Debunking the secret swinger symbols and codes

Transcript

Speaker1: Welcome. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening. Wherever you may be, I hope you have blue skies and a smile in your heart. I am your host, Jason. Let me get the disclaimer out the way before we jump into the fun stuff. This podcast is for adults only. We will be talking about topics of a sexual and adult nature. This podcast is not appropriate for anyone under the age of 18. Don't play it around your kid. Put them to bed and settle in with me as we talk about the wild world of the lifestyle. Please subscribe, check out our website thatotherlifestyle.com and you can also find us on sdc.com. Have you ever heard something so stupid, so monumentally dumb that it makes your brain skip a beat? Have you ever read a news article or saw a TikTok that made you worry that you might forget algebra after seeing it? I had to take a mental inventory and make sure I could still tie my shoes. The genesis of this podcast came from a very unlikely place. Since we have been in the lifestyle, I tend to actively go out and look for stories or blogs or news articles to increase my understanding of this wild world. In my quest, I found a list of secret swinger symbols. Ooh, secrets. You've seen the same list, I'm sure of it. If you are in the lifestyle, you will laugh each one of these off. If you are not in the lifestyle, let me be the first to say, these are all bullshit. All these secret symbols we will be debunking today are complete lies. Go on Google and search for secret swinger symbols or search for how to tell if my neighbor is a swinger. You will find hundreds of articles sharing the same list repeatedly. What really angered up my blood was that last night I finally downloaded TikTok. I know I am way behind the times on this one. Doing research for this episode, I searched for secret swinger symbols. First TikTok that popped up was a person. I ain't sharing their name because screw them. They don't deserve our attention. This person, based on their screen name, claimed some knowledge of the lifestyle and then proceeded to share the same fraudulent list of swinger symbols we're going to go over today. Why does all this send me into a tailspin of mental knots? Because none of these are true. I felt redemption as I found the third TikTok in the list. Some random guy told the truth and I applaud him for that. He shared that there are no secret swinger symbols. This hobby is built around discretion and most people do not want their neighbors or co-workers or church congregation to find out. And it is not from shame. Do not think that. We are not ashamed of our hobby. We are protective of our hobby. We are protective of others and their need for discretion. And there is a need for discretion in this hobby. There are people I've known for years in the LS. Wonderful people. Real true friends. People I would trust babysitting my pets. And I don't know their last name. No clue. I'm willing to bet I may not know their real first names. And that's okay. In the LS, friendships are based on character, not your last name. They are built on your quality as a person, not your career, status, or connections. People meet other people on a level playing field. Granted, that field might lead to sexy shenanigans, but I can honestly say this is an egalitarian hobby. One of the reasons I wanted to start a podcast in the first place was to address myths and stereotypes and rumors and falsehoods that surround the LS. One of those being all these news articles that report to show our hidden codes. We'll run through the list debunking as we go. I will cite the articles where I can and I hope we all learn together. Years ago in the pre-internet days there were ways to denote to people that you were in the LS because I imagine it was way more difficult to meet people back then. Personally super curious about the real signals and flags that were used back in those days. If you were in the LS, there were resources and clubs and gatherings, say, prior to 1995. And we'll dig into the cool history of the LS in another episode. Fun fact, there used to be newsletters and magazines and guides you could subscribe to and find other couples. So cool. As I ran down the rabbit hole in researching, my hypothesis on how this list came to be is that there was an article published years and years ago and that article has been reprinted repeatedly ad nauseum because this list has not evolved much in the last 10 years, this list of supposed secret swinger symbols. It is possible that this list was originally published as a humorous piece and nobody got the joke and then the joke got forgotten and it evolved into truth and legend and now everyone who goes to landscape their front yard must be careful or else the neighbors might think that they're swingers. Speaking of landscaping, let's start with the yard. First one on this list is pompous grass. Pompous grass is cool. Originally from South America, it is considered an invasive species in the southern United States. Pompous grass can grow over 10 feet tall in large clumps. I personally think it is a pretty and happy plant. The association with swinging came from the news articles in the early 2010s. This rumor was so prevalent in the UK that it led to a dramatic decrease in sales of the plant. Poor pampas grass sellers. If you've ever seen a clump of pampas grass, it's huge. This is not a discreet plant. Digging into this myth, let me put on my logical hat. It takes pampas grass a few years to reach this gigantic majestic size. That means if I were landscaping my yard and decided, yep, I need to advertise to everyone driving by that I am looking for other LS people, I need to plant some pampas grass. So in a couple of years, yeah, then people will know, then the swingers will show up. You'll notice a trend in these items in this list we're going to talk about. To the vanilla world, swingers are incapable of finding other swingers, most likely because vanilla people can't find them. So vanilla people assume we have to use clever codes to attract other swingers like flies to honey. Maybe that is the breakthrough on all of this. Vanilla people can't figure out how we do it, so they assume there's some trickery involved. Next up, still in the yard, are white landscaping rocks. rocks this one might be a regional indicator though i can't put my finger on the specific region supposedly if you put a pot of white rocks by your mailbox it is a secret sign to other swingers according to the urban dictionary white rocked means being propositioned by a swinger couple the entomology of the phrase white rock comes from the urban legend that a house with decorative white rocks in the front is a signal that it is occupied by active swingers and an open invitation. I feel dumber after reading that out loud. As an aside right now, for any of these symbols to work and for you to attract swingers to your yard, they would also have to know about the meanings behind these symbols. That's how secret symbols work. Both parties must know the meaning to properly interpret it. If you're new to the lifestyle and no one shares the swinger handbook with you, you would never know. I've also heard about red mulch or black mulch. On this one, I'm willing to bet there was a sale at the local garden center. Someone bought bags of black mulch. Someone else liked the look, bought some more bags. Or maybe they're just fans of certain sports teams. You must question, for a hobby that is based on discretion and double lives and keeping everything secret, why would a person willingly want to show the world what they do on the weekends? Why would someone who could lose their job or be ostracized from their homeowners association signal to the world that they are LS? That's what blows my mind about all of these lists. A bit of logical thought and they all go out the window. Next up on the list, garden gnomes. Fuck this list. I love garden gnomes. I am totally not afraid to come to life at night and stare at me through my windows. Nope, not scared of that at all. I may have found the origin on this one. Coming from a real estate blog from the early 2010s, I want to read this verbatim. Quote, that's a very nice subdivision in North County, San Diego that has a ton of community and family-friendly events throughout the year. My client told his friend he's looking to buy in this community. His friend informed him it's a huge swinger community. How can you tell if your neighbors are swingers, you may ask? Turns out that the homeowners keep gnomes on the front lawn as an indicator. My client looked online to see if this was a joke or real, and sure enough, there's a website out there with all info about it. Some agents specialize in collaborating with seniors or first-time homebuyers, etc. Now, maybe there'll be a designation in collaborating with swingers. L-O-L. Ha ha. I'm sorry. Let me pause here so we can all regain our collective composure. So, this blog post has been shared and cited repeatedly by real news agencies. Just a random person having a random conversation with a client. And now my four garden gnomes are I don't know.
Speaker2: I don't know. I don't know. I don This one kind of threw me off. Five pointed metal stars. Admittedly, this might be a Texas thing, the Lone Star State, and all that. This one is fun, though, because I found out where it came
Speaker1: from, maybe. Still, yay. From the amazing website Snopes.com, quote, in late December 2020, a social media post went viral that said houses with five-pointed stars adorning their exteriors indicate that the home's residents are swingers, in quotes, a term sometimes used to mean couples that swap sexual partners. The text above the meme reads, So this morning, my mom was trying to pull Christmas gift ideas out of us. I mentioned a metal star for the exterior of my house like in the photo. I was sad when the sellers didn't leave it, lol. My sister tells me it's a swingers code to attract other couples. What? Google confirms. I had no idea this was a thing. Naturally, I'm noticing all the houses with stars now and can't help but wonder. I see you, you filthy animals. That's from the meme. According to Snopes, we didn't find any evidence to support the claim that swingers put five-pointed stars outside their homes to attract potential swinger partners. What we did find was an article published by the news and entertainment site Distractify, which traces the swinger star rumors back to a 2007 post on the Strippers Online message board. The stars, namely the five pointed metal ones that appear on houses, are more widely known as barn stars. Sometimes they're called Amish barn stars. They do have significance, but it's not that the homes' inhabitants are swingers. Ontario, Canada-based news outlet The Voice reported that the stars are most often spotted on homes of and bear a special significance for Pennsylvania Dutch families. The Pennsylvania Dutch are an American cultural group that immigrated from southern Germany to the United States. The Pennsylvania-based local newspaper The Morning Call reported that the stars' meaning may vary according to whom you ask, but broadly speaking, they are seen as bringing good luck or protection. People even arbitrate different meanings to whatever color the star may be painted. Anyone can readily find a barn star for purchase with a simple Google search. They are common decorations, particularly in places like Pennsylvania, and no, you won't be putting up a bad signal for itinerant swingers. End quote. Thoroughly debunked.
Speaker2: Adirondack chairs. This was a new one for me. As the story goes, if you have two Adirondack chairs on your front porch, it is an open invitation for swingers to show up. This one is super stupid. I guess the thinking is that swingers, being the kind of people that like to sit down,
Speaker1: will drive around a neighborhood looking for chairs to sit on. And then you come outside and you find them, like a weird swinger trap. Because that is totally how couples meet other couples, by the way. The clever use of bait and traps. Like a horny Wile E. Coyote. I'm going to build me an over complicated Rube Goldberg machine on my front porch like that old mousetrap game. Again these are supremely dumb. Speaking of trapping swingers we have the ultimate swinger bait. A hot tub. Now to be honest we had a hot tub and we also got rid of it. It doesn't work. I took the cover off. I let it run full blast, bubbling away, and I would wait inside with a big net and binoculars waiting. I never caught a single swinger. I had a few come close. I had a few couples show up like timid little deer in bathing suits. They got close enough to sniff it, but by the time I jumped out the window, net in hand, screaming at the top of my lungs, they ran away. I'm lying, that never happened. But hot tubs, I can see this one. Hot tubs are sexy. Hot tubs get the blood pumping. Everyone is naked, hopefully feeling frisky. Bubbles in water high, wandering hands. If there is one item on this list that may have validity, this one. It does fall apart though because not everyone who has a hot tub is a swinger. Not every swinger has a hot tub. I say this, I say that because we got a hot tub years before we got into the lifestyle and we have one when we started, but we don't anymore. In truth, hot tubs are not good for sexy time. Water is not a lubricant. Water is not lube. Hot water is not a lube and will strip away any natural moisture. Pro tip for the ladies. Hot tubs can throw off your natural vaginal pH balance and cause yeast infections. I am not a doctor or medical in any way, but I would suggest checking out boric acid supplements if you are prone to yeast or bacterial infections. I don't have a vagina, so I will need to bring a person onto the show who does have a vagina when we dig into staying healthy in the lifestyle. All right, back to hot tubs. It is a cliche at this point. Very common Hollywood trope. Coupled with a hot tub, yep, they're swingers and looking to convert any couple that may come over. We're going to put this one in the maybe kind of true pile. Onward. This one is near and dear to my own heart. Pink flamingos. No one can really agree if this is a swinger symbol or not. It seems very situational. You know those pink flamingos people put in their yard? Very kitsch, very cute. For a couple of years, my mother has been giving me a pink flamingo every Christmas. A figurine, a picture, a sign, and I love and appreciate it a lot. So I was shocked, flabbergasted, I dare say, when I read online that flamingos were considered a swinger symbol. Seems to originate from RV parks, though it could also mean that a person is celebrating a birthday. The really annoying part of debunking flamingos is the nebulous definition. Flamingos could mean this situation or it could mean this in this scenario the situationalness of it all is annoying on a cruise ship they could be swingers or it could maybe it means they're celebrating a birthday party this one i would say is debunked the next one though i never knew bathing accessories could be a swinger sign loofahs. Loofas. You know those plastic body poofs you use in the shower? This one's fun because there might be some validity to it. Maybe not. According to a Reddit post that was then picked up by the Palm Beach Post and possibly a Florida drag queen in the villages, a massive sprawling retirement community in Florida, residents are using loofahs to proclaim their LS participation. The Villages covers three counties' hundreds of thousands of people, and some of them are looking for a good time. In the Villages, the primary mode of transportation is golf carts, and think like souped-up golf carts with rims and stereos. A local Florida drag queen released a TikTok with over 3 million views that reported to show the meaning of different loofahs hanging in the said golf carts. As shared from the TikTok video, white is for those who are novices or new to the LS, purple is for voyeurs or those that like to watch. Pink is for soft swap. Blue is for the lowest level of full swap. And I'm going to start right there because that doesn't make any sense. How do you have levels of full swap? It's either you do or you don't. Yellow is for mid-level swap for those who want to have fun but are still nervous. So if you meet them and say we engage in shenanigans, they will claim to be nervous at first and then get naked. Okay. Black is for full swap. Those who say what the hell, let it all go down. I translate as anal. That means anal. Black means they'll do anal on the first date. Teal is for bisexual people, for those that want to increase their dating chances. I promise that's what the caption says. Teal is for bisexual people, for those that want to increase their dating chances. This is insulting. You aren't bisexual because you want to increase your chances of banging it out with someone. You're bisexual because you're open and honest and interested and both are all genders equally. That's what bisexual means. You don't increase your odds by being willing to play with the same gender. That's just super insulting. The story also made it over to twitter where people were more than happy to chime in with symbols that denote swingerness, citing all the things on this list we are currently debunking. I did see a response that makes way more sense though. People hang these on their golf carts to help them find their golf carts in a parking lot. Same reason you put a sticker on your windshield to help you find your car. That makes sense. Willing to bet those people did this as a way to find their golf cart and a random vanilla person saw all the loofahs and then created an elaborate system of color-coded messages. Or maybe it's true. I've never been to the villages to ask. This all harkens back to the handkerchief code used in the gay community decades ago. Men would signal their interest by hanging certain colored handkerchiefs from their back pockets. Red means you're into this activity, blue for this, green had a meaning. I grew up in the 80s hearing about this. I remember hearing about it, but I take it with a grain of salt. These were also the same people when I was growing up that bought into the satanic panic of the 1980s, so not the best source of information. I don't want to do the same thing to that community that the vanilla world is doing to the LS by inferring information that I don't know for certain, but it totally feels similar. This system is way too damn complex. I might remember three or four of these colors on a good day and now that it's out there I promise you if this if it is real the community the LS community in the villages have switched to another code or symbol. Get one too many awkward questions from your grandkids when they visit and I bet you you will find a new flag. Last one for the home and yard decor, pineapples. I gotta talk about pineapples as a symbol. Here's the crazy bit. There is no real historical evidence that pineapples were a symbol in the LS community until maybe 10-20 years ago? And I must address two myths right now before we go any further. The first myth is that an LS couple will put a pineapple on their front porch to tell anyone passing by, just anybody, that there is an active sex party going on inside the house. Just stop on by, come on in, take your shoes off, take off your pants, jump right on in, you random person off the street no one has ever met before. This is one of those super stupid ideas that made me want to do a podcast in the first place and debunk myths. No one in the LS community is going to advertise that there is a sex party or an orgy or even a gathering going on inside their home. I have been to house parties. No one puts a pineapple out on the porch. I guess vanilla people think that we cruise around looking for pineapples and will randomly knock on doors if we see one. And they think that being in the LS, we welcome any random person off the street into our home, into our sex party and start getting frisky. We do not. Stop believing this one. Stop sharing this one from me to you. Stop it. If we are having a party, I don't want vanilla people to know. I don't want LS people knowing what I'm doing unless they're invited. We're not going to advertise. We're not going to share it. Give it some thought here. We do not have sex with random people. Most don't. That's a whole other episode for the ones that do. But most in the LS community do not have sex with random people we have never met, especially a person coming to my front door off the street. Does not happen. We do not want our neighbors to know what we're doing. We do not want vanilla people to know what we're doing. Again, it goes back to this thought that swingers have to attract other swingers versus having conversation like adults with words. The other pineapple myth, which I have alluded to in another episode, the story goes and you have heard it. swingers will go to the grocery store and put an upside down pineapple in our shopping cart to advertise to other swingers who happen to know the code that we are looking for action. Total bullshit. We do not pick up random people at the supermarket. We have websites. This was an activity that maybe swingers did in the old days, but not today. We have our own websites like sdc.com where you can go meet people. We do not need to cruise a supermarket looking for action. In interest of sharing, because I read this in research for this episode, so now I need to share it with you. Coming from scoop.upworth.com, scoop.upworth.com, here is a couple shocked after unintentionally signaling their swingers during a beach vacation. This person originally posted the story on TikTok. I feel like I'm going to get a lot of research material from TikTok. I'll read the article and add in my own color commentary as we go. When Linda and her husband saw matching bathing suits with pineapple prints on them, they thought it was cute and decided to buy them. The couple was on vacation and on a nice sunny day they headed to the beach wearing matching bathing suits. It certainly felt like a good day. It got even better as other couples and people were incredibly nice to them. Not just regular nice, but they seemed a little extra interested in them. They were confused, but it took them a while to realize that they had unwittingly signaled to non-monogamous couples that they were open to swinging. No you didn't lady. It's called being friendly. Just because I acknowledge your resistance does not mean I want to see you naked. Back to the article. Many debated if the pineapple was a universal sign for swinging. A few people argued in the comments of the story, but some confirmed it. It is area-specific, but placing a pineapple on the mailbox or on the front porch of any house is a sign that a swinging party is happening. Spread those lies, those precious, precious lies. Pineapple print clothing is said to indicate couples are into swinging. Some argue that an upside-down pineapple was the secret sign. It's not. It's totally not. According to Urban Dictionary, which we've already stated was this the best resource ever a pineapple is turned upside down when a person is in search of a swinger party originally it was turned upside down in the individual shopping cart swingers use this symbol to identify each other in public pineapple garden decor and door knockers are also used by people to identify themselves as swingers i no we don't we don't it's coincidence it's a way of saying
Speaker2: Thank you. decor and door knockers are also used by people to identify themselves as swingers. I know we
Speaker1: don't. We don't. It's a coincidence. It's a way of saying a subtle hello to fellow swingers in the neighborhood. I'm not subtle about it. I'm literally doing a podcast about the lifestyle. Does the sign work? Well, it does. Quote, my husband and I always put an upside down pineapple in our shopping cart when we go shopping. We haven't met other couples yet, but one time we I'll see you next time. it does. Quote, my husband and I always put an upside down pineapple in our shopping cart when we go shopping. We haven't met other couples yet, but one time we did get a very telling wink and a smile, said Jen from Atlanta, according to hedonism.com. No one approached you. That means it didn't work. That is the opposite of working. Oh, someone winked at me. No, they were trying to hold back a sneeze. This is an example of how these myths are perpetuated in the echo chamber that is the internet. Pineapples have historically been a symbol of hospitality. There are clothing brands that use pineapples in their designs. Are pineapples a secret swinger symbol? No, because they're not secret anymore. Not sure where this association originated, but you better be sure the vanilla world knows about it, or think they know about it. Pineapples have been embraced by the LS community, especially the Upside Down Pineapple, but unless I'm at an LS event and I see a person person wearing a shirt with pineapples i won't assume anything about their sex life and you should not either let people just enjoy pineapples they're delicious frozen in a drink upside down cake for our vanilla listeners in the ls and really any secret community once a symbol becomes widely known outside the community the community will switch to a new symbol it's not necessary to point out every pineapple and question whether the owner of said pineapple is a swinger assume nothing about other people's sex life you really want to know ask we talked about yard ornaments and landscaping which the vanilla world has a keen interest in whatever i put in my yard the other mystical swinger symbols are jewelry specifically black rings and anklets for black rings out of all the items on the list yeah there is some validity to this one wearing a black ring on the right index finger or middle finger or left hand i the internet cannot agree on where i need to look for it, may indicate a person is a swinger. This is a very subtle but very public sign. If someone knows what to look for, yeah, they could pick it up. Same rationale behind an anklet on the right or left leg. Again, no one can agree where to wear it and when and by whom. There appears to be some code to all this that I will totally forget after three drinks. If a person is wearing a prominent piece of jewelry to denote their participation in the lifestyle, they're out and proud about being a swinger. There is no subtlety, no need for a singular symbol because they're going to tell you about it. There is one piece of jewelry or design I know out there that singularly denotes a person is in the LS. It's a red and black pendant sold by The Swinger Shop. They are not sponsoring me. Oh, please sponsor me. Go check that out if you want to wear your LS-ness for the world to see. Again, that's theswingershop.com. I really wanted to do this episode. I couldn't wait. That's why it's the second episode. I wanted to address so many of these myths and symbols and supposed secrets in the LS. When we told some vanilla friends what we do, their first question was about pineapples. Pineapples are not a secret anymore to all my LS friends. The vanilla world found out. We are going to switch. So maybe carrots, clown noses, yellow sashes, fancy hats, just throwing some things out there. I am not a sociologist. Just a guy with a microphone. But from my uneducated perspective, humans want secrets. They want to know all the hidden information so they can feel special. Same reason people want to know the secret initiation rituals of sororities and fraternities. Hint, they aren't all special. People want to know these secrets about other people's lives when really it is none of their business. The people who buy into these lists and share them, they want to sit back and go, tee hee hee, I know a secret. Big whoop. The world would be a happier place if we all just let people be. No need to cast judgment or gossip or pride. Let people have their own happiness. And really another aspect is the gossip. In these small towns and suburbia and church groups, lacking any topics of substance, people will resort to gossip and wild conjecture. I ponder how many people have been falsely accused of being swingers based on landscape choices. I can't attest to the validity of random stories from the internet, but it is scary to think that people made life-altering choices like buying a house in a certain neighborhood because their neighbor planted pompous grass 12 years ago when they caught it on sale and needed a fast-growing hedge. You could be like me and just like flamingos and have a special bond with your mother. Someone like a teacher could get falsely accused of being in the LS based on their jewelry choice for the day. And what happens when a new secret symbol is fabricated and disseminated by the vanilla world? What if owning a black hat suddenly you're a swinger? Or driving a certain kind of vehicle? We could run a while with this crazy train. Everyone who owns a pair of Nike shoes, specifically yellow Nikes, you're a swinger. Everyone who gets a haircut on Tuesdays, everyone who got married in 2007, swinger. Do you like apples? Do you like pork chops? Swinger. It doesn't end and is always changing. The only solution is to abandon them. We don't need these secret symbols anymore. We have much better ways to find our people in this world than relying on riding around neighborhoods checking for white rocks. The vanilla world wants a window into the LS. Fine. You came to the right place. I will share what I can. I will share the truth. I will call out the bullshit for you. We do not have secret symbols. We are adults. We have the internet. Thank you for listening. Please subscribe. If you're interested in starting this adventure in the LS, check out our website where we have more information that other lifestyle.com and a link to get you started on sdc.com thank you for the time and attention know that you are appreciated and loved have a great day