The Past and Future of Three of LA's Historic But Threatened Gay Nightclubs - Curbed LA

Contents:

• THE BT GAY BARS AND CLUBS LOS ANGEL
• THE PAST AND FUTURE OF THREE OF LA'S HISTORIC BUT THREATENED GAY NIGHTCLUBS

THE BT GAY BARS AND CLUBS LOS ANGEL

Andrew Ahn’s father once told him that there were “no gay people Korea. In a culturally nservative muny, where gog to church and buildg a fay were heavily emphasized, Ahn felt his gay inty kept him “om beg able to participate Korean culture. ” Then, he started equentg GAMeBoi, a weekly Asian Amerin gay party at Wt Hollywood’s Rage Nightclub.

He learned to embrace beg both Korean and gay, so much so that he directed “Fire Island, ” a groundbreakg queer Asian Amerin rom- released last year. Beg Asian Amerin and LGBTQ+ n feel lonely, wh stutns such as ethnic church often disavowg non-heterosexual relatnships while tradnal LGBTQ+ spac such as gay bars n be unwelg to people of lor.

“Fdg plac like GAMeBoi, where beg queer and Asian do -exist … It’s not like a 1, 000-year-old Korean cultural rual, but I uld create a new rual, ” said Ahn, a recent Friday, hundreds packed QT Nightlife’s monthly K-Pop Night at Micky’s, a Wt Hollywood gay club a block or so east om the old GAMeBoi posed for selfi a pk Barbie box wh dis balls hangg overhead. ” (Michael Owen Baker / For The Tim) Even historilly gay neighborhoods like Wt Hollywood or San Francis’s Castro district, Asian Amerins have long been ignored or fetishized, seen as feme and weak.

THE PAST AND FUTURE OF THREE OF LA'S HISTORIC BUT THREATENED GAY NIGHTCLUBS

In 2019, then-Wt Hollywood Mayor John Duran argued that he did not appropriately touch a member of the Gay Men’s Chos of Los Angel bee “he’s a skny Korean kid wh pimpl on his cheek.

” Asian Amerin advocy groups cricized Duran’s remark, wh API Equaly-LA potg to the long history of discrimatn agast Asian men gay muni such as Wt Hollywood, whose clubs “ed to require three forms of photo intifitn om anyone they perceived as Asian.