The Unsung History of Circu Parti, Where Gay Men Seek Sex and Freedom

Contents:

• DO YOU WANNA FUNK WH ME?: A BEGNER’S GUI TO GAY NIGHTCLUBS
• THE DOS & DON'TS OF GAY CLUBBG
• THE UNSUNG HISTORY OF CIRCU PARTI, WHERE GAY MEN SEEK SEX AND FREEDOM
• NUDY! DRKG! BAD MIC! A GAY MAN REVIEWS A STRAIGHT STRIP CLUB
• WHY GAY BARS ARE DISAPPEARG ACROSS AMERI
• HOW TO BEE POPULAR AT A GAY BAR
• LONDON'S LANDMARK BUILDG DOTTED WH STRIP CLUBS, GAY VENU TO TURN TO MOSQUE
• GAY PARTI & EVENTS
• HOW TO START A GAY-STRAIGHT ALLIANCE (GSA)
• THIS STRAIGHT GUY ACCINTALLY END UP A ‘GAY SEX CLUB’ AND LEFT THE BT YELP REVIEW

DO YOU WANNA FUNK WH ME?: A BEGNER’S GUI TO GAY NIGHTCLUBS

Good advice, but you uld jt do the easy way: fd the bit gay club town. (By “gay bar”, I mean any bar that ters primarily to gay men or lbians.

But if you want to go dance, party, and have a good time, tst me — a gay club is where you should be head. To be fair, there are straight clubs that play great mic and have fun, nonjudgmental crowds, and there are gay bars that are nothg more than S and M (Stand and Mol) clubs. Certa gay/lbian clubs have their target clientele, of urse — wboys and wgirls (The Round-up Saloon Dallas), leather men (La Track Montreal), punk lbians (The Dyke Bar Brighton, UK), and drag queens (1001 Pub Maryl Istanbul), for stance — but what I’m talkg about is your basic glter-ball, all-wele, humpg-on-the-dance-floor dis.

THE DOS & DON'TS OF GAY CLUBBG

This wouldn’t have happened at any of the gay bars town, and we fely would have had a better time, as the doorman was jt the first of numero snooty employe we enuntered, there.

If you’ve never been to a gay bar, there are a few thgs you need to unrstand so that you n have the right attu. First, there are gog to be homosexuals there.

THE UNSUNG HISTORY OF CIRCU PARTI, WHERE GAY MEN SEEK SEX AND FREEDOM

That may seem obv, but ’s amazg how many people enter what is clearly a gay bar and say, “Hey, thar’s a bunch a queers ‘ere.

NUDY! DRKG! BAD MIC! A GAY MAN REVIEWS A STRAIGHT STRIP CLUB

” And the homosexuals who are there will be dancg wh one another, holdg hands, huggg, and, y, kissg. A gay bar is one of the few plac where homosexuals n exprs their affectn for one another whout beg subjected to someone’s narrow judgment, or, prumably, riskg harm to themselv, so expect to happen.

I went wh three iends — a lbian and a straight uple — to a gay nightclub a while back, but was separated om them immediately after enterg the crowd club.

Unlike what you may have seen on Queer as Folk, the overwhelmg majory of gay bars don’t have backrooms and hallways where wild i are takg place.

WHY GAY BARS ARE DISAPPEARG ACROSS AMERI

Dg e, particularly the e of ecstasy and other signer dgs, is higher among the gay populatn than the straight populatn, and some gays and lbians equate a night on the town wh a night of high-energy, dg-duced spastic dancg. Havg said all that, why should you go to a gay nightclub? In my qut for the perfect dance club, I tried, or was dragged to, diss of all varieti, so I know om experience that the bt dance mic is a gay bar.

And numero dance masters and producers market their goods to gay clubs specifilly. Sylvter, the late dis diva of the ’80s, was one of the first to target gay dienc, and he tablished a proud tradn of producg multi-layered tracks to which even the most rhythmilly-challenged uld dance. Not so a gay club.

Even though he was straight and had a girliend, Ron and I went dancg together often; we both loved to dance, and if no one wanted to go out wh , we knew we uld dance a gay bar whout beg hassled. From gym gods to nerds to fag hags (the latter beg the straight women who hang wh their gay male iends) to straight upl who want to try some place new — don’t matter.

HOW TO BEE POPULAR AT A GAY BAR

Although, to be hont, the more you look like a er ught the headlights, the more the regulars will look at you oddly, so try not to eak out when you see your first drag queen or gay/lbian uple makg out.

Still, there are a few thgs to keep md before venturg to your first gay bar. And often, gay clubs smaller towns or ral areas are entrance-by-membership-only, to keep out the rednecks and others who want stir up trouble. When I attend llege the homophobic town of Wa, Texas, gettg to the one gay bar town remd me of enterg a speak-easy durg Prohibn, but once si, the patrons were all nice and easy-gog.

Dependg on the cy, the parts of town where gay bars are loted are often rough, and crime rat are high. Even when loted “nicer” parts of town, gay bars tend to attract n artists, pick pockets, and gay bashers lookg to prey on the weak or dnk.

LONDON'S LANDMARK BUILDG DOTTED WH STRIP CLUBS, GAY VENU TO TURN TO MOSQUE

If you would prefer to have bamboo shoved unr your nails to beg around homosexuals, then bt to stay out of gay clubs. However, if you have no problem wh gay, lbian, bisexual or transgenred people general, they turn will have no problem wh you, so you ought to give the lol gay bar a try.

There are gay venu most ci and towns. ’s most remote gay bar) you uld probably fd one place to wet your whistle.

Chanc are, your first tentative steps out onto the London queer scene were ma or around Old Compton Street, the shg of London’s mastream gay culture. The inic Royal Vxhall Tavern is one of the olst gay venu the cy and ss, as you may have gused, Vxhall. Chanc are you probably won’t be starg down that barrel of that gun a gay club eher then pal.

GAY PARTI & EVENTS

Csg a venue to ll out an expensive plummer bee you and your pals thought ’d be a great plan to smash up the toilet after your first h of gay gra gak isn’t exactly the pnacle of allyship. Gay men do not have any more right to touch a woman’s breasts than a straight man whout nsent. It’s been 50 years sce homosexualy was crimalised this untry.

A mere 30 years later, sectn 28 was passed - makg an offence to promote (talk about) homosexualy schools and only 5 years ago same sex marriag were not legal. Wh every new generatn of gay and bisexual men a new generatn of cisers. (This is large part why gay bathho are shuttg down across the U.

HOW TO START A GAY-STRAIGHT ALLIANCE (GSA)

) But if you are one of the gay/bi men out there, like many of , who don't get that same sh om Grdr that you do om furtive eye glanc the sna -- which turn to so much more -- then this article is for you: the 5 do's and 5 don'ts of gay cisg.

Don't take your Rolex or that rg your grandma gave you when she passed away to the gay sna. The circu—a loose global work of often weekend-long danceathons, where partygoers (almost all gay men) nvene om around the world to bond spirually, socially, sexually and milly—is one of the most unique phenomena to emerge om queer muni over the past few s.

Undoubtedly, many younger gay men prefer smaller venu that "bask the bety and openns of queer culture. " Plenty of olr gay men, too, fd the whole ethos of circu parti — glow sticks, remixed diva anthems, lor them, "body fascism"—to be tired figure out the state of the circu 2017, THUMP spoke wh Mickey Weems, a lecturer at the Universy of Hawai'i Manoa who has extensively studied circu parti (alongsi relig, anthropologil and folklore terts). Weems spoke to their past, prent and potential future, explag what role the circu has played shapg queer and gay culture, and what s evolutn says about the same today.

THIS STRAIGHT GUY ACCINTALLY END UP A ‘GAY SEX CLUB’ AND LEFT THE BT YELP REVIEW

A gay circu party (Photo via)THUMP: Can you give me a psule history of the circu? When the Gay Activist Alliance was formed—the first gay rights group, born only six months after Stonewall—they had danc an old firehoe SoHo. And New York, thoands of men began gatherg at Downtown loft spac that began croppg started pourg , wh plac like Flamgo and Twelve Wt, two of the most proment gay male dance spac, full of sweaty men dancg all the same time, Fire Island beme the place for people who uld afford .

The term "circu" me om beg the "need to know circu"—not only diss, but "--the-know" plac the gay muny that even clud, 1980, the Sat opened the East Village. One thg the 2002 documentary When Boys Fly [which followed a group of young gay men attendg the Miami Whe Party] got right was showg someone fallg out [passg out om dg e] was sndalo. Then you started seeg the rise of the ter, which pecially affected the gay datg scene.

A handful of proment gay punds saw the parti as a waste of our energy and rourc. People like Michelangelo Signorile, who wrote about his experience at the Palm Sprgs Whe Party Life Outsi, a book about gay culture at the time, were posg that the parti were crics like Signorile, Larry Kramer and Gabriel Rotello, parti were seen as havens for irrponsible behavr, sex and dgs. Most of the kds of studi look at the areas of gay culture—like the bathhoe scene, club scene, the app scene—bee they're supposed hot spots for HIV fectn and rampant dg the qutn is: do the people dog the studi unrstand our muny at all?