The Gay Mecca That Isn't

Those of you reading this blog who are attuned to gay culture might well be thinking: Charleston seems like it could be a gay mecca.

I've talked about the beautiful, antique mansions and houses, many of them lovingly restored; the gardens (more on that to come soon); and the food culture. And the city also has plenty of art galleries and antique stores, and a much higher-level cultural scene (e.g. Spoleto) than most cities its size.

But it's in South Carolina.

Which means, not only is it subject to the state's conservative politics and Christianist culture (the road to the airport is lined with billboards advertising Jesus), but also it still hasn't gotten over the Civil War: you still hear tales of people swearing they'd rather let their house be torn down than sell it to a Yankee.

Anywhere else in the country, you'd walk these beautiful streets and see rainbow flags flying and same-sex couples strolling. Here, you see absolutely no trace of either.

As far as we could tell, gay life in the downtown area is limited to two venues tucked away on a side street behind the main visitors' center.

The first, Dudley's, is a medium-sized bar with a vaguely 19th-century interior, decorated in wood and stained glass, with a second room in the back housing a pool table. It was pretty much empty when we walked in at 10:30 last Saturday night but started filling up by 11 with a nondescript, not particularly friendly crowd of all ages and sexes.

Down the street is Pantheon, a dance club, in the first floor of a modern parking garage. It's a big square room, a bar dominating one half, a slightly raised, enclosed dance floor in the other. Although the building looks to be less than 10 years old, the interior of Pantheon looks timelessly dingy and shabby. The music was a bit retro, and so were the people: one person wound glowsticks all around his body in true '90s rave style, while the rest embraced a dress code of untucked, button-down shirts, like New Yorkers of 2007.

The crowd at Pantheon was a bit younger than at Dudley's, but still quite mixed; I'd estimate it at 15% straight (men and women) and 30% lesbian. There were a number of obviously military types present, some clearly straight, some less so. Almost the entire crowd was white, which surprised me a bit this deep in the South. The mode of dancing was relatively restrained, and only a few shirts came off.

Still, we probably would have managed to have fun had they not shut off the music at midnight and cleared the entire dance floor for a drag show. A bad drag show, just basic lip-synching, neither funny nor particularly skilled. As I've also seen in Key West (but not elsewhere), the crowd began tipping the drag queen with dollar bills, as if she were a stripper. This was about the moment when we decided to leave.

It's really too bad, as Charleston is so attractive in so many ways. But a gay destination, unfortunately not.