Why Gay Bars are Val for LGBT Communi | KCRW

Contents:

• IN ‘GAY BAR,’ TIME-HOPPG SNAPSHOTS OF QUEER NIGHTLIFE
• LICHT CAFé, D.C.’S NEWT GAY BAR, IS A COZY, ART-FILLED U STREET HIAWAY
• WHAT DO A GAY BAR LOOK LIKE?
• ARTS DISTRICT GAY BAR OWNER PLANS OPENG OF LGBTQ+ HOTEL AND NIGHTCLUB
• WHY GAY BARS ARE VAL FOR LGBT COMMUNI
• BEER IS SO GAY
• LGBTQ MEMORABILIA DIGNER HONORS DEFUNCT FLORIDA GAY BARS
• THE 42 BT GAY BARS AMERI
• 'GAY BAR' TRACKS THE WAVE OF A WHOLE CULTURE — AND ONE LIFE
• 13 BT GAY BARS IN BROOKLYN, NY
• HOW ‘GAY’ SHOULD A GAY BAR BE?

IN ‘GAY BAR,’ TIME-HOPPG SNAPSHOTS OF QUEER NIGHTLIFE

If you felt a twge of boredom (bon if you thrill to disheveled, elive, gamy), then I have a book for Atherton L’s “Gay Bar” is a rtls and telligent cultural history of queer nightlife.

LICHT CAFé, D.C.’S NEWT GAY BAR, IS A COZY, ART-FILLED U STREET HIAWAY

In the openg scene, Atherton L and his partner (rather regrettably referred to as the Famo Blue Raat, after the Leonard Cohen song) go out to a London gay bar, lookg for a ltle adventure, and enter a crowd: “Wh a kd of btal elegance, the group spread apart like the blas of a pocketknife. Atherton L is a skilled rear of the signifiers of cloth and archecture, the fetishizatn of workg-class fashn, for example, and how the rise of AIDS fluenced sign cisns: “A new type of gay bar began to appear London’s Soho the ’90s — airy, glossy, ntental.

Sometim that history is his Atherton“Gay Bar” offers a twist on the nventnal memoir; ’s a life seen snapshots, the bars as the backdrop.

WHAT DO A GAY BAR LOOK LIKE?

Amaretto sours Wt Hollywood, Atherton L llege, still strenuoly datg women and meetg his first groups of gay men. “Everythg about beg gay was so crowd: the ads for bars and rts and waxg servic rammed together, shallow and histrnic and imper, ” he wr.

) Most jarrg, perhaps, are Atherton L’s efforts at mimickg the theorists he clearly admir, those sectns that e across as parodi of amic wrg: “If the word muny is ed a failure of vobulary — too broad, too utopian — perhaps the metaphor to bt replace is metaphor self”; “gay bars are about potentialy, not rolutn.

ARTS DISTRICT GAY BAR OWNER PLANS OPENG OF LGBTQ+ HOTEL AND NIGHTCLUB

He’s already told what he most miss about gay bars; how movgly he replit here, wh his wi, strobg tellect, enliveng skepticism, raslly allure: “Perhaps you uld ll a gay bar a galaxy: We are held together but kept om llidg by a fe balance of momentum and gravy. In the gay dark ag (sometime before Ksey’s rearch revealed how many of there actually are), the sparse rmatn available about the gay muny was pure famatn.

‘Homosexual, ’ a medil term associated wh mental illns and synonymo wh pedophilia, was often the only word available for scribg queer people of any kd (excludg slurs). When the Amerin gay liberatn movement started the late sixti, clil terms like ‘homosexual’ and ‘transexual’ were dropped for the more posive ‘homophile’ (and then simply ‘gay’) and ‘transgenr’. The pk triangle, a hate-fueled mark assigned to gay men by the Nazis, and the black triangle for lbians were both appropriated by the muny.

WHY GAY BARS ARE VAL FOR LGBT COMMUNI

Graphic signer Tom Doerr chose the Greek lambda for the Gay Activists Alliance, and would eventually bee the symbol for gay and lbian rights worldwi. For gay bars, pri events, important msag, and any tablishment that is lookg to stake out a fively queer space, say loud and proud wh a bold sign.

Most gay liberatn movers and shakers probably weren’t tryg to be pneers—they were jt tryg to be themselv and live their liv an thentic way. The followg signs take their cue om the past, transformg classic genr symbols or a vtage athetic to a progrsive future wh that special gay flair.

“The goal is to foc on the classic cktails, rather than jt vodka-sodas and rose Kennedys, as you may get at other gay bars, ” he says. Kiki owner Keaton Fedak, the former general manager at nearby gay bar Dirty Goose, will expand Kiki to the next-door space that formerly hoed dive Dodge Cy. While I n’t say for certa that this work picts a gay bar, we know Perl was active the 1950 gay bar scene of New York Cy.

BEER IS SO GAY

A WWII-propaganda and magaze illtrator, Perl was an tablished artist who extensively created work pictg gay life. The nonscript figur the patg are male-prentg and the limed choice of warm lor suggts a level of uny, so wouldn’t be outlandish to suggt the bar he is pictg might be a gay bar. Due to assiatn, gentrifitn, and dozens of other factors, the last twenty or so years have seen signifint closur of gay bars.

Perhaps I’ll be stg next to the next Perl—jt as was possible, he was stg next to Jared French or Pl Cadm at a gay bar 1957.

LGBTQ MEMORABILIA DIGNER HONORS DEFUNCT FLORIDA GAY BARS

The team behd one of Las Vegas’ most popular gay bars announced Wednday s lnchg an LGBTQ+ boutique hotel, rtrant, gamg lounge and nightclub next month. “It has been my missn to create a vibrant and clive entertament district for our LGBTQ+ muny, and I’m thrilled to announce that Q Hospaly Group has secured a prime lotn on the inic Las Vegas Strip to create the Gayt statn Las Vegas, ” Cordova said a statement. Gay bars and nightclubs have long served as sanctuari for LGBT muni, but many of the venu have been disappearg.

THE 42 BT GAY BARS AMERI

On June 12, the adlit mass shootg the history of the Uned Stat took place Orlando, Florida at Pulse, a gay nightclub. Kyle Fzpatrick, -founr of the gay culture magaze Boy Club, recently wrote “Why Gay Bars Are So Important” for ATTN. If you thk about the gay muny as other muni, à la relign or somethg, our rallyg pots, our church are gay bars.

'GAY BAR' TRACKS THE WAVE OF A WHOLE CULTURE — AND ONE LIFE

There’s been a lot of theori that wh apps like Grdr and Tr, people don’t need to go to a gay bar to meet other gay people, or other queer people, or other trans people, etc.

13 BT GAY BARS IN BROOKLYN, NY

Stone Bar Hollywood was another one, which is now Harvard & Stone, but ed to be … a gay bar for primarily the Thai muny.

There’s a bar lled La Plaza, which is a primarily Lato gay bar that people pass and have no ia that ’s a gay bar.

DnA: The spac are safe spac for the reasons you’ve explaed, but they n also be – at the very same time – unsafe spac, precisely bee the gay muny gathers there, and they n bee a target. DnA: The straight muny has always known that the gay muny bars, or certaly the gay dance clubs, are more fun than the straight dance clubs.

HOW ‘GAY’ SHOULD A GAY BAR BE?

KF: It’s always great when you have straight or cisgenr people at gay bars or queer spac, bee that’s the moment of celebratn, that we all are g together to really acknowledge and experience and really celebrate each other. Where n get tricky – and LGBT people have been gay bars where you have a bachelorette party, or even a bachelor party, or some group that is sort of en masse, g like tourists to poke their head , see what’s gog on, and then leave – we feel kd of like zoo animals. On top of that, a lot of tim when you have the groups that are not necsarily a part of the gay muny g to “vis, ” they mand the space.