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This paper aims to explore how municipal law, in its various guises, serves to police the boundaries of acceptable sexual conduct by considering how Sexual Entertainment Venues (SEVs) in British cities are controlled through diverse techniques of licensing and planning control.

The paper describes the emergence of permissive new licensing controls that provide local authorities considerable control over SEVs. Licensing decisions, judicial review cases and planning inspectorate adjudications since the inception of the new powers are examined to explore the logic of judgements preventing SEVs operating in specific localities.

Through analysis of case studies, it is shown that local authorities have almost total discretion to prevent SEVs operating in specific localities, particularly those undergoing, or anticipated to be undergoing, redevelopment and regeneration.

This paper offers unique insights on the “scope” of municipal law by highlighting how land uses associated with “sexual minority” interests are regulated in the interests of urban regeneration, redevelopment and restructuring.

This article examinees how vulnerability operates within the intimate economy in Hong Kong’s prominent entertainment district of Wanchai. Best known in its portrayal of The World of Suzie Wong, Wanchai’s historicity is anchored in a legacy of colonialism, orientalist imagination, and Western militarization. Presently, the area continues to cater to Western expatriate men, foreign travellers and the US Navy. An influx of Southeast Asian migrant domestic workers to Hong Kong in recent decades has led to the rise of new intimate relationships fostered in the bar district. While Wanchai is renowned as a red-light district celebrating white Western masculinity, a complex portrait emerged after a year of ethnographic fieldwork observing the intimate exchanges between Western expatriate men and Southeast Asian migrant domestic workers, as two groups who are positioned on opposite ends of the city’s socioeconomic spectrum. Contrary to recurrent portrayals of female victimhood in commercialized sex industries, this article illustrates how other experiences of vulnerability, particularly those of the Western male expatriate partner, also deserve critical attention. By exploring the decommercialized transactions within Wanchai’s intimate economy, this piece demonstrates how the intimate relations forged between Western expatriates and Southeast Asian migrants can help negotiate longstanding gendered relations of power and shared senses of structural precarity.

The purpose of this paper is to explore gay male informant experiences of discrimination and stigma in Bangkok from a health promotion community nursing perspective.

Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 30 informants and included field work observations at eight entertainment venues. Data analysis utilised an inductive thematic approach.

Key themes that emerged from the data were related to communication, particularly the use of smart phone applications; lack of privacy in health services; sexual exploitation by entertainment venues; and concerns about coming out safely to protect self-esteem and mental health.

Development of key mental health promotion messages based on a greater understanding and knowledge of discrimination and stigma may help to reduce negative behaviour and stigmatisation towards Thai gay men in Bangkok.

This study uses a phenomenology method to investigate the experiences of married Muslim women while having romantic conversations via online dating sites during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sixteen participants were selected via purposive sampling, and the data were gathered through semi-structured interviews. The results confirm that resistance to Islamic marriage limitations is the underlying reason accounting for Muslim women's romantic chat. However, “premarital experiences in virtual space” and “chat as a remedy for loneliness” create the causal conditions of romantic chat, and “experience of family restrictions” and a “sense of freedom” provides the foundation for an online romantic chat. It is worth noting that those who voice a sense of “unhappy marriage” and “husband's sexual coldness” are more likely to turn to sex chat during the COVID-19 pandemic. The consequences of digital romantic conversations for married Muslim women are “chat addiction” and “feeling a sense of betrayal.”

This paper presents a theoretical definition of protest that overcomes the bifurcation of politics and culture in mainstream social movement research. The model is grounded in a study of drag performances, which have a long history in same-sex communities as vehicles for expressing gay identity, creating and maintaining solidarity, and staging political resistance. Extending Tilly’s concept of repertoires of contention, we propose the term “tactical repertoires” to refer to protest episodes, and we identify three elements of all tactical repertoires: contestation, intentionality, and collective identity. We combine social constructionist perspectives on gender and sexuality, the social movement literature, and writings in performance studies to understand how drag performances function as tactical repertoires of the gay and lesbian movement. We argue that because they are entertaining, drag shows illuminate gay life for mainstream audiences and provide a space for the construction of collective identities that confront and rework gender and sexual boundaries.

Based on in-depth interviews with 64 women in 5 Japanese firms, this chapter examines how women workers interpret workplace sexual behaviors and interactions in different organizational contexts. The chapter explores the processes by which workplace sexual interactions, including harmful behaviors, are normalized and tolerated. It discusses three types of sexual workplace interactions in Japanese firms: (1) taking clients to hostess clubs, which women workers often see as “a part of their job”; (2) playing the hostess role at after-work drinking meetings, where a certain amount of touching and groping by men is seen as “joking around” or simply as behavior that is to be expected from men; and (3) repetitive or threatening sexual advances occurring during normal working hours, which are seen as harassment and cause women to take corrective action. The chapter confirms previous studies that have shown that women's interpretations of sexual behaviors can vary from enjoyable to harmful, depending on the organizational contexts. The chapter also argues that Japanese organizational culture, through its normalization of male dominance and female subordination, fosters and obscures harmful behaviors. Eradicating harmful sexual behaviors will require firms to reevaluate sexualized workplace customs and mitigate the large gender gap in the organizational hierarchy in Japanese firms.

LGBTQ+ spaces are often considered as safe havens for the LGBTQ+ community, as they can gather free from prejudice and fear. This research explores the effect that heterosexual people attending LGBTQ+ venues have on this community. This paper considers the impacts on the community, the importance of their safe spaces and identifies practical implications to be considered in protecting these spaces.

The study implemented a multi-method qualitative data collection approach with LGBTQ+ community venue attendees in the UK. Stage 1 utilised an online qualitative survey and collected data from 558 respondents. Stage 2 saw critical incident techniques (CITs) used with 12 participants. The data collected were analysed using a thematic system.

The LGBTQ+ community has experienced an increase in frustration and fear as a result of more heterosexual attendees infiltrating their safe spaces. Both participants and respondents discussed the importance that security personnel play in ensuring safe spaces. Finally, the findings demystified that not all attendees in LGBTQ+ venues are allies, and that there is a need for those outside the community to better understand the importance of these spaces for the LGBTQ+ community, as many heterosexuals do not consider how they should act.

Limitations associated with the implementation of the CIT were identified. Further training is advised for researchers employing this method to prepare them for dealing with the emotional impact of participants’ experiences.

This study highlighted the need for security and staff working at LGBTQ+ venues to undergo extensive inclusivity training, and for stricter door policies. Participants also argued for LGBTQ+ venues to educate heterosexual attendees about the community and their historical and present-day struggles and culture.

This paper is of practical value to those who organise and manage LGBTQ+ events, bars and nightclubs. An enhancement to the four types of space framework originated by Castilhos and Dolbec (2018) has been identified.

In the UK the indoor sexual marketplace of brothels, saunas and massage parlours has historically been left to manage itself, with limited regulation from policing agencies. This paper examines the current nature of the indoor sex markets in light of the Home Office's co‐ordinated prostitution strategy. It looks critically at the impact of ‘disrupting sex markets’, and examines the arguments for rejecting a system that regulates the indoor sex venues. It also discusses the proposal to change the law to enable ‘two (or three)’ women to work together indoors and plans to minimise exploitation through an action plan on trafficking and the implications for practitioners and policy are assessed.

This paper examines customers' participation in the production of commercial hospitality. Drawing on a study of queer consumers (i.e. lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals), the paper considers the ways in which frequently circulated understandings, or myths, shaped consumers' actions. The case study is used to highlight previously under examined dimensions of participation.

The paper draws on an ethnographic study of bar culture. The principal method of data collection was participant observation, which involved working at one venue for 27 months, as well as social visits throughout a five‐year period. Participant observation was complemented by semi‐structured interviews with 26 informants, 19 of whom were interviewed repeatedly during the research.

The paper suggests that three myths were evident in consumers' behavior: commonality, mutual safety, and the opportunities for liberated, playful consumption. Focusing on two particular aspects of participation: performative display and frontline labor, the paper discusses the ways in which these myths influenced patrons' actions.

The study suggests that an examination of the cultural dimensions of patronage provides crucial insights into consumer participation. The results will be relevant to social scientists and management academics seeking to understand the relationship between shared interest and identity, consumption, and the production of hospitable spaces.

This study provides a new understanding of both the nature of and motivations for consumer participation. This challenges existing approaches, which have tended to focus narrowly on the managerial aspects of participation in the service sector.