I UNDERSTAND THAT the Steamworks in Berkeley went entirely smoke-free-by law-last year (and the rest of California followed on Jan. 1st of this year). If cigarette smoke is detected, the staff will actually make an announcement over the intercom: "Someone in Room N is smoking. Please put it out. Smoking is not allowed at the Steamworks." Now, I'm no fan of government regulation, of any kind-but this is the sort of development that should have happened years ago, independent of governmental meddling. I can't tell you how many trips to the baths or sexclubs or bookstores have been ruined by some rude fucker lighting up a cigarette under my nose. Generally speaking, I'm too discreet to complain because on one occasion when I did complain, years ago, I ended up in the hospital, getting seven stitches in my face. That episode cost me $700 in medical bills-and the police questioned ME, not him, because he claimed I was 'putting the make' on him. (I tapped him on the shoulder, to get his attention.) In any case: I'm delighted to see that there are finally 'safe' spaces for non-smokers.

Our dear friend pansy, in his recent review of City Entertainment, complained of the non-smoking policy, then added that he ignored it, using the confines of a video booth to light up. He's not alone. I've encountered many such boors, in many venues. It takes an incredible degree of insensitivity, I feel, to befoul these tiny enclosures with noxious fumes; unfortunately, management has little incentive to control it. My opinion is that such people should be shot on sight, without benefit of trial. Please don't suspect me of being a closet Republican; I merely wish to grant their collective death-wish in the most expeditious manner possible. Quite liberal of me, really.

The ones who really outrage me, of course, are the ones who move into a bathhouse cubicle with me and then light up. I don't try to claim that cigarette smoke makes me asthmatic; I just loathe the smell, and do my damnedest to avoid associating with people who reek of it. I feel similarly about those inconsiderate morons who insist on opening their poppers in the sauna. Why oh why can't we just establish one national Smoking Area-say, North Carolina-and send all smokers there, to live out their unnatural lives in peace? The other unsafe behavior of which gay men seem irrationally fond is drinking. Am I a moralizer? Yes, in that I acknowledge certain facts about the essential destructiveness of alcohol. And I'm not even talking about the myriad physical ravages: I'm just talking about watching normally-rational men turning into maudlin, slurring, stumbling, brain-dead animals. Does this mean I want alcohol banned by government edict? Heavens no. That never solves anything. I just don't understand why it is that gay men seem so dependent on the stuff. Many seem unable to have sex unless they're smashed. Just one more destructive habit. And yet the politically-conservative segment of the population focuses on sex as the big bad monster that destroys lives. They're financially entangled with alcohol and tobacco; so obviously those can't be the problem. What can it be? Well, sex is always a good target...

Which leads us to the notion of 'sex addiction.' You've all heard about it: the twelve-steppers claim that most any sex is addictive behavior, that it stunts a person's ability to develop intimacy and sidetracks spiritual maturity. And, well, you may think me a traitor to the cause of sexual freedom, but I sometimes agree with them. Seldom, but sometimes. There is such a thing as 'abuse' of sex ... but defining it objectively is impossible. The act of sex, per Se, can never be bad; the uses to which it is occasionally put, however, certainty can be. When the NEED for sex prevents someone from accomplishing something that he objectively considers more important, then it's time to re-evaluate his sex-life. When the need for sex (or, for that matter, drugs, alcohol, or masturbation) gets in the way of interpersonal relationships, then maybe it's time to decide which is more important: sex, or relationships. (I've recently changed my mind about this, by the way.) These are not choices you can delegate-but you need to recognize that you're making them, daily, whether or not you admit it.

Does all this seem obvious, elementary, Sexuality 101? 1 agree. But there is a large contingent of people out there who still feel that they need to tell us how to live our lives. They pass laws mandating that businesses shall be smoke-free; they declare that sex and alcohol may not mingle; they 'protect' us by initiating innumerable prosecutions against 'obscenity'; and they try to tell us what sexual habits are 'moral.' (Some moralists substitute the phrase 'good for you.' They mean the same thing: Father Knows Best.) I don't know what behavior is best for you. You're the only person who can decide that, as you're the only one who can truly take responsibility for your actions. It's tempting, occasionally, to ask government to lift that responsibility from our shoulders, to say Please Big Daddy, tell me what's good for us ... but it's not possible. Like it or not, these are all personal decisions. By declining responsibility for them, you're giving up the rights and prerogatives of a human being.

Everyone is different. What is addictive to one person may be healthy for another. What's unsafe for me may be safe for you, and vice versa. You wanna know what behaviors I call unsafe? Smoking tobacco and drinking, sure; excessive' drug usage, yeah; bareback fucking, probably. But most dangerous of all: swallowing someone else's dogma straight, without analyzing it yourself.