A double standard in my home town of Milwaukee?

[Monkeyleg]

Every night I check the Milwaukee Journal website just to see if my home town is still there. Tonight there's a story on the paper's website about the city council voting against allowing a "gentlemen's club" in the Walkers Point area. Walkers Point is alongside the largely Mexican part of town, and has seen something of a resurgence with new bars and restaurants having popped up in the last ten or so years.

This is the second or maybe third time the city has said no to a topless joint in that area. What's unusual is that the city gave the okay several years ago for a gay bar that has dancing boys wearing nothing but g-strings.

For the life of me I can't figure out how nobody sees the hypocrisy. What's more, I can't imagine that any of the council members are so afraid of the gay lobby that they'd just roll over, but I guess I give them too much credit.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Homosexuals are a protected class.

[Northwoods]

For the life of me I can't figure out how nobody sees the hypocrisy.

That would require a sense of morals, or at least shame.

[French G.]

Maybe the council didn't want to say no to their new favorite hang-out.

[seeker_two]

That would require a sense of morals, or at least shame.

...and we are talking about politicians, right?.... 

[AJ Dual]

Honestly, I think it's two things:

1. The right palms simply haven't been greased yet.

2. Strip clubs are one of the few attractions in Milwaukee that will draw black men from Milwaukee's north-central side to wherever you put it. And Walker's point is supposed to be where yuppies/20-somethings are to brave the "less scary" fringe of the Latino quarter to enjoy the past decade's gentrification, loft apartments, bars, and restaurants etc. And "whoever" does not want a reason for them to come there.

[Monkeyleg]

Interesting theory, AJ.

As for the "less scary," that area still isn't really safe. There's a lot of gang violence that victimizes the white yuppies as well.

And why the word "Latino" to describe the area rather than "Mexican"? Are there a lot of Hondurans or Guatemalans living there?

[AJ Dual]

I assume the majority are Mexican. 

I used to live down there, in the Tannery lofts back in '96.

Perhaps the gay strip club got no resistance because it went in before Walkers Point got enough gentrification for anybody to care.

Or it still fits with the racial theme I'm sensing, since blacks (on average) tend to be less accepting, and open about homosexuality, the whole "down low" thing and all.

Although a favorite pastime of my buddies and I when we lived down there was to ditch friends who were unfamiliar with the area at the various gay bars down there. Our favorite was "The Ball Game (come play with us)"actually over in the Third Ward just a block or two north. We'd try to convince them it was a sports bar. 

[Monkeyleg]

Down low? Is that a double entendre?

Although a favorite pastime of my buddies and I when we lived down there was to ditch friends who were unfamiliar with the area at the various gay bars down there. Our favorite was "The Ball Game (come play with us)"actually over in the Third Ward just a block or two north. We'd try to convince them it was a sports bar.

The Ball Game has been pretty much a hangout for old gays like my wife's uncle, who's 77. Most younger guys wouldn't be seen in there.

[AJ Dual]

Down low? Is that a double entendre?

The Ball Game has been pretty much a hangout for old gays like my wife's uncle, who's 77. Most younger guys wouldn't be seen in there.

LOL.. no idea what theme that bar had. We only managed to get friends drunk enough to not be suspicious and go in there, but not so drunk we feared for their safety to leave them alone for a bit a few times. It's a real balancing act.

I've only been to one gay bar/restaurant, to watch my BIL's band who was playing there. I can't remember the name of it, my wife told me it was the one that was almost a hetero-cross over place. I'm still pretty sure we were getting the stink-eye (maybe I should rephrase that?) for not having any gay escort, or insufficient context to be there.

As to "down low", I guess it is a double entendre, or just redundant. (Shrug...) it's their term, not mine. I guess it has to do with how they see the mainstream gay community as a 'white perversion', so this is how inner-city blacks are "gay without being GAY" I guess.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Down-low_%28sexual_slang%29

BTW... where's Mabs when you need him? He could explain all this stuff to us.