The Atlanta Eagle reopened in June for limited outdoor gatherings, then quickly closed again. Eagle shut down last May amid the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, and the legendary San Francisco Eagle now features a “for sale” sign.
“The Eagle was probably the most diverse melting pot of leather and kink communities in Atlanta,” said Neon the Glowgobear, a resident DJ there for the past six years.īut despite its importance to the leather community, the Atlanta Eagle wouldn’t have been the first casualty of COVID-19: The D.C. It’s home base for Onyx Southeast, a national leather organization for people of color. The Atlanta Eagle is equally intentional about including people of varied ages, body types, and racial identities. While Midtown power gays rub shoulders with east Atlanta queers on busy nights, young kinksters in their first harnesses flirt with old-school leathermen and leatherwomen. That’s one thing I’ve worked on the hardest.” His work is evident in the crowd, with kinksters across the gender spectrum present.
“When I first took over the Eagle, there was a bit of a stigma situation,” he told them. Richard Ramey, its longtime proprietor, took this responsibility seriously, making it his mission to be more welcoming to women when he started running the bar 22 years ago.