increasing in popularity among the gay male subculture. Clip-on earrings were primarily the preferred fashion in the 1920s; however, the physical piercing of lobes began growing in popularity from the 1960s. In the 1970s, piercing began to expand, as the punk movement embraced it, featuring nontraditional adornment such as safety pins; and Fakir Musafar began popularizing it as a form of Modern Primitivism, which incorporated piercing elements from other cultures, such as stretching. Body piercing was also heavily popularized in the United States by a group of Californians, including Doug Malloy and Jim Ward. Ward (inspired by and with money from Malloy) opened The Gauntlet as a home business in November 1975 and then as a commercial storefront operation in West Hollywood on 17 November 1978. The establishment of this business – considered the first of its type in the United States – was the beginning of the body piercing industry. As word of body piercing spread to the wider community, Ward began to publish the first publication dedicated to the subject, PFIQ. A table in Larry Townsend's The Leatherman's Handbook II (the 1983 second edition; the 1972 first edition did not include this list) which is generally considered authoritative states that a purple handkerchief is a symbol for body piercing in the handkerchief code, which is employed usually among gay male casual-sex seekers or BDSM practitioners in the United States, Canada, Australia and Europe. Wearing the handkerchief on the left indicates the top, dominant, or active partner; right the bottom, submissive, or passive partner. However, negotiation with a prospective partner remains important because, as Townsend noted, people may wear hankies of any color "only because the idea of the hankie turns them on" or "may not even know what it means". A significant development in body piercing in England occurred in 1987, when during Operation Spanner, a group of homosexuals—including well known body piercer Alan Oversby—were convicted of assault for their involvement in consensual sadomasochism over a 10-year period, including acts of body piercing. The courts declared that decorative body piercing was not illegal, but that erotic body piercing was. Subsequently, the group Countdown on Spanner formed in 1992 in protest. The group appealed the decision before the High Court of Justice, the House of Lords and finally the European Commission of Human Rights, attempting to overturn the verdict which ruled consent immaterial in acts of sadomasochism, without success.