Photo Book Documents Male 'Cruising' (PHOTOS)

When it comes to gay culture, the term "cruising" doesn't mean taking a leisurely boat trip, exotic sea voyage, or oceanic journey. It means something quite different.

Filed under "Gay/Nature/Photography," Cruising by Chad States (with text by Gordon Grent Ingram, Ph.D., and Alec Soth) is a visual exploration of the eponymous practice, whether conducted in far-off parks, public restrooms, or secluded woodlands.

The 100-page hardcover features 80 full-color photographs that investigate the mysterious, but no less mammalian, sexual practice.

Cruising is available for order here.

This piece originally appeared on Pop Curious.

 

 

 

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Comments

[ramal]

03:23 AM on 01/12/2012

I have always thought that Gay Cruising is simply what happens when you have twice the testosterone of a straight (male/female) situation. Society tends to find fault with what a minority of the portion of the Gay male population may do on a regular or occasional basis. It is however something that a great portion of the male straight population would do it if the sex were as easily available to them as the Gay men who cruise. If women were as promiscuous, as sexually driven and as constantly preoccupied with sex as men (Either Gay, straight, or in-between) are society would be very much a changed affair. For better or worse I can't say, but most certainly changed.

[DanielSC]

05:30 AM on 01/11/2012

Cruising is no more a phenomenon in the gay community than it is in the straight community. The straight community simply has many, many, many more public (clubs, etc) to do it in--and it is usually given a more classy name when it involves straight people.
-- and Cranmer1549, I agree, story or advertisement?

[Tanja M. Laden]

09:25 PM on 01/11/2012

It's a slide show!

[Tumunzahar]

08:16 PM on 01/10/2012

Sex. What a unique and novel subject.

[DavidEm]

08:09 PM on 01/10/2012

I liked the nature aspect of the pictures.

I would never have sex in a park, but sex in the woods or while hiking?

Oh, yeah.

[JonB2057]

07:02 PM on 01/11/2012

"I would never have sex in a park, but sex in the woods or while hiking?"

What's the difference?

[DavidEm]

11:00 PM on 01/11/2012

Do you really not know the difference between a park and the woods?

Man, 100 years ago ANYONE could have told you that.

A PARK is a public space; the woods is actual NATURE, as in SECLUDED.

And I really do pity you for not realizing that people have had sex in secluded natural settings, like...since the very BEGINNING of TIME.

[CBasilJr]

11:23 PM on 01/11/2012

While I was serving in Germany many years ago, a prostitute was bitten on the ass by an asp during a tryst in the woods.

(I couldn't resist)

[outloud]

07:16 PM on 01/10/2012

He missed his mark.

[tjtoday]

02:47 PM on 01/10/2012

Did they get the approval of the individuals in the coffe table ad?

[inthedesert]

02:32 PM on 01/10/2012

I remember driving up a certain road in Griffith Park in the 80s and wondering why all these men were standing around, some were "polishing their cars" and others were just standing there. Then I got it. I imagine they are still doing this. Highly dangerous from both a legal standpoint and otherwise too.

[truth be told again]

02:52 PM on 01/10/2012

So, gay people are supposed to be exempt from the promised freedom of assembly and freedom of association?

What decade is this again??? Stonewall was sooo 1968.

[Justin Werner]

03:02 PM on 01/10/2012

It's a really bad idea. I hate to see my gay brothers out there doing that kind of thing. It's not good for them. Really, really not good for them, and I say this as a completely out-of-the-closet gay man. Guys, you are risking prosecution and a lifetime of being registered sex offenders - not to mention health issues and the black eye you are giving *all* LGBT people, and for what? A little thrill? Please, a little less emphasis on gratuitous sex (which, if you insist on it, can be had a lot more safely and discretely) and a lot more emphasis on love and *real* intimacy. Sexual gratification doesn't last. Love can last, though, if you give it a chance and some proper care and feeding.

[Nick Franco]

10:29 PM on 01/11/2012

Who ar you to say what is 'real' and what is not? Leave your judgement behind.

[axcordova]

02:03 PM on 01/10/2012

Not terribly provocative. More like a book of some lame nature photographs. You can see better on xtube and you don't have to shell out for a coffee table book.

[truth be told again]

02:53 PM on 01/10/2012

Uber lame, if you ask me. Pictures of buses and trees and highway pylons. So utterly NOT informative/helpful/entertaining.

[haganj3]

08:00 AM on 01/11/2012

Yes, there are bushes, tree and highway pylons, but this a correct depiction of a specific kind of gay cruising, in rest areas and parks made mostly of married men on their way home from work or on their lunch hour. However, I don't think I would purchase this book, as I could easily take a drive up the Interstate rest area and shoot my own photos.

Really... is this an ad or a story??

[Cranmer1549]

10:33 AM on 01/10/2012

Was this "story" an article or an advertisement?

[Tanja M. Laden]

12:43 AM on 01/11/2012

I never received a review copy of the book, only a .pdf of the intro and a smattering of pictures, so my post was most definitely not an advertisement. I just thought the idea was interesting — something that deserved be brought to the public's attention.

[NINA B]

09:21 AM on 01/10/2012

They should have let George Michael write the forward.

[Steamboater]

01:02 PM on 01/10/2012

Shows how little you know about cruising. Straights do it too and all the time. It's not a physical act, just the desire and promise of one.

[Bill J4321]

01:39 PM on 01/10/2012

See, now, I think they should have let a heterosexual write the forward.

That way, they could explain that their persecution, criminalization, and harassment of gay citizens historically forced them to seek sexual contact in clandestine and remote areas.

But hey, potato, potahto.

[Jason N]

04:59 PM on 01/10/2012

You know what, BS. I'm gay and that's BS! Even when I was in the deepest of closets, I could STILL rent a hotel room for the night if I was that pressed. This idea that gay men HAD to go to public parks for hookups is absurd. No MARRIED MEN have to go to parks and rest stops because their wives can check credit card statements.

[NINA B]

06:48 PM on 01/10/2012

I don't disagree with what you're saying Bill, and I don't know how old these photographs are, but I think times have changed a little and there's got to be better and safer alternatives at this point in time.