Recently I had the pleasure to get to compete to be the 2013 Mr. San Francisco Leather. I came in 1st runner up, and while I am, of course, disappointed I didn't win, after taking some time to reflect on things, I have realized that what I gained from competing is worth far more than any title could have been.
In previous posts I have touched on the abuse I suffered at the hands of my father growing up, and while there was some physical components to it, the worst of it was psychological. I grew up thinking I didn't have much worth. I didn't feel I deserved to be happy, and was always afraid of people who were nice to me just for the sake of being nice. However all that changed while getting ready for the contest.
Several men and women in the community offered their knowledge, expertise, and time to help me prepare for no other reason than the fact that they wanted to see me do well. I had mentors who helped me on every step of the way that I know without them, I wouldn't have been able to do as well as I did. I had someone helping me get my application together and getting my sponsorship together, someone who helped quiz me on things I needed to know for my interview, someone to help review and critique my selection of clothing for the weekend, someone to review what I wanted to say in my speech, someone to help groom my public demeanor, and after it was all over, and I was worried I had let them all down by not winning, I was instead met with such praise for my performance that I was at a loss for words.
I had never felt such overwhelming and unconditional love as I had from the leather community that weekend, and I realized at that point that I had, through my preparations, allowed myself to lower my guard. I now know how to let people love me and how to express my gratitude to other people, and more importantly I have positive role models in my life. I have men older than myself who have mentored me and continue to be there for me, who, now almost fill the father figure role I never had, and have already made me feel more loved.
And after all this, for the first time in my life, I am starting to truly believe that I deserve to be happy. That I deserve to be able to love people and receive their love. I am so very blessed to have had this experience and to have met so many wonderful people and am excited to see how my life continues to unfold now thanks to their influence.
Friday, March 15, 2013
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Google vs Porn
Has Google decided it knows what's best for us? Does the world's largest search engine think that even when we tell it we are okay with explicit or adult related search results that we really didn't want to see that, or are they, like so many, bending to the idea that they don't want "the children" to look up porn on computers (neverminding that you can still set your Google settings to filter explicit content and lock those settings in place, thus keeping children from viewing them)
It seems that this has been the case. Occasionally I'll be in the position of needing to look up photos of colleges in the industry when talking about them with friends to either show them who they are or remind them, or in some cases I find myself looking up photos of other men in the industry when looking for photos to show people what I'm trying to obtain with my body. Over the last few months, however, I'm finding it has become harder and harder to get the results from my image search that I'm looking for, and it wasn't until this morning when a friend of mine did a Yahoo image search that I found the results there to be much more appropriate to the search we were doing.
Take for example Adam Killian. Google gives us results like this:
As you can see, not all the images in the top results are even him, and most of the photos showing aren't that pornographic, just a few showing his butt crack.
Now on a Yahoo search, I get this:
This time the results are much more accurate. All photos of him, some very pornographic.
It becomes even more obvious the less super star status the person has gotten close to obtaining. Take for example a still well known porn actor, Leo Forte on google:
and on Yahoo:
As you can again see here we've been censored out. I have made certain that my options do not tell Google to filter explicit results, and so this does not seem to be a case of settings, but more a reason for me to change search engines to one that doesn't feel the need to tell us that the internet isn't really for porn.
It seems that this has been the case. Occasionally I'll be in the position of needing to look up photos of colleges in the industry when talking about them with friends to either show them who they are or remind them, or in some cases I find myself looking up photos of other men in the industry when looking for photos to show people what I'm trying to obtain with my body. Over the last few months, however, I'm finding it has become harder and harder to get the results from my image search that I'm looking for, and it wasn't until this morning when a friend of mine did a Yahoo image search that I found the results there to be much more appropriate to the search we were doing.
Take for example Adam Killian. Google gives us results like this:
As you can see, not all the images in the top results are even him, and most of the photos showing aren't that pornographic, just a few showing his butt crack.
Now on a Yahoo search, I get this:
This time the results are much more accurate. All photos of him, some very pornographic.
It becomes even more obvious the less super star status the person has gotten close to obtaining. Take for example a still well known porn actor, Leo Forte on google:
and on Yahoo:
As you can again see here we've been censored out. I have made certain that my options do not tell Google to filter explicit results, and so this does not seem to be a case of settings, but more a reason for me to change search engines to one that doesn't feel the need to tell us that the internet isn't really for porn.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)