This wasn’t the most interesting thing writer and Capitol Hill resident Dan Savage said in April. At least, not as far as CHS was concerned. Nope. We were more interested in Savage Love Episode 288 in which Savage opens the show by confirming something CHS gets questions about but very rarely any facts — Volunteer Park as gay sex cruising playground.
“We realize we’d stumbled into the sex part of the park,” Savage says starting out his monologue on encountering cruisers on a night he, his partner and a friend cut through the space. Savage doesn’t name the park but does say it is near his home. Perhaps he’s referring to another Capitol Hill park but it sounds pretty much like Volunteer. Savage describes how realizing the men were on the cruise made him “really uncomfortable” and goes on to worry about what his straight Volunteer Park area neighbors might think. He also dispenses some advice for the hunters including a plea for them to consider going about their business later in the night and giving people space.
Savage Love Episode 288
It’s a funny little diatribe, totally Not Safe for Work and, for CHS, like hearing somebody say he saw Bigfoot. We get an email every now and then about cruising concerns and the Volunteer Park urban legend has always been part of Capitol Hill lore. But it’s extremely rare for us to find a Seattle Police incident related to lewd acts or public exposure around the park. Savage’s story doesn’t make it fact, of course. But we’re inclined to take his word for it. And, apparently, it’s mostly safe on the law and order front.
C’mon, people. Straight or Gay is irrelevant. Seeing unexpected sex isn’t hot; it’s more like seeing someone floss or cut their toenails in public. Take care of your sexual hygeine in private.
More discrete than the big sex party it used to be (remember when the restrooms weren’t chained shut?) — the park is still an active cruising mecca. Definitely not an urban legend, stuff happens…
Prior to park closing at 11:30pm, the police do stop by occasionally. It’s more like a spot where they take their breaks though — usually two squad cars parked with their windows open so they can talk to each other in front of the atrium, the furthest possible spot from where all the activity is taking place. After 10 minutes or so, they drive off, never getting out of their vehicles.
A shame that with things as open as they are now that this type of activity even takes place in a public park. Historically, it was a form of segregation for a disproportionately closeted crowd, now it’s just plain laziness…
I have found used condoms beneath the trees several times. Gents, clean up your mess! There are lots of garbage cans for your detritus.
He pretty clearly mentions the name Volunteer Park.
Also, in my anecdotal experience from running in the park near dusk, there are men cruising there at 6pm or so. I’ve never been in the park much later than that but I assumed it would be much busier.
Yes, I missed that first reference. updating. It’s pretty clear :)
Has Savage really become so prudish?! After reading things in his Savage Love columns that quite frankly grosses me out, it’s amazing that he would turn into such a prude in the park.
Frankly, I’ve never in 3 decades stumbled into public sex at Volunteer Park. If it’s there (if), then you really have to ‘want’ to find it. Anyway, I hate the idea of public sex, I hate the idea of public nudity, and I hate our hysterically sexualized media. It all disgusts me. However, for Dan Savage to complain about it is the height of hypocrisy.
How do you know they are ‘cruising’ for sex? Maybe they are just guys out walking and pay extra attention to someone they think is sexy. Straight people do that all the time. They call it flirting. When gay men do it, it’s called cruising. Humph.
Gimme a break. I have seen more peen at that park… I agree it’s sheer laziness. I have see. A dude at have mast post coital smoke in hand pants free leaning against his car. A bare assed bear by a tree near the reservoir. And a couple mid thrust behind the stage. All during daylight hours – generally around 400 pm. ICK.
Maybe this is why they changed the park hours? The park used to be closed from 11:30 pm – 4:30 am. Now it is closed from 10:00 pm – 6:00 am. Also, half the park has been closed to cars for a while. Anyone know what’s up? Mayor McPedals saving $$$?
I’m so tired of these uncle-tom fags who feel the need to write tell-all expose’s on all the tawdriest parts of gayness. Whether it’s full-length Stranger articles blowing the doors open on Club Z or Dan Savage publicly whining about gay sex going on in Volunteer Park, it all gets a little tedious. The self-righteousness gets a little old, especially since these writers have dirty laundry of their own.
Look, people– men (and women) have been having sex in public parks throughout history. There’s a certain public park in Paris right on the banks of the Seine, just steps from the Louvre, that’s is now and has been a gay mens’ cruising area for literally several hundred years. Across town in the Bois de Bologne straight couples by the dozens (maybe hundreds?) fuck their brains out every night, and have been doing that forever too. This is nothing new, people straight and gay have been doing it throughout history, and it’s not ever going to stop– not until sex becomes obsolete, anyway. And I’m thinkin’ that won’t happen any time soon. So let’s all just dispense with the aghast indignation.
Dan Savage is a bawdy sensationalist who sells press and himself by having an opinion about everything and doesn’t seem to have the least introspection about whether he’s being base or contradictory.
Film at 11.
I have to admit, I don’t wander around the park after dark. And I don’t hang out behind the stage or take shortcuts through the shrubs and bushes. It would ‘ick’ me out too. Just haven’t seen it in thirty years, so I have to wonder if it really exists and if so, how hard it is to stumble across. I imagine that they are not the sexy buff model types, or we wouldn’t be hearing complaints in this hypocritical neighborhood in which we live.
Of course it still happens. Nothing like what it used to years ago, but it still happens. But yes– you have to be looking for it to stumble across it. Savage’s protestations are a little phony and disingenuous. They must have purposely strolled right past the areas they knew they’d see it, just so they could be appropriately shocked. And then tell everyone about it, of course.
You should try heading to the arboretum beaver dam/triangle area on a nice day if you want to see people in the park without any regard for families and whatnot. Volunteer is tame compared to that point.
It might be a combination of after hours hijinx and budget cuts. The water tower is closed a lot more often in my experience, for example.
As someone who lived next to Volunteer Park and would often walk my dog around it before going to work for the day, I personally witnessed Dan entering the section of the park known for gay cruising. I highly doubt he was doing any sort of research that early in the morning. It saddens me that he’s become a public figure for the gay community. The guy’s a hypocrite.
Oh snap. I love it.
I thought I was the only person who felt like this about Dan.
I’m so confused by this thread. I walk my dog in Volunteer Park all the time, in the morning, in the evening, after dark, and I’ve never seen anything like what is described in this post. And I walk all through the park; I don’t feel like any park of the park is really hidden. I have no idea what part of the park Savage is talking about, and I wish I did so I could avoid it!
He’s just upset because some cruising twink did not want to suck him or his partner off in the park.
Thank the heavens that’s your opinion.
Exactly. Too big for his own head.
Second and third that.
Park hours and services are cut because our economy is in the shitter and there isn’t as much money for parks as there used to be. The mayor and the gay community have nothing to do with the reduced hours and closures. If you are bummed about the shittier park service (snicker), start voting and lobbying to tax corporations and rich people at a fair rate, so that public services can start being restored. Then we can afford longer park hours and people to pick up used condoms out of the parks in the morning, clean park bathrooms so they can be open to the public, etc…
I find it hard to believe he did not know about this. I’ve lived in Seattle for 15 years and Volunteer Park was always something we joked about.
thank you for articulating that so nicely, I couldn’t have put it better.
from an insider…the glory holes have been repeatedly repaired in the men’s bathroom. last year a guy dug a hole/tunnel in the ground that parks had to fill up with dirt. he was having gay butt secks in that hole.
this savage flake needs a mental health examination. i have not seen sex in this park for 10 years. you will not even see gays in this park anymore. gay men are extinct in seattle.
no one wants to be gay anymore and savage is a classic example of why no one wants to be gay. who in their right mind would want to be associated with this aging, disconnected flake?
savage is the only gay in volunteer park so he wrote this article to attract gays to this area. he is a flake to his core and the reason no one wants to be gay anymore.
savage is no different than bozo the clown showing up at schools for kids to laugh at. savage has as much effect on changing peoples attitudes as bozo the clown does.
savage is nothing more than a clown to laugh at.
Anyone who has walked through the trees, i.e. the used rubber minefield, on a Saturday or Sunday morning knows it is no myth. Seriously guys, do what you want in the middle of the night, but clean up your mess. Nobody needs their kids or their dogs picking up that nastiness.