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British Eldergays, did you use the term "clones"?

I was watching a very touching documentary on the early years of the AIDS crisis in the UK. I feel like most early-epidemic documentaries have been focused on California and New York, so it was interesting to see the UK perspective. It's not a great work of cinematic art, but it is an interesting and moving oral history / first-hand account from the men and women who survived those terrible years. One gentleman who survived was a doctor whose partner died in the early 80s. He talked about meeting him in a club and described him as "one of the Clones." He used that term a couple of times and almost like a capital-C proper noun -- it seemed to describe fit, attractive gay men with mustaches -- a very late 70s/early 80s look. Anyway, I'd never heard this term before. Just wondering if it was common vernacular or just something this particular gentleman was using.

It's called After 82: The Untold Story of the AIDS Crisis and it's free to watch on Tubi and the Roku Channel in the U.S.

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by Anonymousreply 4March 11, 2024 7:53 PM

Nowadays, I see the term "Castro clone" used to describe the way some gay men in San Francisco and New York dressed in the late 1970s.

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by Anonymousreply 1March 11, 2024 6:38 PM

I had a group of friends called the clones, all 4 of them wore the same uniform of the pale blue denim on denim, extra long brown leather belt, Hush Puppies.

The picture is pretty close, just lack the dangling belts and shoes.

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by Anonymousreply 2March 11, 2024 7:18 PM

Absolutely. Clones WAS the word in the early 1980s for gay men who wore jeans, tight-fitting tshirts or wife-beaters, and had moustaches, and who worked out enough to have defined bodies. I never heard Castro clone during the time I was living in NYC (early-mid-80s). Can you spot the clones in the link to the 1984 gay film below?

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by Anonymousreply 3March 11, 2024 7:30 PM

We called them Freddy Mercury Clones first. Then just clones.

by Anonymousreply 4March 11, 2024 7:53 PM
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