Bonadio court case in 1980, and serving queer people in bars and restaurants was considered illegal until the early ‘80s. Outwardly homosexual behavior was severely condemned and even illegal until the Commonwealth v. This illicit party culture was shaped by fundamental changes that occurred in the region during post-war industrialization culturally, Pittsburgh was-and to a certain extent, continues to be-informed by blue-collar working class identities dependent on hard labor and deeply ingrained heterosexual ideologies of masculinity. And it’s mostly thanks to the efforts of one man, Robert “Lucky” Johns, that the once-elusive scene exists and has since transformed into a robust niche worthy of global attention.
While those parties have dominated popular knowledge of contemporary midwestern techno, the city actually has a rich history of queer social spaces that laid the groundwork for the now-popular nightlife destination. The unlikely American city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania recently entered the international clubbing consciousness thanks to a gay bathhouse-turned-techno club called Hot Mass.
