Why don't heterosexuals use hanky codes?

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(Here is a google hit list of "hanky codes" for all of you wondering what the hell it is. Admittedly, I had no idea what is was until two years ago)

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:36 (twenty-one years ago) link

Is this in response to the "are you dominant or submissive?" thread?

― caitlin (caitlin), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:38 (twenty-one years ago) link

The problem is..

* what about colorblind folks?

* what if someone sees your mustard hanky in your right pocket as a yellow hanky instead? Eeeewwwwww.

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:39 (twenty-one years ago) link

Is this in response to the "are you dominant or submissive?" thread?

No, the "Coming out of the closet" thread.. but hey, that would work too!

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:40 (twenty-one years ago) link

Wow.

I had an ex-boyfriend about 15 years ago who was obsessed with hanky codes (and watching Cruising... was that the name of the film?). Eventually he just came out of the closet and spared us all a lot of angst.

― kate, Monday, 13 January 2003 22:41 (twenty-one years ago) link

i am going to start wearing lavendar hankies in all my pockets. actually why doesn't EVERYONE use hanky codes?

― di smith (lucylurex), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:42 (twenty-one years ago) link

Man, I've said this so many fucking times in my life... I'm happy to have found the one other person on this planet who agrees with me that it'd be a great idea.

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:42 (twenty-one years ago) link

I'm obsessed with watching Cruising (that is the name, Kate, if you're thinking of the hairy Al Pacino does the gay club scene flick), but that is because it is quite hilariously bad.

― Nordicskillz (Nordicskillz), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:44 (twenty-one years ago) link

I'm glad that my paisley hanky sends the right message...

― kate, Monday, 13 January 2003 22:47 (twenty-one years ago) link

So what kind of hanky does a rock critic wear?

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:52 (twenty-one years ago) link

polka dot!

― jel -- (jel), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:53 (twenty-one years ago) link

UNDIE POP SHOW HANKY
color: dark cardigan green
Left: likes to look like partner, romulan black hair, hop up and down, and not show emotion
Right: likes to look like partner, romulan black hair, hop up and down, and not show emotion

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:54 (twenty-one years ago) link

a snotty one.

― di smith (lucylurex), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:54 (twenty-one years ago) link

If you just carry tissues, does that make you a cheap date?

― jel -- (jel), Monday, 13 January 2003 22:55 (twenty-one years ago) link

Kleenex.

― Curtis Stephens, Monday, 13 January 2003 22:56 (twenty-one years ago) link

UNDIE POP SHOW HANKY

I thought this one would have Hello Kitty on it...

― brg30 (brg30), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:04 (twenty-one years ago) link

No, that's for undie pop MANGA obsessives. Big difference.

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:08 (twenty-one years ago) link

So what if someone has no idea and they got a red hanky in either pocket?????

― brg30 (brg30), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:09 (twenty-one years ago) link

Then someone's in for a surprise......

― whatzitzname (whatzitzname), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:12 (twenty-one years ago) link

OK seriously now... why no hanky codes for the hetero's or bi's wanting to have fun with the opposite sex?

Is the tradition of heterosexual courtship swimming in such forced subtlety and repression that hanky codes would take the "fun" out of figuring out what the object of adoration may or may not want? Or in brief, do straight people see something like this as too forward to be sexy? As a "straight" guy myself (I use quotes because I believe I fit in the "more adventurous than purely 100% straight" status that Michael Daddino talked about in the "closet" thread), I think hanky codes would be a huge sigh of relief to a lot in the same boat.

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:12 (twenty-one years ago) link

Hm, the ol patriotic red white and blue has interesting implications.

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:13 (twenty-one years ago) link

Or in brief, do straight people see something like this as too forward to be sexy?

you might be onto something there... it seems as tho most people i know (including queers) are into looking for sex without making it obvious they are looking for sex, for fear of being seen as "desperate" or "available". perhaps thats why the ole hanky is not so fashionable anymore.

― di smith (lucylurex), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:22 (twenty-one years ago) link

Has anyone ever been to a traffic light party?

― N. (nickdastoor), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:25 (twenty-one years ago) link

do you mean a traffic cone party? if so: plenty.

― RJG (RJG), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:27 (twenty-one years ago) link

Well, thinking about it more, it's not so much the hanky is out of fashion, but moreso that the "hanky" has taken on a new form these days.. the internet.

Besides, I don't think I could ever do the hanky thing, literally. (Besides, it would make my ass look HUGE!).. but I think a small percentage of guys or girls on the verge of desparation for a one night stand would find it useful. If the stakes aren't too high to begin with, then why kill yourself trying to be subtle?

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:28 (twenty-one years ago) link

Besides, it would make my ass look HUGE!

You're not being asked to wear it as a diaper, silly boy.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:31 (twenty-one years ago) link

If you just carry tissues, does that make you a cheap date?

it means you're going home alone to...y'know...

― Dave M. (rotten03), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:34 (twenty-one years ago) link

cry?

― di smith (lucylurex), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:36 (twenty-one years ago) link

do' bitch: Why don't homosexuals use hanky codes? I've never seen one actually using them (though admittedly it's not like I'm spending every night at the Eagle) and most gay people I've talked to have never heard of it.

― Chris P (Chris P), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:38 (twenty-one years ago) link

Maybe you should come up with a hanky that means "I think hanky codes are a great idea!"

― Chris P (Chris P), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:40 (twenty-one years ago) link

A METAHANKY! Chris, you are brilliant.

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 13 January 2003 23:44 (twenty-one years ago) link

Yay! Pomo handkerchiefs.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 00:31 (twenty-one years ago) link

Why don't homosexuals use hanky codes? I've never seen one actually using them (though admittedly it's not like I'm spending every night at the Eagle)

Exactly. Only old leather queens do the hanky thing. Do you mean the SF Eagle? That's the kind of place you'll see it, yeah. I used to DJ at the Hole in the Wall and occasionally the Eagle, btw.

― Sean (Sean), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 01:35 (twenty-one years ago) link

The Eagle's a chain -- there's one in every major city, and probably a few minor ones. So I was thinking of the Portland Eagle, but from my understanding, they're all the same. (Because when I say I'm not spending every night in them, I mean I've never been in one. Gay bars depress me, and I have no interest in the leather thing.)

― Chris P (Chris P), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 01:45 (twenty-one years ago) link

Ambiguity sucks, hanky codes are great. We should all use them. Also they'd give excuses to collect handkerchiefs which would be great. (Also didn't Victorians or some other dead straight people use them?)

― Maria (Maria), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 02:28 (twenty-one years ago) link

even though not all gangsters are straight...just visit dorms fifty 1 to fifty 4 hundred in lacj...i highly reccomend it...we don't have the segregation problem...the only fights that occur are either relationship based,or closely follow Threes' Company.."i overheard you and i took what you said completely out of context(generic form-script number two )"....well......i say "we" even though i consider myself straight...i just get sick of people telling me i sit like a girl in the straight dorm .....oh,and,yeah...you're a lot more likely to get raped or harrassed in the so-called straight section of any jail...lots of repressed homosexuality...that manifests itself violently...ouch.....i dunno....isn't it the same damm hanky?(getting back to the question)..?...i'm too tired right now to say anything even slightly funny.sniff.

― ummmm....the bloods...the crips....did the bandana identity crisis begin and end, Tuesday, 14 January 2003 02:28 (twenty-one years ago) link

Ambiguity sucks, hanky codes are great.

Bah -- ambiguity is truth. It's not like I'd wear the same hanky every night or with every person. For you it might be [color], but for someone else it might be [other color], what I was into yesterday doesn't prove what I'll be into tomorrow, etc., etc.

― Chris P (Chris P), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 02:31 (twenty-one years ago) link

The Eagle's a chain

There may be a chain of Eagle's... I know the owners of the one in SF; it's not part of a chain. Actually, both the HITW and the Eagle (sf) are the *least* depressing gay bars I know of... I still barely set foot in them anymore though.

― Sean (Sean), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 02:33 (twenty-one years ago) link

Ambiguity sucks, hanky codes are great

So everytime I see hunter green I should say "Will you be my sugar daddy?!?"

― brg30 (brg30), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 03:00 (twenty-one years ago) link

Clearly hanky codes should be mandatory for FAPs

― James Blount, Tuesday, 14 January 2003 03:05 (twenty-one years ago) link

just be careful accepting a beer from anyone with a yellow hanky

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 03:19 (twenty-one years ago) link

I don't get the need for a 'tons o' fun' one - can't someone just look at you and see you're fat?

Anyhow, light blue left pocket

― James Blount, Tuesday, 14 January 2003 03:27 (twenty-one years ago) link

I don't get the need for a 'tons o' fun' one - can't someone just look at you and see you're fat?

I imagine you would probably only find it worn on the right hand side.

Where's my orange hanky?

― electric sound of jim (electricsound), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 03:38 (twenty-one years ago) link

I would prefer button hole flowers for conveying messages. Like the lady with the camelias (I don't speak French)

― isadora (isadora), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 04:15 (twenty-one years ago) link

I would prefer button hole flowers for conveying messages. Like the lady with the camelias

Or Oscar Wilde and his green carnation. (I was thinking of those examples as precursors to the hanky code. Has anyone else here head Robert Hitchens' The Green Carnation?)

― j.lu (j.lu), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 05:16 (twenty-one years ago) link

"read". For an editor, I sure can type dumb sometimes.

― j.lu (j.lu), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 05:17 (twenty-one years ago) link

Occasionally I see the het. community using the hanky codes, but more frequently I see them using the key-ring codes to cover the top/bottom/dominant/submissive identifications. Likewise, there are other subtle codes, like the BDSM flag that show-up on key-chains and rings and pins, etc. Just designs to the vanilla world, a communication tool to the pervs.

― LCD (Ms Laura), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 05:17 (twenty-one years ago) link

j.lu, I find myself in the same boat - I can edit other's work, but refuse to see the mistakes in my own until after it's posted. Kind of Murphy's Law-ish or something.

― LCD (Ms Laura), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 05:18 (twenty-one years ago) link

I had an ex-boyfriend about 15 years ago who was obsessed with hanky codes

Kate I thought you were 22? nevermind

― Vic (Vic), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 06:01 (twenty-one years ago) link

The Eagle might not actually be a chain; there nevertheless is one in every city, and they serve the same clientele.

― Chris P (Chris P), Tuesday, 14 January 2003 07:46 (twenty-one years ago) link

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