“Organized Intimacy” events in the Bay Area

It&#x27;s worth remembering that up until 20 years ago, the unusual sexual activities in San Francisco was the main thing that San Francisco was known for. It was, for a long time, the epicenter of LGBQ activism, and especially AIDS activism. During the years from 1956 (when Allen Ginsberg published The Howl) to the start of the Internet boom in the 1990s, San Francisco made national headlines mostly because of the types of sex that was happening there.<p>San Francisco&#x27;s national reputation had changed dramatically over the last 20 years, and especially over the last 10 years.<p>(I&#x27;m not implying that any of this is good or bad, I&#x27;m just stating a bit of history.)

I think that these patterns will become more common in areas where economic opportunity for all involved parties equalizes. We are seeing social problems arise from this today, but hopefully those movements (incel, for example) begin to falter as the benefits from such a setup are realized.<p>The idea that there are benefits to this are based on my personal point of view: I am married, I have two children, one adopted. While my marriage works, from my perspective, as a financial and management arrangement. However, it has failed in a variety of other areas that something like this would solve.<p>Physical intimacy is an important aspect of human life, and finding reasonable access to it during our contemporary societal power shifts is going to be an ongoing problem. I expect to see more articles like this as people try to figure it out.

Why are there are so many &quot;fake trend&quot; articles? If you find 2-3 groups of people doing something weird is that a &quot;trend&quot;?

I recall a daily science fiction piece in which people were romantically involved according to various algorithms that enforced optimal evaluations such as a limited difference in wages. The plot was that a woman falls in love with man, but she recieves a promotion which makes her relationship inappropriate according to the algorithm of her robot-servant. She is issued two days to get over it and is swiftly paired up with another male, who affirms that he is also recovering from the same emotional burden of losing a loved one in this same way.

I host such events in my home here in the Bay Area in addition to attending such events hosted by others. Happy to answer any questions.

I feel like such things have been around kind of everywhere but just low-key. I&#x27;m from postsoviet space and I used to frequent on forums&#x2F;social medias where there were also lots of people from role playing subculture (not sexual, just real life RPGs, Tolkien fandom and stuff) and from time to time I read about people organizing gatherings&#x2F;picnics with the theme of hugging, snuggling etc.<p>There are also more socially acceptable activities which, basically, come down to the same thing - getting super close with other people physically but without sex: partner dancing, massage, some group games, activities in religious&#x2F;spiritual groups.<p>Whatever works for some people.

&gt; various new ways to get cozy with strangers—from lectures on tantra, workshops on “rope play,”<p>Neither of those typically involve getting &quot;cozy with strangers,&quot; at least no more than going to an art gallery or meetup or hike.

I don&#x27;t know why people pay for cable or Netflix when the best three-ring circus exists in the form of Silicon Valley.<p>Related to discussion, Japan actually has something in this vein where you can book an appointment with someone and engage in non-sexual intimacy (hugs, etc.) I believe Vice <i>also</i> had an article or video on this.

This is too weird to go mainstream as is, but perhaps some aspect of it could be Starbucksed for the mainstream.

I remember one Contra Dance at the Lake Eden Arts Festival in North Carolina which seems to have been written with rapid sequences of eye contact with many different people in mind. During that dance, I found myself stopping my verbal stream of consciousness, and it became entirely about music, dance, and eye contact. I remember coming back to my normal state of consciousness, amazed at what just happened.

This is another article that reeks of unsubstantiated, anti-tech sentiment.<p>&quot;culture and fun has been sucked out of the city since the second tech boom ... when the artists [left] the sex parties would dry up ... Burning Man morphed [to] a multi-million dollar, helicopter valeted, elite event ... sex and intimacy parties altered by the world of tech and money ... You can smell hubris on the streets ... toxic and sometimes dangerous events that revert back to a very unprogressive and misogynistic dynamic, in which entrepreneurial tech 2.0 entitlement and hubris is leveraged to excuse treating women, usually lower on the career ladder, as little more than sex toys.&quot;<p>It&#x27;s suffocating.<p>Yes, the events happen. They are almost always sincere, good-hearted, intimate, and problem-free. People in SF are experimenting to see if this is the vitamin that makes people happier in a culture that is hyper-connected, but scrutinized and isolating.<p>This writer takes these intimate events, and publishes an article about how they are &quot;kinky&quot; and &quot;sexual.&quot; Author Andrew Chamings should write 1,500 words about he&#x27;s the problem.

This seems to me like commodification of affection, or an attempt to &quot;disrupt&quot; the deathly loneliness of late-stage capitalism.

My observations are as follows:<p>1) Vice.com, so it is automatically edgy, scant on actual facts and details, and often just completely wrong.<p>2) SV has a lot of people who work too damn much.<p>3) Not everyone in SV has &quot;money&quot; as in &quot;Fuck you money&quot; and for those who do, it should not be hard to purchase intimacy in some form.<p>4) All these cuddle parties, eye gazing, and what have you events are a poor substitute for actual intimacy (not that I am against holding them) in a loving relationship, which makes me think the substitution must mean something--people there are desperate for any human contact. We are PC-ing ourselves to death.<p>5) Every generation thinks they invented sex. This current go around is risk averse while attempting to appear edgy and yet at the end of the night, I&#x27;m sure there&#x27;s the same hurt feelings and sense of rejection we all have had. It doesn&#x27;t matter how inclusive everyone is, the hot chick is not going home with the fat, bald guy (unless he has #3).<p>By the way, I went to an engineering school, I know quite a bit about problems dating and how that all plays out. Seems like things are just a bit worse these days.

&gt;The average young person moving to San Francisco today may no longer be a hitchhiker escaping a conservative town in search of art, free-thinking, and mind-altering drugs. Instead, they are more likely a recent graduate from a top college who has survived a five day interview process with a large tech firm, moving into a corporate sponsored condo in Mission Bay they’ll see 15 hours a week. The much hyped death of art and culture in the Bay Area may have led to many musicians moving to LA or Portland and artist collectives and shared spaces closing down due to an invasion of start up money and astronomical rents. But all of that hasn’t quenched the city’s thirst for getting off, getting weird or finding new ways to connect. Whether that be through cacao, eye contact, or cuddles, or some other kind of kink, the Valley—for all its known faults—isn&#x27;t vanilla.<p>Rapacious capitalists have to do something when bored..