Sexual liberation takes a hit
The enhanced vetting and remote location likely helped Flex avoid the wrath of Hinson McAuliffe, who as Fulton County solicitor waged a scorched-earth campaign against obscenity violators that would have impressed General Sherman. McAuliffe gained national recognition for locking up employees and patrons of adult bookstores, massage parlors and strip clubs in Atlanta, with a majority of such establishments closing by the time he retired in 1982.
But having survived McAuliffe’s puritanism, Flex and other bathhouses across the country now faced the most significant threat of the 20th Century.
“When AIDS hit, it changed everything,” Hayward said. “People had to really think about what they were doing, and who they were doing it with, and how they were leading their lives. The thing that was so hard about it all is that [sexual liberation] was something we really prided ourselves on, and it was taken away from us.”
The gay community was divided about whether a bathhouse should continue to exist in the middle of a sexually-driven plague, Robison recalled. In the Georgia General Assembly, the AIDS crisis triggered an onslaught of punitive legislation, from mandatory testing and quarantine, to closing bathhouses and other sex venues.
“The [omnibus AIDS bill of 1988] did get through, but it was one of those things where it had to look bad, but it didn’t really have to be bad – meaning it had to cater to a lot of AIDS hysteria, but it didn’t have to have much substance,” said Robison, who lobbied legislators to vote against anti-AIDS legislation.
Nevertheless, attendance at bathhouses dropped significantly during the 1980s and ’90s, despite the venues being among the earliest promoters of condoms and safe sex awareness.
“Historically, it was unfortunate that when AIDS hit, they would close the baths, because that was such a great opportunity for outreach and education and to reach people,” Hayward said.
While they’re often considered a vestige of a seedier era of gay life, Robison thinks Flex and other bathhouses might be on the brink of a renaissance.
“I guess there will always be a place for that, that is, anonymous sex,” Robison say. “These days, with PrEP and with treatment leading to undetectable equals untransmittable, I imagine that they will take off again.”
—Longtime Atlanta resident Dave Hayward
October 27, 2017