BootsnAll Travel Community

Is there any country/city in Europe that truely does accept GLBTs?
Holland? Switzerland? England?

Or even city?

Where on earth that you've been would you feel the safest being gay?

Hello,

I live in Brighton, England, which has the highest gay-to-straight ratio in the UK. Having said that, it all depends how out and flamboyant you are. There are dozens of bars and clubs, several of them clumped together along the seafront by the pier. London and Manchester have also got big gay scenes.

Most cities in Western Europe have good gay scenes, Amsterdam is very good and very gay friendly; Paris was ok but I didn't find much there, I'm not sure about Switzerland and Germany.

But on the whole it's safe to be gay as long as you're cautious outside of the overtly gay districts.

Hope that helps!

Hud x

No city/country/place is 100% accepting to gays, but there are a few places that are quite high.

Amsterday is high on the list. I was there last weekend, and met a guy at a club. On the way back to his place, we were walking on the Leidsestraat [busy main street connecting the Spui and Leidse square] and we were making out the whole way down the street. We got some looks but just from tourists it seemed... the Dutch don't care.

West Hollywood is also very high on the list.

That's about what I thought. I recently (as the American boy I am) trapesed around Europe for a year and got about the same feeling as I have here--You wont get shot most places for being openly gay but you'll probablly hear the word (or local equivilant of) 'fag' at least once a day.

I found Berlin to be laidback in that way, as was Geneva, and London... but no-where seemed any great deal better or worse than my home town, Milwaukee Wisconsin, except for the fact I could leagally go to the gay clubs. Somehow, I had envisioned it to be better, because Americans seem so... behind... on most of those sorts of liberal issues.

Someday...

Once a day?? Ouch. I cant imagine being called the n-word ONCE A DAY.

Mind you, everyone's talking about western Europe here. The further you go east, the worse it gets. The former Soviet Bloc countries can be pretty bad. In a number of them homosexual sex was only just legalized in the 90's and a lot of the population isn't too happy about it. Read up on this year's gay pride marches in Warsaw or Moscow more for info.

I'm not sure what you were actually doing to get the 'fag' reaction Brambles, but I've been lucky enough to visit most of the major cities in Europe, and a lot of the not so major and never once have I been called a fag (or it's equivalent).

I think with all cities though you have to take care, gay or straight. But I don't think on a main street in any of the major cities in Europe you'll have much of a problem.

My boyfriend and I often walk home hand in hand, and we do this in Cardiff, which is about as rough as you can find on a Weekend night, and we don't have a problem.

I you wanted to visit the better, more fun gay cities in Europe, I would go to Brighton and Manchester in the UK, Paris, just because it is a fantastic city, the scene isn't amazing, but if you go with the right people, it can be fun.

Amsterdam, has a huge scene, and Berlin, is worth a visit.

Most of the other cities, all have bits and pieces here and there. Or the odd great bar and decent club - like Prague (which has a large gay scene, but seems only to have the a few places you would want to spend any time in.)

The comment about the further West you go is right. The odd thing though, is that I've been to a few places, where the country has a different reaction towards gay tourist than it does to its own people.

Egypt (not quite in Europe I know, but very close), used to say on it's website, that though homosexuality is illegal in Egypt, visitors will not have a problem.

And having been there with my partner in a double room, that information did seem to be right.

I forgot about this thread...
It seems interesting what you say... I'm farmillar with the scenes that wasn't what I meant, I know they're bigger and better, but when I was holding hands with another guy in Europe, people reacted differently than they would here in Milwaukee. I guess its becuase I'm young and the other (more insecure?) teen guys do that, I don't tend to distinguish them from anyone else particularly in my mind, but thinking about it it seems like they were doing most of it. (Although fewer of them seem to do that here...)
Its just interesting to me that I can hold hands with my boyfreind anywhere here without people saying anything about it. I guess I'm just lucky.