Despite extreme thunderstorms here in the vally Friday night and Saturday morning, the National Coming Out Day Street Festival here in Las Vegas started with no problems as the skies had cleared up by last evening. The temperatures had dropped a bit, but it was kind of nice to be back to light jacket weather again.

The festival takes place every October at the Fruit Loop-- the area around the gay bars on Paradise; the parking lots of Gipsy, 8 1/2 and FreeZone. The crowd seemed a little thin this year, probably because of the rainy weather earlier in the day. I was there from about 9:00pm - 11:00pm. The stage entertainment sucked. The booths sucked. Nothing very interesting to do, really. The only fun thing is running into people you dont' get to see very often, and all at one time. It's very convenient for that.

I've never like the idea of have NCOD at the bars. I've always had the notion that National Coming Out Day should kind of focus on coming out, but that aspect has always seemed absent from the festival here in Vegas. While the appearance of such crowds may lead one to believe that there is at least some group of people who find gayness socially acceptable, there is no obvious effort to extend this encouragement to those who don't quite into the 21+ bar community. It is a sad fact of life in Sin City that the social structure of gay life is built around the bar scene. While the local gay & lesbian community center, the only real place for under-21's to socialize and find support resources, was represented, it seemed very out of place in an otherwise adult menegerie.

Despite this, there were plenty of under-21s present. Unfortunately, I think their presence, while encouraged, is more welcome because they are being groomed as future patrons to the bars; are being aclimated to the scene, as it exist here. I will welcome the time when gay people, instead of pressing others to drag them into normal society, will themselves work to broaden their horizons a bit beyond smokey rooms of drunken people. I should say that other places have done that, that the spectrum is much broader in other cities and countries. But here in Vegas, Gay = Fruit Loop for most people. The non-bar gay community here is on the fringe, coming and going, never mentioned much in the local publications.

It is possible that some kind of coordinated effort to actually provide coming-out support, to people both young and old, happened without my seeing it. It is possible that I am being overly critical, that the mere existence of the street festival is encouragement and education enough, that the presence of the crowd and the organizations with booths is support enough, but I really believe that National Coming Out Day should be more than just expanding the bars to their parking lots. Instead it seems like they say, You are gay, so you will watch drag shows and spend too much money on nightclub drinks and the associated clubwear because that is what gay people do.

Is it?