2. As a resident (soon-to-be former resident) of Chicago, I’d like to note that while the city has a thriving bar scene, it also rates very low on the percentage of same-sex partner households when compared to other major cities, even some not known as gay meccas. In the 30 years I’ve lived in Chicago, I’ve found that the community has an overaundant share of ghetto bar queens who can’t settle down in a relationship. On querying the geographical origin of gay folks in Chicago, one is struck by how many come from small cities in the Midwest. I theorize that people there have lots of internalized homophobia preventing them from integrating with the general community and forming partnerships. My theory is that this is less true in the Red States because (1) prejudice against gays is more open and so gay people learn it is irrational at an early age and (2) less of the population consists of Catholics. The Catholic church messes gay people who grow up in it more than conserrvative Protestants do because it seems to be harder for them to leave its guilt-inducing ideas behind.

It would be also interesting to see how various cities score on internalized homophobia.

But frankly, the neighboring town, Maplewood, has a much bigger and more vibrant gay community, and even if it’s not quite as fancy and expensive a town as Short Hills it’s much more friendly and less pretentious.

Jay…your comments about the Burnside Triangle are “spot-on.” I recently heard that McMenamins will be moving into the former Silverado-Club Portland building, after we were all told that Silverado moved and CP closed because the building was being torn down. Perhaps this intrepid reporter will attempt to get to the bottom (hee hee) of that.

Thanks!

I live in Portland, and they really don’t know much about our city. The “Burnside Triangle” they mention actually followed the development of the Pearl district and not vice versa and the Pearl district’s development was YEARS later than the gentrification of the Northwest neighborhood. They have it all backwards. Further, the development of these areas lead directly to the closing of 3 long established gay bars and their relocation to another part of town. It was all MUCH more of a gay district before.

I don’t think that they have any actual data to support their statement that Hawthorne has the biggest concentration of lesbians “on the continent”. I always thought Olympia, Washington held that honor.

We did, however, just elect an opening gay mayor and his sexuality was never an issue in election. Portland is an awesome city, with a huge gay population and virtually no straight vs. gay problems, but this article didn’t really list any of the correct reasons aside from gay mayor and good housing market.