Divas San Francisco

[Ben in LA]

Any update on the status of SRO in San Diego?

I was told sometime in June they’ll be moving to a new location in Hillcrest.

[thombergeron]

How many girls that rely on sex work can move to mainstream jobs after their looks fade?

Guys, this is kinda dumb. Virtually all of the women you met at Divas have other, regular jobs. They're waitresses, home health care workers, beauticians, some even have professional corporate jobs in the daylight hours. Working class people have good reason to worry about retirement, but women doing sex work aren't really in a different boat from any others in the service industry. It's a much bigger problem than sex workers.

Maybe somewhere in the SOMA area or the Castro. That whole Polk Gulch area has turned into a bust. Most of the straight clubs have closed as well. That whole area will probably be converted to low income housing eventually.

Polk Gulch is rapidly gentrifying as the top of Nob Hill caters to multimillionaires and the mere millionaires have to settle for housing further down the slope in the TL. There are still tons of straight bars in the gulch, but some, like the Hemlock Tavern and blur, have closed to make way for luxury housing developments. The cheap dive bars are closing, but the higher end places like Vertigo and Mayes Oyster House are booming with rich young white straight people. Another factor is the massive new hospital going in on Polk and Van Ness. The city and California Pacific Medical Center absolutely do not want prostitutes, rent boys, and meth addicts hanging around their sparkling $2 billion hospital. Polk Gulch is not at all the seedy den of vice it was 30 years ago, and there's no chance that low-income housing is going to be located anywhere near there.

The whole city has changed like that. Very few of the women you would have met at Divas live in SF anymore. Nobody has really paid very close attention to what the lack of affordable housing in SF has done to the arts, culture, and entertainment here, but it has been absolutely devastating to SF's old hedonistic culture. Even the gay community in SF is pretty much all wealthy and white these days. The closure of Divas may have gotten everybody's attention On Here, but for real, guys, other subcultures in SF have been losing their iconic venues for years now. It's nice to imagine that another Divas will open in SOMA, but The Stud, home to drag and transgender events for decades, is hanging onto its lease by a thread and will likely also be gone soon. LOL at the idea that you could open a transgender bar in the Castro in 2019.

If you care, start going to the Stud or Aunt Charlie's every damn week. But for Divas, it's too late. It's over.

[wombat2k]

Apparently they are staying open for a few more weeks. https://photos.app.goo.gl/8DTA5UQofSXYJ7Jj9

[golffool]

Sometimes these real estate transaction take more time than you think. The buyer may want to make sure they can get the needed approvals for the type of property they want to build on the site before they close escrow. Would not surprise me if it stays open a while longer.

[gaysian71]

Apparently they are staying open for a few more weeks. https://photos.app.goo.gl/8DTA5UQofSXYJ7Jj9

That's cool. I'll have to stop by and see how it's going. Who knows. Maybe the closing party was just a marketing ploy to get people to come in. I saw a lot of girls there that I knew years ago when I was a regular there. And most of them are not working girls but the ones I spoke to are doing well. It's just too bad they've all been gone for so long. I've also been gone too. I'm sure that all of us being gone didn't help the place .

[golffool]

Maybe if we realize that these places that we dearly enjoy will be gone for good we will begin to visit them more often.

[crutsinger]

Thanks Ben, good to know SRO is merely relocating and not closing. Did a dive type bar ever rise up in Los Angeles to replace The Oxwood?

I was told sometime in June they’ll be moving to a new location in Hillcrest.

[golffool]

SRO will be a big success if its move into Hillcrest

[thickmotherfucker]

Good to hear they'll be open a few more weeks at least - I will need to stop by next time I am in SF (soon).

I really enjoyed the place from the very first time I went there in the '00s, everything seemed to be on point - the girls, the music, the DJ, the bartender (oh, the bartender, I nutted to you a few times shortly after ). Then it seemed to slowly go downhill, with the club not being updated/getting run down, less people, etc.

Still, highly recommend going to anyone who hasn't been.

[golffool]

Did any one go last night??