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hausboy -> RE: The term "Old guard" (12/24/2010 8:50:18 AM)
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Folks:
May I suggest that on your next vacation to Chicago, you stop and visit the National Leather Archives and Museum?
What we now associate with "Old Guard"-both the term and what it implies--existed long before Norman's body of works, and while the author certainly may have lived during that time in leather history, he is not credited with the creation of the term "Old Guard"--but I'm certainly willing to check with the archives division of the NLA to verify this.
"Old Guard" stemmed from the gay leathermen's community--and the term "community" is used loosely here. It was subculture in the truest sense of the word, and unlike the BDSM cultures of today (they are hardly subcultures anymore when you can find their evidence walking into a strip mall), you didn't have "rules" written down, posted on the internet. Arising from the 1940's--and establishing itself in the 1950's--the various subcultures both in the Leather subculture (and within the Lesbian community, the butch/femme subculture) their "rules" if you will, were almost a reflection of the society itself. The rigid male/female roles found in American 1940/1950 life expanded into rigid sexual and relationship roles within both the lesbian world and the leather one, and what you call "rules" essentially was a code of conduct for those in the culture. They were inherent...spoken.....and the "enforcement" if you will, was entirely dependent upon those living within the culture. Those who did not conform to that code could find themselves outcast or pushed out of the subculture through social exclusion.
Part of that subculture that is most often associated with "Old Guard" values--and from my understanding, it is this particular "value" that is most connected to Gorean lifestyle--is the tenet that a Master is always a Master--trained by other Masters in the ways of sadism and such. And just our society's rigid structure of male and female roles began to break down in the 60's--and a gay liberation surfaced in the 1970's--those rigid roles, codes of conduct and ways of the past began to fade into history. They transitioned from a strict social code to a suggestive one--and just as the next generation of sexually liberated men and women broke those boundaries, the leather community started to morph into a more diverse and less rigid structure.
Used often when I was coming out into the gay leather communtiy in the late 1980's, "Old Guard" often was the term used to refer to those who preferred to adhere to the "old ways of thinking" of who held what role, how were they trained and how they carried themselves. Same as "Old School" -- it became much more of an adjective applied to the philosophy as much as the practice itself.
"New Guard" was coined by a newer generation of leatherfolk who refused to accept the rigidity that those Old Guard tenets required, and those who identified as Switches clearly flew in the face of convention in that regard. It's really sad to me that what I have seen lately, both in the Queer S/M communties and the Straight ones, is that "Old Guard" has become something of an insult or a dirty word. The Old Guard is a part of all of our past and history as Leatherfolk and should be embraced as such.
I was brought into the leather world by what we would consider "New Guard"--and many of my colleagues, mentors and friends were Old Guard, leather dinosaurs who entertained me with their reminiscing stories of the leather underground worlds in the 50's. Sadly, most have passed now--many from AIDS or cancer. Their verbal histories are lost as well, but all the more reason to support the National Leather Archives and Museum in Chicago.
In any case, I'll contact my various resources to see if I can trace down the actual root of the word.
My apologies: Dark Stteven, you are correct. I just noticed the date on this thread. If interest surfaces, I'll start a fresh one.
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