Strange Fruit #104: Why Would Straight Men Sleep With Men?

Everyone knows that gay men sleep with men, and straight men sleep with women. Right? On this week's show, we learn it’s not always that simple. Today we’re listening back to a conversation we had with Dr. Joe Kort. He’s a sex and relationship therapist based in Detroit, and when we talked in September 2013, he’d just had an article published at the Huffington Post about why straight-identified men sometimes have sex with other men. In it, he shares a whole list of reasons why this phenomenon might happen. These reasons are by turns predictable (they’re in prison with no access to women), poignant (they seek to replace the affection they didn’t get from their fathers), hilarious (narcissism!) and taboo (we’re pretty sure this was the first time the word cuckholding has been uttered on Strange Fruit). It was a fascinating conversation and Dr. Kort shed some light on a lot of things. (NOTE: This conversation includes some blunt talk about human sexuality, and some discussion of sexual abuse —if that’s not something you can listen to, consider sitting this one out, and we'll see you next week! ♥) To close out today's show, labor historian Toni Gilpin shares a little-known story from 1940s Louisville. A local chapter of the United Farm Machinery workers organized at Louisville’s International Harvester plant in the late 1940s, and began advocating for racial equality both inside and outside of the plant. Their efforts would lead to an entire factory of mostly white workers walking off the job to protest the unfair treatment of their African American colleagues. Outside the factory walls, union members tried to desegregate the Brown Hotel and Cherokee Park—both whites-only at the time—and were met with violence and forcible removal by police.