Black-owned gay bars are dwdlg. Can they survive Covid?

Contents:

• GAY NEW YORKERS SHARE ACUNTS SIAR TO ROBBERI THAT LEFT TWO AD
• LBB PRENTS: GREGGOR MATTSON - WHO NEEDS GAY BARS?
• BOOK SHOPS - LEFT BANK BOOKS
• THE 10 BEST PARIS GAY CLUBS & BARSGAY CLUBS & BARS PARIS
• THE NUMBER OF GAY BARS HAS DWDLED. A NEW GENERATN PLANS TO BRG THEM BACK.
• ‘THE ARE OUR HOM’: LA GAY BARS FIGHT TO STAY AFLOAT AFTER YEAR OF SHUTDOWN
• BLACK-OWNED GAY BARS ARE DWDLG. CAN THEY SURVIVE COVID?

GAY NEW YORKERS SHARE ACUNTS SIAR TO ROBBERI THAT LEFT TWO AD

Both of their bank acunts were they may not be the only gay New Yorkers are g forward for the first time wh acunts that share notable siari to the unexplaed aths this sprg of Jul Ramirez, 25, a social worker, and John Umberger, 33, a polil biggt difference so far: They News spoke to two people who scribed harrowg experienc that seem to broadly f the pattern of what happened to Ramirez and Umberger. Meanwhile, the gay muny the untry’s largt LGBTQ cy awas Person, 55, says he was robbed siar circumstanc 2018 and, bed wh the recent reports, the experience has left him shaken. ”No memori and emptied bank acuntsIn December, Burt — who reached out to NBC News on social media after recent reports regardg the two aths — was walkg home om a night out wh iends when he stopped at The Boiler Room, a popular gay bar Manhattan’s East Village, for one last drk by himself.

LBB PRENTS: GREGGOR MATTSON - WHO NEEDS GAY BARS?

Lda Clary is prsg the NYPD to further vtigate the ath of her son, John ClaryRoughly a month later, Umberger was found ad after he and two unintified men left another popular Hell’s Kchen gay bar, The Q.

Wh this climate of relative tolerance many specialised same-sex tablishments were opened and a gay sub-culture thrived the 1920s.

Although most straight venu were clearly habed by homosexuals and lbians who nformed to tradnal valu, same-sex venu began to open to ter for those who need a greater gree of openns. Many popular ‘straight’ venu such as the Angel Bar, Champs Elyse Bar and the Liberty Bar attracted a large gay dience. One of most popular ‘exclively gay’ venu was the Claire Lune the Café Biard near Place Pigalle.

BOOK SHOPS - LEFT BANK BOOKS

There was no ban on homosexualy France and the police were tolerant toward special nightclubs providg that ctomers mataed m.

The owner, who was an ex-movie starlet, liberately created a mixed atmosphere of lbians and gay men and if the police arrived, lookouts would tip everyone off and the men would dance wh the women. Paris Gay Village is an anizatn that has been proposg for 15 years special walkg tours dited to the history of homosexuals and homosexualy Paris.

THE 10 BEST PARIS GAY CLUBS & BARSGAY CLUBS & BARS PARIS

Beyond that, rampant gentrifitn big ci has phed gay bars out of the neighborhoods they helped make hip. Jarred by the closg of his favore lol waterg hole Cleveland, Oh, Greggor Mattson embarks on a journey across the untry to pat a much more plex picture of the cultural signifince of the spac, si "big four" gay ci, but also beyond them. Loosely rmed by the Damron Gui, the so-lled "Green Book" of gay travel, Mattson logged 10, 000 on the road to all rners of the Uned Stat.

His statns are sometim thrivg, sometim stgglg, but all offerg timate views of the wi range of gay experience Ameri: POC, whe, trans, cis; past, prent, and future. "A fun, thoughtful, and nuanced examatn of the past, prent, and future rol of the 'gay bar' as the mand for and enomics of queer muny space wildly flux.

THE NUMBER OF GAY BARS HAS DWDLED. A NEW GENERATN PLANS TO BRG THEM BACK.

New York (also known as the Big Apple) offers an amazg choice, whether be gay bars, dance clubs or simply shoppg. A group is planng a lbian and queer “clubhoe” Los Angel, and an “old-school gay girl” Norfolk plans to reopen the lbian bar she found four s ago. Pike and McDaniel know openg a bar durg a panmic may be risky, but they say they’ve learned one thg om years of visg and workg other queer tablishments: If they want to survive, they first have to build a better and more clive than a barThe gay bar was long the ma, and sometim only, space where queer people uld gather.

‘THE ARE OUR HOM’: LA GAY BARS FIGHT TO STAY AFLOAT AFTER YEAR OF SHUTDOWN

A few opened quietly the early 1930s, then after World War II, hundreds more began servg gay men and women. About 200 of those tered to, like Hershee Bar Norfolk, opened when their stat had laws that prohibed bar owners om employg gay people or creatg gatherg spots for them. She mentored foster children whose parents had kicked them out, and every Thanksgivg, she threw a dner for people whose fai didn’t accept 1987, Norfolk had four or five gay bars, and the number natnwi peaked at more than 1, 700.

Those servg lbians and people of lor were h all gay bar listgs cled by 37 percent between 2007 and 2019, the number of queer bars servg people of lor cled by 59 percent, and bars for lbians cled by 52 percent, Mattson Francis lost the Lexgton Club, and Rubyu Jungle shut s doors New Orleans. Still, Mattson has found two prevailg factors — the rise of datg apps and a growg acceptance of gay people.

“Gay bars were never jt hookup plac, but they were plac to meet other LGBTQ+ people, and now that you n meet them om your bedroom or while you’re wag for the b, that has taken away some of gay bars’ monopoly on beg the place where you fd other LGBTQ+ folks, ” he bars are also no longer the only place some queer people, pecially Whe and cisgenr men, feel safe. “I thk this is highly uneven, ” Mattson said, “but for gay, Whe, middle-class people like myself, any bar feels like a gay bar if you show up wh six iends. For some bar owners, Mattson found, that’s jt enomics, but for a new generatn, “lbian” and “gay” don’t pture their full and fluid inti.

BLACK-OWNED GAY BARS ARE DWDLG. CAN THEY SURVIVE COVID?

Pike did secury for Nellie’s Sports Bar, and McDaniel bartend at APEX, Cobalt and other gay bars before workg alongsi Pike at A League of Her Own (ALOHO) Adams was one of jt 21 lbian bars left the untry when Pike and McDaniel worked there, but durg the early days of the ronavis panmic, the uple cid they wanted to create a new spot, one they owned. As You Are won’t have secury guards; stead, Pike is trag a fleet of “safety managers” — a change Pike hop will attract applints who are ls ncerned wh actg tough and more terted creatg a safe atmosphere for and McDaniel know that some people thk the gay bar era is over, that spac like theirs are no longer need, but people who say that tend to have more privilege, McDaniel said. “My experience of tryg to fd safe space here the Stat, and parg wh trips back to vis fay Mexi, has probably rmed my fervor for creatg a space where you are able to jt exist regardls of how or where you were born, who you want to love and how you intify, ” Castellanos, the owner of Hershee Bar Norfolk, nsirs herself an “old-school gay girl, ” but she’s rootg for the next generatn of queer bar owners.

As bt anyone n tell, the number of lbian bars peaked the 1980s, toppg out around 200 bs, acrdg to Greggor Mattson, an associate profsor of soclogy at Oberl College & Conservatory, who rearch LGBTQ+ muni, gay bars, equaly, and gentrifitn.

But the most mon reasons ced by the operators of the dozen lbian bars terviewed by CNN Bs are the wage gap and fancial dispari of queer women and genr mori, as pared to their straight and cisgenr unterparts, as well as gay men. LBQ women tend to have lower e, lower spendg abily, and higher rat of poverty than gay men, straight women and straight men, said Bian Wilson, a senr scholar of public policy at The Williams Instute at the UCLA School of Law.