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Inside the World of Sex Raves
207 Plays3 months ago
This week on Fun with Sex, we explore the thrilling world of sex raves—where music, desire, and freedom collide. With insights from hosts, we delve into consent, community, and what makes these spaces so transformative.
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Transcript
Introduction to Sex Raves
00:00:00
Jon McCray Jones
Hi, this is the Fun with Sex podcast. I'm Natalie. And I'm John. And today we're talking about the world of sex raves. So sex waves are, for people who don't know, they're basically a normal nightclub experience, normally to techno music, but they're spaces to play or have sex, either off the dance floor or most commonly i'll off the dance floor, and in some spaces you can have sex right there on the dance floor.
Origins of Sex Raves in Berlin
00:00:31
Jon McCray Jones
Uh, where these come from is Berlin, Germany, where there's an entire nightlife industry based off of techno sex raves and many clubs that specializes in that. Uh, there's a long history of like, we're play on site dance clubs come from actually rooted here in the United States and queer culture and policing and homophobia. Do you want to get that history or do you want me to give it?
00:00:59
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, um you know, the origins of dark rooms, right? It's a pitch black room. You can't see the person you're playing with. um And typically it's a quick encounter and not really much background of each other is exchanged.
Dark Rooms and Queer Safety
00:01:16
Jon McCray Jones
And doing play this kind of way makes a lot of sense when you think about the origins being in queer spaces at a time where homosexuality was illegal, you know?
00:01:29
Jon McCray Jones
um And aside from from being illegal, there's so much shame and fear in that too. So, you know, you're not going to be bold enough to go up to someone and see if they're gay, like that can get you arrested or ostracized from your whole community. So being in that dark room like that, it was safety, you know, you can't see who I am. You don't even know if you know me outside of this. You don't know my
Queer Nightlife History in the US
00:01:53
Jon McCray Jones
name.
00:01:53
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, play on site. Nightlife has its roots in Chicago and New York, where basically in the 70s, 60s and 80s, a lot of times queer sex was still criminalized. And so you could have take someone home with you, not to mention there was also a lot of homophobic attacks. So we're at a straight nightclub. You can dance with somebody, meet somebody if you're a straight couple and take them out on the street and you would be safe. Whereas if you're a queer couple, you're in a same gender relationship you can face physical violence if you go out on the street also like again you can be criminalized if you take someone back to your house and have sex so basically the only space where queer people can meet each other was in nightlife and because dancing already starts physical contact you already have a gateway into that physical intimacy that leads to sex so also space all in one where you can meet queer people hang out dance with queer people
00:02:49
Jon McCray Jones
and Then explore your sexuality of other queer people and there's also the stigma of shame where if you're in a dark room You and the person don't know who each other are there's not gonna be outside consequences of being outed for being queer So you allowed that freedom and space to explore your sexuality ah That culture moved to Germany as the techno scene moved where Germany also was experiencing a lot of homophobia split especially in Berlin um right after the Cold War.
Berlin's Nightlife and Tourism
00:03:21
Jon McCray Jones
And Berlin basically started these like techno raves and warehouses where they implemented dark rooms in private spaces for people who were persecuted in Germany for their homosexuality could play with their queerness in a safe space. So very similar to the US. Yeah.
00:03:37
Jon McCray Jones
So basically that evolved into the nightlife scene that we were talking about today with nightclubs and his play on site. Normally it's for queer people, but it's a multi-million, I think billion dollar industry. I think like one in three tours to Berlin came ah explicitly for the nightlife where most clubs in Berlin have some type of dark room or play area for people to do things in while listening to the music. Do you want to describe like,
00:04:06
Jon McCray Jones
what basically a play rave is and the idea of that like it's just like nightlife versus like a normal nightclub.
What Are Sex Raves Really About?
00:04:13
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah. Um, that's really the thing about these types of events is they're not really too much different than a typical rave or club. You know, people are dancing, there's a DJ, people are listening to music. Um, the only real difference is like at first glance, there's more sex positivity. So you might see like,
00:04:35
Jon McCray Jones
more revealing clothes or kinkier clothes or something like that. naked person or two Yeah, but even a lot of these events we've seen like there's still a lot of people in very regular clubbing attire. I mean, Berlin is different where they have like very strict dress codes, but the ones I've been to in other cities like there's a lot of people who are just in regular clubbing attire. um Also, I think like a misconception is that like you have to play if you go to one of these parties when especially the sex raves, the majority of people don't play. Like they either come for the music or they come to meet people. But the majority of people never actually do anything sexual on site.
Comparing Global Sex Rave Experiences
00:05:15
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, that's something I always say to people too when they're asking me questions about these events is
00:05:21
Jon McCray Jones
It's really a lot more flexible than like, let's say you show up to someone's apartment for like an eight person orgy meetup and you're the only one who doesn't want to play and you're like, Oh, this is a lot of pressure.
00:05:32
Jon McCray Jones
Versus like, if you don't feel like playing, you can just go and dance, go and grab a drink. There's always hundreds, or depending on how big the party is, there's always hundreds of people on the dance floor are not playing that you can socialize with and hang out. You don't feel like the odd person out. If you go the entire not night and not have sex. Yeah. So ironically, we've been to two of these parties, but none of them have actually been in Berlin.
00:05:57
Jon McCray Jones
We've been to Torture Garden and the United Kingdom's in London, and we've been to Pervert
Gender Expression and Playroom Setups
00:06:02
Jon McCray Jones
Party in Mexico City. Do you want to give a quick synopsis of Torture Garden and your time there? Do you want me to do that? Yeah, Torture Garden. um It was in like a two-story venue. There were multiple bars, multiple dance floors.
00:06:18
Jon McCray Jones
Um, the main difference at first glance is just simply that everybody was in much concierge higher than like a typical nightclub scene. Um, you know, in one room they had more like pop house remixes. Another room was straight techno.
00:06:35
Jon McCray Jones
that's the room we fucked in on the dance floor. Um, and then they also had like upstairs areas for play, which, you know, typical of like these types of events where it's more of a brief style, it was pretty like bare bones. It wasn't like, you know, lot one of the more sex clubs where they have like a full bed or anything like that. But yeah.
00:06:59
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, I think the Lake Torture Garden was really cool. And again, the emphasis wasn't on sex there. And I think that's another misnomer for a lot of of these events. People think that the emphasis is sex. Normally the emphasis is the music and meeting people and dancing. But it just gives you the freedom to have sex on site if that's what you're interested in doing. The freedom to say that like, hey, maybe I don't want to go home with this person. Or maybe I don't want to make this into a thing, but they're hot. I'm horny right now. And we can just play.
Consent Culture Differences
00:07:29
Jon McCray Jones
Uh, again, the torture garden scene was a little bit geared more towards man, woman, cis couples. I will say there's a lot of bi people that we met there and it was very queer. There was also a lot of like gay man couples. I didn't see too many like sapphic couples there. It was queer than a lot of swinger clubs that we've been to, but it was still very cis hat focused in comparison to pervert party. Do you want to give us an opposite on that one?
00:07:57
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, the thing I will say though about torture garden and why you'll see that so many of these spaces aren't super femme focused is, you know, because the origins were very mask focused, it was, you know,
00:08:11
Jon McCray Jones
the dark room, the sex room, whatever was pretty bare bones. Cause it's like people with penises, that's pretty easy. You can just, you know, put it in someone's mouth, put it in someone's butt, like, and you don't really need like a place to lay down or toys, but with so many femmes, like not like most of us can't finish from something just being stuck in us alone. So,
00:08:37
Jon McCray Jones
Situations like that where it's just very like bare bones. I don't think it attracts a lot of femmes because it's like well, I Don't know this is really gonna be a comfortable play experience for me And that was like my comparison with like pervert party where pervert party had a much stronger focus on cis gay man and the playroom Actually, this was a pure dark room. So just a quick definition Playroom means that there's play allowed in the area, but it's normally well-lighted. Pervert Party had a dark room, which is, there's play allowed in this space, but it's dark where you can barely see the person in front of you or the person you have a relationship with. And that was like Pervert Party, since it was very much centered for gay men. There wasn't any beds or any surfaces to lay on. ah computer appear In Torture Garden, where their playroom has spots where films or other people could lay on,
00:09:29
Jon McCray Jones
Torture Garden, not Torture Garden, Pervert Party was just a very bare bones upstairs to a warehouse and it was just concrete floor. And I think it was like all cis gay men up there. I don't think I see any other gender expressions. They even had like their version of a glory hole where it was kind of like a rope was set up and people lined up and you basically just kind of move down the line like a conveyor belt to like suck someone's dick. um So yeah, definitely weren't any thumbs on that line.
00:10:01
Jon McCray Jones
And I would say about Pervert Parties that the downstairs had more films there on the dance floor, and they had like really, really well-known DJs in Mexico City. It was a very good music-focused event. At Pervert Party in Mexico City, I would say at any point of the time, 75% to 80% of people were on the dance floor dancing. It's always only a small minority of people who are in the playroom. And I think that like 75% to 80% is a conservative number, because I don't think Say there's like 500 people there. I don't think in any event those ever 50 people. Yeah. And that's 10 percent. So moving forward, though, talking about the dark room.
Flirting at Sex Raves
00:10:42
Jon McCray Jones
And how these events work, the first thing that pops in a lot of people's head is like, how does consent work in these spaces on the dance floor and in the play spaces? And I think it depends on if it's one, a dark room or a play space. Yeah, I think, you know, with these circles, it's
00:11:00
Jon McCray Jones
honestly kind of similar to like how a lot of more swinger circles are where you rely heavily on like someone's nonverbal cues and someone's ability to just like say no straight up, you know, it's kind of you test things out by maybe like lightly touching someone before going all the way in. And of course, yeah, you have bad actors that just totally misread situations and you know ah way too far would i always say that like my experience at torture gardened and per party was that
00:11:35
Jon McCray Jones
the consent culture in a play room wasn't as explicit as I would like. Like before someone touches you, they go like, Hey, do you mind if I touch you? I really say that torture garden made a really good effort on their Instagram page to alert people that like, Hey, you shouldn't do that. Perfect party, not as much, but also like, oh yeah that's the difference between a dark room and a play room. Because when you go to a dark room for a lot of people, they're looking for the experience of anonymous play. And the idea is that It's a yes until it's a no, and you rely on nonverbal cues, you progress physically, and then you rely on the other person to verbally or physically deny you. But if they don't, you just assume that they're into it too. um What I was able to prefer party was like being up there after Matt left, had a lot of people just like come up and touch me and like fill on my body without my consent. But I also understand that that is a culture there and I was yeah able to, I feel, I don't feel uncomfortable telling people no.
00:12:31
Jon McCray Jones
At Torchic Garden, and people were a little bit more consent culture conscious. people would Instead of just grabbing straight for your private parts, like at a private party, they'll touch your arm or they'll touch your chest and see like how you react to that. Some people would verbally ask, like, hey, are you interested in me? Other people would try to progress things after just touching you. But the consent culture is not amazing. And I think that if you are someone who struggles with the word no, maybe a sex rave isn't for you or at least not for you to go alone.
Safety at Sex Raves vs. Nightclubs
00:13:06
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, I agree. That was definitely, you know, the culture at Torture Garden is it was different than like, you know, the events we throw in the consent model we follow where, you know, people don't see like touching someone's leg is like a violation without asking for consent.
00:13:26
Jon McCray Jones
They kind of see it as like, Oh, this is me testing the waters and I'll see how they react. Um, and things were a lot less nuanced to where it's just kind of like, Oh, you're down to have sex. Okay, cool. And we're not really going to deep dive into like,
00:13:41
Jon McCray Jones
the intricate details of our boundaries. And if we agree to play, that means like I can automatically do whatever. What I will say is two things. One, Torture Gardens Instagram did try as hard as to communicate consent culture to people. And the other thing that I will say is that like that type of norm of You kind of like flirt with your hands a little bit and ask people verbally. It's a norm. I like a lot of play parties. It's not just like torture garden. It just kind of in the more like swinger sex positive communities. People don't feel comfortable talking about sex. And I think that's the difference between like
00:14:20
Jon McCray Jones
Play events and like a explicit King dungeons. We're in King dungeons. The enormous is like opposite We're like we're gonna sit down and have a five-minute conversation And maybe like someone pulls out their phone and take notes on what's allowed and was not allowed Other places you kind of like play it by ear and like I don't think torture garden was anomaly was an anomaly or bad It's just they're like that's the type of environment that like you're willingly going into I agree and I also like that's why when it comes to talking about the topic of consent, I really try to gear away from like painting things that are super like black and white like good actors and bad actors thing because I don't think any of those people even had a single thought that they were doing something like outside of the realms of consent. You know, I think that's just the norm in those spaces. I would say like consent is kind of norm based.
00:15:15
Jon McCray Jones
Whereas like some acts that happened like a provert party to me was like the norm of how they approach consent and like spaces. Um, I guess like moving away from like the playroom slash dungeon. How would you describe flirting other places in the venue? Like, how do you get it up to the space? Say like, you don't want to meet somebody in the playroom. How do you meet people on the dance floor? And how does that work? Well, I mean, I'm the worst person at flirting. I,
00:15:43
Jon McCray Jones
like in a typical bar, I just like make eye contact with someone repeatedly. I don't think I'm weird or approach me, but you know, it's really like the same vibes as a regular club. Like if you're interested in someone, find a way to respectfully strike up a conversation or ask if they're interested in chatting, if, you know, they'd like you to buy them a drink or whatever. Um,
00:16:11
Jon McCray Jones
And if they're not interested, they're not interested, if they confirm they are. You can talk, you can not ask them to dance, that sort of thing. Yeah, I was going to say that I think like floating and initiating touch is not that different from a normal nightclub. Like the things you mentioned, you ask somebody to dance, you ask them for a drink. Maybe if you guys make prolonged eye contact for a long time, one person approaches the other, you may dance. I think that the only thing that I will notice is that every act has a lot more.
00:16:41
Jon McCray Jones
Gravity to it yeah since there is sex on site when you make out with someone at a normal bar You're like, okay, this is fun This is making out but we're gonna have to like leave and go through a different space to play So like there's always a break in between there's a chance to say like, okay, I'm going home whereas making out at a play party, sex is some places where you can like have sex on the floor. You can literally fuck right there. But like, it's never more than like 100 steps away. Which means that hugging, kissing, farting do come with a little bit more gravity. And that means that people should ask for a little bit more like a explicit consent, since it does come with that weight. Yeah. And also just trying to have
00:17:23
Jon McCray Jones
upfront conversations about like what you'd be in the mood for tonight. Maybe you're enjoying flirting with this person, but you know in your head, you're like not ready to go to the playroom. Just communicate that like, oh, you know I'd love to get your number and meet up again. I'm not ready for the play space though. Yeah. And I think that communication is key. The most disaster dynamic is when you have someone who's a little pushy and another person who's not good at saying no or a people pleaser. Those two people are always like the worst combination. Yeah, but normally like these spaces are I would argue safer than normal nightclubs are normally staffed with people who understand consent or ready to intervene. They have other sex positive people and the difference is like
00:18:09
Jon McCray Jones
You go home with somebody from a nightclub or a bar, a normal one. You're at their house. You're in a private space. You don't have anyone to intervene if this person like violates your consent or gets a little bit too pushy versus at a play space. There's a room full of people that like you can sure you can draw attention to.
00:18:30
Jon McCray Jones
There's also like normally staff on site. I know Torchic Garden had a really good job of having their staff for a slash, so somebody's making you uncomfortable. It's not slash, it's a sash. Is it a sash? Yeah.
00:18:42
Jon McCray Jones
you can just walk up and like act one of them like, Hey, you're wearing this red sash. Uh, this person's bothering me. Can you escort them out? They had security there. And I think they're like, that's what makes it safer than other spaces. Yeah. I mean, even just having the ability to simply walk away, like if you meet someone at a club and you bring them home and you know, the vibes are off, you're seeing red flags. You're like, I do not want to play with this person. There's,
00:19:12
Jon McCray Jones
a very good chance, especially with how a lot of Ben are that when you reject them and say like, I'm not interested in sex tonight, that they got very aggressive. And in the worst case scenario, even violent versus if you're at a club and it's a play space with all these people, like, more likely to so yes, because there's going to be like very real consequences if they got aggressive or violent with you in front of all those people and the staff and everything.
00:19:41
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, and like we just heard of a horrible situation where nothing physically happened. Our friends' friends. on Halloween invited these guys back to their hotel room and basically they kept trying to tell these guys like you need to leave we have an early morning you need to leave and these two guys just like would not leave their hotel room and they didn't like sexually assault them but also like that fear of like these two men are just like hanging out while we're telling them multiple times that they need to leave carries a lot of weight and like that's not something you have to worry about at a play party yeah
00:20:17
Jon McCray Jones
Um, what else do we want to talk about?
Diverse Activities Beyond Sex
00:20:19
Jon McCray Jones
The other thing I'd like to say that like, why I think that like sex rapes, comparing them to like normal play parties and s swinger parties are better, especially for newbies, is that it gives you more options and things to do. Whereas you go to like a normal play party or sex club.
00:20:38
Jon McCray Jones
You either have to just like chit chat on the dance floor or not on the dance floor. You do have to just like chit chat with people or you have to like have sex. And like more people there are there solely to have sex versus like a lot of these like sex raves. They book really, really big name DJs.
00:20:55
Jon McCray Jones
There's a lot of people who come for a sex-positive atmosphere, but they come for the music. So there's always people on the dance floor you can spend the entire night dancing and clubbing and treated like a nightclub and not even realize that sex is happening above you versus like at a sex club. Everybody there is coming for the same reason and that's to have sex. Or i mean they also are coming to meet people where there's lots of things to do outside of having sex.
00:21:20
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, or even just being able to be in a sex-positive atmosphere and wear whatever you want. And there's plenty of people that do that and they have no intentions of playing, but they just enjoy the atmosphere. Heard about the play parties or the sex raves or both? Sex raves, yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, I guess like it could be applied to both, but I think that like if you're not coming for sex, there's less stimulation to do and less things to meet people and bond over at a normal play party because as a sex rave you could strike up a conversation about the DJ the music you can go out dancing together you can literally just treat it like a night out at a nightclub but then always know that you have that option there i also think like it's more approachable because like whereas the first couple times that we've been to like a sex party or a swinger party you have to get dressed up and you go to these spaces and it's like
00:22:11
Jon McCray Jones
The only thing to really talk about is sex and do a sex.
Exploration of Gender and Sexuality
00:22:14
Jon McCray Jones
And like, you meet really great people there, don't get me wrong. Versus when you go to these raves, you're still going to a rave at the end of the day. Yeah. Yeah. Is there anything that you would want to address? I think we covered it all.
00:22:28
Jon McCray Jones
Yeah, I will say that a lot of times these raves aren't a monolith. Just quick compare and contrast. Like Torture Garden, you were allowed to have sex everywhere but they also had...
00:22:41
Jon McCray Jones
two designated playrooms that were like well lit. What was the other place we went to, Pervert Party? I think you weren't allowed to play on the dance floor, but they had a dark room upstairs. um We're going to an event on Sunday where the basement is going to have like mattresses and well lit, and there's a two floor experience. They differ, do your research, but also think, be exploratory. I think it's a chance to play and like explore your gender in a way that play and explore your gender and sexualities in a way that you don't get to do elsewhere. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's like the importance of like the outfits too, is that like it gives people a chance to wear things and present in ways that they don't get to do anywhere else. Yeah, definitely. All right. Well, this has been the fun with sex podcasts. I'm John. I'm Natalie.