St louis gay scene

Discover the best gay bars, bathhouses, neighborhoods, and pride events in LGBTQ-friendly St. Louis. Let queer local experts at Travel Gay guide you. St. Louis' LGBTQ magazine. Covering politics, people, home life, and events in the queer community. Immerse yourself in the LGBTQ St. Louis community with a variety of local businesses and engaging events, including the annual PrideFest.

Here are some popular gay events in Saint Louis, MO: Pride St. Louis: An annual PrideFest celebrating the lgbtq+QIA+ community, fostering understanding, and tolerance through educational programs and events. Black Pride St. Louis: A celebration focusing on the Black lgbtq+QIA+ community. Here is a list of gay bars and hotspots in Saint Louis, MO: Club St. Louis: Club St.

Louis serves as a. Gregory Kompes, author of the Queer Planet series, lauded St. Louis in his book 50 Fabulous Gay-Friendly Places to Live, touting the city’s socially laissez faire attitude, cultural attractions. By Ian Darnell. October 31, Tonight we celebrate the 45th anniversary of a pivotal event in St.

Louis LGBT history. More than any other single date, Halloween can be said to be when a movement for the rights of LGBT people began in the Gateway City. On the night of Friday, October 31, plainclothes officers from the St. Louis police department's vice squad waited outside a gay bar called the Onyx Room. Vice officers, who typically concentrated on policing female sex workers, also enforced laws against gender nonconformity and homosexuality.

best gay bars in st louis

At the time, it was illegal for people to wear the clothes of the opposite sex or to have sex with someone of the same sex. It was on the eastern edge of the "gay ghetto," a part of St. Louis that largely overlapped with the Central West End. The neighborhood had a high concentration of LGBT residents and bars and other places where queer people gathered. LGBT people from all around the St.

Louis region and beyond came to the gay ghetto to meet and socialize with others like themselves. Soon after midnight, a group of nine male-bodied people wearing wigs, evening gowns, women's earrings, and high-heeled shoes exited the Onyx Room. Available sources suggest that these people identified as men, but it is possible that some were trans women.

The vice officers promptly arrested them. One account implies that the police had been at the ready in front of the bar as part of a planned crackdown on LGBT nightlife.

Similar arrests also took place that night across the Mississippi River in East St. Louis, which had several lesbian and gay bars of its own. According to a police report, the nine people arrested in front of the Onyx Room were all young, ages All worked low-paying, low-prestige jobs, were students, or were unemployed. Seven were white, and two were black. Most lived in the city of St. Louis, but one was from the nearby suburb of Webster Groves, and three were visiting from out of town.

They said that "they were insulted by the arresting officers, roughly treated in the police van, and made the objects of jokes and derision in the jail. Up to this point, the night's events weren't very unusual. Historical newspaper reports show that St. Louis authorities, like their counterparts in other cities, had been policing queer people since at least the late nineteenth century. Oral histories and other sources recount police raids of "fruit" bars and harassment of gender-nonconforming people throughout the s and '60s.

To be queer in these years meant risking abuse at the hands of police, arrest, and even imprisonment. Being arrested could mean public exposure resulting in loss of employment and alienation from family and friends. The Halloween arrests were just the latest example of this pattern.