Bounded Nonnormativity of Heterosexuality: Gendered Sex Partying in Hong Kong

Abstract

Despite queer theory’s intention to critically analyze the institution of heterosexuality, how heterosexual men and women are differently constrained by normativity—or potentially rupture it—is underexplored. Through an ethnography of sex partying, I integrate queer and feminist perspectives to examine how people navigate and cope with institutionalized heterosexuality and compulsory monogamy. This study finds a contradictory relationship between sex partygoers and normativity: They embrace the ideal of straight manhood and womanhood but simultaneously feel constrained by and desire to transgress it. Therefore, the bounded nonnormativity of sex partying, which allows the compartmentalization of normative and nonnormative desires, is instrumental in helping them cope with the contradiction. This paper contributes to gendering transnational queer sociology by highlighting the distinct experiences of men and women in relation to the regime of normalcy in Hong Kong.

Keywords

critical heterosexuality queer theory feminism nonmonogamy normativity

I talk about “safe” not only in terms of health. Our club also wants to keep members’ identities safe. They must use a different name—not their real name—in the club. They’re also not allowed to talk to or date each other outside the club. I often think, don’t forget what you seek at the beginning. Sex parties are a dessert. A dessert only, not the main course. Never regard sex parties as the main course. (Dai-lo, man, 50s)

This study uncovers how a group of Hongkongers who, despite describing themselves as “normal” and “ordinary,” discreetly participate in sex parties bounded by rules and discipline. In Hong Kong, those engaging in nonmonogamous practices fall outside what Rubin (1984) terms “the charmed circle” in the sexual hierarchy. Faced with the stigma surrounding “low-status sex practices” (Rubin 1984, 152), how do these partygoers navigate their nonnormative desires amid the constraints of heteronormativity and compulsory monogamy? How do they reconcile the tension between their normative aspirations in everyday life and their deviant intimate practices at sex parties?

In the opening quotation, the organizer of Marvel-Sex Club¹—one of Hong Kong’s largest heterosexual sex party clubs—underscores the need for partygoers to separate their normative lives from their nonnormative sex party experiences. The compartmentalization is framed through the analogy of the main course and dessert. Building on this analogy, I draw on queer and feminist perspectives to examine how individuals cope with the regime of normalcy by embracing nonnormativity within the confined space of sex parties.

In this paper, “queer” refers to theories and practices that interrogate normativity, question “the operation of the hetero/homosexual binary” (Seidman 1994, 172), and “maintain identity and difference in productive tension” (Epstein 1996, 156). Through an ethnography of sex partying, I demonstrate how a queer analysis can advance our understanding of the normative/nonnormative tensions within heterosexuality. I argue that sex partying experiences, both online and offline, embody a form of bounded nonnormativity that allows participants to escape from mundane entrapments of (hetero)sexism while revitalizing and complementing their family and productive lives. The nonnormative space of sex partying consists of not only heteroerotic and homoerotic activities but also acts that suspend “the reiterative and citational practice” (Butler 1993, xii) of the regulatory norms of gender. However, while nonnormative practices deviate from normative regimes, they do not necessarily undermine the status quo (Beasley, Holmes, and Brook 2015).

Furthermore, I draw on feminist critiques of institutionalized heterosexuality to reveal that although normative ideals constrain both men and women, they especially deprive women of sexual autonomy. Consequently, whereas bounded nonnormativity offers men respite from the daily stress of enacting respectable masculinity, it offers women refuge to experiment with their sexuality in a setting that is safer and more pleasurable than other casual or relational heterosexual contexts.

In this study, I make three key contributions to the critical and sociological studies of heterosexualities. First, building upon existing research that has explored same-sex eroticisms of North American heterosexual men (e.g., Adam 2000; Heasley 2005; Reynolds 2015) and women (e.g., Kuperberg and Walker 2018; Nield et al. 2015), I extend the analysis of the complex constructions of straightness by examining a variety of nonnormative intimate practices among heterosexuals. Second, whereas previous research has often focused on either men or women within specific social settings or locations, I investigate how both genders are differentially constrained by institutionalized heterosexuality in the same context and how a grassroots sexual organization gives rise to gendered interpretations of nonnormative experiences. Finally, by analyzing heterosexual experiences in Hong Kong, I augment transnational queer sociology (Kong 2020) that decenters whiteness (Moussawi and Vidal-Ortiz 2020) and provincializes the West (Chakrabarty 2007) as the privileged locus of queer knowledge production. I contribute to the critical paradigm of queer Asia (Chiang and Wong 2017; Yue 2017), emphasizing how glocal processes of sexuality—that is, the diverse and fragmented ways in which global and local forces interact and constitute sexuality—are shaped within the context of multiple modernities.

Feminist And Queer Critiques Of Heterosexuality

Sociologists, feminists, and queer scholars have extensively analyzed the institution of heterosexuality for its influence on not only sexual minorities but also heterosexuals (e.g., Dean 2014; Ingraham 1994; Ward 2020). Feminists have theorized how heterosexuality, as a sociohistorical institution, normalizes male dominance over women (e.g., MacKinnon 1989; Rich 1980). Meanwhile, queer theory questions how heterosexuality has been produced as normative, while other sexual expressions are marginalized (Jagose 1996). As queer theory defines itself “against the normal rather than the heterosexual” (Warner 1993, xxvi), it is a critical resistance to “the normalizing mechanism of the state power” (Eng, Halberstam and Muñoz 2005, 1). In this study, I draw on queer theory’s analytical lens to interrogate less the deviant margins than the hegemonic center (Stein and Plummer 1994) while synthesizing feminist critique of gender hierarchy to analyze how men and women cope with normative ideals.

Nonnormative Eroticism of Heterosexuals

Although queer theory strives to analyze the institution of heterosexuality, it has relatively understudied the inconsistencies and disruptions of normativity in the lived experience of heterosexuality. An emerging body of literature explores inconsistencies between sexual identification and behaviors among heterosexuals. Research from Australia (Richters et al. 2014), Britain (Geary et al. 2018), and the United States (Silva 2022) reveals that some heterosexuals experience same-sex attraction or engage in same-sex encounters. These studies emphasize that sexual identification is shaped not only by the sexual acts one engages in but also by numerous social factors (Silva 2019; Silva and Whaley 2018) and “the different subcultural, institutional, affective, gendered, and racialized contexts” (Ward 2015, 193) in which these acts take place. For instance, at college parties in the United States, some straight women engage in performative acts such as kissing and fondling each other to attract men’s attention (Hamilton 2007; Rupp and Taylor 2010), showing how institutional and subcultural dynamics provide conditions for same-sex interactions (Pham 2019). Meanwhile, studies on straight white men who have sex with men reveal that their straight identification is connected to their investment in normalcy and enjoyment of straight privilege (Silva 2019; Ward 2015), underlining that “there are both queer and straight ways of having same-sex sex” (Silva 2018, 85).

This body of literature also highlights how the imperative to uphold normative family lives shapes the way straight-identified participants perceive their queer eroticism. Budnick (2016) demonstrates that early motherhood foreclosed the possibilities of LGBTQ+ identification for women with lower socioeconomic status. For married men (Silva 2017) and women (Walker 2014b) who had same-sex encounters, these experiences are perceived as less threatening to their heterosexual marriages than opposite-sex encounters, particularly when emotional ties are absent (Walker 2014a).

In addition to heteroflexibilities—where individuals incorporate same-sex attractions and behaviors into their understanding of heterosexuality (Carrillo and Hoffman 2016)—heterosexuals also engage in other nonnormative forms of sex and intimacy, such as nonmonogamy (e.g., Klesse et al. 2022) and Bondage and Discipline, Dominance and Submission, and Sadism and Masochism (BDSM) (e.g., Lindemann 2012). Feminist scholars underscore the role of compulsory monogamy in reinforcing heteronormativity (Jackson and Scott 2004). As mononormativity is central to white heteromasculine hegemony, Schippers (2016) theorizes the potential of polyqueer practices to disrupt race and gender hierarchies entrenched in dyadic sex and monogamy. These studies showcase the diverse nonnormative possibilities within heterosexuality. The concept of “heterodoxy within heterosexuality” (Beasley, Holmes, and Brook 2015) captures this range of practices that, while not radically dismantling normativity or the hetero/homosexual binary, still diverge from the normative.

One such nonnormative possibility involves a departure from heteronormative gender roles (Rossi 2011). Building on Halberstam (2005), Read (2013, 481) posits a Nevada brothel as a temporally queer space where “masculine control is mitigated” and sex workers assume “a position of control.” Although patrons and sex workers do not entirely discard established gender or sexual categories, their encounters interrupt “the apparent uniformity of heterosexual positionalities” (Butler 1991, 24), highlighting that not all hetero-gender enactment adheres to normativity.

Whereas these studies are insightful in articulating heterodox practices and queer potentialities of heterosexuality, they do not capture these dynamics in non-Western contexts. As Kao (2021) cautions against the coloniality of queer theory, we should beware of the assimilation effect of U.S.-centered temporality that turns queer radicalism into cultural imperialism. Given the unique sociohistorical contexts, queer politics and experiences in Asia, despite their semblance, may have different manifestations and meanings (Jung 2022). Thus, the particularities of normative/nonnormative tension in non-Western societies are indispensable to revising and expanding the critical paradigm of queer theory (Liu 2010). To illustrate how heterosexualities are socially constructed in heterogeneous glocal processes, I adopt queer Asia’s framework of disjunctive modernities to understand how “the sedimented fusion of tradition, colonialism, postcolonial developmentalism and globalization” (Yue and Leung 2017, 751) shapes the bounded nonnormativity in Hong Kong.

Gendered Institution of Heterosexuality

Institutionalized heterosexuality shapes straight masculinity and femininity differently. Ward (2020) characterizes straight culture as being pervasively influenced by sexism and toxic masculinity. Feminist scholars have discussed how sexual violence reinforces gendered power imbalances (see Armstrong, Gleckman-Krut, and Johnson 2018), as the dominant discourse of compulsory heterosexuality normalizes sexual violence against women (Hlavka 2014). The institution of heterosexuality constrains not only women’s freedom from unwanted sex but also their freedom to enjoy sex (Vance 1984). Furthermore, heterosex, particularly penile–vaginal intercourse, often fails to provide women with pleasure (Fahs 2014).

Research on Hong Kong women reveals how institutionalized heterosexuality constrains their sexual autonomy, with one in five women experiencing sexual or physical violence inflicted by men during their adulthood (Bouhours and Broadhurst 2015). Sex in heterosexual marriage is also often unenjoyable: A survey reveals that 25.6 percent of married women reported unpleasurable or even physically painful sex (Zhang, Fan, and Yip 2015).

Heteronormativity, while privileging straight men, also subjects them to the pressure of conforming to hegemonic masculine ideals (Connell 1995). Research on Hong Kong men highlights how masculinity is defined and constrained by notions of respectability and responsibility (Ho, Jackson, and Lam 2018; Kong 2009). Meanwhile, heterosex can be unfulfilling not only for women but also, albeit to a lesser degree, for men. A survey reveals that half of heterosexual men (48.3 percent) and women (50.5 percent) in Hong Kong are dissatisfied with their sexual lives (Lau, Kim, and Tsui 2005). In short, while heterosexual marriage may help men uphold a respectable and responsible masculinity, it does not always ensure pleasure and intimacy.

As contemporary Chinese patriarchy encompasses both gender and generational hierarchies (Santos and Harrell 2017), it is important to consider not only the dynamics within marriage but also the centrality of parent–child relationships in regulating people’s sexual behaviors. Instead of perceiving the enduring Confucian cultural logic as an essentialized legacy of East Asian traditions, we must examine how this logic is adopted and reinterpreted in the contemporary context. Kong (2012) explains that the family, as a site of sexual control, was established by British colonialism and perpetuated through postcolonial administration. Under these circumstances, parents not only view adolescent romance as a “personalized moral failure” (Chan 2019, 723), but they also impose sexual control over their adult children. A comparative study of mother–adult daughter relationships in Britain and Hong Kong (Jackson and Ho 2014, 394) underscores the prevalent concern among Hong Kong mothers for “preserving their daughters’ virginity.” As my findings illustrate, parental sexual surveillance also applies to adult sex partygoers in Hong Kong.

Methods and Setting

Between 2016 and 2018, I carried out 29 months of participant observation in both the online and offline spaces of Marvel-Sex Club. The club’s online forum provided a public section that allowed potential newcomers to acquaint themselves with the club’s rules. These rules forbade members from revealing their identities or disclosing the locations of events. Members were required to practice safer sex and have STD tests biannually; they must also explicitly ask for consent before having sex with a person they had not already had sex with at least twice. To become a member, one must introduce oneself on the forum, fill out three application forms—which include a test of the applicant’s knowledge of the club’s rules—and submit photos to the organizer. If potential members passed the test, they attended an interview, followed by comprehensive STD testing.

The club hosted approximately six to eight sex parties each month, primarily in hotel suites or rented apartments. Both one-on-one and group sex were popular at these events. Sexual activities typically unfolded in the bedrooms, while the living room served as a space for conversation, eating, watching movies, or playing games. As I will demonstrate, same-sex intimacies often emerged during group sex scenarios and occasional erotic games at these gatherings.

Before beginning my research, I was already a member of Marvel-Sex Club. Upon agreement with the organizer, I revealed my study to the participants, many of whom I was already acquainted with, at the parties. Guided by the feminist and queer principle of “friendship as method” (Owton and Allen-Collinson 2014), I contextualized my research in the organic tempo of friendship between myself and the participants in its natural environment. Because it was common for club members to share their “sex party anecdotes” on the forum, I occasionally posted my fieldnotes—using a style and tone that matched the forum—to share what I observed and to allow them to reply to my notes.

This article is based on ethnographic data from both in-person and online spaces of Marvel-Sex Club, as well as 25 semistructured interviews with current and former members of the club between 2016 and 2018 and in 2020. The interviewees consisted of 14 cis-men and 11 cis-women. They were between 18 and 52 years old and spoke fluent Cantonese. All except one interviewee considered their sexual orientation heterosexual or mostly heterosexual. At the time of the interview, 10 (40 percent) were in a long-term relationship, 10 (40 percent) were single, and five (20 percent) disclosed their status as complicated.

By leveraging the initial participant observation, I developed a queer and feminist theoretical framework to guide this study and the creation of the interview protocol. The abductive approach, characterized by uncovering unexpected empirical findings in relation to established theories through methodological examination (Deterding and Waters 2021), was employed in the data analysis.

Bounded Nonnormativity

This study finds a contradictory relationship between sex partygoers and the regime of normalcy: They embraced the ideal of straight manhood and womanhood but simultaneously felt constrained by and desired to transgress it. Thus, the bounded nonnormativity of sex partying, which allowed them to compartmentalize their normative and nonnormative desires, provided an alternative structure of desires (Wade 2022) for them to cope with this contradiction. Bounded nonnormativity can be understood as an attempt to suspend normative ideals. Paradoxically, it was also built on a normative logic. Its boundedness allowed the participants to protect and invigorate their normative lives while enjoying communal erotic intimacies in a liminal space. Consequently, its primary function was to bolster normative regimes. However, while most participants experienced bounded nonnormativity as complementary to their normative lives, a few of them found it to be a transformative process that altered their everyday lives.

In the next section, I follow up on the analogy of the main course and dessert introduced earlier to explicate the tension between normativity and nonnormativity in sex parties. First, I examine the gendered implications of compulsory heterosexuality (Rich 1980) and compulsory monogamy (Schippers 2016), showing how marriage and parental control constrain the sexual autonomy of partygoers. Next, I analyze how the meanings of bounded nonnormative practices, including same-sex intimacies, differ for women and men. Finally, I delve into how participants, both men and women, navigate the return to normativity or depart from it in their everyday lives after sex party participation.

The Main Course: Doing Normativity in Everyday Life

When Dai-lo founded Marvel-Sex Club in the mid-2000s, he intended sex partying to complement, rather than subvert, the regime of normalcy. To ensure that sex partying does not disrupt the members’ normative lives, he enforced a comprehensive set of rules in the club. Health and longevity were prioritized. Not only were members required to practice safer sex, but they were also encouraged to exercise regularly and maintain a balanced diet. He also banned smoking, excessive drinking, or any intoxication at any event. Meanwhile, Dai-lo often mentioned how he preferred members who value their family and work, repeatedly describing sex partying as a dessert to revitalize the participants.

The implication of the dessert metaphor is that, while the main course (normative life) and the dessert (bounded nonnormativity) offer contrasting taste experiences, the role of a dessert is secondary to the main course. Dai-lo’s vision resonated with most interviewees, who saw sex partying as a sweetener that allowed them to recover from everyday stress. Almost all members of Marvel-Sex Club had never disclosed their involvement in sex parties to any family member. Covert sex partying was a crucial strategy for them to enact the role of a good husband, wife, son, or daughter and maintain harmony at home.

Married men such as Oppa said sex partying was a way of dealing with their unsatisfying conjugal sex:

[My wife] feels pain every time I penetrate . . . In fact, I have elaborated on the foreplay, I did not just go straight to penetration. Still, she feels pain. I want to take care of her feeling and I don’t want her to feel pain every time. I don’t feel right to make her do that again. Surely, it doesn’t mean she resists [to have sex] when she says she feels pain. But if she feels that way, I don’t want to impose myself on her. (Oppa, man, 33)

Despite being the patriarch at home, Oppa did not feel he should impose his sexual requests on his wife. Whereas forcing his way in bed involved the risk of upsetting his lifelong companion, he considered discreet participation in sex partying a better option for preserving marital stability without sacrificing his sexual happiness.

The obligation to maintain family harmony by repressing one’s own sexuality was not limited to husbands. Worse still, for wives, silence was often not just an option but the only way to survive a marriage:

Even if I tell my husband where to kiss and how to satisfy me, after a few times, he’d say, “don’t you challenge me! I lose my mood when you say this.” All I want is that we can improve together, but perhaps I can’t articulate well, he thought I was hypercritical. As time goes by, I can’t get wet when I make love with him. I don’t feel desire, I just feel tortured. Quick, quick, please penetrate and ejaculate and finish quickly. But I should not display such feelings because, as a wife, you know? (Anna, woman, 30s)

Unlike Oppa, who chose to spare his wife from painful sex, Anna had no choice but to endure torturous sex with her husband. “As a wife,” Anna was expected not to make any sexual demands, as it would be interpreted as challenging her husband’s authority. “As a wife,” Anna was obliged to perform emotional labor by masking her distress.

Sex partying not only allowed Oppa and Anna to enjoy sex outside marriage, but it also improved their marital relationship, as both believed it helped them vent their sexual frustration and even reconfigured their desires to perform their conjugal duties:

After joining the club, my sexual relationship with [my husband] has become better. Maybe I’m bad, but when I make love with him, I recall my fantasy [memories] of sex in the club . . . Previously, when he kissed me, I really wanted to push him away as it felt like being raped. It’s true. But now with the fantasy, the whole thing is much easier for me. So, when I’m more devoted, we influence each other, and he also becomes more devoted. (Anna)

The experience of bounded nonnormativity did not turn Anna away from her unhappy marriage. Rather, during sexual encounters with her husband, she found that recalling memories of the club helped arouse her and increase her “devotion” for intimacy with him. Just as a dessert makes a meal complete, for participants like Anna, bounded nonnormativity is a part of, and a completion of, their normative project. Nonetheless, Anna’s story also ridicules the institution of heterosexual monogamy, as her marriage was sustainable only through the supplement of sex partying.

Parental expectations and surveillance were even more significant reasons for the participants to hide their nonnormative sexual desires. When I asked my interlocutors whom they would least want to know about their sex party participation, the most common answer was their family of origin. Parental pressure affected participants of all ages and genders, but it was especially severe for young women who still lived with their parents. Among the interviewees, women under 25 years unanimously feared their parents would discover their involvement in sex parties. To avoid arousing her parents’ suspicion, Joyce went so far to get an overnight job to justify her late-night activities. Having grown up in a Christian family, she revealed her anxiety about living up to her parents’ expectations in tears:

I know my mom cares so much about me. . . she’d be shocked if she knew [about my sex partying] . . . She’d be furious and sad. Especially she has taught me religious principles since I was little. I’m a well-behaved Christian in their eyes. If my parents knew about it, all I have done to maintain such an image would be overthrown. Upholding this image is not only for myself, but also to protect their feelings . . . What I’m most concerned about is the feeling of my parents. (Joyce, woman, 25)

Other young women who were not Christians also faced similar pressure to maintain chastity, as the practice of filial piety includes the regulation of one’s own sexuality (Kong 2016). Aurora recalled her experiences of being judged by her mother for shaving her legs in winter and buying “panties with lace.” Likewise, Lychee said her parents were not pleased when she went out at night.

Men also revealed similar, though milder, sexual control from their parents. Chi-wah said he did not want his parents to know about his sex partying, as they considered nonreproductive sex indecent. Richard, a 28-year-old man, was the only person who had disclosed his sex partying to his family. While his mother was ambivalent, his maternal uncles reacted fiercely and grounded him in a secluded place for 2 months as punishment. In the end, the family elders let him join the parties. Although they considered sex partying risky, they found it more tolerable because Richard was a single man, and they believed “a woman will suffer losses if she joins such a club.” What Richard’s family elders said hints at the persistent gender division in the expectation of chastity.

Richard’s story exemplifies how the family disciplines its members to conformity. However, as these interlocutors indicated, they were not only passively coerced but also actively desired to be good spouses or children. Therefore, they did not openly defy coercion but discreetly went sex partying to enjoy both worlds of normative respectability and nonnormative liberation.

The Dessert: Nonnormative Intimacies of Sex Partying

Dance parties and home parties are completely different. I would certainly categorize [Marvel-Sex Club] as a home party. Very cozy, it’s like when your parents bring you to an uncle’s or auntie’s home for dinner. Everyone chats cozily, and the place is bright and clean. It’s only if you hit it off with someone, you go and chat at a corner, and then into a room . . . It’s a bunch of congenial people, very clean and decent. You can even say it’s very pure, except the part in rooms.

Then clubbing parties . . . They’re totally different. I like both atmospheres: while a sex party is peaceful and comfortable, clubbing is wild. It’s because their lighting is dim and colorful, and there’s lots of alcohol and people getting drunk. In a sex party, you only drink to relax. You drink like wine tasting or sipping at your uncle’s and auntie’s home. (Aurora, woman, 18)

Not all sex environments are the same. As indicated by Aurora’s account, sex parties in the participants’ eyes were qualitatively different from the commercialized spaces of bars, discos, and nightclubs. She characterized sex parties as “pure, except for the part in rooms,” suggesting that, aside from the abundance of erotic encounters, interactions in the common areas of these events were innocent enough to meet the standards of her parents.

Marvel-Sex Club did not charge membership fees but rather asked participants to pay a fee to join each event. For participants, paying this entrance fee was not unlike sharing costs for having a home party with friends. As they paid the entrance fee in advance, there was virtually no monetary transaction in the party space. While the parties were purposefully constructed as a noncommercial place for erotic connections, the meanings of these connections were gendered. In the following, I first analyze how women sought refuge from (hetero)sexism that often plagued their sexual exploration in everyday life before examining how men pursued genuine connections that they did not find in relational or commercial sex. Then I discuss how same-sex intimacies in sex parties were gendered.

Dessert for Women: Resisting (Hetero)Sexism

Although both men and women emphasized the importance of safety and confidentiality in choosing to participate in rule-bound sex partying, women tended to describe it as the only option for them to pursue sex in a relatively safe and respectful way. Anna’s story in the earlier section exemplifies how sex in long-term relationships can become a distressing obligation for women. Other women also talked about the perceived or actual dangers of casual sex. For instance, Beatrice had “never hooked up,” as she was afraid of “being scammed, held captive . . . and STIs.” Lychee was one of the few who had looked for casual sex, but she was concerned about how men kept nagging her and made her feel unsafe. Most of the interviewed women also rarely went clubbing. Although Aurora enjoyed both clubbing and sex partying, she was aware of how prevalent harassment was in clubbing. As she said, “At least, you’ll not be randomly molested at a sex party, but you’ll certainly be groped when you go clubbing.”

Walker (2018, 85) shows that women seeking sex outside long-term relationships often desire an enhanced sense of “control over their sexual lives.” Rule-bound sex partying catered to these needs by offering a safer space for women to engage in their preferred sexual activities. The club emphasized that everyone could reject other members’ sexual invitations. Members could report unwanted sexual advances to the organizer, who would then penalize the perpetrators. A section on the club’s forum documented all rule-breaking cases and how each offender was disciplined. Those who failed to respect consent often faced a temporary or permanent suspension of membership. Although sex partygoers were not entirely free from the risks of stigma and sexual violence (Tsui 2022), the rules made the club a safer option than other sexual environments.

To the women, rule-bound sex partying was not only safer but also more pleasurable than other sexual options. Because men in the club wished to be desired sexually—a point on which I will elaborate momentarily—they tended to focus on women’s pleasure. For instance, while Chi-wah, Paris, and Otter observed that men did not always perform cunnilingus in casual or relational sex, it was an indispensable act at the parties. Except for Richard, all interviewed men agreed that while they were keen to give cunnilingus to enjoy the enthusiastic responses of the women, they did not consider a reciprocal act from women necessary.

Because pleasuring women was normalized in this space, the bounded nonnormativity also facilitated the undoing of internalized slut-shaming values of these women. For instance, while cunnilingus was not common in everyday heterosexual sex, some women felt ashamed to receive it in parties:

It’s possible that I’m brainwashed by social teaching . . . I’ll try to make myself believe that my partner doesn’t mind seeing my slutty side. (Sansa, woman, 30s)

For Sansa, women’s expression of sexual enjoyment was slutty, and it made her feel uncomfortable receiving cunnilingus. Her comment on the forum attracted replies from several members who offered alternative perspectives:

I don’t believe there is such thing as “slutty.” This word is very negative, though I can’t explain why. If you’re hungry, you naturally eat. If you have desires, you naturally have sex and want to enjoy. So, does it mean you are a glutton or greedy pig because you eat when you’re hungry? (Tom, man, 30s)

Sansa’s feelings about oral sex were likely conditioned by years of socialization and would not be changed overnight. Nevertheless, in the online and offline spaces of sex partying, the ongoing discussion disrupted the forcible reiteration (Butler 1993) of the normative category of “women.”

Dessert for Men: Pursuing Genuine Connections

For the men, although everyday spaces were not necessarily unsafe, they were mundane and stressful. As previously demonstrated, the home served as a site for respectable enactment rather than an emotional shelter. Whereas men like Oppa adopted silence as a strategy to cope with unsatisfying marital sex, sex partying allowed them not only to express their desires but, equally important, to feel desired:

When you kiss someone, she’ll kiss you back spontaneously. It makes me feel like she needs me, and that is the feeling of connection. Like, when you hug and kiss, she’ll hold you tightly and caress you. It means she needs you . . . And I think this feeling of need and being needed is what all men desire apart from bodily sensation. (Oppa)

Oppa’s statement exemplifies how men considered sex parties a space in which they could experience genuine connections characterized by mutual desires during sexual encounters. Hulk, Patrick, and Chi-wah, like Oppa, were disappointed that their wives or girlfriends did not desire or appreciate them sexually. Other men, such as Otter and Fork, longed for more connections beyond monogamous relationships. While these men never wanted to give up the “main course” (monogamy), they knew it lacked the “sweetness” (connections) they craved.

Because these men craved reciprocity of desire, they pitted sex partying against not only relational sex but also paid sex. More than half of the interviewed men expressed indifference or even aversion toward paid sex. Luke said he “loathed paid sex as he loathed anything that was fake.” Similarly, Patrick was against paid sex, instead preferring sex parties where “everyone had a genuine desire for pleasures.” These men did not perceive genuineness as something that could be manufactured or purchased. Despite these men’s distinction between their pursuit of genuineness and the pursuit of authenticity by many sex work customers (Bernstein 2007; Jones 2020), it is noteworthy that both groups—sex partygoers and sex work customers—seek truthful connections in sex, suggesting that genuineness/authenticity is sexy for men. There are two potential explanations for this perception. First, truthful and enthusiastic connections with sex partners provided married men with “much-needed validation of their masculinity” (Walker 2020, 104). Second, because these men believed such truthfulness was unattainable in everyday life, these encounters offered “the possibility of escape—from work, from home, from aspects of the self that are seen as oppressive” (Frank 2002, 202).

While everyday life is monotonous, repetitive, and even alienated, sex or love is what makes me feel like a human most . . . It’s also like what they say in Fight Club: “After fighting, everything else in your life has the volume turned down. You could deal with anything.” [In parties], I don’t believe anyone is treating others as a mere tool to release desire . . . there is no object, but only human to human. (Nougat, man, 30s)

For Nougat, genuine connections were “human-to-human” rather than “human-to-tool/object” encounters, which allowed him to return to life to “deal with anything.” Therefore, the quotation also underscores the normative logic of bounded nonnormativity—that is, the suspension of normativity was paradoxically meant to sustain the “monotonous” and “alienating” regime of normalcy.

Gendered Dessert of Same-Sex Intimacies

Group sex can be considered a nonnormative sexual practice because it disrupts mononormativity through its plural intimacies and potentially encompasses heterosex, homosex, and other nonbinary sexual activities. Although group sex was a popular activity at Marvel-Sex Club and occurred at nearly every party, men and women set distinct boundaries with same-sex participants during their involvement. The way these boundaries were drawn reflects the divergent constructions of straight masculinity and femininity.

Although only Aurora identified herself as bisexual, women were generally more bi-comfortable at the parties. While both Paris and Yves indicated that they were attracted to men only, they had sexual interactions with women in group sex:

I play with girls, too; I’ve kissed their lips and down there. I can have sex with both guys and girls, but I’m certain I’m not attracted to girls. It’s because I’m certain I like boys, and my feeling for girls is like friendship. I never have that intense longing to see a girl or feel like missing her, which is obviously different from with guys. (Yves, woman, 21)

Yves defined her sexual orientation according to her emotions (longing to see or missing someone) rather than her sexual activities (kissing and oral sex). Conversely, men were more likely to define their sexuality by their sexual activities than by their emotions:

I never had intimate contact with other guys in the club—not even a kiss . . . Even during group sex where other guys are present, I just take occasional bodily contact, like masculine interactions in changing rooms. I can’t say I find it extremely repelling, at least I’m unlike . . . Tanner is an enthusiast in group sex, but he can’t have anyone touching his butt. He’s somewhat like me, as he shared with me that he once had some intimacy with a guy, so it’d remind him of this past if his butt is touched. (Maurice, man, 20s)

Like Tanner, Maurice had once “dated a guy before his first love with his girlfriend.” As he recalled, they were in love, but they separated when Maurice could not stand the social pressure. In contrast to Yves, who defined her sexual orientation through her emotions instead of her sexual acts, Maurice, who considered himself mostly heterosexual, defined his sexuality not by his (past) romantic attraction but by his sexual activities. The implication is that the boundaries of heterosexuality were gendered not only because women were generally more open to homoeroticism but also because the emotional and sexual elements in homoeroticism were ascribed to different values by men and women in their enactment of straight masculinity and femininity.

Consequently, even among men who enjoyed group sex, their engagement in same-sex intimacy was often limited. For example, Oppa frequently engaged in threesomes with women at parties alongside Sean. However, he noted that the most intimate act he had with Sean was kissing. The group sex practices of the men resembled what Dean (2014) identified as reframed homophobia, which is critical in the construction of many men’s straight masculinity in postcloseted social contexts. Whereas men in this study did not display explicit prejudicial attitudes toward LGBTQ+ people, they reproduced hegemonic masculine norms by rejecting embodied enactment that could be associated with homosexuality. However, as Dean also argues that “straight masculinities are shifting and do not necessarily rely upon homophobic practices” (127), in the following, I delineate how persisting homophobic teasing in sex partying may turn into an opportunity for men to reinterpret same-sex sex:

In an event, folks were doing nothing and came up with this game. Everyone picks a card, and the one who picks the king card will become “the King.” Others who get the number cards are commoners, and they’re ordered by the King to complete certain tasks, like No. 1 kissing No. 2 . . . My ultimate punishment was an order by a woman that I as the “victim” had to give a blowjob to the “beneficiary” until he’s hard . . . I put his cock in my mouth and tried to suck it. Other women helped to arouse him, but he never got hard under crowd pressure . . .

Why did I do it? I can’t just go away when I lose, right? I need to do it, and it’s okay, as it’s just a game . . . it’s okay, as he didn’t turn hard, otherwise, I’d throw it out immediately. It’s not a big deal; I become famous afterward as everyone knows who I am. To a certain extent, icebreaking with others is easier, as they recognize I’m “that guy.” (Duncan, man, 34)

The implications of the King’s Game are double-edged. On the one hand, it suggests the existence of homophobia in the parties, as it would not have been a sensational performance of courage had it not threatened the straight masculinity of the partygoers. As long as arousal was absent—in Duncan’s words, “it’s okay, as he didn’t turn hard”—homoerotic performances became an enactment of masculine courage to suppress homophobic fear rather than succumbing to same-sex desires. Effectively, homoerotic performance enhanced, rather than diminished, the performers’ straight masculinity.

On the other hand, through repeated parodies, the men re-socialized, and their attitudes toward queer sex changed. Richard recalled his contrasting experiences of homoeroticism in his first King’s Game and the second time after prolonged participation in sex parties:

[The first time] was very uncomfortable . . . It was an alien feeling . . . I was filled with abhorrence. It’s not because I don’t like those people; it’s because of the act itself. I mean, I don’t like a bunch of guys sucking me . . ..

I had another same-sex encounter after that time. It was also the King’s Game. I sucked Wan’s cock. I didn’t feel anything special, as I was prepared psychologically. Also, Wan is a person I can accept, not in the sense that I can have sex with him, but I do not resist him. I have confidence in him, as I know that he knows where the boundary is. I even licked all around his shaft. He did not get hard. But a game is a game. (Richard, man, 28)

Richard’s evolving perspectives on same-sex fellatio highlight a transformation in his understanding of straightness. His more playful attitude during the subsequent experience indicates that he no longer perceived the same-sex sexual act as boundary-crossing. The distinction between straight and queer masculinity then seemed to reside not in the act itself but in the presence of arousal. Duncan’s and Richard’s narratives reveal how playfulness was invoked in bounded nonnormativity. In this sense, they were not unlike the straight white men who had sex with other men whom Ward (2015) describes: By framing their homosexual activities as frivolous, these men reinforced their straight masculinity.

However, though far from being subversive, the transformation Richard experienced is not negligible, as illustrated in his description of how his view of homoeroticism changed after 2 years of sex partying to where he found enjoying same-sex acts more conceivable:

When I first joined the club, I’d definitely avoid anal sex or men [as sexual partners]. But if you ask me now, I think it depends on who that person is. There is no particular act but only particular person that I am averse to. (Richard)

Just as the repeated consumption of desserts may change our bodies and appetites, engaging in nonnormative enactments repeatedly could potentially expand the fissure in regulatory norms. In the final empirical section, I demonstrate that although, for many participants, bounded nonnormativity only reinforced their straight everyday lives, a few exceptions considered it a gateway to enduring nonnormative possibilities.

After Bounded Nonnormativity

A married man told me that a fortune teller revealed that he’s born with strong toufaa, [meaning] he would attract women effortlessly. Joining our club helped dissolve the potential disaster the fortune teller warned him about. It’s like if a fortune teller predicts a bloody incident, you donate blood to counteract a potential traffic accident or serious surgery. If this man continues to follow the rules and enjoy our parties, he can have fulfilling sex without jeopardizing his marriage. (Dai-lo)

When Dai-lo shared this story on the club’s forum, he did not present it as a unique experience of a particular man but rather as a story to which many partygoers could relate. It highlights two aspects of bounded nonnormativity. First, by conceptualizing the nonmonogamous desires as inevitable (born with strong toufaa), Dai-lo portrayed rule-bound sex partying as a risk-control measure to avert a more disastrous collision between the participants’ normative aspirations and nonnormative desires.

Second, the quotation illuminates the gendered meaning of bounded nonnormativity. Whereas women often felt apprehensive about casual sex, men tended to view it as difficult-to-resist temptations. In other words, nonnormative intimacies, in their unbounded forms, were enticing for men but potentially dangerous and stigmatizing for women. In fact, men had numerous relatively safe opportunities for extramarital encounters, such as through affairs, paid sex, or hookups. To safeguard their family lives, men strategically managed these temptations within rule-bound sex partying.

Dory’s story exemplifies how heterosexuality and monogamy were compulsory for women. Outside of sex parties, Dory had been intimate with only one man in her life, and sex partying served as an interlude within her long-term relationship. Dory met “her man” when she was 19. A decade later, they were on the verge of getting married, but she discovered that he had been flirting with other women. This served as an epiphany for Dory, making her realize that she was unhappy with life. She canceled the wedding, broke up with him, and participated in sex parties. After 2 years, however, Dory decided to “return to an ordinary life,” quit sex partying, and married “her man.” As she explained:

I now feel that I don’t want to give up a relationship so easily. I’ve chosen to reconcile with him because I love him. I used to have many expectations, but now I realize that people are who they are, I must learn to accept them. It’s not just about what they can give you, but also about what I can give and accept . . . I have resolved my dissatisfaction in my own way, and now I have no excuse to escape. (Dory, woman, 34)

Although Dory did not say “boys will be boys,” her narrative about love still revolved around accepting the flaws of “her man” and relinquishing her own expectations. Despite appearing gender-neutral, her narrative reflects heteronormative gender norms where women are expected to be accommodating in a relationship. Sex parties were her “way” of resolving her dissatisfaction, but even though she found them enjoyable, she felt compelled to return to her normative role. She could not articulate why she needed to “return to ordinary life” but described it as the natural and only path she should take, which reveals the workings of regulatory norms.

While bounded nonnormativity was mostly constructed to reinforce straight life, a few participants became inspired to envision the “potentiality or concrete possibility for another world” (Muñoz 2009, 1). Two such participants, Monica and H2O, married after meeting each other at the parties. The couple opted for an open marriage, permitting both to have sexual relationships outside their union. As they noted, engaging in a nonmonogamous marriage would have been unthinkable had they not met at sex parties. For them, the temporary transgression of bounded nonnormativity could evolve into a lasting nonnormative lifestyle.

Aurora, the only interviewee who identified as bisexual, described how she came to embrace her sexuality only after sex partying. She recalled that when she grew up within the heteronormative culture of her secondary school, she was “attracted to boys because girls around [her] said they liked boys.” When she joined Marvel-Sex Club as a student, what she wanted was to have sex with men. However, she found the club a more inclusive environment for exploring and discussing her sexuality:

It was only after joining the club that I began having sex with women, as I became courageous to be more open about myself . . . I talked to the club’s organizer about it because I didn’t know any friends to talk to about these issues . . . After talking to him, I felt more liberated and embraced the idea of pursuing further [intimate] relationships with women. (Aurora)

The queering process Aurora experienced was rare. Nevertheless, it suggests the potentiality of bounded nonnormativity. Despite being heterocentric, sex parties were fundamentally different from most heteronormative spaces in everyday life. In particular, for people who had no initial access to queer communities and resources, it was a doorway to an alternative future.

Conclusion

This study augments sociological queer analyses by using bounded nonnormativity as a framework to critique the institutions of heterosexuality and monogamy. As Pfeffer (2014, 38) suggests, sociological queer analyses are a form of sociological imagination that “approach the normative as ‘strange’” to expose how taken-for-granted assumptions (re)produce regulation and oppression. Bounded nonnormativity is characterized by a carved-out space/time that allows its participants to enjoy both respectability in their normative lives and liberation in nonnormative practices. This suggests that the regime of normalcy, even if toxic and tormenting, is still compulsory. While nonnormative intimacy rejuvenates its participants, it is relegated to the margins as a nonsustainable way of life. The very existence of bounded nonnormativity highlights that institutionalized heterosexuality and monogamy may not provide fulfillment insofar as the participants find their straight lives bearable only when they are sweetened by nonnormative intimacies. For men, sex partying serves as a valve that enables them to release stress while enacting respectable masculinity in everyday life. For women, rule-bound sex partying could potentially be their only escape from (hetero)sexism in everyday life. As such, bounded nonnormativity is not only perceived as a respite from normativity but also a refuge from a misogynistic straight culture for women.

The concept of bounded nonnormativity contributes to “Asianizing” (Kao 2021, 13) queer knowledge production by advancing a critical understanding of gender and heterosexuality in contemporary Hong Kong. First, research on queer and nonnormative practices of heterosexuals in the West has seldom addressed the influence of parental control over adult children’s sexuality. I have demonstrated how the expectations of chastity, monogamy, and heterosexuality play a significant role in filial piety. As Kong (2020) argues, the British colonial government made family and Christianity an important closeting mechanism to regulate homosexuality in the city. This study contributes to understanding how the closeting mechanism in postcolonial Hong Kong also regulates heterosexual experiences and how heterosexuals cope with this mechanism through bounded nonnormativity.

Finally, although bounded nonnormativity mostly reinforces normative institutions, I deliberately emphasize the feminist and queer possibilities of bounded nonnormativity in a non-Western and nondemocratic context. Over the past 3 years, Hong Kong’s political landscape has experienced significant shifts, resulting in the rapid decline of civil society and democratic politics. Progressive gender and sexual spaces have been shrinking, as exemplified by the recent cancelation of the city’s first and only LGBTQ+ radio program in July 2023. I found that, whereas most participants considered bounded nonnormativity a mere sweetener in their lives, some experienced it as a process of potentiality to embrace queer futurity, leading them to adopt LGBTQ+ identities, explore nonmonogamous relationships, or question the (hetero)sexist norms of gender. Given the increasing difficulties faced by feminist and queer activism in this city, it becomes all the more important to consider how to harness the full liberating potentials of bounded nonnormativity, exploring why and how some people experience it as a gateway to a less oppressive future. As opportunities for feminist and queer reforms in formal politics dwindle, we must think more creatively to transform the sparks of liberating potentiality of bounded nonnormativity into sustainable changes and expand the fissure in the regime of normalcy.

Footnotes

Author’S Note:

My gratitude extends to Sik Ying Ho, Hae Yeon Choo, Jessica Fields, Adam Green, Josée Johnston, Markus Schafer, and members of the 2020–21 University of Toronto Sociology research practicum for their invaluable insights and commentary. I am appreciative of the editors and the anonymous reviewers from Gender & Society, whose feedback has been pivotal in enhancing this manuscript. My heartfelt thanks go to the research participants who shared their intimate moments and stories with me.

ORCID iD

Pamela P. Tsui

Notes

Pamela P. Tsui is a PhD candidate in sociology at the University of Toronto. This article stems from her master’s thesis, which she completed at the University of Hong Kong. Her current dissertation research explores the varied monetary practices adopted by Hongkongers within a transnational context, with a focus on the roles that desires and pleasures play in shaping these practices.

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