Gay men in straight bars

Everyone is here just to have fun, man. Here everyone is just here to have a good time. Everyone thinks so, too. You can go to other places for fun, but when you really want to have a good time you come to Splash. This was the third time in the last two weeks that a clean-cut, muscular straight guy had approached me in a gay bar.

Straight people in gay bars have sometimes been flagged as a problem. Bachelorette parties can still be problematic in big-city gay bars, but were more so before same-sex marriage was legal. Sometimes big-city gay clubs become so popular with straight couples the gays abandon it.

All of the owners of small-city gay bars I interviewed said they depended upon straight people to stay open. What is problematic in big-city gay bars is not in the rest of America. We know why straight women enjoy gay spaces: an evening free of sexual objectification, a lower risk of sexual assault, and sometimes, a low-risk opportunity to sexually objectify men.

I had never given any thought to what straight men might get out of visiting gay bars.

An Etiquette Guide for Straight People in Gay Bars

C, which was featured in a Washington Post piece about gay bars becoming just bars. A tanned, white shirtless man lurched up to me and shouted about what a great time he was having. Over shouted small talk he put his hand on my shoulder and asked where I was going later.

At New Beginnings in Johnson City Tennessee, I was getting ready to leave when a muscular blonde in his late 20s approached me. He grabbed my hand and asked for my phone. There have always been straight men in gay bars, of course: unassailable bartenders or strippers, or clinging to women as some sort of heterosexual lifesavers.

We had a group of probably eight straight guys who would come and hang out, just regular guys. They were in their 20s. Most of the time if we pull a straight guy up on stage and razz him, we tell him if he brings in friends next time we will give them a hard time. And they love that!!! Then they bring a group of guys in the next weekend.

So it really helps getting new people into the bar. The woman looked bored, the man pounded on my shoulder. The result? Everyone loses. There are thousands of hetero bars in every city and only a handful of gays bars.