Via Peterson Toscano… 

You’d think that the managers of a gay bar would understand that the climate of violence toward gay people can make their establishments seem to gay bashers, as a waterhole to a leopard…somewhere they know their prey will be.  You’d think that they’d keep the safety of their customers (you know…the folks who pay their bills) in mind.  You’d think that, at minimum, when a gay man is bashed right at their doorstep, that they’d give the man shelter inside and not have their bouncers throw him back out to the wolves.  You’d think…

I Was Gay Bashed

Two guys stood in front of us hugging. The usual New York traffic passed without dismay until the white Mercedes C-class appeared. The tall bald guy leaned out of the window yelling and screaming obscenities that no one would be proud of—the usual clichés spit towards gay men. It seemed like an incident that could easily be brushed off until he got out of the car. He came toward us, still yelling. He was angry, as if we had personally offended his entire being.

All I saw was a tall muscular man coming toward my friend and these other unsuspecting guys in the path of what seemed to be a disaster. He continued to yell, the couple broke their hug.

My instinct told me that I was the most beefy of all of the guys standing in the breezeway—a silly notion seeming I only stand 5 foot 6. He came within inches. I tried to ward him off by telling him that no one is trying to mess with him. I pleaded for him just to go away. He spit in my face and I knew that I was no match for him. I immediately ran toward the bouncers of the gay club. I got behind the huge door man. The guy was quickly in pursuit behind me, fired up. Out of nowhere a punch landed on the right side of my face. It was the basher’s friend from the passenger seat. I swung, at which point the basher kicked me in the stomach. The bouncers quickly yelled at me to get in the club.

I tried to keep my composure, but ended up in the bathroom stall, crying, ashamed that I wasn’t able to protect myself, my friend or my fellow gay brothers. And then the worst happened…

To my dismay, one of the bouncers found me and told me I had to leave. Leave, I said. I’ve been gay bashed by a stranger. I was protecting my friends and in turn was socked and kicked in the stomach. He stayed firm to his orders. As I walked up the stairs of Splash Bar NYC, I saw one of the managers. I pleaded with him not to kick me out because I was afraid the guy and his friend were still out there. His response: "I don’t know anything about that!"

Before I knew it I was outside and I started to tremble at the sight of a white Mercedes parked down the street. And then a hand grabbed my back and pushed me toward a cab. "Get in, I’m taking you home," my friend said. I hurried inside trying not to cry before the driver pulled off.

As I write this I don’t know what hurts worse: My stomach or my eye or the fact that a gay bar kicked me out and refused to help me. I’ve spent the past five years trying to empower gay men, hoping with all my heart that we can one day roam the streets without being afraid, and here I sit at my computer, hurting physically and psychologically. If we can’t protect ourselves who will? In five years I’ve managed to post nothing but positive comments about any establishment or gay product. During this time my mindset was that there is enough negativity out there for me not to join in and down other gays. Yet I sit here wondering why I even bother when a gay bar (albeit a tragic one called Splash Bar NYC) threw me out to the wolves.

Dig it.  A gay basher vomits a string of obscenities at  a couple he sees hugging…a thing opposite sex couples do in public every fucking day…and when doing that doesn’t fulfill him enough he and his passenger jump out of their car and one of them proceed to beat the crap out of the a gay guy who tried to protect the couple from being attacked.  The gay guy takes refuge in the Splash Bar, only to be almost immediately thrown out back out the door.  Luckily for him the attackers were gone by then.

The Splash Bar website has an "Under Construction" page up. No word yet on whether or not their conscience is still under construction too, or when it might be completed.  But they have a MySpace profile Here.  This reminds me of the contemptible indifference the bathouses gave to the safety of their customers during the initial AIDS outbreak in the early 1980s.  But more then that, the history of the institution of the gay bar is more one of preying on the gay community, rather then catering to it, and that’s something we all need to keep in mind as we choose which businesses to patronize, where to spend our hard earned 23 percent less income then the average heterosexual makes. 

Back before Stonewall, before the modern gay rights movement, most gay bars were run by organized crime gangs who payed off the local police in order to stay open and serve alcohol in a day when most states and cities had laws forbidding bars from serving known homosexuals.  Back when any same sex dancing on the premises could get a bar closed down and it’s patrons arrested, the only gay watering holes that could stay open for very long were the ones run by mobsters who knew which hands to grease and when.  Those bars basically treated their gay customers like dogshit, because they knew there were no other places where we could gather, other then back alleys.  They served watered down bathtub booze and charged premium prices for it.  The bars were pest holes, but they were all we had, and their owners couldn’t have cared less about the people who spent their money there.  They didn’t have to.  We had nowhere else to go.

Times have changed.  I’m sure many gay establishments now are operated by people who feel a close connection to the community, and want us all to prosper and have the good life and enjoy ourselves together.  Chasing the Almighty Dollar doesn’t necessarily mean treating your customers like rubes.  In fact, that’s always a short sighted path to nowhere.  Just ask Detroit.  We have come a long way from the days of the seedy mob run bar.  But it’s worth remembering that the people who serve us drinks, don’t necessarily give a rat’s ass about us, about our safety, about our basic human dignity.  Some of them just want our money.  If they could pluck dollar bills off our cold dead gay bashed bodies they would, and spend it the next day on their own cheap thrills without a twinge of remorse or care.  You don’t throw someone who’s just been gay bashed back out the door to face his attackers again if you have a single solitary shred of conscience in you.  However, if you’re afraid that giving refuge to a gay bashing victim inside your establishment might spoil the atmosphere you’ve so carefully worked to create, and maybe make people spend less money, or even worse, go somewhere else where they might feel safer, then out the door he goes like yesterday’s trash, and your conscience before it.

[Update…]  From the comments to Ramone’s blog post…

I am so sorry about the bashing aspect of your story, but the only thing that I wanted to add is that SBNY has a tendency to REMOVE any drama from the bar at first glance. They did it to my partner who slipped on the steps and cut his had on a glass. The wrapped his hand up and told us to get in a cab. In retrospect – they never gave us an apology nor and sympathy or compassion, they just wanted us out. SBNY is lacking compassion and the days where is used to be a good ole neighborhood bar are gone. Now they just want gay dollars for shitty small watered down drinks, and they have no sense of community.

Yeah.  This is pretty much what I expected…

[Edited a tad…]