Toronto news and views, updated every day. torontonotes@eyeweekly.com.
Just one month after Paul Gallant wrote in EYE WEEKLY (in gAll laid out,h on June 18) about how the Supreme Courtfs 2005 decision legalizing on-premises sex clubs ? previously outlawed as bawdy houses ? had made Toronto gCanadafs Amsterdam,h Canadafs Paper Of Record follows up. The story by Lisan Jutras in the old grey Globe carries the risqu?-by-their-standards double entendre headline gA swinging way to keep the tourists comingh ? is the Globe newsroom demonstrating here a newfound crudity or their total innocent ignorance? Hard to tell, but one presumes the former. Unlike Gallantfs report, she ignores Teh Gay, keeps her descriptions out on the sidewalk and, most interestingly, focuses on the tourist angle. (I mean, surely these clubs are full of vacationing Yankees, no? They canft be peopled by citizens of Toronto the Good, can they? City Councillor Mark Grimes recoils at the thought, saying, essentially gOMG yer gonna give my neighbourhood cooties!h And god knows he must know what hefs talking about, right?)
But anyway, from Jutras:
The sex clubs have been proliferating since 2005, when a Supreme Court decision rewrote the definition of indecency, ruling that clubs that offer group sex and partner-swapping are legal because they cause society no harm.Since then, the Canadian sex-tourism trade has flourished, particularly in the GTA. "There's a buzz around Toronto," says Diane.Wicked, Club Hers and M?nage ? Quatre are all "on-premise" establishments, meaning that clients can engage in sexual activities in the club - and just about anything, as long as it is consensual, goes. Wicked, for example, is housed in a three-storey building and the vibe gets kinkier the higher you climb, culminating in a third-floor members-only zone featuring "sex furniture" and quarters designed for sexual idiosyncrasies.On-premise clubs are illegal in some U.S. states, but even in states where they are technically legal, such as New York, the practice isn't well tolerated, says Richard Pollara, proprietor of M?nage ? Quatre.
Now before it sets the type on its gToronto: Come Againh advertising campaign, Toronto Tourism may want to consider the other elements of Toronto the Hot fnf Bothered that wefve long thought were worth marketing (why should Las Vegas get all the pervy tourist dollars, after all?):FULL CONTACT LAP DANCES: In some US States, strippers keep their underpants on. In others, you canft have a beer while you admire the show. Here, in the land built on the Beaver trade, $10 gets you a crappy domestic bottle and $20 a song gets you a fully naked stipper writhing in your lap, spreading her goods in your face and allowing you to touch her breasts. In fact, just put that last sentence on the brochures.LEGAL PROSTITUTION: You can still go to jail for streetwalking or pimping, but the in-call sex trade is not only allowed but out and proud. And on this very website.BATHING-OPTIONAL BATHHOUSES: An innocent wandering around Church and Wellesley would think that the homosexuals were the cleanest people on earth, what with all the bathhouses all over the place. But $20 gets you a private room for eight hours and from what we understand, the hot tub is kind of besides the point. (Bathhouse patron to strip club patron: $20 per song for dancing? Yer doin it wrong!)AND OF COURSE THOSE SEX CLUBS: Including our favourite, Goodhandyfs Pansexual Playground, which is clubba-non-gratta to the daily press, as well as all kinds of other places to get some OPP in front of a crowd.All this and your clich?d jokes about the skylines phallic and vulvic symbols too! The possibilities are Unlimited.