There would be the occasional boldfaced “snow” gay seeking “dinge,” as the terminology went, as white gays could cross certain boundaries that black gays couldn’t. “I remember a T-shaped stage and gorgeous black drag queens, queens you never saw elsewhere,” recalled Regina Adams, a white New Orleans nightclub performer who, in 1973, had a black lover. Patrons of the Safari would flirt beneath the blare of live music and dance almost lip-to-lip.
Within the Safari Lounge in 1973, men like Hickerson found a saloon teeming with black men, plus black managers named Priscilla and Roosevelt Porter. Safari was up stairs, and I ventured up there very afraid.” You sense that ‘it’ is out there, but you don’t have anyone to show or tell you. “You’re trying to find out where ‘it’ is.
“Coming out as gay in the black community, you’re struggling to explore,” recalled Hickerson.
Black gays, by contrast, mostly frequented the few black gay bars in town like Charlie’s Corner or the Safari Lounge, a second-floor saloon on the corner of Iberville Street and Royal Street. There were black gays around, obviously, but it was very difficult for us to get in.”ĭiscreet white homosexuals enjoyed the virtual run of the French Quarter, with more than 20 gay bars in close proximity. “The majority of the bars were predominantly, if not entirely, white gay bars. “The racial politics, for lack of a better word, were terrible,” recalled Michael Hickerson, a lifelong New Orleanian who is black as well as gay. None of the gay Mardi Gras krewes, or fraternal orders that hosted theatrical masque balls during Carnival season, had black membership in the early 1970s. In keeping with Damron code, to protect gay travelers from criminal exposure, the UpStairs Lounge received “(*)” status to signify “Very Popular.” In fact, the Up Stairs Lounge was so popular that summer that it attracted a black visitor from Atlanta named Reginald Tubbs. The UpStairs Lounge culture had proven so attractive to open-minded gays, such a queer change of pace for New Orleans, that it received special mention in Bob Damron’s Address Book, an annual travel guide for the discreet gay vacationer. The crew of the UpStairs Lounge had an anthem they liked to sing at the piano that summed up their unique outlook: “United we stand, divided we fall.” So went the chorus.
Such terminology had been appropriated from national gay culture-appearing throughout queer literature such as Andrew Holleran’s Dancer from the Dance and Larry Kramer's Faggots-but given new context in the racial dynamics of the Creole South.įor example, two black longshoremen who crossed racial lines to frequent the UpStairs Lounge, which served mostly working-class white patrons on the border of the French Quarter, went by the nicknames Smokie and Cocoa as reference to their skin tones.īuddy Rasmussen, the white bartender and manager of the UpStairs Lounge, was known to be especially friendly to all comers, even letting women into the bar at a time when gays and lesbians were strictly separated. “Snow,” by contrast, meant white and referenced antiquated notions of pureness in an era that eroticized race. “Dinge” was slang for black homosexuals, reference to dirt-language now pejorative and offensive but then considered to be street-speak, a crude but commonplace descriptor. That was unspoken law in the gay subterranean of New Orleans in the 1970s. Was so BAD.“Dinge” did not mix with “snow” openly, especially not on Bourbon Street. Such a gay never forget him ever in my life. horrible and never ever go here everybody! I wrote email directly and they never respond i think they are happy with predicate as the most racist club ever in bali! Someday it will drop cause customer will tell another peoples how horrible this club because of the staff and especially the guy with something in the ear and a bit long hair. Seriously bad memories from bali is from La favela ONLY. We moved to Soka and sky garden is a lot better than this place! Seriously, Need to change mind and attitude with the staff. I told all my friends and family member to never enter this place because they way they treat peoples are so bad. I was waiting for long time only to enter because of my friends. I’m working in hospitality for a long time, never ever i will recommend this place to my guest or friends because i had bad experience with this guy in front of the gate. I’ve been to a club in middle east, Europe and even high class club but this club is so horrible the security check is so racist and no attitude at all.