IN-PERSON Barcelona. Section A

Abstract

In the decades following World War II, populations dwindled in many downtown areas of North America cities. Importantly, during this time, many cities retained unsanctioned Red-Light Districts; Times Square in New York City, the Tenderloin in San Francisco, Boulevard Saint Laurent or “The Main” in Montreal, and the Yonge Street strip in Toronto. Campaigns to clean up these areas began as early as the late 1970s. Toronto is noteworthy for the swift eradication of adult entertainment businesses (such as massage parlours and adult film theatres) following the tragic murder of a child in the Yonge Street strip in 1977. Queer nightlife venues were a particular target of this campaign in Toronto. In addition to Toronto’s swift sanitization efforts, larger scale urban gentrification processes have continued since that time. Underground queer nightlife venues and spaces, particularly those at the fringes of respectability, are now non-existent. Assimilation into dominant North American societal norms is arguably impossible — even undesirable — for many queer/trans artists, performers, and nightlife participants. With gentrification and subsequent continued eradication processes of queer nightlife spaces underway, where will non-heteronormative queer and trans artists and performers gather to intermingle, co-exist, to offer living art, when the physical spaces to do so struggle to exist? With the demise of the North American Red-Light District, what type of cultural creative potential was lost for communities of queer artists and performers, especially for those who are oftentimes outsiders within the mainstream 2SLGBTQ+ community?