"There are no spectators at Clambakes. Everybody participates."

March 8, 2019 8:32 PM

I want to tell Jeffrey that there’s something happening here, something of significance beyond what, to an untrained eye, would look like the exact Sodom-and-Gomorrah vision my old football coach in Texas has in mind four beers in at the bar, when he rails against those coastal elites in San Francisco doing their queer hedonistic liberal shenanigans and sticking doodads up their butts. But what, exactly? (Ahmed Kabil, Medium)

Raw cacao as the new cocaine? An eye-contact party that's "more intimate than an orgy?" Silicon Valley's latest craze is "Organized Intimacy."

posted by Johnny Wallflower (18 comments total)

"Various new ways ..." Cuddle parties were happening in the bay area around 1999, maybe even earlier. The new new hotness is eye extreme contact parties where you touch your eyeballs to your partners eyeballs, thus exchanging floaters and delicious eye goo.
posted by user92371 at 9:09 PM on March 8, 2019 [4 favorites]

as was prophesied in my youth.
what's the holdup with the clams?
posted by es_de_bah at 9:32 PM on March 8, 2019 [2 favorites]

DMT is, uh, not what I would generally consider a party drug, which causes me to slightly doubt the first tale.

... I mean, unless they're talking about a different tryptamine and are just being loose with terminology?
posted by aramaic at 9:33 PM on March 8, 2019 [1 favorite]

From the VICE article:

It would stand to reason that when the artists, musicians, and writers have left, the sex parties would dry up.

Yeah! Who ever heard of the rich doing anything decadent and depraved?
posted by Going To Maine at 11:20 PM on March 8, 2019 [6 favorites]

You can't have a proper sex party without writers
posted by Pruitt-Igoe at 1:27 AM on March 9, 2019 [8 favorites]

Once the writers have left, who will chronicle the sex parties? Mark my words: the kinkiest shit is going down, undocumented, far from the prying eyes of literature
posted by phooky at 3:46 AM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]

.....What does it say of me that I read about the goings-on at the Clambakes and think ".....I kinda want to go to one just once to see what it's like?"

The new new hotness is eye extreme contact parties where you touch your eyeballs to your partners eyeballs, thus exchanging floaters and delicious eye goo.



.....on second thought maybe no thanks
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:43 AM on March 9, 2019 [3 favorites]

You can't have a proper sex party without writers... waiters... waders...

Sorry, fixing that for you....
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:46 AM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]

Clambakes are examples of an emerging artistic discipline called immersive experience design. “Participants in experience-driven events are encouraged to find unique solutions to the challenges they encounter while interacting with the narrative,” writes Freddie Nelson, Clambake’s Creative Director, in a manifesto on the subject. “In this way, each individual can contribute to a shared story of the experience, as every action carries a meaning.”

That part is cool. The rest sounds kinda tiresome, but I'm getting old. Exploring the far boundaries of perception and the self-other divide is fine and all, but eh. What I really need is free time to sit in the backyard and read a book.

The Wall was an empathy-building interactive piece of art where, for once, as a mostly-privileged white audience, you could feel the smallest, most microscopic taste of what it was like to be told: ‘No, you can’t go here. Why? Because we said so. Because we created a construct that says you can’t.’”

Uhhh....if this is the experience that teaches you that, boy do you have some narrow and fortunate life.

“I’ve seen things in my astral travels you wouldn’t believe in a million fucking years, bub. But thanks for checking in.”

oh that guy

“Most folks live their everyday lives within the same patterns,” Nelson says. “They get up, they go to work, they do their thing, maybe they go on vacation, maybe they get married, maybe they have kids someday. They follow the traditionally laid out path of the Western world of late-stage capitalism. Rarely do they get to ask themselves: is this what I really want?"

I see things a little differently!
posted by Miko at 6:58 AM on March 9, 2019 [4 favorites]

I find after reading the article that I really want is to see one of these parties fenced off from the outside world and subjected to bombardment by heavy artillery. But, y'know, I'm just some horrid pleb going through the motions of trying to survive. I obviously wouldn't understand that no, this bacchanal for rich people, artists, and their hangers on is totally different and so much more special, woke, and meaningful than the ones that have been going since the beginning of recorded time.

I mean, great, you're rich and/or weird and you want to party. Good for you. Enjoy. À chacun son goût and all that. But please don't be so fucking greedy as to want meaning and virtue rolled up into your debauchery. And please please don't expect people not to get pissed off if you also seem to want attention and praise for it.
posted by Grimgrin at 7:47 AM on March 9, 2019 [7 favorites]

“With a bit of luck, his life was ruined forever. Always thinking that just behind some narrow door in all of his favorite bars, men in red woolen shirts are getting incredible kicks from things he’ll never know.”
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:41 AM on March 9, 2019 [7 favorites]

"There are no spectators at Clambakes. Everybody participates."

Hmmm... completely unsubstantiated story that cannot possibly be fact-checked, invite-only events nobody is willing to go on the record about, sensational details custom-made to engender FOMO in millennials...

Yeah I'm gonna call bullshit on this. I'm not saying this is definitely made up, but it doesn't sound NOT made up.
posted by panama joe at 9:12 AM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]

after reading about the “clambake” i got a strong desire to sit in a cubicle in a beige room and work on something boring, just out of spite.
posted by vogon_poet at 10:12 AM on March 9, 2019 [6 favorites]

Yeah I'm gonna call bullshit on this. I'm not saying this is definitely made up, but it doesn't sound NOT made up.

I find it completely plausible that some wealthy techbros believe that creating Alice in Wonderland art that references drugs is transgressive and groundbreaking.
posted by betweenthebars at 1:23 PM on March 9, 2019 [8 favorites]

I also find it plausible that "all shapes and sizes" means some Alices had big boobs and some had small.
posted by betweenthebars at 1:24 PM on March 9, 2019 [2 favorites]

I know artists making minimum wage + tips that have been to "clambakes" so it's not just rich plebs. Or at least that's what I've heard.
posted by gryftir at 6:18 PM on March 9, 2019

Actually I don't know for certain they are what the article talks about, since I haven't been myself, but certainly there are similar parties in and outside the city that include a wide variety of people.
posted by gryftir at 9:04 PM on March 9, 2019

I know artists making minimum wage + tips that have been to "clambakes"

Oh yes, artists and broke creatives are essential to creating the vibe of outré coolness that wealthy scenesters desire. They become commodities in the game and sometimes are even permitted the illusion that they are directing it.

I don't for a second doubt that it exists. This may be the only one the reporter knows or has access to, and it may be a particularly well-developed one, but there are "secret" societies that put on "secret" art events all over the country, with a mix much like this, maybe with less psychedelia but still, same general concept. I know of some that go on the NY area and Boston area, though I am not involved from anything other than a very outside ring of interest. If you get connected to your nearest regional cluster of burners you can probably find your way to a sort of version of this event. The mistake is in thinking that something uniquely historical or special is going on here. They are people with resources having fun with creativity. Nothing wrong with it in the grand sense, but also, the fact that you Columbused it doesn't mean it's a cultural paradigm shift.
posted by Miko at 10:15 AM on March 10, 2019 [2 favorites]