mentor
you and you finally found yourway With Townsend's book.
It was the first widelyavailable map into a hidden
(13:06):
world.
It was the first book thatcould tell you how to enter that
letter.
First of all, what was theletter bar?
Where was it, what was the nameof it and how to enter into it
and therefore how to enter intothe community.
And there's no minimizing howradical that was.
And what's beautiful about itis that Townsend is really
(13:30):
codifying a culture in motion.
So we get to see the communityat this point in time and we get
another glimpse of it in 1997.
Part of what made it so radicalis that he legitimized kink as
an identity and not a pathology.
His core message in this bookis your desires are valid, your
(13:55):
desires are valid.
And for a generation that wastold to be ashamed, this was
liberating.
I mean a generation first ofall told to be ashamed of, this
was liberating.
And I mean a generation firstof all told to be ashamed of
being gay.
And not even kink wasn't evenon the horizon of toleration, of
tolerance.
But here's this book that saysno, it's okay, your desires are
(14:22):
valid.
In fact, leather is healthy andjoyful and beautifully erotic.
At a time when it would havebeen considered an illness, like
in the Diagnostic andStatistical Manual of the
American PsychologicalAssociation, it would have been
an illness.
And here it is, this booksaying no, you're not sick, you
(14:43):
are not sick and your desiresare valid.
Part of that radicalcontribution that Townsend made
was also laying the foundationsfor consent and negotiation and
notions of how this communityworked out, how it was going to
do what it was going to do,going to do what it was going to
(15:09):
do, and then also radical, wassimply offering a community.
These people were not freaks,they were a member of a sort of
tribe, a lot of that centered atthe bar and centered in bike
clubs.
But in his storytelling you seehow there were really deep
affective friendships in thesespaces.
I think it's also radical forus and worth recovering at this
(15:30):
moment, because he really doesshow leather is not just sex, it
is also a kind of lifephilosophy and it is a political
stance and it is ritual and itis all of that together, ritual
and it is all of that together.
So take a moment right now andimagine if you were alive in
(15:51):
1972.
I was.
Imagine you were alive in 1972.
Imagine you were to open a bookand suddenly see your secret,
dirty, shameful desires in print, celebrated.
That is the kind of radicalmoment that Townsend represents.
(16:13):
Now we're reading the SilverJubilee edition from 1997, and
that also requires a little bitof framing.
Now, by 1997, we do have theprotease inhibitors, so, and
HIV-AIDS is not quite the deathsentence it used to be.
However, reading Townsend'snotes, you really still get a
sense of the trauma.
(16:34):
You see the impact of HIV-AIDSon our community and you see the
grief and you see theuncertainty.
So there's still a lot ofthings like we're not sure if
Popper's causes HIV-AIDS andwe're not sure if this is risky
behavior.
And it's really kind ofinteresting because at this
point I was actually quitebaffled because I'm like, wait a
(16:55):
second, this is 1997.
There was a lot of stuff weknew, but in that moment I think
the knowledge was so new, theknowledge of a horizon where
people could live with HIV AIDS,the protease inhibitors that
trajectory was so new that ithadn't trickled down into the
(17:16):
deep soul consciousness ofpeople.
And I think we see thatreflected in Townsend's notes
right.
And for anyone like me wholived through this pandemic, it
just altered everything.
It altered everything.
The whole landscape of ourintimacy, our sex and our desire
(17:36):
was inalterably shaped, changed, and HIV-AIDS reshaped leather
life and we see that here Now.
It's great to celebrate thesethings in this radical moment
and I want to provide thathistorical context in that
framing.
However, it's really importantto talk about what is dated and
(17:58):
even potentially offensive inthis book, because it's very
much a book of its time time.
Some of the things that aredated are really obvious, like a
lot of the landmarks are gone.
He talks about a lot of barsand clubs and hookup spots and
even between 1972 and 1997, hereflects on how those spaces
(18:20):
have changed and have continuedto change.
That part's not particularlysurprising right Bars open and
close all the time.
Surprising right Bars open andclose all the time.
Some of the other parts of itthat feel really dated and
almost offensive is the rigid,rigid roles.
Now there is no top, bottom,dom sub.
In Townsend there is the S andthe M.
(18:44):
The S is the sadist and the Mis the masochist, which is
interesting because it's notlike M for master, s for slave.
No, it's capital S sadist and Mfor masochist.
There's very, very little sensethat anyone could be a switch.
There are a couple of momentswhere he kind of talks about it,
but there isn't the samefluidity of roles or even
(19:06):
necessarily evolutionary pathsof roles that we see in the
community today.
There's also a very exclusionaryfocus on cis, gay men.
There's no mention of leatherwomen.
Certainly we know they were outthere doing their thing.
Also, no mention ofnon-masculine leather people,
(19:28):
transgender leather people.
None of that is in this bookand the whole safety and consent
frameworks are there likethere's a sense you need to
negotiate.
But in terms of safety there'snot a lot of information on
aftercare, the way we understandaftercare, of information on
(19:53):
aftercare, the way we understandaftercare, or really you can
see in his 1997 notes still alot of doubt about how to have
safer kinky sex.
So that feels really dated.
One of the things that alsofeels dated and a little
offensive is that masculinity isso centered and in fact he has
a really I found it personallyoffensive a really offensive
intra-community, misogynistichomophobia.
(20:16):
He calls certain gay men poofsand it's a way of really
vilifying their lack ofmasculinity and the poof is also
non-leather and so that alsosets up this binary where
masculine is leather, feminineis gay and I just don't think
(20:38):
that's true and I don't thinkthat is something we can really
tolerate as a community.
He is surprisingly pessimisticabout relationships.
He has this sense that leatherrelationships are not possible,
they are doomed, they're notgoing to be stable.
There's a real sense that thebest way to do it is to kind of
(20:59):
have a roommate and each of youdo your own thing.
There's no real understandingof polyamory or leather
households or chosen family.
None of that is reallyavailable to him at that time.
And then, finally, the mostblatantly offensive stuff is his
(21:21):
use of certain racialterminology that is just not
something we tolerate anymore.
In fact it's something we don'ttolerate so much I'm not even
going to mention it and you seeit.
There's a survey in the end,kind of a survey of your
interests, and you can reallysee he's using terms that we
just don't use anymore.
So because it's a product ofits time, a lot of it is going
(21:43):
to feel really dated and a lotof it, if you read the book, you
should just kind of put in abox, throw away.
You should really not take inthese more dated and offensive
elements.
That being said, there's still asurprising amount of this book
that rings true even today, andpart of that is this notion that
(22:07):
consent is critical.
It is the backbone of theencounter.
So in all his little vignettes,in all his little stories,
there's some mention of usuallyon the way home from the bar.
There's some mention ofnegotiation or discussion.
There's a real sense that trustis important and that you need
to be clear on what yourinterests are, what you're
willing to do and what you'renot willing to do.
(22:27):
So this becomes much moredeveloped and we become much
more structural about it in anunderstanding of what consent
looks like.
But even then there's a realsense that there is community,
that there is consent.
There is a real sense ofcommunity.
Now there isn't leather familyand there isn't polyamory and
there aren't stable leatherrelationships.
(22:47):
But in the bars there are thesefriends and friendships, and
those friends and friendshipsare deep and effective.
They are very close, intimatebonds, and so you get a sense of
community and you get a senseof mentorship as well.
That this person taught me thathere's my friend here.
I loaned him my boy.
There's a lot of that.
There's also a real sense of theritual and meaning that can
(23:11):
come into play.
That is still pretty core tohow I practice leather today.
That leather is identityaffirming, it is intimate, it is
symbolic, it carries meaningand it carries meaning that is
deeper than the acts we aredoing.
It means something bigger thanus and there's a sense of that
(23:32):
here in this book that reallyremains true to us today.
There is also just a basicaffirmation that these roles are
valid and there's respect forthem.
There's no sense thatdomination is abuse or
submission is weakness, but no,if you're a sub, that is
absolutely great.
I'm sorry, in his context, ifyou are an M, that is absolutely
great.
(23:52):
Obviously that is something wecovered for today.
And the integration of leatherinto everyday life, that it's
not a pastime but it really ispart of who you are, that is
part of your identity and partof your lifestyle.
Those are some of the larger,deeper sorts of things that I
(24:13):
think resonate and as you readthrough you might find
particular practices that westill do as a community.
So, beyond the stuff that, okay,we need to throw away, beyond
the stuff oh yeah, that's stilltrue there's a lot of really
curious stuff that I read and Ijust found kind of fascinating,
because Townsend is writing fromthe 70s with a reflection from
(24:38):
the 90s and therefore is showingus, remember this culture in
motion and so you see a snapshotof the configuration of
fetishes at that time.
So, for example, he talks aboutrubber, but it's very clearly
kind of a fringe thing, like acouple of people are into rubber
, maybe there's a rubbermanufacturer, and now, if you
(25:00):
think about how huge rubber is,mir is a major event.
Everyone's been asking merecently if I'm going and
there's rubber everywhere aroundthe world.
So what was really minor thenbecame really big now.
In the same vein, he talksabout animal play, and that was
hilarious for me because when Iwas coming out there was a lot
(25:22):
of talk about animal play.
I don't know why, I don't knowwhy.
I just remember the Bardex,which is a particular brand of
enema equipment.
It just cropped up in a lot ofpornographic stories.
I know no one into enema playtoday.
I never hear about it.
So it's really fascinating.
It's very curious how someelements started very minor and
(25:44):
are now so huge, and someelements that were very huge
then are minor and almostdisappeared.
So, beyond these curiouselements, beyond the things that
remain true, beyond the thingswe should let go of, the core
message, the reason I was mostexcited to talk about Townsend
(26:06):
was to talk about the things weshould recover, the things that
he talks about that are sopoignant and poignantly useful
to us here in this historicalmoment.
And the most important of thoseis that it is very clear from
reading Townsend's book that theleather uniform was not central
(26:28):
.
What was central to thecommunity was the outlaw biker.
The outlaw biker and this madeenormous sense because the book
is filled with these anecdotesof the police raiding bars, of
the police arresting people.
Townsend talks about theadvocacy organizations he's a
part of that are doing legaladvocacy for people.
(26:51):
So we were not reallyeroticizing and fetishizing the
leather uniform.
I think about this for a couplereasons.
I know so many young leatherpeople who are so eager to get
their quote-unquote formals, andby that what they really mean
is a leather uniform,quote-unquote formals, and by
(27:11):
that what they really mean is aleather uniform.
And if we think about thecommunity as it circulates today
, the central figure of theleather community tends to be
the leather cop, the leatheruniform.
And that was great, that wasfine.
Now, in my memory, that reallyexploded in the late 1990s.
That makes sense historically.
By then a lot of our rights, alot of our basic existence was,
(27:33):
I'm not going to say, secured,it was not being harassed.
I would say it was a time whenthe cops weren't raiding bars
and so we could shift our eroticfocus.
That's my memory of thecommunity.
That happened in the late 1990s.
But today obviously there's alot of resistance to state
authority, to systemicstructures of oppression, and at
(27:58):
the heart of that is often theimage of a uniform.
So what if we didn't have theleather uniform as the central
image to our community?
Instead, what if we went backand recovered the outlaw biker?
And I think that notion of thenot just the biker, the outlaw
(28:21):
biker and I think that's reallyworth recovering.
And because for Townsend it'snot just an aesthetic, it's not
just an image, it is a practice.
Not that he was a biker, Ithink he talks about, I think at
some point he's maybe ridingaround in a convertible, but not
that he was a biker, but thathe was politically active and
(28:46):
really working againsthomophobia, working against
state repression.
And so leather was not justerotic identity, it was
political defiance.
And this might be a historicalmoment, certainly here in my
local context, but I thinkaround the world.
This might be a historicalmoment for us to recenter on the
(29:09):
outlaw biker with that outlawemphasis, to really use this as
a place to resist.
Now, I'm not disparaging leatheruniforms.
I'm not saying we shouldn'twear them.
I have a closet full of them.
I enjoy my leather uniforms.
But it is a way of saying that,especially if you are so
politically sensitive to thecurrents of power that the
(29:31):
uniform is really offensive toyou, there is an option and the
option is you know, langlitz isthe premier manufacturer of
leather.
It is top of the line, it isthe Rolls Royce and everyone
(29:56):
uses it.
If you look at pictures ofFolsom Europe, it's a sea of
Langlitz.
Everyone's in Rangers,everyone's in competition
breeches, everyone's wearingLanglitz as part of their
leather uniform.
But Langlitz is biker leather.
That means we can recover theoutlaw biker and still keep our
langlets.
I'm happy about that.
(30:18):
One of the ways I'm trying tomanifest this in my own
aesthetic and practice is I'verecently become very interested
in motocross pants from the 70s.
These are emerging out of thebiker community.
Obviously, motocross is alittle bit different, but what I
like about them is much likeuniform breeches.
(30:38):
They are designed to tuck intoboots because you need the
protection of the boot shaftwhen you're riding your
motocross bike, and much likebreeches, they feature padding
in different areas, and what Ifind in breeches is they have
very sexy hip padding, not justthe knee padding that we usually
see.
So I'm actually working ongetting a pair of motocross
(31:00):
pants made.
I found a used pair on eBayfrom the seventies and I'm
having them recreated becausefor me it's a way of beginning
to recenter the biker but alsobeing able to tuck my pants into
boots so that I can wear mytall boots.
In Townsend it's all chapsleather pants and those would
(31:23):
have gone over the boots.
There's not really a lot oftalk about boots as a fetish, or
even tall boots, so that's oneof the ways I'm trying to
manifest the outlaw biker in myown practices by shifting some
of my leather purchases in waysthat respect the overall
aesthetic I like, ie tuck thingsinto boots but also de-center
(31:44):
Not get rid of.
For me personally, not get ridof the uniform, but de-center it
.
You know, one of the other keythings that might be worth
recovering from Townsend is theaccessibility of identity.
In Townsend's day, leatherdidn't require langlets.
It didn't require reallyexpensive gear, really boots and
(32:09):
a jacket, pair of jeans andyou're ready, you're set.
Oh, and a belt.
Obviously you need a beltbecause that often becomes a
tool of play.
Townsend is looking at acommunity that is fully
operational without the largestructural apparatus we've
created of all this leatherrestraints and hoods and leather
(32:33):
straight jackets and leathersleep sacks, and for Townsend
it's a leather thong like asmall strip of leather string,
essentially a pair of boots anda bladder full of beer piss and
you're ready to go.
I think that notion ofaccessibility is important
because of the financialpressures that a lot of people
(32:54):
are facing.
Important because of thefinancial pressures that a lot
of people are facing.
Here is a community where youdidn't need super expensive gear
to be part of the community.
You needed simply the basics,and I would think we might want
to recover that as well.
We might recover, in addition,the kind of community care that
Townsend exhibits, that therewas a lot of legal defense,
(33:15):
there was a lot of solidarity,there was a real sense that
survival depended on protectingone another.
This is a community at risk,constantly under assault,
constantly with people trying toexterminate it, and it banded
(33:36):
together to protect its own, andI think that is a message we
need.
I'm not saying it's a simplemessage, particularly when we
intersect that with the whitecis gayness of Townsend's
community right, that the peoplewho were banding together were
white cis gay men and not theleather women and not the trans
(33:57):
leather folk.
So I'm not saying it's an easytranslation to make, but in this
political environment, I thinkit's important for us to think
about how to protect our own andwhat that looks like.
It's a conversation worthhaving, and I don't think it's
an easy conversation because Ithink our community is much more
aware of the lines and faultlines of privilege, but it's a
(34:18):
conversation worth having.
Some additional observations Ihave for you on Townsend.
One of the things that's reallyuseful about it is that he
explodes this myth of amonolithic old guard, which is
something we talked about in thelast episode, this myth of a
monolithic old guard, which issomething we talked about in the
last episode.
What's clear from Townsend'sbook is that leather was never a
(34:41):
uniform monolithic practice andthat the practices differed by
city and by region.
So he talks about thedifference between East Coast
leather and West Coast leather,but he also talks about the
difference between LA leatherand San Francisco leather.
And so here we have this livingdocument from that time in
history that shows to us, thatgives us evidentiary proof, that
(35:05):
there was no monolithic culture, there were no monolithic set
of rules.
In fact, leather was very mucha lived thing that varied based
on who was practicing it andwhere they were practicing it.
And so we also, because we'relooking at the 1972 and the 1997
edition, we see that not onlyis it this kind of patchwork,
(35:28):
but it is a patchwork thatchanges over time, so we get to
see how some of the norms ofthis community change.
You know, Townsend was really anethnographer.
He sent out a survey to a bunchof people because he wanted to
collect data.
And he's not recording laws,he's recording practices.
That's important.
He is not recording laws, he'srecording practices.
(35:53):
Now, when everyone does thesame practice, the visual effect
of that is that it is a law,but there are no written rules.
There are no laws in Townsend'sbook.
Instead, it is that culture inmotion and we get a snapshot of
it.
So that means for us today,there is no single right way to
(36:13):
do leather.
That is a lesson we want torecover, re-recover from
Townsend and Hold, and it allowsus this freedom from notions of
the old guard and monolithicways of behavior, monolithic
rules around leather.
So, as much as there's stuff weshould get rid of, as long as
there's stuff that's still true,as long as there's stuff, you
(36:35):
know, while there's also stuffthat's really very curious,
there's some key elements Ithink we should recover and
recenter from Townsend,including the aesthetics of the
community, including theaccessibility of gear, including
protecting our own, and thenincluding this notion that
(36:58):
leather is never a monolithicthing.
And you know, while he doesabsolutely omit things like
polyamory, he omits real senseof leather family, he omits
inclusivity.
He omits a lot of things, butpart of what that does is show
us what we had to invent acrosstime.
(37:22):
We invented households, weinvented leather family.
We made leather relationshipswork, and for Townsend they
really didn't.
He couldn't imagine how theyworked, but we make them work.
So this is a complicated book.
At the end of the day, thereare parts of it that just do not
(37:44):
ring true, but there's so muchof it that is really important
for us to think about.
There was so much that Iconnected to that I didn't
expect to connect to, and so Ithink reading it is this really
interesting, fascinatingadventure, and I invite you to
(38:06):
get the book.
And if you aren't able to getit not everyone has access to
all the resources of the worldor all the money in the world If
you can't get it, at least takethis podcast away as an
understanding of some of thelessons that that book contains
that we can carry forward.
And that is my kind ofexplication of the Leather Man's
(38:28):
Handbook.
It's incomplete, you know.
I was reading this one chapterat a time over months, and there
are probably parts of it that Iwas chuckling at while I was
reading it that I had forgotten.
There were parts of it, thatmany parts of it, that I found
offensive.
I didn't read any of the pornthis time, I will say so.
I skipped Every time he got toone of his porn stories.
(38:48):
I just skipped over it becauseit was more.
This time I was more interestedin the community content.
Really interesting, becauseobviously when I was younger,
late 1980s of the lastmillennium I was reading it and
really the only thing I rememberpaying attention to was the
porn.
And this time God, such adifferent context.
The only thing I was reallyinterested in was the historical
(39:08):
functioning of the community.
So isn't that interesting?
And that's my take on Townsend.
I hope you found it useful and Ihope, if you've read it, if
you've got other insights ofthings that you connected with
or you found horrible or youfeel we should recover, share
them with me.
They can also always crop up ina later episode or in an Ask
(39:29):
Edge.
But that's it for now, thankyou.
That's it for now.
Thank you, since I have sometime left in this episode, I
thought I might provide a fewupdates of what's going on in my
life, especially since I don'timagine I'll be returning to the
interlude episodes, simplybecause there's only so many
episodes I can crank out in amonth and I'm not sure what I've
(39:52):
shared in the last episodeabout my personal life.
So some of this may be new news, some of this may be new old
news.
I'm not sure what news this isat all.
The big thing that's going on inmy life is that I've started
antidepressant, I've startedWellbutrin, and it has to do
with depression and anxiety.
(40:13):
And the anxiety I have is fromthe world, because it is very,
very anxious out there at themoment.
And the depression is directlyrelated to my life as a single
person and the kind of horrorsof having to date or not even
being able to date because youcan't find anyone to date.
That's a situational depression, meaning if I suddenly had a
(40:35):
boyfriend I wouldn't bedepressed.
However, I've been in thatsituation for so long that I do
believe it started to actuallyalter my brain chemistry in ways
that could be addressed andsupported through medication.
So for the first time Iactually went to a psychiatrist
Normally.
In the past.
I've done antidepressants Ithink at least four times during
(40:57):
my life and I would just go tomy primary doctor and she would
prescribe something and that wasit.
But I wanted someone a littlemore expert this time.
So I am on extended releaseWelbutrin and have been for a
couple of weeks and I think it'shelping.
You know, the worst part ofbeing on antidepressants is
(41:19):
waiting for them to really kickin and although there's a little
bit of a boost, knowing thathelp is on the way, there's
still this sort of carrying theweight of the emotional
landscape until it begins toalter.
I'm starting to see it alter insome ways and I am happy for
that.
I am slowly orienting myself toPalm Springs and Palm Springs
(41:44):
Leather Pride, which is at theend of October.
I will be celebrating my 55thbirthday there.
So I've never been to PalmSprings.
I've never been to Palm SpringsLeather Pride.
I'm looking forward to thattrip.
A little bit of anxiety justbecause there's so many people I
want to see and only so manydays and I can get overwhelmed
by events and I'm not entirelysure how it's all going to play
(42:06):
out, but I'm still lookingforward to the getaway.
I'm also trying very hard tosave up vacation days because I
would like to get to Europe nextyear.
At first I was thinking Berlin,then I was thinking Spain, and
I'm hoping to do Spain andBerlin, maybe another country as
well.
I'd like to do at least twoweeks in Europe three if I can
(42:30):
find the vacation days and soI'm trying to be very
conservative about what littletrips I take and if it's a
weekend trip I'm trying to notimpact my leave time so that I
can save all those days forsomething significant.
And partly that's about goingto Europe and seeing Europe and
experiencing Europe, and partlyit's about I do do a lot of
weekend trips and they'reexhausting, they don't actually
(42:53):
renew me at all.
So I want a vacation that isextended enough that I can just
sort of catch up on sleep andrelax and unwind and disconnect
and recharge, and most of myvacations are not that.
Even Palm Springs.
I'm going to be there, I think,for five days, which isn't a
huge amount of time, and it'sgoing to be filled with a lot of
stuff.
Some of it will fill the well,but a lot of it is also a
(43:17):
constant expenditure of energy.
So, hopefully, europe in 2026,if I make it there.
I will let all of you know I amleaning into artificial
intelligence more and more, andyou know it's curious.
Artificial intelligence, moreand more.
(43:40):
And you know it's curious.
I wasn't really on the AI boatto start, but a friend of mine
in San Antonio kind of has beenusing it and kind of turned me
on to how good it's gotten and Istarted off very experimentally
using it for some tasks at work.
I started off veryexperimentally using it for some
tasks at work and it was reallywow, that was really handy.
And then I asked it to helpwith my dating life and,
(44:02):
shockingly, it had some reallygood suggestions.
Now it hasn't resulted in anydates, but I'm really using this
as a tool to reflect on mydating journey, to make
decisions about where to investenergy, to shape the text I
present to the world, and I havealso used AI to tweak my
(44:22):
workouts and give me new workoutroutines.
All of this feels hmm, I havevery mixed feelings about this.
I will say that it seems like areally useful tool.
What's curious is I was all soI was sort of lukewarm on AI and
then I was all about AI and Ihad to do this thing at work and
(44:42):
it got something really obvious, really wrong.
It had two dates that's like,oh, you can do it on this
Tuesday and Wednesday.
And I'm like, oh great, and Ipresented it and it turns out
those dates are actuallyWednesday and Thursday.
I'm like, well, how do you getactual dates on a calendar wrong
?
And if you get that wrong, whatelse are you getting wrong?
So my entire relationship withAI is evolving and I don't know
(45:07):
that will be interesting to see.
It is beginning to intersect myleather life, right, like AI
knows all about my leather life.
In my thread on dating itreally we talked about oh my God
, we talked about.
I have shared with the AI someof the things that make my
journey, my dating journey,complicated, so that's going to
(45:28):
be curious.
Also, full disclosure.
I did have it.
Help me organize the script andthe thing is I don't use AI to
do all the lifting.
I use it to do the initial liftand then I fix what's wrong.
So I start off by saying, okay,tell me about Larry Townsend's
Leatherman's Handbook and itgave me a bunch of stuff and
some of it was just dead wrongand I knew it was dead wrong,
(45:50):
but I also knew the things Iwanted to do in this episode.
So I was able to be reallydirective and say, make sure you
incorporate this element andlet's do a section called this.
And here are three things.
I noticed what else, and so itwas really more of an assistant
than the artificial intelligence.
It was really helping meorganize my thoughts and kind of
group them, and hey did apretty good job.
(46:12):
I think this is a good episode.
I don't know what's going to goforward in my future with AI.
We'll see.
I am recording this on Saturday,september 13th.
It is a rare weekend when Idon't have plans and it's
curious.
There are some people in townthat I saw last night at the
Rubber Social at the Eagle andpart of me wants to spend more
(46:33):
time with people and with thesepeople and getting to know them.
But I also feel my introvertbattery running very low.
So it'll be curious to seetoday if I end up doing things
with people or if I just end upbeing alone in a beautifully
nurturing, regenerative way.
Next weekend I have plans, theweekend after that my DC boy is
(46:56):
coming and then we're in October.
So this is my last chance tosort of quietly, silently
breathe for this month and Imight take advantage of it.
We'll see.
It's actually those are some ofthe little hints that the
antidepressant is starting towork, that I'm starting to think
about connecting more andreconfiguring the line between
(47:16):
being alone and isolating, rightLike there's a part of me as an
introvert where being alone isreally renewing but there can
slide into a kind of isolationthat keeps me from connecting
the others and therefore adds tothe depression.
And also, you know, I'm notgoing to find a boyfriend
sitting in my living roomwatching TV, so got to get out
(47:37):
there a little bit.
And that's kind of what's goingon in my life.
The world is terrifying.
I am not watching the news.
I am doing my best to nurture myspirit every day and I hope, I
hope you are doing the same.
I hope you are keeping yourhead above water and I hope that
you are finding little pointsof joy, because those are the
(47:59):
things that keep us going.
Joy is the spark, I think, thatfeeds hope and hope is the
thing that keeps me going.
So I hope all of that, Ijoyfully hope all of that for
you and I will talk to you nexttime.
And that's it for this episode.
(48:19):
Thank you so much for joiningme.
Please consider subscribing, oryou can send feedback to edge
at full cow dot show.
As always, may your leatherjourney be blessed.
Let's talk about the Leink and BDSM.
My name is Edge, my pronounsare he, him, and I'm your host,
(00:46):
and in this episode we're goingto focus on the Leatherman's
Handbook by Larry Townsend, anincredibly important document
for our community and one thatwas out of print for a very long
time but which has beenrecently re-released.
As usual, I'll start by sharingmy experiences in relation to
this topic before we do a deepdive into the book itself and
(01:08):
thinking about what about itreally still resonates and
remains important for us, andwhat about it feels particularly
dated, and that's going to bethe whole of this episode.
I did not have any Ask Edgequestions, so this episode may
be a little bit on the shorterside.
However, I think it's a reallyimportant document.
(01:29):
I cannot stress enough howcritical this book was and how
important it was to theformation of the community as we
know it today.
So I'm hoping that, even ifit's a little short, it is
something you enjoy, because Ithink it's going to be a really
good episode.
And let's get started.
(01:52):
I started my journey as aleather person in the late 80s
of the last millennium Maybe theearly 90s, but it was very late
in the last millennium andobviously we did not have the
web.
We did not have the internet,we did not have the ready access
to information that we areblessed and cursed with today.
(02:14):
And so when I discovered theLeatherman's Handbook, it was a
lightning bolt of revelation.
A lightning bolt of revelation,it was fundamental to the
beginning of my journey.
It helped birth me as a leatherperson.
Now I wish I could tell youwhen I got it.
(02:35):
I wish I still had my book.
It disappeared from my libraryat some point.
I probably loaned it to someoneand never got it back, and I
kick myself for that.
At some point I probably loanedit to someone and never got it
back, and I kick myself for that.
I know that it was very earlyon in my journey and I have to
imagine I probably got it fromSecond Skin, which was the
leather store in New Orleans atthat time, because I can't
(02:56):
imagine anywhere else I wouldhave bought it.
This is not something thatwould have been in bookstores we
didn't even have Barnes andNoble back then, let alone
Amazon.
So I have to imagine I got itfrom the local leather shop,
which means I suppose I'dalready stepped into the
community to some degree.
I think I was actually readingthe Leatherman's Handbook 2.
(03:18):
I'm not entirely positive andI've tried to figure out how
many different editions thisbook has been through and when
the Leatherman's Handbook 2 cameout.
And I've tried to figure outhow many different editions this
book has been through and whenthe Leatherman Handbook 2 came
out.
I couldn't untangle thattimeline because the resources
available today require moreresearch than I'd like to do.
Here's what it comes down to.
(03:39):
I found this book.
It opened the door to me and Iwalked through.
The thing I most remember aboutthe book is not the insights
about the community.
I kind of feel like those partsof it the actual practical
how-to.
I wasn't paying a whole lot ofattention to the parts of the
(04:02):
book I remember most was theporn.
So throughout this book, at theend of every chapter, in the
middle of a chapter, townsendwill go into an erotic
pornographic story and this wasmy first access to kink porn.
And I can't tell you whichstories I really zeroed in on,
(04:24):
but I recall having certaingo-to stories in the book that
really, let's say they served mewell.
So even though I wasn't takingnotes out of it and in part by
that time I'm sure it feltpretty dated to the community I
was moving into by that time.
I was moving into the communityand learning more directly from
(04:46):
the leather folk around me.
I can't say that I actuallytook notes out of it, but I
certainly took images, fantasies, desires, the shapes of scenes.
I definitely imprinted thoseinto my erotic imagination very
deeply.
(05:07):
There remains as well, thissense of initiation that I
recall from getting this book.
I was so bewildered firstentering into the community,
because it's disorienting, let'sface it.
It's disorienting now foranyone stepping into the
community, and that's with allthis information readily
(05:30):
available.
I was so disoriented anduncertain, unsure who I was, how
I fit, what my place was, whatmy tribe was, what my community
was.
I just place was what my tribewas, what my community was.
I just I didn't know.
I didn't know.
(05:50):
I was moving through somedesire in me to find something.
And when I found this book Idiscovered, first of all, I'm
not alone.
Second of all, there's a wholecommunity, there is a tribe,
there is a place where I belong.
Third, it has a history.
It has a history that existedsince before I stepped into it.
(06:13):
So for all those reasons,picking up the Leatherman's
Handbook felt like coming intosomething, coming into the
community, coming into my own.
Somehow.
It felt very initiatory and Ivalue that.
(06:36):
I would do anything to have mycopy of the Leatherman's
Handbook back.
It is so resonant for me.
And here's what's interesting,right, I can't tell you, I can't
tell you when I got it, I can'ttell you what year it was.
I can't tell you what I read.
I can't tell you when I got it.
I can't tell you what year itwas.
I can't tell you what I read.
I can't tell you what I learnedfrom it.
I remember the things about itthat I valued.
(06:57):
I know, if nothing else, it wasincredibly important to me.
And you know I collect all kindsof leather books.
I have Leatherfolk, I have theReal Thing, I have Urban
(07:22):
Aboriginal.
I have tons of books aboutleather because I'm kind of a
bookish guy and because in thelong ago, in the before time,
that's what we did we read books.
We didn't have the web.
So I have a lot of books andthe one that just feels most
missing is this book, and I wasso thrilled to see that it had
(07:46):
been re-released.
It is a reprint of the Jubileeedition, right?
So the Leatherman's Handbookwas originally published in 1972
.
This is the Silver Jubilee.
It's a 1997 edition and I wasso thrilled because I had looked
for the book.
I'm like I need the Letterman'sHandbook on my bookshelf.
(08:07):
Well, you know what To buy itbefore this release.
To buy it, you'd find usedcopies that went for like $400.
And as much as I value it, I'mnot spending $400 for an old,
beat up paperback book.
That was just not going tohappen.
So for I don't know a decade ormore I've been longing for this
(08:34):
book and did not have itbecause it was not available.
It was not in print and theused copies were exorbitant.
So I was just over the moon whenI found out that it had been
reprinted and bought itimmediately, and before I
decided to really talk about it,I did a short little video on
my social media about it just tolet people know it was out, and
I decided, before I reallytalked about it, I need to spend
(08:57):
some time rereading it.
And that's what I've been doingover the past several months,
because I don't have all thetime for reading that I used to
have, but I would spend a littlebit of time each morning
reading a chapter or a part of achapter, with this podcast in
mind, with an understanding thatI wanted to share what I saw
(09:17):
with all of you.
So the whole arc of my personalexperience with the
Leatherman's Handbook is this Ifound it and found myself.
I lost it and continued on myjourney.
I missed it and looked for itand did not find it.
And then I found it again and Ipromise you it will have a
(09:41):
place on my bookshelf now and myname will be written in that
cover and people, if someoneborrows it, they will return it
to me because I will not losethis book again.
And for now, it's this sort ofreminder of my beginnings and
it's this reminder of who wewere.
And what's interesting you'llsee in the next segment is I
(10:02):
rediscovered things that are sotimely, that are so perfect for
the world we live in today, thatit's re-release seems really,
really fortuitous.
And that's my story about theLeatherman's Handbook.
I wish I had more details toshare about the hot stories.
I wish I could tell you thespecific things I learned, but
(10:23):
we're talking about memoriesthat are over 30 years old
probably 35 years old, oh Godand they're fuzzy.
They're fuzzy, but theemotional resonance is crystal
clear.
This book is important to meand that's why I want to share
it with you.
Not that it's going to beimportant to you, not that you
(10:44):
may even ever read it, but Iwant you to know about it
because it's an important partof our story.
And so, with all that beingsaid, I'm going to move into the
next segment, where we reallygo into what makes this book so
important.
See you soon to what makes thisbook so important.
(11:11):
See you soon.
Let me start by framing thisbook and how radical it was.
Now, if you are a loco like me,a leather person of a certain
age, then this entire episodemight evoke a kind of nostalgia,
because there's a very goodchance that if you've been into
leather for a long time, you'veencountered Townsend before Now.
If you're younger and byyounger I mean younger in
leather, not necessarilychronological age this is going
(11:35):
to be an important introductionto a key text, a key figure in
our community and its history.
The book was originallypublished in 1972, and the
edition that's been reprinted isthe 1997 Jubilee Silver Edition
Silver Jubilee Edition and thatmeans it's a kind of palimpsest
(11:56):
.
We have the original text, butbeside it, in parentheses and
italics, townsend is adding innotes from the perspective of
1997.
And so in this one book you geta simultaneous view of two
points in our history 1972, thebeginning when our community is
emerging out of the shadows andinto a kind of openness where
(12:18):
people can find it more easily,and 1997, the height of the
HIV-AIDS pandemic.
And both of those incrediblyhistoric moments are in this
single text and you get to seethem both operating as Townsend
narrates them both.
This book was the first entrypoint available into Leather
(12:44):
life.
So before 1972, there was nohandbook.
Before 1972, you wandered intoa leather bar and looked like an
idiot because you didn't knowwhat you were doing, and then
maybe stumbled along and foundsomeone to teach you and mentor
you and you finally found yourway With Townsend's book.
It was the first widelyavailable map into a hidden
(13:06):
world.
It was the first book thatcould tell you how to enter that
letter.
First of all, what was theletter bar?
Where was it, what was the nameof it and how to enter into it
and therefore how to enter intothe community.
And there's no minimizing howradical that was.
And what's beautiful about itis that Townsend is really
(13:30):
codifying a culture in motion.
So we get to see the communityat this point in time and we get
another glimpse of it in 1997.
Part of what made it so radicalis that he legitimized kink as
an identity and not a pathology.
His core message in this bookis your desires are valid, your
(13:55):
desires are valid.
And for a generation that wastold to be ashamed, this was
liberating.
I mean a generation first ofall told to be ashamed of, this
was liberating.
And I mean a generation firstof all told to be ashamed of
being gay.
And not even kink wasn't evenon the horizon of toleration, of
tolerance.
But here's this book that saysno, it's okay, your desires are
(14:22):
valid.
In fact, leather is healthy andjoyful and beautifully erotic.
At a time when it would havebeen considered an illness, like
in the Diagnostic andStatistical Manual of the
American PsychologicalAssociation, it would have been
an illness.
And here it is, this booksaying no, you're not sick, you
(14:43):
are not sick and your desiresare valid.
Part of that radicalcontribution that Townsend made
was also laying the foundationsfor consent and negotiation and
notions of how this communityworked out, how it was going to
do what it was going to do,going to do what it was going to
(15:09):
do, and then also radical, wassimply offering a community.
These people were not freaks,they were a member of a sort of
tribe, a lot of that centered atthe bar and centered in bike
clubs.
But in his storytelling you seehow there were really deep
affective friendships in thesespaces.
I think it's also radical forus and worth recovering at this
(15:30):
moment, because he really doesshow leather is not just sex, it
is also a kind of lifephilosophy and it is a political
stance and it is ritual and itis all of that together, ritual
and it is all of that together.
So take a moment right now andimagine if you were alive in
(15:51):
1972.
I was.
Imagine you were alive in 1972.
Imagine you were to open a bookand suddenly see your secret,
dirty, shameful desires in print, celebrated.
That is the kind of radicalmoment that Townsend represents.
(16:13):
Now we're reading the SilverJubilee edition from 1997, and
that also requires a little bitof framing.
Now, by 1997, we do have theprotease inhibitors, so, and
HIV-AIDS is not quite the deathsentence it used to be.
However, reading Townsend'snotes, you really still get a
sense of the trauma.
(16:34):
You see the impact of HIV-AIDSon our community and you see the
grief and you see theuncertainty.
So there's still a lot ofthings like we're not sure if
Popper's causes HIV-AIDS andwe're not sure if this is risky
behavior.
And it's really kind ofinteresting because at this
point I was actually quitebaffled because I'm like, wait a
(16:55):
second, this is 1997.
There was a lot of stuff weknew, but in that moment I think
the knowledge was so new, theknowledge of a horizon where
people could live with HIV AIDS,the protease inhibitors that
trajectory was so new that ithadn't trickled down into the
(17:16):
deep soul consciousness ofpeople.
And I think we see thatreflected in Townsend's notes
right.
And for anyone like me wholived through this pandemic, it
just altered everything.
It altered everything.
The whole landscape of ourintimacy, our sex and our desire
(17:36):
was inalterably shaped, changed, and HIV-AIDS reshaped leather
life and we see that here Now.
It's great to celebrate thesethings in this radical moment
and I want to provide thathistorical context in that
framing.
However, it's really importantto talk about what is dated and
(17:58):
even potentially offensive inthis book, because it's very
much a book of its time time.
Some of the things that aredated are really obvious, like a
lot of the landmarks are gone.
He talks about a lot of barsand clubs and hookup spots and
even between 1972 and 1997, hereflects on how those spaces
(18:20):
have changed and have continuedto change.
That part's not particularlysurprising right Bars open and
close all the time.
Surprising right Bars open andclose all the time.
Some of the other parts of itthat feel really dated and
almost offensive is the rigid,rigid roles.
Now there is no top, bottom,dom sub.
In Townsend there is the S andthe M.
(18:44):
The S is the sadist and the Mis the masochist, which is
interesting because it's notlike M for master, s for slave.
No, it's capital S sadist and Mfor masochist.
There's very, very little sensethat anyone could be a switch.
There are a couple of momentswhere he kind of talks about it,
but there isn't the samefluidity of roles or even
(19:06):
necessarily evolutionary pathsof roles that we see in the
community today.
There's also a very exclusionaryfocus on cis, gay men.
There's no mention of leatherwomen.
Certainly we know they were outthere doing their thing.
Also, no mention ofnon-masculine leather people,
(19:28):
transgender leather people.
None of that is in this bookand the whole safety and consent
frameworks are there likethere's a sense you need to
negotiate.
But in terms of safety there'snot a lot of information on
aftercare, the way we understandaftercare, of information on
(19:53):
aftercare, the way we understandaftercare, or really you can
see in his 1997 notes still alot of doubt about how to have
safer kinky sex.
So that feels really dated.
One of the things that alsofeels dated and a little
offensive is that masculinity isso centered and in fact he has
a really I found it personallyoffensive a really offensive
intra-community, misogynistichomophobia.
(20:16):
He calls certain gay men poofsand it's a way of really
vilifying their lack ofmasculinity and the poof is also
non-leather and so that alsosets up this binary where
masculine is leather, feminineis gay and I just don't think
(20:38):
that's true and I don't thinkthat is something we can really
tolerate as a community.
He is surprisingly pessimisticabout relationships.
He has this sense that leatherrelationships are not possible,
they are doomed, they're notgoing to be stable.
There's a real sense that thebest way to do it is to kind of
(20:59):
have a roommate and each of youdo your own thing.
There's no real understandingof polyamory or leather
households or chosen family.
None of that is reallyavailable to him at that time.
And then, finally, the mostblatantly offensive stuff is his
(21:21):
use of certain racialterminology that is just not
something we tolerate anymore.
In fact it's something we don'ttolerate so much I'm not even
going to mention it and you seeit.
There's a survey in the end,kind of a survey of your
interests, and you can reallysee he's using terms that we
just don't use anymore.
So because it's a product ofits time, a lot of it is going
(21:43):
to feel really dated and a lotof it, if you read the book, you
should just kind of put in abox, throw away.
You should really not take inthese more dated and offensive
elements.
That being said, there's still asurprising amount of this book
that rings true even today, andpart of that is this notion that
(22:07):
consent is critical.
It is the backbone of theencounter.
So in all his little vignettes,in all his little stories,
there's some mention of usuallyon the way home from the bar.
There's some mention ofnegotiation or discussion.
There's a real sense that trustis important and that you need
to be clear on what yourinterests are, what you're
willing to do and what you'renot willing to do.
(22:27):
So this becomes much moredeveloped and we become much
more structural about it in anunderstanding of what consent
looks like.
But even then there's a realsense that there is community,
that there is consent.
There is a real sense ofcommunity.
Now there isn't leather familyand there isn't polyamory and
there aren't stable leatherrelationships.
(22:47):
But in the bars there are thesefriends and friendships, and
those friends and friendshipsare deep and effective.
They are very close, intimatebonds, and so you get a sense of
community and you get a senseof mentorship as well.
That this person taught me thathere's my friend here.
I loaned him my boy.
There's a lot of that.
There's also a real sense of theritual and meaning that can
(23:11):
come into play.
That is still pretty core tohow I practice leather today.
That leather is identityaffirming, it is intimate, it is
symbolic, it carries meaningand it carries meaning that is
deeper than the acts we aredoing.
It means something bigger thanus and there's a sense of that
(23:32):
here in this book that reallyremains true to us today.
There is also just a basicaffirmation that these roles are
valid and there's respect forthem.
There's no sense thatdomination is abuse or
submission is weakness, but no,if you're a sub, that is
absolutely great.
I'm sorry, in his context, ifyou are an M, that is absolutely
great.
(23:52):
Obviously that is something wecovered for today.
And the integration of leatherinto everyday life, that it's
not a pastime but it really ispart of who you are, that is
part of your identity and partof your lifestyle.
Those are some of the larger,deeper sorts of things that I
(24:13):
think resonate and as you readthrough you might find
particular practices that westill do as a community.
So, beyond the stuff that, okay,we need to throw away, beyond
the stuff oh yeah, that's stilltrue there's a lot of really
curious stuff that I read and Ijust found kind of fascinating,
because Townsend is writing fromthe 70s with a reflection from
(24:38):
the 90s and therefore is showingus, remember this culture in
motion and so you see a snapshotof the configuration of
fetishes at that time.
So, for example, he talks aboutrubber, but it's very clearly
kind of a fringe thing, like acouple of people are into rubber
, maybe there's a rubbermanufacturer, and now, if you
(25:00):
think about how huge rubber is,mir is a major event.
Everyone's been asking merecently if I'm going and
there's rubber everywhere aroundthe world.
So what was really minor thenbecame really big now.
In the same vein, he talksabout animal play, and that was
hilarious for me because when Iwas coming out there was a lot
(25:22):
of talk about animal play.
I don't know why, I don't knowwhy.
I just remember the Bardex,which is a particular brand of
enema equipment.
It just cropped up in a lot ofpornographic stories.
I know no one into enema playtoday.
I never hear about it.
So it's really fascinating.
It's very curious how someelements started very minor and
(25:44):
are now so huge, and someelements that were very huge
then are minor and almostdisappeared.
So, beyond these curiouselements, beyond the things that
remain true, beyond the thingswe should let go of, the core
message, the reason I was mostexcited to talk about Townsend
(26:06):
was to talk about the things weshould recover, the things that
he talks about that are sopoignant and poignantly useful
to us here in this historicalmoment.
And the most important of thoseis that it is very clear from
reading Townsend's book that theleather uniform was not central
(26:28):
.
What was central to thecommunity was the outlaw biker.
The outlaw biker and this madeenormous sense because the book
is filled with these anecdotesof the police raiding bars, of
the police arresting people.
Townsend talks about theadvocacy organizations he's a
part of that are doing legaladvocacy for people.
(26:51):
So we were not reallyeroticizing and fetishizing the
leather uniform.
I think about this for a couplereasons.
I know so many young leatherpeople who are so eager to get
their quote-unquote formals, andby that what they really mean
is a leather uniform,quote-unquote formals, and by
(27:11):
that what they really mean is aleather uniform.
And if we think about thecommunity as it circulates today
, the central figure of theleather community tends to be
the leather cop, the leatheruniform.
And that was great, that wasfine.
Now, in my memory, that reallyexploded in the late 1990s.
That makes sense historically.
By then a lot of our rights, alot of our basic existence was,
(27:33):
I'm not going to say, secured,it was not being harassed.
I would say it was a time whenthe cops weren't raiding bars
and so we could shift our eroticfocus.
That's my memory of thecommunity.
That happened in the late 1990s.
But today obviously there's alot of resistance to state
authority, to systemicstructures of oppression, and at
(27:58):
the heart of that is often theimage of a uniform.
So what if we didn't have theleather uniform as the central
image to our community?
Instead, what if we went backand recovered the outlaw biker?
And I think that notion of thenot just the biker, the outlaw
(28:21):
biker and I think that's reallyworth recovering.
And because for Townsend it'snot just an aesthetic, it's not
just an image, it is a practice.
Not that he was a biker, Ithink he talks about, I think at
some point he's maybe ridingaround in a convertible, but not
that he was a biker, but thathe was politically active and
(28:46):
really working againsthomophobia, working against
state repression.
And so leather was not justerotic identity, it was
political defiance.
And this might be a historicalmoment, certainly here in my
local context, but I thinkaround the world.
This might be a historicalmoment for us to recenter on the
(29:09):
outlaw biker with that outlawemphasis, to really use this as
a place to resist.
Now, I'm not disparaging leatheruniforms.
I'm not saying we shouldn'twear them.
I have a closet full of them.
I enjoy my leather uniforms.
But it is a way of saying that,especially if you are so
politically sensitive to thecurrents of power that the
(29:31):
uniform is really offensive toyou, there is an option and the
option is you know, langlitz isthe premier manufacturer of
leather.
It is top of the line, it isthe Rolls Royce and everyone
(29:56):
uses it.
If you look at pictures ofFolsom Europe, it's a sea of
Langlitz.
Everyone's in Rangers,everyone's in competition
breeches, everyone's wearingLanglitz as part of their
leather uniform.
But Langlitz is biker leather.
That means we can recover theoutlaw biker and still keep our
langlets.
I'm happy about that.
(30:18):
One of the ways I'm trying tomanifest this in my own
aesthetic and practice is I'verecently become very interested
in motocross pants from the 70s.
These are emerging out of thebiker community.
Obviously, motocross is alittle bit different, but what I
like about them is much likeuniform breeches.
(30:38):
They are designed to tuck intoboots because you need the
protection of the boot shaftwhen you're riding your
motocross bike, and much likebreeches, they feature padding
in different areas, and what Ifind in breeches is they have
very sexy hip padding, not justthe knee padding that we usually
see.
So I'm actually working ongetting a pair of motocross
(31:00):
pants made.
I found a used pair on eBayfrom the seventies and I'm
having them recreated becausefor me it's a way of beginning
to recenter the biker but alsobeing able to tuck my pants into
boots so that I can wear mytall boots.
In Townsend it's all chapsleather pants and those would
(31:23):
have gone over the boots.
There's not really a lot oftalk about boots as a fetish, or
even tall boots, so that's oneof the ways I'm trying to
manifest the outlaw biker in myown practices by shifting some
of my leather purchases in waysthat respect the overall
aesthetic I like, ie tuck thingsinto boots but also de-center
(31:44):
Not get rid of.
For me personally, not get ridof the uniform, but de-center it
.
You know, one of the other keythings that might be worth
recovering from Townsend is theaccessibility of identity.
In Townsend's day, leatherdidn't require langlets.
It didn't require reallyexpensive gear, really boots and
(32:09):
a jacket, pair of jeans andyou're ready, you're set.
Oh, and a belt.
Obviously you need a beltbecause that often becomes a
tool of play.
Townsend is looking at acommunity that is fully
operational without the largestructural apparatus we've
created of all this leatherrestraints and hoods and leather
(32:33):
straight jackets and leathersleep sacks, and for Townsend
it's a leather thong like asmall strip of leather string,
essentially a pair of boots anda bladder full of beer piss and
you're ready to go.
I think that notion ofaccessibility is important
because of the financialpressures that a lot of people
(32:54):
are facing.
Important because of thefinancial pressures that a lot
of people are facing.
Here is a community where youdidn't need super expensive gear
to be part of the community.
You needed simply the basics,and I would think we might want
to recover that as well.
We might recover, in addition,the kind of community care that
Townsend exhibits, that therewas a lot of legal defense,
(33:15):
there was a lot of solidarity,there was a real sense that
survival depended on protectingone another.
This is a community at risk,constantly under assault,
constantly with people trying toexterminate it, and it banded
(33:36):
together to protect its own, andI think that is a message we
need.
I'm not saying it's a simplemessage, particularly when we
intersect that with the whitecis gayness of Townsend's
community right, that the peoplewho were banding together were
white cis gay men and not theleather women and not the trans
(33:57):
leather folk.
So I'm not saying it's an easytranslation to make, but in this
political environment, I thinkit's important for us to think
about how to protect our own andwhat that looks like.
It's a conversation worthhaving, and I don't think it's
an easy conversation because Ithink our community is much more
aware of the lines and faultlines of privilege, but it's a
(34:18):
conversation worth having.
Some additional observations Ihave for you on Townsend.
One of the things that's reallyuseful about it is that he
explodes this myth of amonolithic old guard, which is
something we talked about in thelast episode, this myth of a
monolithic old guard, which issomething we talked about in the
last episode.
What's clear from Townsend'sbook is that leather was never a
(34:41):
uniform monolithic practice andthat the practices differed by
city and by region.
So he talks about thedifference between East Coast
leather and West Coast leather,but he also talks about the
difference between LA leatherand San Francisco leather.
And so here we have this livingdocument from that time in
history that shows to us, thatgives us evidentiary proof, that
(35:05):
there was no monolithic culture, there were no monolithic set
of rules.
In fact, leather was very mucha lived thing that varied based
on who was practicing it andwhere they were practicing it.
And so we also, because we'relooking at the 1972 and the 1997
edition, we see that not onlyis it this kind of patchwork,
(35:28):
but it is a patchwork thatchanges over time, so we get to
see how some of the norms ofthis community change.
You know, Townsend was really anethnographer.
He sent out a survey to a bunchof people because he wanted to
collect data.
And he's not recording laws,he's recording practices.
That's important.
He is not recording laws, he'srecording practices.
(35:53):
Now, when everyone does thesame practice, the visual effect
of that is that it is a law,but there are no written rules.
There are no laws in Townsend'sbook.
Instead, it is that culture inmotion and we get a snapshot of
it.
So that means for us today,there is no single right way to
(36:13):
do leather.
That is a lesson we want torecover, re-recover from
Townsend and Hold, and it allowsus this freedom from notions of
the old guard and monolithicways of behavior, monolithic
rules around leather.
So, as much as there's stuff weshould get rid of, as long as
there's stuff that's still true,as long as there's stuff, you
(36:35):
know, while there's also stuffthat's really very curious,
there's some key elements Ithink we should recover and
recenter from Townsend,including the aesthetics of the
community, including theaccessibility of gear, including
protecting our own, and thenincluding this notion that
(36:58):
leather is never a monolithicthing.
And you know, while he doesabsolutely omit things like
polyamory, he omits real senseof leather family, he omits
inclusivity.
He omits a lot of things, butpart of what that does is show
us what we had to invent acrosstime.
(37:22):
We invented households, weinvented leather family.
We made leather relationshipswork, and for Townsend they
really didn't.
He couldn't imagine how theyworked, but we make them work.
So this is a complicated book.
At the end of the day, thereare parts of it that just do not
(37:44):
ring true, but there's so muchof it that is really important
for us to think about.
There was so much that Iconnected to that I didn't
expect to connect to, and so Ithink reading it is this really
interesting, fascinatingadventure, and I invite you to
(38:06):
get the book.
And if you aren't able to getit not everyone has access to
all the resources of the worldor all the money in the world If
you can't get it, at least takethis podcast away as an
understanding of some of thelessons that that book contains
that we can carry forward.
And that is my kind ofexplication of the Leather Man's
(38:28):
Handbook.
It's incomplete, you know.
I was reading this one chapterat a time over months, and there
are probably parts of it that Iwas chuckling at while I was
reading it that I had forgotten.
There were parts of it, thatmany parts of it, that I found
offensive.
I didn't read any of the pornthis time, I will say so.
I skipped Every time he got toone of his porn stories.
(38:48):
I just skipped over it becauseit was more.
This time I was more interestedin the community content.
Really interesting, becauseobviously when I was younger,
late 1980s of the lastmillennium I was reading it and
really the only thing I rememberpaying attention to was the
porn.
And this time God, such adifferent context.
The only thing I was reallyinterested in was the historical
(39:08):
functioning of the community.
So isn't that interesting?
And that's my take on Townsend.
I hope you found it useful and Ihope, if you've read it, if
you've got other insights ofthings that you connected with
or you found horrible or youfeel we should recover, share
them with me.
They can also always crop up ina later episode or in an Ask
(39:29):
Edge.
But that's it for now, thankyou.
That's it for now.
Thank you, since I have sometime left in this episode, I
thought I might provide a fewupdates of what's going on in my
life, especially since I don'timagine I'll be returning to the
interlude episodes, simplybecause there's only so many
episodes I can crank out in amonth and I'm not sure what I've
(39:52):
shared in the last episodeabout my personal life.
So some of this may be new news, some of this may be new old
news.
I'm not sure what news this isat all.
The big thing that's going on inmy life is that I've started
antidepressant, I've startedWellbutrin, and it has to do
with depression and anxiety.
(40:13):
And the anxiety I have is fromthe world, because it is very,
very anxious out there at themoment.
And the depression is directlyrelated to my life as a single
person and the kind of horrorsof having to date or not even
being able to date because youcan't find anyone to date.
That's a situational depression, meaning if I suddenly had a
(40:35):
boyfriend I wouldn't bedepressed.
However, I've been in thatsituation for so long that I do
believe it started to actuallyalter my brain chemistry in ways
that could be addressed andsupported through medication.
So for the first time Iactually went to a psychiatrist
Normally.
In the past.
I've done antidepressants Ithink at least four times during
(40:57):
my life and I would just go tomy primary doctor and she would
prescribe something and that wasit.
But I wanted someone a littlemore expert this time.
So I am on extended releaseWelbutrin and have been for a
couple of weeks and I think it'shelping.
You know, the worst part ofbeing on antidepressants is
(41:19):
waiting for them to really kickin and although there's a little
bit of a boost, knowing thathelp is on the way, there's
still this sort of carrying theweight of the emotional
landscape until it begins toalter.
I'm starting to see it alter insome ways and I am happy for
that.
I am slowly orienting myself toPalm Springs and Palm Springs
(41:44):
Leather Pride, which is at theend of October.
I will be celebrating my 55thbirthday there.
So I've never been to PalmSprings.
I've never been to Palm SpringsLeather Pride.
I'm looking forward to thattrip.
A little bit of anxiety justbecause there's so many people I
want to see and only so manydays and I can get overwhelmed
by events and I'm not entirelysure how it's all going to play
(42:06):
out, but I'm still lookingforward to the getaway.
I'm also trying very hard tosave up vacation days because I
would like to get to Europe nextyear.
At first I was thinking Berlin,then I was thinking Spain, and
I'm hoping to do Spain andBerlin, maybe another country as
well.
I'd like to do at least twoweeks in Europe three if I can
(42:30):
find the vacation days and soI'm trying to be very
conservative about what littletrips I take and if it's a
weekend trip I'm trying to notimpact my leave time so that I
can save all those days forsomething significant.
And partly that's about goingto Europe and seeing Europe and
experiencing Europe, and partlyit's about I do do a lot of
weekend trips and they'reexhausting, they don't actually
(42:53):
renew me at all.
So I want a vacation that isextended enough that I can just
sort of catch up on sleep andrelax and unwind and disconnect
and recharge, and most of myvacations are not that.
Even Palm Springs.
I'm going to be there, I think,for five days, which isn't a
huge amount of time, and it'sgoing to be filled with a lot of
stuff.
Some of it will fill the well,but a lot of it is also a
(43:17):
constant expenditure of energy.
So, hopefully, europe in 2026,if I make it there.
I will let all of you know I amleaning into artificial
intelligence more and more, andyou know it's curious.
Artificial intelligence, moreand more.
(43:40):
And you know it's curious.
I wasn't really on the AI boatto start, but a friend of mine
in San Antonio kind of has beenusing it and kind of turned me
on to how good it's gotten and Istarted off very experimentally
using it for some tasks at work.
I started off veryexperimentally using it for some
tasks at work and it was reallywow, that was really handy.
And then I asked it to helpwith my dating life and,
(44:02):
shockingly, it had some reallygood suggestions.
Now it hasn't resulted in anydates, but I'm really using this
as a tool to reflect on mydating journey, to make
decisions about where to investenergy, to shape the text I
present to the world, and I havealso used AI to tweak my
(44:22):
workouts and give me new workoutroutines.
All of this feels hmm, I havevery mixed feelings about this.
I will say that it seems like areally useful tool.
What's curious is I was all soI was sort of lukewarm on AI and
then I was all about AI and Ihad to do this thing at work and
(44:42):
it got something really obvious, really wrong.
It had two dates that's like,oh, you can do it on this
Tuesday and Wednesday.
And I'm like, oh great, and Ipresented it and it turns out
those dates are actuallyWednesday and Thursday.
I'm like, well, how do you getactual dates on a calendar wrong
?
And if you get that wrong, whatelse are you getting wrong?
So my entire relationship withAI is evolving and I don't know
(45:07):
that will be interesting to see.
It is beginning to intersect myleather life, right, like AI
knows all about my leather life.
In my thread on dating itreally we talked about oh my God
, we talked about.
I have shared with the AI someof the things that make my
journey, my dating journey,complicated, so that's going to
(45:28):
be curious.
Also, full disclosure.
I did have it.
Help me organize the script andthe thing is I don't use AI to
do all the lifting.
I use it to do the initial liftand then I fix what's wrong.
So I start off by saying, okay,tell me about Larry Townsend's
Leatherman's Handbook and itgave me a bunch of stuff and
some of it was just dead wrongand I knew it was dead wrong,
(45:50):
but I also knew the things Iwanted to do in this episode.
So I was able to be reallydirective and say, make sure you
incorporate this element andlet's do a section called this.
And here are three things.
I noticed what else, and so itwas really more of an assistant
than the artificial intelligence.
It was really helping meorganize my thoughts and kind of
group them, and hey did apretty good job.
(46:12):
I think this is a good episode.
I don't know what's going to goforward in my future with AI.
We'll see.
I am recording this on Saturday,september 13th.
It is a rare weekend when Idon't have plans and it's
curious.
There are some people in townthat I saw last night at the
Rubber Social at the Eagle andpart of me wants to spend more
(46:33):
time with people and with thesepeople and getting to know them.
But I also feel my introvertbattery running very low.
So it'll be curious to seetoday if I end up doing things
with people or if I just end upbeing alone in a beautifully
nurturing, regenerative way.
Next weekend I have plans, theweekend after that my DC boy is
(46:56):
coming and then we're in October.
So this is my last chance tosort of quietly, silently
breathe for this month and Imight take advantage of it.
We'll see.
It's actually those are some ofthe little hints that the
antidepressant is starting towork, that I'm starting to think
about connecting more andreconfiguring the line between
(47:16):
being alone and isolating, rightLike there's a part of me as an
introvert where being alone isreally renewing but there can
slide into a kind of isolationthat keeps me from connecting
the others and therefore adds tothe depression.
And also, you know, I'm notgoing to find a boyfriend
sitting in my living roomwatching TV, so got to get out
(47:37):
there a little bit.
And that's kind of what's goingon in my life.
The world is terrifying.
I am not watching the news.
I am doing my best to nurture myspirit every day and I hope, I
hope you are doing the same.
I hope you are keeping yourhead above water and I hope that
you are finding little pointsof joy, because those are the
(47:59):
things that keep us going.
Joy is the spark, I think, thatfeeds hope and hope is the
thing that keeps me going.
So I hope all of that, Ijoyfully hope all of that for
you and I will talk to you nexttime.
And that's it for this episode.
(48:19):
Thank you so much for joiningme.
Please consider subscribing, oryou can send feedback to edge
at full cow dot show.
As always, may your leatherjourney be blessed.
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