Open Letter: Let’s build a Bator Network!

Hello there,

Some of you might know me already, but just in case we haven’t interacted: Hi! I usually go by DoubleA (or Persona) on bate platforms. I’ve been cam bating for about 18 years, mostly on DudesNude and later, around pandemic times when bate culture exploded, also on Zoom like many of us. I live in Barcelona; for the last 4 years or so I’ve been involved with the London Bator Bro community and worked alongside Nick (Woof) as a co-editor for the Bator Sex zine. For the last year I’ve been running my own bate event, Copes i Bastos, in Barcelona.

Bating is and has always been an integral part of my life. My bating practice itself and the friendships I’ve made through it have made me grow as a person and have gifted me with so many valuable relationships of many kinds and so many unbelievably hot and beautiful moments. I imagine some of the people reading this letter might feel similarly. Many of us deeply care for the Bator community and want it to keep developing in the best way possible.

We are also all quite different. We all have different backgrounds, different points of views and understandings of how things should work, or what would be best for the community. Difference can always spark friction, often rifts and misunderstandings. But I think if we learn and practice respecting each other’s points of views, and understand our diversity as an asset and not as a problem, we can share our insights, skills and sensibilities and learn from one another to make the whole community a much better place.

Through the years I’ve seen examples of the way sharing information and each other’s visions have improved the community: Bator Bro’s careful space design elevated our bate into shared ecstasy; the before and after socials (Strokinut Steve’s idea!) brought us together, made the local community blossom and inspired Paris’ Apéro Poto social event. 

Experiencing these events and experiencing these communities has inspired Copes i Bastos in Barcelona as well as Qua La Mano in Milan and the newly started Berlin Bators. The gift keeps on giving too. The Milan Bators are now innovating for their November party, on occasion of Movember they’re bringing a urologist to dispel any myths anyone in the community might have about prostate cancer and teach the community how to detect any early lesions in our own prostates. A brilliant initiative on their part, and a shame if the other communities never heard about it.

I’ve been sharing my ideas of creating a network of bate communities for a while. Bator Sex Network and the thoughts I share on my column Coming Together are small attempts at that, I’ve also written an essay about it here (feel free to start reading three paragraphs before the bulletpoints). I can see it take many different forms: as a forum to share ideas, a yearly in-person self-organized event, a distribution network for materials and publications around bating, as a system of support for new local parties, maybe even our own digital infrastructure.

Before continuing, I think it’s vital to address the subject of money, deeply controversial in matters regarding community building. Some of us understand that bringing profit into community dynamics can quickly turn community into “target audience” and dehumanize the scene. Others believe that sustaining spaces can only happen through solid economic viability. I believe it must be up to each of us to decide which route is good for us as we each organize our specific initiatives. I believe that as long as we can stand by a common set of values —we wrote the Bator Sex Manifesto as a proposal for what those might look like— that shouldn’t stop us from sharing knowledge and resources. 

I do believe, however, that if we are to consider building a central entity that is the network itself, it should be a separate, non-for-profit legal entity (an association!), comprised of those who choose to be actively involved in the network. I was working on setting it up some nights ago when a sudden realization crossed my mind: Why in the world was I trying to set up an association and then try to get people to join it? Am I the only one interested in doing something like this?

This is a (very long-winded) attempt to reach out to those interested in building a bator network (for now I’d say mostly European). Would you be interested in trying to build something like that? If you do, what shape do you think it should take? Could you contribute in some way to bringing it about? Should it be informal or formal? If it existed, what needs do you think it could supply? Should we bother at all?

I’ve sent a similar version of this post as an e-mail to different people involved in bator community building in Europe, but after some discussion we decided to put it out to anyone out there who might be interested. Bators are an extremely resourceful and diverse group of people, we could make beautiful things happen.

If you like the idea and think you could contribute to these efforts, feel free to shoot me an email at info@copesibastos.cat. If you know me personally and have my telegram, you could also reach out through there but it might take me some time to respond, please be patient. Feel free to share this post with other like-minded bators who you think might be interested as well. If I get some people interested I might try to set up a videocall, or some kind of forum, where we can discuss the possibilities and try to build it. I’m sure we can work something out, even if it ends up being something very simple and only involving a few of us, but the sky’s the limit.

Love,

— DoubleA