The ‘good gay’ versus chemsex

The articulation of a homonormative response

Dados Bibliográficos

ID7375262
AutoresDaniel Joloy (0000-0003-4667-9154, Birkbeck, University of London, autor correspondente)
Ano2023
Volume28
Fascículo1-2
Páginas5-23
Data de publicação2023-03-24
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoSexualities (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1363-4607 • E-ISSN: 1461-7382
EditoraSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/13634607231158065
OpenAlexW4360838356
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas7
Referências citadas36

Responses to chemsex have largely fluctuated between punishment, moral censure and indifference and have been weaponised to justify anti-drug policies and to protect established norms of gender and sexuality. As drug prohibition and heteronormativity interlock, men who engage in chemsex are finding themselves at an intersection of multiple systems of oppression that produce feelings of exclusion and rejection both from society in general and within growing numbers of LGBTQ+ spaces. This article explores specific notions of homonormativity performed by gay men as a way to advance their own recognition and respectability among society, resulting in the isolation of those who engage in chemsex who are ostracised simply for the way in which they have decided to express their sexualities. Such homonormative articulation of an open rejection of chemsex in exchange for social recognition and legal protection appears to have become an easy bargaining chip to show how “good gays” have moved away from historical markers of stigma, including drugs and HIV, making chemsex the most recent currency to publicly prove their disavowal of those who remain outside of the kinship norms of marriage and ‘normal sex

Criminology · Decriminalization · Heteronormativity · Human sexuality · Oppression · Political science · Punishment (psychology · Sociology · Gender Studies · HIV, Drug Use, Sexual Risk · Law · LGBTQ Health, Identity, and Policy · Psychology · Sex work and related issues · Social Psychology