“A social media thread has reignited the dialogue about straight women in queer venues, and who really belongs in designated LGBTQ spaces.”--Vivien Mansbach, 9th Grade
I remember, about six months ago, a friend of mine texted me the link to a viral clip of tiktoker @sofiamastt, captioned, “Last night I asked 5 girls if they were gay at a GAY CLUB and all of them were straight AT A GAY CLUB I GIVE UP”. Another creator, @elizahhh, stitched the video, saying, “Straight people have been everywhere else, literally everywhere. And we want one safe place for us and y’all just take over?” I remember feeling mixed; as a young queer woman, I obviously haven’t really gone to any clubs yet, but it has always been a big part of the wlw (women loving women)culture and media I consume. I felt discouraged, and a bit confused. My friend and I had a long exchange around what it’s been like to deal with the microaggressions and bewildering questions we’ve had to endure from straight girls, like the infamous ‘don’t get a crush on me or anything’, ‘just don’t rub it in my face’, etc. It’s exhausting how straight girls think that quuer women and girls exist purely for them to gawk and fawn over. ‘Who let the straight women in there?’ I asked myself, questioning its origin.
There isn’t exactly a straight answer to that question. The closest I could come was to explore the history of the entitlement some straight women feel to their place within both gay and lesbian culture. (I’ll be using gay and lesbian for succinctness, but of course this includes mlm and wlw of all types).
The women who frequent gay clubs are easy to understand; according to this timeline, from Advocate, the image of gay culture and the gay best friend narrative have been fed to us from the 1990s and 2000s onward. Going to the gay bar with your gay friend meant no predatory gazes, but an abundance of attractive men who would dance with you, praise you, talk about fashion, and all the rest of the stereotypes people use to describe gay men. The friendship of the two demographics isn’t manufactured; the issue isn’t the closeness of the two but the boundaries straight women tend to cross and the space they take up. As Jeremy Helliger, who identifies as gay, wrote in a 2017 article for Huffpost, ‘Some girls, generally the ones with boyfriends or husbands at home, cheerfully observe from their place on the sidelines. They come strictly to hang out with their gay friends or to avoid the obnoxious men who stalk straight clubs. Then there are the ones who give straight women in gay bars a bad name. They're usually single, and they're always angling for center stage. It's like they're secretly hoping to lure the one straight guy who might be there on the same night, or perhaps luck out and succeed at "turning" one of us.’ Helliger goes on to say that many gay men don’t have an issue with straight women populating their spaces; it’s really just about respecting the wishes and, again, the boundaries of the people who the space was originally intended for. They are the guests, and so they should respect their hosts.
The lesbian side of things can get a little more complicated, since there is no way to tell on surface-level which women are of which orientation. The great thing about lesbian spaces is that they are supposed to be places where sapphics can mingle and have a genuinely awesome time, without worrying about the homophobia, fetishization, and… the uncomfy situation of hitting on a straight girl, having to ask about people’s sexuality, hoping not to offend or ward anyone off by being yourself. A place without those things - - what a treat!
It can be very difficult, spending time in one of the sparse places that has been set aside specifically for you, when it feels like more often than not, those spaces are being infiltrated by people who will be offended by you. Many straight women refer to lesbian bars and clubs as ‘a safe space for women’, which deeply undermines the reason for the bars. They are meant to be a place where queer women don’t have to worry about judgment from people outside the community. There are many opinions and ideas around this; gay and lesbian bars and the straight women who populate them mean a place without straight men. And one thing that won’t change is the attitude of the majority of straight men toward gay and lesbian bars; solidarity is forever important and holds a lot of power.
Again, it’s difficult to discern where to place belief; with the general scarcity of queer spaces, the constant evolution of attitudes from outside the community, and what a night out means today. I’d like to emphasize again that the point of this article is not to shut straight women out of gay and lesbian spaces, but to remind them that true allyship is to listen and be respectful of the boundaries that are enforced. Marginalized groups are stronger together rather than pitted against one another.
There isn’t exactly a straight answer to that question. The closest I could come was to explore the history of the entitlement some straight women feel to their place within both gay and lesbian culture. (I’ll be using gay and lesbian for succinctness, but of course this includes mlm and wlw of all types).
The women who frequent gay clubs are easy to understand; according to this timeline, from Advocate, the image of gay culture and the gay best friend narrative have been fed to us from the 1990s and 2000s onward. Going to the gay bar with your gay friend meant no predatory gazes, but an abundance of attractive men who would dance with you, praise you, talk about fashion, and all the rest of the stereotypes people use to describe gay men. The friendship of the two demographics isn’t manufactured; the issue isn’t the closeness of the two but the boundaries straight women tend to cross and the space they take up. As Jeremy Helliger, who identifies as gay, wrote in a 2017 article for Huffpost, ‘Some girls, generally the ones with boyfriends or husbands at home, cheerfully observe from their place on the sidelines. They come strictly to hang out with their gay friends or to avoid the obnoxious men who stalk straight clubs. Then there are the ones who give straight women in gay bars a bad name. They're usually single, and they're always angling for center stage. It's like they're secretly hoping to lure the one straight guy who might be there on the same night, or perhaps luck out and succeed at "turning" one of us.’ Helliger goes on to say that many gay men don’t have an issue with straight women populating their spaces; it’s really just about respecting the wishes and, again, the boundaries of the people who the space was originally intended for. They are the guests, and so they should respect their hosts.
The lesbian side of things can get a little more complicated, since there is no way to tell on surface-level which women are of which orientation. The great thing about lesbian spaces is that they are supposed to be places where sapphics can mingle and have a genuinely awesome time, without worrying about the homophobia, fetishization, and… the uncomfy situation of hitting on a straight girl, having to ask about people’s sexuality, hoping not to offend or ward anyone off by being yourself. A place without those things - - what a treat!
It can be very difficult, spending time in one of the sparse places that has been set aside specifically for you, when it feels like more often than not, those spaces are being infiltrated by people who will be offended by you. Many straight women refer to lesbian bars and clubs as ‘a safe space for women’, which deeply undermines the reason for the bars. They are meant to be a place where queer women don’t have to worry about judgment from people outside the community. There are many opinions and ideas around this; gay and lesbian bars and the straight women who populate them mean a place without straight men. And one thing that won’t change is the attitude of the majority of straight men toward gay and lesbian bars; solidarity is forever important and holds a lot of power.
Again, it’s difficult to discern where to place belief; with the general scarcity of queer spaces, the constant evolution of attitudes from outside the community, and what a night out means today. I’d like to emphasize again that the point of this article is not to shut straight women out of gay and lesbian spaces, but to remind them that true allyship is to listen and be respectful of the boundaries that are enforced. Marginalized groups are stronger together rather than pitted against one another.