chemsex in the uk

- Episode 12- Transcript

Georgie Williams, voiceover: The following episode contains trigger warnings for discussions of sexual abuse, rape, drug use and addiction. Please proceed with caution.

In 1996, New York Magazine writer Daniel Mendelsohn published an article which addressed the cultural visibility and significance of gay and lesbian experiences. Provocatively titled When Did Gays Get So Straight?, Mendelsohn states that the cultural imagination, the way gay people distinguish themselves within a sociocultural context, had shifted from the “exoticised gay margin to the normalized straight center.” At the heart of this statement is a social conflict which predates Mendelsohn’s writings and has persisted into the 2020s- the debate surrounding queer assimilationism and sanitisation. Within this debate, norms and practices, places and spaces have been scrutinised for their presumed queerness and, by extension, incompatibility with heteronormative and cisnormative culture. Sometimes, these practices and spaces are benign. Sometimes, they are sites of radical self-expression fraught with both risk and reward. One such site of contestation is the practice of chemsex. As a controversial topic in LGBTQ+ journalism, today our question on chemsex is this- what is the significance of this practice in UK queer society- and should we preserve facets of queer culture which risk the welfare of queer people? Welcome to Episode 12 of /Queer. You’re here with me, your host, Georgie Williams. 

If you haven't heard of chemsex before, you're not alone. It can be hard to define chemsex- interestingly enough, the UK-based organisation DrugWise defines chemsex as "a term used by gay or bisexual men to describe sex that occurs under the influence of drugs". The fact that this practice is, in this example, defined by the sexual orientation and gender of those involved, speaks to the assumptions made surrounding chemsex culture. First and foremost, one has to question whether heterosexual individuals are supposed to have another word for sex that occurs under the influence of drugs. If such a word exists for, predominantly, gay and bisexual men, what necessitated the creation of such a word? To what extent is it normalised or acceptable in the social circles of men who have sex with men?

Chemsex is a controversial topic for obvious reasons; one of the motivating factors behind the decision to produce this episode was a fan of the podcast reaching out to us directly about a chemsex, as something that had affected her directly. As a trans woman who had spent time in a rehabilitation center as a consequence of her own chemsex experiences, her decision to bring this subject to the team was evidence enough that chemsex is a practice which has reach beyond the lifestyles of gay and bisexual men. 

The drugs most commonly associated with chemsex in the UK are GHB, often referred to as G, crystal methamphetamine, cocaine and ketamine. At the centre of the drug abuse narrative present in British mainstream media is a purported concern about the impact of illegal drug use on the country's National Health Service, or NHS. As years of socioeconomic inequality and austerity under a Conservative Party government have pushed this essential service to its limit, many more right-leaning publications have propagated notions of more vulnerable groups 'abusing' this healthcare system- from immigrants and refugees to drug users and addicts. This is one of the factors which reinforces the shaming of drug users in the UK, with a presumption that those who use said drugs make decisions which not only endanger themselves, but the medical resources available to others across the country. But to what extent is drug use a central component of chemsex culture? What are the risks involved, and what does queerness symbolise within the chemsex debate?

Sebastian Baxter, in interview: So this is the interesting thing if you describe chemsex as a social phenomenon or even the pathology narrative that we describe as an addiction- I think it's kind of poly-addictive in an interesting way. (00:00:14)

Georgie Williams, voiceover: The voice you're listening to is that of Dr Sebastian Baxter. Dr Sebastian Baxter is a Manchester based Queer artist & activist. He holds a PhD in Art & Design having conducted practice-led artistic research into place, space and identity in post Celtic Tiger Ireland. Dr. Baxter is active in the fields of visual anthropology, sexual health and artistic research, and has a background in film, performance art, poetry and prose. His work has been presented at a variety of academic conferences, independent cinemas, squats, social centres and radical fringe gallery spaces. Dr Sebastian describes himself as suspicious of the official ArtWorld. He currently heads up the transgressive Queer artistic research space Manchester Penetrated, a project that employs video, photography, poetry, performance, storytelling and sex-maps amongst other things, to challenge dominant narratives around chemsex, cruising, addiction, mental health and marginal identity.

Sebastian Baxter, in interview: So, people obviously focus um, on the ‘chems’ and the ‘sex’ aspect of chemsex, or the practice and obviously they’re kind of like central to it, you know? I mean like, it’s like going to the theatre- but there’s a whole other set of experiences that I think go on at a chill-out or between two people that are engaging in chemsex. It all points to the centrality of bare-back gay porn, as the ‘background atmosphere’ to the action. It’s there to create um, living out your sexual fantasies. So we see these amazing guys doing really agile forms of sexual acrobatics and because of the drugs that you have, you have the ability to then perform the same type of sex.

Jamie Hakim, I’m sure you know Jamie Hakim’s work- I was really influenced by when he talked about ‘intimate collectivity’; the notion that a lot of what happens at a chemsex chill-out is not actually just sex or drug use. It is also men sitting around naked together talking about things. And sometimes those things can be quite trivial, so a lot of the time it’s like talking about guys on Grindr, or talking about this guys cock, and a lot of it is about that, but it’s also story-telling as well. It’s about engaging those, those narratives of a certain way of life. But it can… depending on the participants, it can go to really profound areas. I’ve noticed a lot of the time like um, that people will talk quite freely and openly about sexual abuse that they’ve endured or suffered in their life in a very sort of  ‘not-traumatised’ way of speaking about it. So it’s that sort of thing where if you go into counselling it’s your experiences are all trauma, you know… crystal is the perfect drug for this as well, it allows you to look at your experience of life in a detached way so you can see it, but it’s not damaging for you by seeing it at that point and people are sharing that, as well.

I think there’s a really interesting thing for me, and I think I made it up into a theory one night when I was talking to some guys at a chill-out, as if it is actually a theory… I sometimes like inventing things just to see how they fly… but basically, I do think there’s a correlation between the development of chemsex, Grindr, and Uber. So, it’s that ‘flying through the night’ kind of thing on the way to a new place and ‘who will be there, what will it be like?’ It’s got a sense of adventure and Daring-Do to it. I don’t know if there’s any research around this but like the development of chemsex, Uber and Grindr are parallel because who’s a driver going to make money off of at 3’o’clock on a Tuesday night in a given city? Like who’s going to be out then? It’ll generally going to be some horny gay guys heading across the city to the next space.

I see chemsex as a subculture because it has its own kind of language, its own codes and systems, symbols and icons- even like, the way we use language; we don’t say ‘needles’ we say ‘pins’, they’re not drugs they’re ‘chems’ you know? It’s like, are you high and horny, you know? There’s a whole raft of terms and phrases that are indicators and your use of them says “I’m one of you, too”. So there is that collective experience and that you’re part of something, in a way, but not in the sense of how we talk about other sub-cultural movements like Punk or Queer Arts movements based in London or Manchester where there’s a more conscious realisation of being part of something. With chemsex it’s much looser than that, there’s not a sense of ‘shared adventure’ so much. I certainly think COVID has really exposed that in a way, the sudden loss of that ability to be part of this very loose tribe, and it is very very very loose.

There are all types of groups of people that are engaging in chemsex that I don’t participate in, for instance I call them the A-Gays um, A-Gay chillouts it’s all kind of like buff, sort of you know, usually white, desired gays and whatnot and when I started engaging in chemsex just under a decade ago I went to a few of them and I found out the socially undesirable kind of aspects of chemsex e.g. people overdosing, going under on G a lot and non-consensual sex, all those things happening in those spaces. Also I’m really kind of lout and arsey so I do challenge people and hold them to account. 

Also because of my job quite early a few years back I was like ok, I’m a bit exposed here, so I tend to use my own space and go to chill-outs with guys I know and trust, in, in an attempt to create a safer space in which to engage with what at the end of the day are quite powerful drugs and quite dangerous drugs. For instance, I administer G to people and if I don’t know them that well and I ask them “what’s your hit?” and they say “Oh I generally take like, a ml”, I’ll give you one seventh until I know that you can do a ml, like that’s what you’re getting.  So there is a very loose sense of community and I think there’s so many ways in which technology plays a role in this, you know? And Grindr obviously has been the main route to connect with chemsex but how WhatsApp groups have kind-of appeared that are bare-back groups, not essentially chemsex groups, but they are really.

It’s interesting that like, cam stuff is starting to become a part of the culture, obviously it’s a response to conditions of social distancing and Covid-19. There’s a lot of guys who now perform virtually or online and I think that kind of replaces some some like, I think there’s an aspect of chemsex which is like an ‘exhibitionist hit’ you get off it. There’s something really really joyful about being in a room with a bunch of other men naked that’s really liberating, like I did a performance piece before and I was talking about how I went to a chill out and there’s some guys from Newton that chill-out a lot together, and one of them was going to the shop to pick up something and he was like “aw, what do you want?” and jokily someone said “awh, lollipops”. But he came back with 4 lollipops for us, so we were all sitting around watching bare-back gay porn… sucking on lollipops. You know, that’s really child-like. 

[Georgie laughs]

So, there is those aspects like poly-addiction, because not all the guys that do chemsex are addicted but like ‘poly-sensory attraction’, that’s very very hard to replace. I’m really conscious as well, we really don’t know what’s happened underground fully in the past 4-months, my instinct is that chemsex has reduced massively and I know a London friend who did a survey very early on and it seemed like practice has really kind of… and of course some people’s reaction to that was [sarcastically] ‘ooh we can’t be sure of the findings of that survey because loads of gays are probably lying about that’ but why would you take the time to actively go on the survey to distort its findings? Do you know what I mean? It doesn’t make any sense. Yet again, a certain type of queer man must be lying and must be untoward and untrustworthy because they engage in this sort-of stuff so they must be.. you know... There’s a lot of sort-of mechanisms by which ‘normative’ or ‘homonormative’ culture attempts to pathologize and stigmatise without even going into slamming and people ‘going under’ aspect of things.

Georgie Williams, voiceover: the subcultural aspect of chemsex is, at least linguistically, highly interesting. The field of LGBTQ+ linguistics, formerly referred to as "lavender lexicons", explore the development of language within queer circles- language once necessitated by the taboo and stigmatized nature of being queer. A speech community is a community that shares linguistic traits and tends to have community boundaries that coincide with social units. Speakers of a particular lexicon may resist culturally dominant language and oppose cultural authority by maintaining their own varieties of speech. Being able to communicate your identity and create a sense of commonality, solidarity and shared understanding through language has been an imperative within queer circles throughout various periods of history across a multitude of geographies- but, with assimilation being enabled through a decrease in stigmatisation of queer identities in some cultures and communities, this need for exclusive language is being lost. No doubt, in many ways this is a valuable payoff- with integration and assimilation comes various protections and privileges previously denied to queer peoples. However, there is still much to grieve in seeing languages and practices made obsolete. chemsex, for all the taboo and stigma that endures surrounding this practice, appears an unlikely site of conservation. The language used here still acts as a screening process- allowing the inducted to engage and preventing access to outsiders.

Georgie Williams, in interview: How do location and social class come into play with chemsex? So, is this practice more common or popular in particular communities and, if so, what do you believe causes this?

Sebastian Baxter, in interview: Okay so, I suppose I’ll deal with location first. Yeah, chemsex is different in different spaces. What I’ve noticed over the years in Manchester is that chemsex has become much, kind-of, more fragmented and it’s much smaller groups of guys. MORE of it but in smaller groups. At the start, when I started going to chill-outs in Manchester it was all big, with like, 10-20 guys there, and that was the norm then. But it seems here, at least (that it’s kind of… they still happen… not like a lot of the A-Gays kind of stuff, that still happens but a lot of what you find is it’s much smaller groups of people, little networks of people and then new people are brought into that. The different type of drugs people use is affected by location so for instance Ketamine is more popular in chill-outs in Manchester than it is in London. Here, particularly with the A-Gays end of things, crystal meth is a little bit frowned upon. So like, Mcat and G are the ones to go to there but kind of “oh I wouldn’t use crystal because that’s really fucked-up” you know? Where as in London Crystal was always totally part, part and parcel it’s a given you use Crystal, whether you slam or smoke or whatever.

And when you go into the smaller cities there’s differences as well and I notice in smaller cities coke and MDMA are pretty common. Also, In Manchester I’ve never gone to a chill-out where there’s been a cis woman there. I’ve been to chill-outs where there’s been a trans woman there, a pre-op trans woman, and there’s a lot of fetishization going on there and there really hasn’t been enough work done on the experience of pre-op trans women at chill-outs, because sometimes it’s very transactional and fetishized. But you’ll go to say, Warrington, and I’ve not to been to one of these chill-outs but you go and there’s cis women, quite often sex workers, at chill-outs. It does shift in location. 

In terms of social class, this is one of the things about chemsex that is most alluring and most interesting, is that there isn’t a social class that is more prevalent. It is very very diverse in that sense. Ethnically, in terms of economic background, and age, it’s a really wide spread of people who engage. And for me that’s a really important aspect of the culture because if you go to a club in the city centre, it is going to be dominated by cis white gay men. That’s not the case with chemsex. I don’t think I’d be interested in it if it was just a bunch of white guys like, cis middle-class white guys, I’d be bored out of my mind. I want that kind of, I want to find out about other people and their experiences. So, I think in terms of ethnicity, social class, age and body-type it’s very wide-spread.

Now there are- I have noticed distinct similarities in the way between the types of people who engage in chemsex to an extensive degree and I mentioned the piece ‘chill’ that I wrote and we were talking earlier about the prevalence of guys who have suffered sexual abuse or rape in some stage in their life. That seems to be a constant. Also there’s a lot of people I feel who engage – and this is not to sort-of back up Matthew Todd and Dave Stewart, the internal homophobia narrative because I don’t believe that and I don’t think that’s correct – but a lot of guys in one way or another at some stage in life struggled with their sexual identity and their gender identity and never really resolved it to a satisfactory degree. And a lot of these, a lot of guys who do chemsex are on the down-low, you know, and this is their queerness and this is how they actively participate in and engage in their sex. They may be married to a cis woman and what-not.

It’s also how do you get to know people, almost everybody is using a false name [Sebastian laughs], or telling you what they do is not what they do, particularly because quite a few people work for the NHS and are engaging in chemsex as well and there is really huge consequences then for speaking a bit too freely about that because of how the dominant narrative of chemsex and how it’s been articulated has been so pathologized and stigmatised that the associations with it are quite dark. I’m probably one of the few people who work in these fields and is open about my use and my work. But it’s still got that thing where I talk to somebody about chemsex and they’re like [indecipherable] “Oh he must be like raping guys at the weekend and going under in G all the time” but it’s like, come-on there are people who engage in this in a way that is safe and enjoyable for everyone and there are people who look out for each other as well. And yeah, I think that’s where things become tricky because under the notion that if you do chemsex you have a problem, there’s also people who don’t have a problem, but if things start to get difficult for them, they’re unlikely to approach organisations for help if that’s how they feel they’re going to be portrayed. 

And the imbalance as well is like when, because the organisation I work for has a chemsex programme, and I think there’s a slow realisation among practitioners that how it’s been represented is slightly skewed because if you’re working for an organisation that does chemsex support they’re likely to be hearing the very very worst of things, like somebody’s at the end of their tether with this, you’re not gonna hear all of the sweet and funny stories about like guys eating lollipops naked together like that’s probably not going to come up it’ll be like “ahh I got really fucked up and did this stupid thing” so yeah, when you look at something solely through one lens it will fix it that way, you’re kind-of excluding a lot of experiences and then people don’t feel represented in how this is articulated. And then that kind-of scares them off in a way.

It’s interesting that it is a subculture but it’s a subculture which nobody wants to identify being a part of that sub-culture. It’s just very underground in that sense. I think one of the most important things about chemsex as a culture is its diversity and I think you know it’s response as well to how homogenised queer spaces have become. And just fucking boring [Georgie laughs].

Georgie Williams, voiceover: The homogeneity of queer spaces is a hot topic. In London's Nocturnal Queer Geographies, Campkin & Marshall address how, in the country's capital, a great number of LGBTQ+ venues are both owned by and seem to be largely catering to cisgender, white, able-bodied, middle-class men. These venues do present a homogeneous sample of the queer community- a sample which is in many ways more palatable to a non-queer audience. When we consider the concept of the "good gay" vs the "bad queer", we should think about how the values of a society and, by extension, a state, are reproduced through one's body. Is your appearance considered the whitewashed norm, or is your existence politicised and thus considered radical and disruptive, if you are a person of colour? Are you able bodied and thus considered "normal" or do you have a visible disability or additional needs? Do your desires and aspirations conform to capitalism? The difference between the good gay and the bad queer is often how much an individual is willing to atone for their gender or sexuality by performing and practicing that which is valued in a cisgender and heterosexual society. The good gay is excused for being gay, since it's the deemed the only rebellious outlier in their personality. Ultimately, cisgender, white, able-bodied, middle-class gay men are often considered less of a threat to the conservation of traditional social values than other queer individuals. But they cannot, and should not, be considered a fair representation of the queer community.

Georgie Williams, in interview: I feel like in many ways you've already answered my third question, but I guess are there any, are there any other misconceptions surrounding chemsex that you feel need to be dispelled?

Sebastian Baxter, in interview: All of them, um... [Georgie laughs]

Sebastian Baxter, in interview: Yeah I suppose perceptions… One other thing about locations that’s interesting that just came to me, as well, is that when I started doing chems and doing chill-outs years ago like all of the chill-outs were in the city centre of Manchester and that’s changed over the years so Salford’s one of the principle chemsex kind-of chill-out locations and Trafford and some of the other boroughs, it’s sort-of spread-out and you’d wonder is there a link then to between property speculation and property prices going up in city centres and gay guys not having a) the space or the money to afford space and therefore its sort-of reading out and reading out to other parts of the country as well.

In terms of misconceptions, I think the main medical understanding of it I think is obviously where I wanna attack. I have somewhat of a problem with the liberationist model as well. I think there’s a sense where somebody’s trying to represent chemsex as this sort-of non-conformist anti-Stalinist, consciously political thing. Now, I’ve never been witness to a conscious political articulation of like manifestly against the modernisation of LGBT or queer space, I don’t identify as LGBT or queer, you know? I think there is a politics to it but it’s politics you know, with a small ‘p’ and it isn’t a kind-of resistance movement against heteronormativity, those things can be expressed when engaging in chemsex but I think almost as well the liberationist model sort-of isn’t comfortable with then talking about some of the things that the medical model stigmatising, pathology end of things sort-of reinforces, like I did a performance at an Act Up event in London and in parts of the performance it was like, naked in a paddling pool with a co-performer and sex toys and drug paraphernalia condoms, lube everywhere but I was basically talking about HIV and addiction and it was that thing that like you know, I’m not saying… I have had every STI under the sun, I’ve been raped at a chill-out you know I’ve had psychosis and it’s shit, you know, I’m clearly an addict, however, I still enjoy this like I’m not an idiot, I wouldn’t do it if it was all bad. Like, there are problems, of course, but in our culture we’ve got a very infantile way of looking at substances, misuse and addiction right? It’s like there’s this hierarchy of drugs so you can go into work for example and say “oh I was out on the piss last night I’m really hungover” and everyone goes “oh yeah har har” but you wouldn’t say like “oh I was slamming all last night” or… [indecipherable] “‘so I got a bit of sleep and I’m fine”, like you’ll get a disciplinary for that. Like, why? What’s the difference between the two? Actually hangovers are fucking awful, I could be on chems for 6 days and I don’t get a bit of sleep but i’m fine you know? A bit tired obviously...

but I think there’s a problem there in society that’s looks at the addict and turns them into a pathological being that is in ‘need of our care’ and ‘help’ and there’s no agency despite kind-of harm-reduction practices becoming more prevalent there is some sort-of abstinence notion that if like you’re not desiring abstinence at some stage then you’re doing something wrong. But if you do the abstinence thing, you’ve gone through the pain of it, the thing that’s keeping you alive and keeping you sane being taken out of your life and sort-of lack of self-belief, the relapse/repeat, and what do you get back in return? The entirety of society is built around alcohol and you can’t get a coffee after six ‘o’ clock in the evening, it’s all about sex and drugs and alcohol and what does the addict get back, in return, for his attempts of abstinence? I’m like why should they be abstinent? I’m an addict, I fully accept that and embrace it almost as an identity, but I’m not out robbing off your granny like, I’m paying for my own chems and whatever happens to my body if I hit psychosis or whatever that’s for me to be aware of not like, being a burden of the state or… It’s like, what business of yours is that? What’s wrong with that? I don’t see anything to be ashamed of at all. 

So I think there’s something for me in my work, something about the power of claiming something, of saying directly ‘yeah, I do this’ What do you want to say? “but all these bad things happen” yeah it shouldn’t happen to me, you haven’t asked me about the reasons why I’m still doing that or the joys and how it’s immersive and engaging. So, with my work I’m kind of using storytelling as a way of doing that and not attempting to kind-of shirk off the issues. What’s the purpose of finding subjects to talk about something when I do the thing I want to talk about, so I can use my own body as a vessel to talk about… the more the merrier of the really really interesting things that chemsex can shine a light on. I think addiction is something we need to start talking about in a different way and I think chemsex is an interesting viewpoint in which to do so. Because it’s poly-addictive, poly-sensory things that are going on, I think there’s something there to sort-of approach that as a talking point. I don’t know if that’s fully answered… 

Georgie Williams, in interview: I mean yeah, I think it has, thank you so much Seb for this.

Georgie Williams, voiceover: Dr Baxter's perspective on this culture is inextricable from his standpoint, personal investments and experiences. I was grateful for his insight, and how he demonstrated the complexity of this subject through both his experiences as a man who has sex with other men and as an addict. If anything is evident from Sebastian's testimonial, it is that chemsex practices will persist, regardless of attitudes towards drugs and queer culture. I don't want to use this platform to endorse chemsex; it's important that I make that clear- but throughout the history of policy development for sex education and drug education, one thing has been clear- that abstinence-focused education is ineffective. We cannot prevent people from making decisions which could potentially adversely impact their mental or physical health, but we can provide resources and services for those who do, or are trying to avoid doing so. It is both patronising and infantilising to treat queer individuals and others who engage in chemsex as if their behaviour needs to be regulated by others for their own good. Drug addiction is a serious issue and debilitating for many people, but that doesn't warrant demonization or the stripping of one's agency. It requires education, open dialogues, signposting to relevant services and a transformative approach to how we approach the subjects of drug use and sexuality. It is far more difficult to unlearn practices and habits when we fear judgement for having fostered them in the first place. 

In conjuring an example of queer culture, few of us will think first of chemsex- but this community exists and is perhaps not as two-dimensional as one might perceive it to be from the outside. Academically, particularly anthropologically, the practice is fascinating- but a pragmatic and impersonal approach to this subject overlooks the very human complexities present; the dangerous, the erotic, the joyful and the painful components interwoven throughout stories about chemsex. chemsex is and will likely remain an integral part of queer culture in the United Kingdom, and I believe what will come to define our culture's approach to this practice is our willingness to educate one another, and support one another- regardless of our personal choices. 

This episode of the /Queer Podcast was edited by Sam Clay, transcribed by Bronya Smith and scripted and produced by me, Georgie Williams. A very special thanks to Dr Sebastian Baxter for his contributions to this episode. If you are interested in learning more about the subject of chemsex and are based in the UK, you can find a list of relevant UK organisations on the LGBTQ+ Resources section of the /Queer website. Thanks once again to my Patreon subscribers who ensure that this stone cold broke queer can afford a coffee between interviews for this podcast. If you’re not a Patreon and want to help this podcast continue to grow, you can find the /Queer Patreon at patreon.com/slashqueer. That’s S-L-A-S-H Queer. The link is also available on our Facebook, Instagram and Twitter pages. This podcast is growing in reach and popularity with every episode so, even if you can’t contribute financially, giving us a share or just subscribing makes a world of difference.

We still have merch available and are taking donations via Ko-fi, you can find the links to both in the description for this episode. I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank all of you who responded to our call for volunteers across our social media- so a warm welcome is in order for June, Lyndsey and Bronya who are donating their time as translators and transcribers. 

This episode was recorded on location in London, the United Kingdom. Music in this episode was composed by Kevin MacLeod. If you enjoyed this episode or have any feedback, please get in touch on Instagram or Twitter at @SlashQueer or email us at slashqueer@outlook.com. As is our mantra- stay kind, stay radical and stay queer.