Crystal meth is out of the closet. Gay publications around the country are running stories about the bitch called “Tina.” An alarm has gone off and a lot of folks are no longer hitting the snooze button.

Sorry. Something about this subject makes me leap for metaphors.

In one story, ex-addict Peter Staley of New York says a year and a half ago the methamphetamine problem was rarely discussed. “If it came up, it was someone bragging about their wild weekend on meth.” Now he says gay guys are as likely to tell each other to keep away from the stuff as they are to say, ooh, try it, it’s the best thing since the International Male catalog.

A piece in San Diego’s Gay & Lesbian Times points out, “Though the meth epidemic is not unique to gay and bisexual men, what is unique among this population is the use of meth primarily to facilitate and enhance sex.” All too often, studies show, men who are experiencing “this euphoric, chemical self-confidence” are also giving safe sex the bum’s rush, pun sorta intended.

From 10 to 20 percent of all gay men use meth, and maybe clear up to 40 percent in San Francisco, The Associated Press guesstimates. Among its many charms, Tina apparently makes addicts of users faster than a drag queen pounces on a sale-priced wig. Aside from the glaring HIV risk, meth also offers the user the chance to lose his teeth, or sink into paranoia. Ironically, meth abuse can also make it tough to have an orgasm, or sustain an erection, the so-called “crystal dick” effect.

All this and you get to pay money for it too? Such a deal.

I’ve been reading the explanations from experts of why gay men are so attracted to this drug, but what sticks with me most is the sentiment of longtime user Bart Johnson, clean for seven years, who remembers the precise date and time he first tangoed with Tina. He remarks that “it’s the first time I really ever felt normal . . . Suddenly all those inhibitions and feelings about yourself go away. Everything that you thought was bad about yourself you completely forget.”

We’re not going to erase anytime soon all the factors that can make a gay man feel badly about himself. Ranging from worldwide homophobia to the stigma of having HIV to the gay male preoccupation with appearance to the heartbreak of psoriasis, there’s a lot to be fixed.

I like the approach of director and actor John Cameron Mitchell, who says we need “intelligent scare tactics, to convince people the drug is uncool.” He notes, “You have a lot of young gay men coming into the city—they were the nerds in high school, the wallflower, the ugly kid.” To them “the city is the place to be sexy, to be a star, and they get a false burst of confidence with a drug like this.”

Then there are the bathhouses and sex parties and people who advertise online that they’re into the “Party and Play” scene, meaning meth and sex together. Sometimes it seems easier to stop a charging rhino (by taking away its credit card, silly), than to change a culture.

It’s seriously tempting, as we struggle for equal rights, to hide our dirty laundry. Throw it down a mine shaft, even. But we know that hiding something will not make it go away. A lot of us have already given that a whirl.