West Hollywood gay pioneers clash with younger progressives over future of city
It’s an old Hollywood story. A gay couple arrives in the City of Angels in the 1930s, looking for a quiet life in a new place. But they find a much bigger city full of people just as gay. They want to stay, but the new neighbors are different.
The first few years of the Hollywood’s gay pioneers’ stay in West Hollywood were a blur of acceptance from their new neighbors. It’s a film noir, but one with real heartbreak. It’s a story of gay couples who fled New York to Los Angeles, looking for a new and better life where sexual orientation would not affect their lives.
Their journey took them through the 1920s, the Roaring ’20s, the early ’30s and the ’40s. Many were followed by more recent immigrants from other countries who didn’t know a gay person from a lesbian. The same holds true for older generations in West Hollywood, who have become increasingly open to the idea of a gay family.
But, as time has gone on, the gay pioneer couples have begun to clash with younger progressives, who support marriage rights but have no patience for the conservative, religious and anti-gay views of a large community of West Hollywood residents who still largely support their right to discriminate based on sexual orientation.
A recent meeting to discuss the future of the city’s gay community included several gay pioneer couples, along with younger progressives and residents of other LGBT-friendly enclaves like Echo Park and the Westwood/Beverly Heights hills.
It was organized by the West Hollywood Gay and Lesbian Community Center, which, despite a recent decision to split from the West Hollywood Gay and Lesbian Center, continues to serve as an unofficial city center for the community.
As a result, the meeting drew a large cross section of the local LGBT community, including longtime gay residents who now work in the city’s cultural and business industries, and out-of-towners who would be better served in other cities.
The issue under discussion was the future of the Gay and Lesbian Center’s
