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Queer Summer Mingle at Old Market Assembly
A new social event for LGBTQ+ people is to be hosted by the Old Market Assembly on Saturday, August 11.
Queer Summer Mingle is a chance for LGBTQ+ people to get to know each other in one of the city’s most supportive venues. The event features workshops, protest banner and badge making, artwork and even knitting. The event is rounded off with a DJs and a club night with tunes from Devolicious, Kiki Bristol and AlmostNotQuite.
“Old Market Assembly was the first venue in the city to sign up for the Bristol Zero Tolerance scheme,” explains the event’s founder Clare Lowe. The hosts a varied range of events for the community including some notable drag and club nights, but this is the first LGBT+ day and night event.
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“This isn’t political, but I wanted to do something that keeps the community supportive,” Clare continues. With venues shutting in the city, Clare felt it was important to create an event that runs from 1pm to 1am and offers LGBTQ+ of all identities the chance to meet people in a relaxed environment.
Old Market Assembly has a varied array of LGBT+ nights, including Category Is…
Clare says the scenes of trans-exclusionary feminists at the London Pride march sparked Queer Summer Mingle. A handful of trans-exclusionary feminists blocked the NHS workers leading the march with their message of intolerance. TERFs, Clare says, are a big problem in Bristol. The event, Clare hopes, is a positive rebuttal to this small, but vocal minority.
“There is a slight selfishness that motivates me,” Clare says, “before I was an ally but I felt quite left out from the community after I came out.”
Although the city is supportive of trans rights, Clare feels that there is a “loud, vocal minority” of trans-exclusionary feminists that are damaging community cohesion
“I’m immensely happy to identify as queer, as non-binary and bisexual now,” Clare adds.
The term ‘queer’ still draws mixed reactions and it is something Clare is happy to discuss. “I listened to a really interesting podcast on the label queer. I love the word queer because it explains me perfectly, but I’ve spoken to gay men from an older generation that dislike the term.”
“I think it is important to see people as they are and not the label they might use but I do think having a label is relevant. It is good to have a shorthand and, more often than not, introducing myself prompts people to ask me questions and I can explain things better than any label could.”
“I’m outside the binaries of male/female and straight/gay, and I think queer afford everyone lots of flexibility.”
Queer Summer Mingle starts at 1pm at Old Market Assembly on Saturday, August 11. Entry is free.
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