Orlando – Just as the United States has seen a rapid shift toward marriage equality in the past year, so appears to be a shift in the annual Gay Days celebration weekend.
Record crowds for Gay Days party events met with low turnout of LGBTs for Gay Day at the Magic Kingdom on June 7.
“We are staying at the host hotel and when we said we were coming to Disney, everyone asked us why, that Gay Days is about a party,” Shawn Stearns, a visitor from New York City said.
Check out Watermark’s complete Gay Days 2014 coverage, with photos and updates from all weekend long.
Stearns has attended Gay Days celebrations for the past 15 years and was celebrating this year with his friend Paul Ridgeway from Chicago.
“Twenty years ago there was much less partying,” Ridgeway said. “People are losing the meaning of what [Gay Day] is.”
What exactly Gay Days is may be up for debate but, while rooted in gay pride, Gay Days has been pushed by promoters for years as a party in the Florida sun. That is not to say that gay pride wasn’t present at the Magic Kingdom, but the tone and numbers were subdued in 2014.
The 3 p.m. parade in front of the castle has historically been packed with thousands of red shirts, but fewer than 300 people in red shirts gathered this year.
“Ten years ago you definitely couldn’t just walk up at 2:45 p.m. for a front-row spot to the parade, but this year it is almost empty,” Stearns said.
Less red
Gay Day began in 1991 when 3,000 LGBTs—wearing red to identify each other—gathered at the Magic Kingdom and, at its peak, attracted tens of thousands of people wearing the same color.
This year, the number of red shirts at the Magic Kingdom plummeted, while attendance at Gay Days party events around the Orlando area hit record highs.
Randy Stephens, the executive director of The GLBT Center of Central Florida, said the lower number of red shirts wasn’t a sign of decreasing pride, but just a shift in how and where it is expressed.
“Look at how much has changed. We used to have to wear red to discreetly know who was gay,” Stephens said. “Now we are openly walking hand in hand and getting married.”
Andrew Cochrom and girlfriend Rachel Santos, both from Orlando, stood in the middle of a crowd of red shirts and watched the parade.
When asked if they knew it was Gay Day at the Magic Kingdom, Cochrom replied, “Yeah, who cares?”
Orlando resident Matt Tabakman also noticed the decrease in red shirts this year. He said that he thought the decrease was brought on because gay people are more accepted and the Disney celebration is “more mainstream.”
Orlando resident Karl Haglund attended the event with his partner Jonathan Eisenberg.
“People are more accepting now, and while there’s still a plane flying overhead with a warning, people just don’t care anymore,” Haglund said.
Just another (hot) day in the park
“It’s just another day. Everyone is always welcome at the Magic Kingdom,” Eisenberg added.
That sentiment echoed throughout the day.
A group from the Space Coast all agreed that other than more red shirts, the day felt like any other at Walt Disney World.
Rich Simmons, sitting beside Charlie Eccleston, his partner of 17 years from Melbourne, Fla., said they have annual passes, visit once a month, and feel comfortable holding hands while at Disney World.
“Today doesn’t feel that different,” Simmons said.
The Orlando Gay Parents, a group that provides a social setting with monthly meet-ups for parents and children of gay couples, met at 7 p.m. at the Magic Kingdom so children could dance together at the Incredibles Dance Party in Tommorrowland.
“We have annual passes and go all the time so honestly, this feels like any other day at the park but we happen to see a few more red shirts,” said one of the mothers in the group, Lauren McNamara, who was there with her wife Heather McNamara and sons Alex and Gabriel.
With the temperature at Magic Kingdom reaching the mid-90s without any rain or many clouds, the heat at times became oppressive.
Girlfriends Laura Dewey and Amie Lieberman of Orlando played in the Coca-Cola water mister with their friend Megan Lacey, also from Orlando. Dewey said that this year she has noticed “way less girls, less people, and it’s too hot.”
However, not everyone feels completely open during Gay Days. Two women, Lindsey and Kat, would not be photographed at the Magic Kingdom or give their last names because they said they’re teachers in conservative counties and fear if they were outed to their school districts, they would be fired.
Movement of the people
Although the red shirts may have dwindled this year, people still visited from all around the globe. Orlando continues its reputation as one of the warmest and welcoming gay cities.
Five friends from Manchester, UK attended the Magic Kingdom for Gay Day on June 7 and were impressed with the friendliness of Orlando.
“Manchester is a large city with an entire gay village, but Orlando is just as gay, although it is a lot friendlier here,” said Dennis Concannon.
So if the crowd of red shirts was deflated at Magic Kingdom, but the numbers overall at Gay Days were up, where did all the people go?
According to Billy Mack, one of the Rip Tide organizers, the annual Typhoon Lagoon party June 6 had their highest attendance yet in 2014.
Adam Beach, Alex Weber and Whit Hoolig, all from Salt Lake City, were spotted at RipTide.
“Orlando is San Francisco but a lot warmer,” Adam Beach said.
Columbian travelers, also spotted at RipTide, said this was their retreat for the year.
“Gay Days is fun. There is nothing like this in Columbia,” Alex Munoz said.
The party began at 7 p.m. and featured a lazy river, wave pool and stayed open until 2 a.m. With full bars all around the park, a large stage featuring a light show, and a DJ on the beach, the park became filled mostly with bathing-suit clad young men. A fair amount of middle-aged men also attended along with a sprinkling of older men and lesbians.
Epcot’s WE Party was also popular, with thousands of attendees, a light show and very loud house and techno music. That crowd looked similar to RipTide’s in that the majority of them were shirtless young men with gym bodies. There was also a general mix of ages and some varying body types. While the crowds lacked at the 3 p.m. Magic Kingdom parade, they packed the special exhibition hall at Epcot until 2 a.m. at the WE Party. Mack, one of the organizers, said attendance at the WE Party was up 20% from last year and included a headlining performance at 11 p.m. by the Orlando Ballet set to Madonna’s ‘Vogue.’
Climax, Girls In Wonderland’s Friday night party, survived a move from House of Blues in Downtown Disney to Firestone Live in Downtown Orlando. Although the club was empty at the start of the party, it quickly filled with festive lesbians as shuttle buses transported girls from the Disney area to downtown. As usual, the Saturday night party at House of Blues—this year, themed Marry Me!—was a popular, crowded event with top notch, sexy dance performances.
Parliament House also attracted what owner Don Granatstein said was the biggest name ever to perform at the club – LeAnn Rimes, on Saturday night. Hundreds packed P-House to watch the country star perform.
Black Pride founder resigns
The Magic Kingdom isn’t the only area where things looked different this year—this Gay Days marked the last for Orlando Black Pride founder Tricia Duncan.
Duncan said that the growth and acceptance of Gay Days was an indication that it was time for her to step down and concentrate on new opportunities and projects that will require the passion she currently is devoting to Orlando Black Pride.
“There’s a point where you say I have done all I can for where it is right now,” she told the Orlando Sentinel.
In 2002, Duncan created the organization because she didn’t feel accepted by either the black or gay community. In the early years of the organization, Duncan would get negative comments and have to explain her reasoning for the black and gay-pride group.
“I used to get a lot of, ‘Why would you do that? Why would you divide the community? How dare you?'” she told the Orlando Sentinel.
Orlando Black Pride broke into this year’s events on June 3 with a concert and wrapped up with another concert on June 8 at the Parliament House.
Note: Reporter Chris Stephenson was hired to photograph Riptide for One Magical Weekend, the company who organizes RipTide and two other GayDays parties.
Jamie Hyman and Christal Hayes contributed to this story.
