“My fear if Alibi had gone down is to instill in the young mind that, ‘Oh, why bother? We’re Black and gay, it’s just going to fail anyway,’” said Minko, who has since reopened his bar outside at limited capacity in compliance with New York City’s rules.Įarlier this month, Alibi Lounge was one of 10 LGBTQ-owned businesses to be awarded funding through the Queer to Stay program, a small business initiative from Showtime and the Human Rights Campaign, a national LGBTQ advocacy group. While Minko eventually received a small loan through the government’s emergency relief program, he said the donations “absolutely saved my business,” as well as the idea that it’s possible for a Black gay man to open his own bar. In only a matter of weeks, the campaign raised $165,000. He was on the brink of ending his lease, he said, when donations suddenly surged. (Courtesy Alibi Lounge)ĭesperate for assistance, Minko reluctantly set up an online fundraising campaign for his bar. Owner Alexi Minko in his bar, Alibi Lounge, in Harlem. Club Langston in Brooklyn closed last year after nearly two decades in business. Of the city’s dozens of remaining gay bars, just two - Lambda Lounge and Alibi Lounge, both in Harlem - are known to be Black owned. Though the reasons are not entirely clear, experts suspect the overall decline in gay bars is related to decades of skyrocketing rents and gentrification, which have disproportionately impacted small, Black-owned businesses the emergence of online dating sites and apps and circuit parties that rotate among venues, which have become increasingly popular among younger crowds.Īccording to online listings, there are more than 60 LGBTQ bars across the five boroughs of New York City, one of the metropolitan areas hardest hit by the pandemic, and many of these spaces are struggling to stay open. The closures have had a disproportionate impact on bars catering to women and people of color: Between 20, LGBTQ bar listings dropped by an estimated 37 percent, and those serving people of color plummeted by almost 60 percent, according to the study. Throughout the 1980s, there were more than 1,500 such bars, a number that has declined steeply since the late ‘90s, with fewer than 1,000 existing today, according to a study published last year by Oberlin College and Conservatory professor Greggor Mattson. Historically, these spaces were where the LGBTQ community gathered to find romance, make long-lasting friendships and engage in community activism. For more than two decades, gay bars, especially those owned by people of color, have been disappearing.
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