Ask Beastly: Why Can’t I Hook Up on Gay Cruises?

Struggling to score at sea? You might need more practice on land.

Hi Beastly,

My husband and I go on many cruises on several cruise lines. I've heard of guys finding all kinds of people to hook up with when they go on cruises, but I've never had any luck. I have tried three or four of the hook-up apps, but they never seem to work for me. I'm not sure if guys are afraid to approach me because I'm totally blind or because I'm with my hubby. I do let it be known that I'm willing and able to play. Any advice on how to meet guys willing to play while on a cruise vacation?

Foreskin Tugger

Hey F. T.

I’m assuming you mean specifically gay cruises. I don’t know if a standard Royal Caribbean cruise is necessarily a hot time for homosexuals.

But gay cruises are—or so I’m told. I’ve never been on one and likely never will. You know that feeling at a party when you want to leave but can’t, for whatever reason? A gay cruise sounds to me like one giant, nonstop dose of that.

So, while I can’t specifically advise on how to hook up on a cruise, I can advise on cruising. For those who don’t know, “cruising” in gay parlance means walking through a bar, club, park, or just on the street, looking for guys to fuck—an old-school art of eye contact, head nods, gaze, and glances that men used to pick each other up in the pre-Grindr, pre-Internet age.

But first, a question: Are cruises the only place where you and your partner feel free to play with others? This is not my first question here about gay cruises or hoped-for encounters on them. Guys seem to view them with certain sexual expectations. Perhaps, for couples, they are "special circumstances"—brief times when the rules are off, freedom is given to all, and sluthood is the law of the land.

I think that’s the wrong way to view sluthood. Sluthood can be an integral part of your daily life. When you compartmentalise sluthood and permit it only in an exeptional place like a gay cruise, where you are literally disconnected from the world (the mainland), and keep it separate from the norms of daily life, you make it shameful, secretive, and forbidden, allowed only to exist in special, nonreal spaces, removed from the mundane and the dull. In doing so, you do two things: 1) You set up the expectation that because sexual freedom is the exception, it must be exceptional; it must be wild and hedonisitic, and 2) You enforce what most people think about hedonism, that it is reckless and dangerous and therefore must be contained.

I live sluthood. It exists in the quiet hum of my days. I’m a slut when I make the bed and meditate every morning. I’m a slut when I read my book at night. This sluthood, this quiet hedonism, is less taxing on my mind and body than when I allowed it only to exist in rare bursts at special events.

That was a period of my life marked by wild parties, drugs, and shame. For a night (or a weekend), I had a fun journey to the dark cave, fantasyland, whatever you want to call it: a party or sex club, some place where I went wild. For years, I told myself this form of hedonism worked because it was separate from my everyday life—it existed only in exceptional circumstances and would not step beyond those bounds.

That meant that I avoided hedonism during the work week, or during “normal life,” and went far, far too wild in the times I dedicated to sexual freedom, often having to recover from them mentally and physically. Because I was starving myself most of the time, my sex life was defined by intensity. And believing that my “true” self, my most authentic sexual identity, only existed in weekends of abandon—drugs and sex with strangers—just reinforced the internalised gay shame I was taught all my life.

Once I stopped trying to box my desires in—after I accepted the fact that I am really like this, I want this stuff, and this is just who I am—I started living with it more healthily. It was something of a surprise to learn I can just have a nice date with a nice guy, or leave the party after one fuck, not twenty. I brought sluthood into everyday life.

Sluthood, fully welcomed into one’s life, becomes a managed, shame-free, and consistent part of one’s days. I enjoy my sexual desires more now that I can indulge them any afternoon, any weekend, so long as I keep the rest of my life—the cooking, the bills, the work—balanced. I don’t have “special circumstances”. All life is a special circumstance. Wouldn't thou like to live deliciously?

I think the specific location you’re asking about is less important. If you’re struggling to hook up on a (presumably gay) cruise, you’ll struggle everywhere. So I’ll address the core of what you’re asking: Why does in-person sex hunting not work? Why do the apps suck? What am I doing wrong?

In our modern world, with all its advances, there are only three ways to meet other MSM. There are in-person, explicitly gay spaces like gay bars, clubs, and cruisy toilets (and cruises). There are apps like Grindr and Scruff, among others. And then there are an unlimited number of non-explicitly gay events where you can happen to meet a gay man—cocktail parties, sports events, the opera, nights out, and so on.

Half a century ago, gay men only had two of those. They didn't have apps and websites. (They had personal ads in gay magazines, but we don't have those anymore.) Here's the rub: No one will be good at all three. Pick one (two at most) and focus on that.

I am not good at apps. They drain my energy, and the encounters tend to be unsatisfying. That doesn't mean in-person is easier. It's hard. I grew up with apps, so they are familiar to me. But by letting them go and shifting my focus to in-person hunting, I now get more practice in that arena. And that’s really what all sex, all cruising, all hooking up, amounts to: practice. Practice, practice, practice.

This is also why I asked my first question. Do you only practice on a gay cruise? If so, that is not enough. Invite your hedonism into your daily life. Try sluthood at home, on the mainland, where you live—on your weekends and nights off. You need more practice so that when the gay cruise comes around, you know what to do.

Explicitly gay spaces require a different strategy than non-explicitly gay ones, so I count them as two different ways to meet men. Many guys just don't like gay bars and clubs. Those men should put their energy into non-explicitly gay spaces—they should do things that put them in contact with more people and assume some of those people will be gay men. You might not meet as many gay men this way, but you might make friends, and every adult needs that, too.

Focusing your energy on explicitly gay spaces, like gay bars, is a different ballgame. It requires you to ask around and learn where to go. Unfortunately, it also usually involves some degree of substance use. That’s an unfortunate fact of gay culture, though there are a growing number of sober-friendly gay and queer spaces in major cities across the world. Still, most explicitly gay spaces are places of substance use. Focusing on these spaces is often not an ideal option for sober or moderating guys.

I’m not telling you anything new. You know all this. You know the ways to meet men are few and, even with modern tech, still limited. They still require work.

But that work is good. It matters. Because you need sex. You need to play. You’re human. So pick one arena to play in—online, IRL-gay, or IRL-but-not-explicitly-gay—and practice only in that arena for a bit.

Yes, being blind and married might make men disinterested, and the married part is more understandable. Many men feel uncomfortable hooking up with someone who is married. You can’t do anything about that, nor can you change your eyesight or any other things about yourself, so you must simply decide that you don’t want to fuck someone who doesn’t like all of you. I do this with my HIV. A man must embrace it or leave. There is no middle ground.

Do not apologise for any part of yourself or see anything about yourself as a barrier. Instead, see all parts of yourself—especially things you might be rejected for—as a first-step test every potential sex partner must pass to get the goods.

You will not have fun on gay cruises if you only play on gay cruises. Guys who go wild on cruises probably go wild back on the mainland, too. They’re practised. They know how these spaces work. There is only one way to get confident in sexually-charged gay spaces, and that is to be in them often. You can’t go from a quiet life in the country straight into a wild sex club and know what to do. These spaces require skills learned from repeat visits.

Pro tip on these spaces: Thankfully, they all tend to be similar. There is usually an adjacent room near the dance floor where guys fuck. Look for the dark corners. Ask around to see if there is a backroom. When drugs get stronger or the party gets later, sex often starts spilling onto the dance floor. If you want to fuck somewhere more private, that usually means going back to a room or cabin (or, on the mainland, home) which generally means leaving the party. Don’t take it personally if someone just doesn't want to go yet.

You will have to make the first move. Assume every man is shy (most men are). Even experienced sluts won’t throw themselves at you, especially if you appear to be with a partner. You have to say something, so have some icebreakers in mind. Complements are nice. Don’t break the ice by talking badly about the party or someone else—ever.

If you want to have sex without a conversation beforehand, you can only do that in a dark cruising area or backroom. I can all but guarantee every gay cruise has one (or several).

And that’s it. Those tips don’t just apply to gay cruises. They apply to any gay space where men are expected to dance, party, flirt, and fuck around.

The hardest part is getting practice and building your confidence, and that won’t happen in seven days at sea. That will happen back home, on weekends, between work, errands, and the tedium of life. That's where gay magic lives.

Love, Beastly