End Of An Era As Fred Swanson Steps Down As Head of Gay Cy – Seattle Gay Scene

Contents:

• SEATTLE GAY NEWS CHARTS A PATH TO THE FUTURE AFTER ATH OF LONGTIME EDOR GEE BAKAN
• SEATTLE GAY NEWS ARCHIV S PAST AND LOOKS TO THE FUTURE
• END OF AN ERA AS FRED SWANSON STEPS DOWN AS HEAD OF GAY CY
• SEATTLE’S BT GAY CLUBS, SHOPS, AND BARS
• REMEMBERG SEATTLE GAY NEWS PUBLISHER GEE BAKAN
• SEATTLE GAY NEWS PODSTS
• LATVIA BE 7TH NATN TO BE LED BY AN OPENLY GAY HEAD OF STATE

SEATTLE GAY NEWS CHARTS A PATH TO THE FUTURE AFTER ATH OF LONGTIME EDOR GEE BAKAN

Gays on Broadway: A ont-row seat to Queer history NYC theater. When Gee Bakan, the edor and publisher of Seattle Gay News sce 1982, died June 2020, thoands of people the LGBTQ+ muny Seattle grieved.

Bakan, known as “the Governor of Capol Hill, ” ma the weekly newspaper Seattle’s leadg source of rmatn about the AIDS epimic the 1980s durg a time when many news sourc blamed gay people for the disease they lled “gay ncer.

SEATTLE GAY NEWS ARCHIV S PAST AND LOOKS TO THE FUTURE

” He also created a place where Seattle’s LGBTQ+ muny uld feel a sense of solidary when many stat still had laws place agast gay sex. (LGBTQ+ stands for lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr and queer/qutng, wh the + notg everythg along the genr and sexualy spectm. )“Gee and the SGN documented and wnsed our llective stggl and acknowledged our existence and humany at a time that few wanted to see , ” says Fred Swanson, the executive director of Gay Cy, the long-standg Seattle LGBTQ+ rource center.

A voted activist and lear the LGBTQ+ muny, Bakan over the s grew the Seattle Gay News om a small muny newsletter to a newspaper wh a weekly circulatn as high as 13, 500. And though the publitn vered the LGBTQ+ muny better than any other publitn Seattle, Bakan’s staff was maly gay, whe men, says Renee Raketty, a transgenr woman who was the managg edor of the publitn om 2005 to 2007. The bs is also still reverg om the fancial issu ed by the panmic and Bakan’s health problems by updatg s webse and social media prence, and by creasg s young rearship, says Crag, the new publisher and owner of Seattle Gay News.

Last December, they joed Seattle Gay News as a reporter. But they also say SGN wasn’t always reprentative of the full breadth of the LGBTQ+ muny Seattle, and their foc is now on “the voic that have been stepped on by the cisgenr, whe, gay muny.

END OF AN ERA AS FRED SWANSON STEPS DOWN AS HEAD OF GAY CY

” Crag is nsirg Eichenbm for the permanent edor--chief role at Seattle Gay News but says she didn’t want to give a posn so fed by her father to anyone so soon after his ath. Gay Cy celebrat over 25 years of servg Seattle’s LGBTQ+ muny‘Gmpy Santa’ and ‘Governor of Capol Hill’: Gee Bakan, longtime edor of the Seattle Gay News, di. Eichenbm and Crag recently rebrand the publitn om “Seattle Gay News” to “SGN” and add a rabow sign next to the masthead to symbolize s cln of all segments of the LGBTQ+ muny.

She says SGN spired her to start a gay-straight alliance at her high school Bellevue. For example, one of SGN’s Pri issu this year featur an say by Filipo Amerin Seattle drag queen Gaysha Starr about transng durg the panmic.

Tom Rasmsen, the first openly gay man elected to Seattle Cy Council and a longtime SGN rear, says SGN’s verage of LGBTQ+ muni of lor unr Bakan was better than any other publitn Seattle.

SEATTLE’S BT GAY CLUBS, SHOPS, AND BARS

That said, Starr says, most of the verage the 1980s and 1990s foced on cisgenr gay and lbian subjects who were maly whe. Her first story was about societal discrimatn agast Black hair styl, and she recently wrote an article where she terviewed Brian Broome, a gay Black thor, about his work. Currently, Crag says the rearship is maly whe, gay men olr than says SGN is also stayg current wh the important issu the LGBTQ+ muny.

In the 1980s and 1990s, that was the AIDS epimic and lbian and gay rights. She says she had a straed relatnship wh her father ever sce he abptly left her fay to live as a gay man Seattle 1982, when she was 12.

REMEMBERG SEATTLE GAY NEWS PUBLISHER GEE BAKAN

Holzer said he knew he was gay sce age 4 and the queer culture and muny he grew up wh Seattle shaped his inty.

But Holzer’s experience exemplifi the challeng faced by many LGBTQ+ people Seattle, where the high st of livg and rapidly shiftg characteristics of “gayborhoods” like Capol Hill have bed to make livg the cy unsirable and often untenable, if not impossible. Natnally, The Washgton Post reported that 45% of gay bars closed sce 2002. Queer spac and muni provi a rpe om the daily grd of homophobia and transphobia and create a rare cril mass of safety to be yourself.

SEATTLE GAY NEWS PODSTS

“It’s not the same thg anymore”Dpe what some media pictns might have thk, LGBTQ+ people are not all affluent, cisgenr, whe, gay men.

In a 2014 story tled “Is Seattle’s ‘gayborhood’ vanishg?, ” Balk found that due to multiple factors cludg enomic forc like gentrifitn (as well as greater acceptance outsi the neighborhood), the number of LGBTQ+ uple hoeholds on Capol Hill dropped by 23% between 2000 and don’t regnize what Seattle has bee.

LATVIA BE 7TH NATN TO BE LED BY AN OPENLY GAY HEAD OF STATE

He said gay bars like Pony changed their management, Capol Hill changed and many iends moved away. I really didn’t do anythg [anymore] — gay, fun, drag, dancg, ” he a month ago, Holzer cid to pull up stak and move back to Billgs, Mont., where he lived before movg to Seattle as a Billgs, he said, “I haven’t been this happy a long time, to be hont.