SPEAKING OF THE HANKIE CODEIt pays, the saying goes, to advertise. And why should advertising sex be any different? Queer men have invented any number of ingenious ways - sometimes subtle, sometimes bold - to flaunt their tastes. | |
| Back in Oscar Wilde's time, when being gay was "the love that dare not speak its name," English queers took to wearing green-dyed carnations as a means of mutual identification, one unlikely to raise suspicion among those not in the know. But even in these "enlightened" times, when rainbow gizmos are everywhere, there are ways to visually let each other know what's what. | 
The OutUK Pocket Guide To The Hankie Code |
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One of the best-known methods is the hankie code, which, rising to prominence in
the early post-Stonewall days, aspired to encode the gamut of sexual kinks, using
the colour and position of pocket handkerchiefs.
Some trace the hankie code back to Gold Rush days in the early American West, where dancers in all-male mining town saloons would divvy up into "fellers" and "gals," the pretend-women wearing identifying kerchiefs wrapped around their arms. Whatever the relevance of this bit of history, San Francisco Castro clones, a century later, found that a well-placed handkerchief looked fetching in the back pocket of their Levi's 501s, and a whole language of hankies arouse. Some mad queen somewhere assigned hankie colours to dozens of sexual predilections, and "official" hankie code lists started making the rounds. Plenty of the code clearly is for entertainment only; has anyone with a preference for circumcised cocks ever actually gone around sporting a brown satin hankie in his right rear pocket? Unlikely. Would anyone wearing boxer shorts stick a paisley hankie in his pocket to advertise the fact? Puh-leeze. Still, a few hankie symbols are in more-or-less widespread use. In general, the guiding principle is that a hankie in the left rear pocket indicates "top"; one in the right pocket indicates a preference for bottoming. Therefore, someone with a navy blue hankie in his left pocket likes to fuck, while one in the right pocket shows a desire to get fucked. Or else a runny nose. And therein lies the problem; many of the most-used hankie colors are very common ones. "In my experience," says one man who's been around the scene, "the hankie code may be useful in bars and at play parties, where knowing who's into what can speed things along. It's riskier, though, to assume that some stranger on the street is using his red handkerchief to show he's into fisting." Actually, that red handkerchief seems to be one of the most enduring, widely used of the hankie symbols, probably because fisting is a minority enthusiasm that requires some experience and knowledge on the participants' part. Navy seems to be out there, too, while light blue indicates, depending on position, liking to give head or wanting to get blown. Black hankies indicate a fondness for heavy SM, gray ones for bondage. Yellow is fairly self-explanatory. One unforeseen use of the hankie code has come about online. Some folks, circumventing censorship, choose to write kinky ads and profiles using hankie code colors, sometimes so extensively that it requires a list to figure out just what makes their dicks hard. There are other signifiers out there, too. A big ring of keys worn on the left might indicate the guy's a big ol' top. Or it may just indicate he's a caretaker. And in the old days, little teddy bears were a marker for those who liked to cuddle; now they're worn by those who self-identify as bears or bear-lovers. And then of course someone's come up with the new non-sexual hankie code which includes green - your dinner date insists on finding organic restaurants in the worst parts of town with no parking spaces and muggers on every corner, lavender - the Siamese cat lover who doesn't see anything wrong with allowing his pets to sleep on your face when you stay overnight and orange - the gym bunny and tanning booth lover who owns a startling array of hair and skin products and who's entire conversation on shopping trips revolves round the question "Does it make my arse look big?"
Yep, a symbol is worth a thousand words. Oh and by the way... that guy with the coral hankie
in his right pocket? Shoes off! He wants to suck your toes.
Simon SheppardSan Francisco artist and activist Simon Sheppard is best known for his contributions to the erotic literary scene. He wrote hundreds of stories that appeared in S/M magazines; erotic anthologies; and over twenty editions of Best Gay Erotica and Best American Erotica. His Sextalk column has appeared on OutUK for more than 20 years. You can find out more about Simon Sheppard in this OutUK feature and tribute, or take a look at some of his many books that are still available:
Looking for something very sexy and just as smart? Man on Man collects the best and hottest gay sex writing by Simon, who is also co-editor of Rough Stuff: Tales of Gay Men, Sex, and Power as well as a collection of gay erotica called Hotter Than Hell. In KINKORAMA : Dispatches from the Front Lines of Perversion he takes readers behind the unmarked doors and black vinyl curtains that lead to the sometimes shocking, often hilarious, relentlessly arousing scenarios of extreme sex. There are also stories of bears in Tales from the Bear Cult: Beat Bear Stories from the Best Magazines. | |
