Surrounded by pink and green banners and rainbow flags on Bourbon Street, New Orleans residents and visitors celebrated the 35th annual Southern Decadence, a gay pride festival, in the French Quarter. The six-day celebration began on Wednesday and concluded Monday with the annual bar crawl through the French Quarter in honor of the Southern Decadence Grand Marshals Lisa Beaumann and Regina Adams. The festival takes place in the portions of the French Quarter that are often frequented by homosexuals. Bars like Bourbon Pub and Parade and Oz participate in the festival every year. Because of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent cancellation of Southern Decadence, bars, restaurants and hotels in the area suffered extensive economic loss. Travis Smith, a bartender at Bourbon Pub and Parade, said the festival brought more people to the city than he anticipated. “Last year’s cancellation had an impact,” he said. “It’s slow without out-of-towners, but I’d say we have about 90 percent of our local business back.” Smith said the festival has always been an important event for Bourbon Pub and Parade, which celebrated its 32nd anniversary in July. Oz bartender Brandon Adams said New Orleans is not back to full capacity, so business is slower than it was before Katrina. The bar reopened in January, but operates on limited hours. He said business has been picking up because Southern Decadence ranks in the bar’s top three celebrations, along with Mardi Gras and Halloween. Adams said he likes Southern Decadence because of its open-minded atmosphere. “Decadence is one of those things where you can be yourself,” he said. Othello Hamilton, a bellman at the Place d’Armes Hotel, said New Orleans needed a big event like Southern Decadence to resume economic development after Katrina. “If Southern Decadence was actually publicized like Mardi Gras, people would see that we can accommodate a lot of things,” he said. The hotel did not have water damage and reopened in late October. Hamilton said he asks guests where they are from when they check-in to the hotel. “I haven’t heard any right here in New Orleans, but I’m sure there are a lot of people celebrating here,” he said. Mark Schmandt and Robert Fortney, who have residences in Milwaukee and Chicago, have attended Southern Decadence more than six times. Fortney said he likes the energy and the atmosphere. Schmandt said they planned to visit the city together before the festival was canceled last year. “I was disappointed for the city and sad for the community,” Schmandt said. Some bartenders and store owners said they had not seen any religious groups protesting the festival as of Saturday morning. Hamilton said some religious groups may have stayed away from the festival this year out of sensitivity for the whole New Orleans community, but some groups appeared in the afternoon. “Our duty is to warn the sinners,” said Kendall Boutwell, an evangelist representing The Church of the Lord Jesus Christ in Brookhaven, Miss. Boutwell wore a sandwich board “warning” liars, drunkards, homosexuals, blasphemes and others. He handed pamphlets to tourists and locales who passed him on the corner of Toulouse and Decatur streets. He said it is important to preach against Southern Decadence because he thinks homosexuals want “special rights” like same-sex marriage and exclusive insurance policies. A passage in the pamphlet titled “Killer Storm: God Puts Sin-City Under Water” reads, “With the abomination, Southern Decadence, days from beginning, a merciful and just God finally intervened. Using Katrina as an instrument of judgment, God answered the defiant cesspool of iniquity by sending us divine retribution to a city apparently without a conscience.” Boutwell said he agreed with the pamphlet because he did not believe Hurricane Katrina was a natural disaster. “I believe God is sending us signals,” he said. “[Sinners] need to repent, or God will send more.”
var uslide_show_id = “32556a62-fa95-4817-9f9d-bb634d782d35”;var slideshowwidth = “468”;var linktext = “Decafest Slideshow”;—–Contact Angelle Barbazon at [email protected]