Male Escort and Gross Indecency

I was born on December 30th, 1947, in a French-Canadian Catholic family. I had one older sister, one twin sister and one younger sister, no brothers. We lived in a rural village called Saint-Joachim, not too far from the Windsor-Detroit border in south-western Ontario. My father was foreman at General Motors.

My mother told me that when I was 12 or 13, she had said to my father: “I will talk to our daughters, you talk to our son.” She meant talking about sex. My father never sat down with me to have this discussion, to explain how babies were made. It’s not something that was done in his own family. When a classmate called me “cock-sucker”, I asked my father what it meant. He answered: “Don’t say that, it’s a dirty word.” I’m sure my mother never sucked his cock.

I came out as a gay man very late, around 27. When I became a teenager, in the early 1960s, homosexuality was a crime, a sin or a psychological disorder. It was legalized in 1969 but society still saw the gay lifestyle as a reprehensible behavior. I didn’t even know that it existed.

In retrospective, I can say that I had homosexual feelings around 12. My mother bought clothes from the Eaton catalogue, and I would secretly flip through the Boys & Men section to glance avidly at the pictures showing briefs. I loved to see a round ass, maybe because mine was a bit too flat. I also enjoyed seeing guys in jeans, imagining them riding a horse. My mother ordered a pair on Wrangler jeans and, after a few wash & dry, they fitted tightly, creating a nice sensation in my groin. I remember having used a steel brush to scrub my crotch, and feeling my cock growing in size. My first masturbation took place under the sheets, thinking of the boys in the Eaton catalogue.

In the 1960s, French-language high schools were private institutions run by religious orders. My parents sent me to a boarding school in Ottawa, 500 miles away (804 km). We were 120 seminarians and our teachers were Oblate fathers. Having been raised with female siblings only, I loved being in the company of other boys. I wasn’t good at sports but I had to play baseball, football and hockey. That’s how I discovered the jockstrap (with a cup). A few years later, I bought the regular white jock and played with my cock tucked in the pouch. I remember that, before washing my new sport gear, I smelled it and enjoyed the sweat aroma. This virile intoxication gave me a hard-on.

Every morning before mass, the father superior gave us a lecture. One day, we noticed that a grade 9 student was absent. Guys were saying that he had been caught in bed with another young seminarian, and had been expelled on the spot. The lecture dealt with the seventh commandment of God: You Shall Not Commit Adultery. No sex outside the sacred union of marriage. It is only after I graduated from high school and went on to Ottawa University that a colleague told me how he sneaked into an older student’s room to suck him off.

I graduated with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and a master’s degree in recreology (leisure studies). I got a job as secretary general of a provincial youth organization and made the news with initiatives I took to promote the French language and culture in my province. The federal government noticed that, and offered me a job in the Social Action Branch of the Secretary of State (some kind of heritage department). I visited all ten provinces and the Yukon Territory. It was demanding work but oh so rewarding. I had become a work-alcoholic and sexual fantasies were virtually off the radar.

My first sexual contact was with a male prostitute. It was a quick “hit & bang” experience. At 27, I was still a virgin and more than ever eager to fool around with a guy. I didn’t know yet what we could do, but I imagined that we would touch each other’s cock, get hard and shoot our load together. I saw a Male Escort ad in the Ottawa Citizen and called the number, requesting a boy at least 18-years-old. He showed up the next day with his pimp, I paid $60, the pimp left, and we sat on the bed. Dan looked more like 16 and knew how to expedite mutual masturbation. I called back the following week and Tony showed up. I tried to caress and kiss him; he just wanted to suck me off. “But don’t cum in my mouth!”, he warned me.

A few days later, a knock on the door surprised me. Two policemen wanted to question me. “We saw your name and address in the Male Escort papers. We want to arrest the pimp but we need your help. Just tell us what happened.” I had to write it down, and once I signed the form, they arrested and charged me under the gross indecency section of the Criminal Code. At that time, homosexual acts were legal between not more that two person at least 21-years-old. I was brought to the police station, a photo and fingerprints were taken, I was put in jail for the time it took to do the paperwork, about one hour, and sent off with a “See you in court!” goodbye.

When all this happened, I was working for the federal minister of Culture, Citizenship and Official Languages. The Ottawa Citizen published the name of the men arrested under what they called “The Homosexual Vice Ring”. The minister’s executive assistant called me to say that I was considered innocent until proven guilty and if I needed a lawyer, he could give me a good contact. Michael O’Connor took my case and the presiding judge, Jean-Pierre Beaulne, knew me from articles in Ottawa’s French-language newspaper Le Droit.

In court, my lawyer asked me if I knew the young man sitting on a bench, who was probably the witness for the prosecution. I had never seen him. As soon as the clerk mentioned my name, the defense lawyer accompanying the so-called witness stood up to ask that the trial be postponed to a later date. Michael O'Connor immediately jumped up to object: "Your Honor, my client has already suffered harsh treatment from the media, even ostracism from his friends and work colleagues. It is indecent to want to continue without the slightest proof..." Judge Beaulne immediately replied: "Case dismissed."

The first time I courted a guy, I landed in criminal court. Shortly after, I discovered a group called Gays of Ottawa and met a host of interesting men who supported me in accepting my sexual orientation and being proud of who I was. My first of over 50 books is a diary of my coming out, a rare thing at the time (1976).