Fridae

John Goss is a multi-media artist, activist and programmer who has designed high-tech special effects for dance clubs and theme parks around Asia. This American member of the World Tribe was born in Germany, grew up in Hawaii and has spent much of his life in the Asia/Pacific region. While an AIDS activist with ACT UP in the late 1980s, he attended the regional International Lesbian and Gay Association conference in Bangkok and produced a documentary on grass-roots HIV education in Thailand. His independent video works were shown at the first Hong Kong (1989) and Tokyo (1992) G&L film/video festivals. John, together with artist and friend Tan Peng, held the first openly gay art exhibition in Singapore at The Substation (1993).

Now forty-two, John keeps busy tending the gardens of Utopia, which lie somewhere between Bangkok, Tokyo and Los Angeles. We caught up with him in cyberspace.

About Utopia

æ: Can you tell us more about Utopia and why it was set up?

john: In 1994, together with friends from Singapore, the US, and Thailand, I founded Utopia, Southeast Asia's first gay and lesbian center.

Utopia's goal was to provide a positive alternative to the commercial-sex scene; a place where gays and lesbians could find books and magazines relating to their lives, make new friends, and socialize beyond stereotypes. The Utopia complex featured a shop, cafe, art gallery, a mixed gay/lesbian pub, and a guesthouse. We established community-building strategies in a largely fractured and competitive gay scene, serving as an information center, hosting author readings, workshops, exhibitions, Thailand's 1st G&L film/video festival curated by Paul Lee, and providing a much-needed locale for visiting and local women to interact.

æ: How did the Utopia-Asia website come about?

john: A website seemed a logical extension of Utopia's information hub. I bought a couple of tutorial books and taught myself HTML, coding the initial website with pen and paper because I didn't even have a modem at that time! We went online in December 1995. In the beginning it was the shop which sponsored the website, but within a couple of years it became clear that the reverse was going to be true.

æ: How has Utopia-Asia affected the gay community, especially in Asia?

john: The Internet was warmly adopted by gays and lesbians, especially in Asia where privacy is paramount and gay information was hard to come by.

With Utopia-Asia I have tried to create a space of high integrity for G&L communities to emerge publicly. I also hope that we've assisted people in forming closer and happier human relationships.

æ: How did Utopia enter the gay travel scene?

john: When the Asian economic bubbles began bursting, starting with the Thai economy, Utopia shifted gears. Whereas previously about 70% of our customers were middle-class Thai, after the baht collapse our customers became mostly tourists whose interests and needs were quite different.

Author and cyberguru, Douglas Thompson, had always encouraged me to add a tour component to Utopia and so, together with good friend Robert, we formed Utopia Tours to assist other travellers in experiencing the places and cultures we love. The Internet was the key to our successful transition and remains integral to our continuing growth.

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Our Community

æ: Have you ever encountered prejudice because of your sexuality? How did you deal with it?

john: High school was like surviving "Planet of the Apes". It seemed like the worst possible thing was to be different. So I started creating my own worlds and mythologies to make sense of my outsider position in culture, gender, and race. Now I understand that my gay sensibility is a treasure.

æ: What do you think we need most in Asia's gay and lesbian community?

john: To recognize and support our unsung community leaders, to archive the past, and to invent the future.

One idea that is very tired and needs to be put to bed is that Asia lacks homosexual traditions, which are somehow a "western" import. Asia has rich and unique traditions of sexual diversity almost everywhere you look (16th century missionaries were mocked in the streets by incredulous Japanese saying, "these are the men who think sodomy is wrong!").

However, sexual relationships in Asia have "traditionally" been based on imbalances of age, power, wealth, and gender. The romantic, egalitarian notion that family ties can be formed based on love is the western gay liberation export.

The true enemies of gays and lesbians in places like Singapore, Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines are antique colonial laws and homophobic, non-Asian religions that bully citizens with skewed views of the natural world. In the words of The Smiths, "the music they constantly play says nothing to me about my life."

æ: What advice would you give to someone who is trying to come to terms with his or her sexuality?

Cultivate your garden and appreciate the blossoms.

About You

æ: When did you realize you were gay?

john: When the Scoutmaster's son crept into my tent at midnight on a beach at the US Marine Corps base in Kaneohe. We emerged just before dawn and there, balanced on the Pacific horizon, was a comet glittering like a big OK! from god.

æ: What kind of underwear person are you?

john: I once required a lover to remove his underwear at Changi Airport and give it to me as a parting gift.

æ: What's your favourite CD?

john: Now: Bali - Wondermints
Then: Together Alone - Crowded House
Always: Hejira - Joni Mitchell

Apr�s Interview

æ: What is your kinkiest experience?

john: I think that the guy who called me for an al fresco quickie at his housing estate as he sat night watch at his father's wake might be considered kinky.

æ: Which is sexier, mind or meat?

john: Uncut nerd.

æ: Towel or tissue?

john: I'll always remember the guy who casually grabbed his own t-shirt to wipe us both down after a messy session. That was such a butch thing to do! Topped only by a moonlight trick at Fort Road who reached into his backpack and pulled out his Singapore police uniform to mop up the evidence.