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I think I want to move to a gay mecca now. I am tired of living in Connecticut, which has a dying, stagnant, cliquey gay population. And now that I'm 30 years old it's only getting more depressing. I remember the days when I was 22-23 years old and living in NYC and it was easy to make new friends and meet other gay guys. But now in CT, everyone is either married or just not into the scene at all. It's very stagnant. Over the course of the next 3-6 months, I will be searching for a job, and I want it to be in a metropolitan area with a legit, vibrant gay population. Since the choices are overwhelming, I was wondering if you could help me focus on maybe 3 cities instead of just one, since it's very hard to get a job as a nonlocal candidate.
So, here is my criteria. I don't believe in imposing too much criteria.
Required:
Democratic/liberal/progressive metro area
Gay population must be adequately large, satisfactory and continuously refreshing
Preferred:
Direct flights to BDL (Hartford-Springfield, CT-MA) or reasonable drive
Ability to afford a nice small home for no more than $250K within a 25-minute commute
Hopefully not a stressful place to live, but I can try to adapt
About me:
Introverted, educated, white collar (corporate tax accountant), fairly masculine, love nature and the outdoors. Not really into clubs, bars or partying. Not a superficial kind of guy. Not the stereotypical gay guy. I try to live a simple, unsophisticated, laid back lifestyle. My appearance/style is rather conventional. Nothing crazy.
Some of the metro areas I had in mind are Philadelphia, Miami, Austin, Atlanta, Chicago, Columbus, Minneapolis, Denver and Seattle. Job prospects are strong in pretty much all of these cities except for Miami and Austin, which appear to be oversaturated.
I am staunchly opposed to Pittsburgh, Charlotte, Nashville, Dallas, Houston, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Salt Lake City and Phoenix.
And now that I'm 30 years old it's only getting more depressing. I remember the days when I was 22-23 years old and living in NYC and it was easy to make new friends and meet other gay guys. But now in CT, everyone is either married or just not into the scene at all. It's very stagnant.
At 30 you are not going to want to hear this, but to a large extent this is a by-product of aging, not of a gay or straight scene anywhere. Because you are looking within a smaller pool, it just looks more pronounced. The older you get, the harder it is to make friends and meet new people, particularly in your own age range.
We see this in a lot of forum posts where someone has moved to another area and complains about how hard it is to make new friends - well, once you end your school years and move away from where you grew up, you no longer have a circle of ready-made friends and you have to start getting creative with meeting people through work, hobbies or outside interests.
At 30 you are not going to want to hear this, but to a large extent this is a by-product of aging, not of a gay or straight scene anywhere. Because you are looking within a smaller pool, it just looks more pronounced. The older you get, the harder it is to make friends and meet new people, particularly in your own age range.
We see this in a lot of forum posts where someone has moved to another area and complains about how hard it is to make new friends - well, once you end your school years and move away from where you grew up, you no longer have a circle of ready-made friends and you have to start getting creative with meeting people through work, hobbies or outside interests.
Well then I guess I'm old and screwed at this point.
I think I want to move to a gay mecca now. I am tired of living in Connecticut, which has a dying, stagnant, cliquey gay population. And now that I'm 30 years old it's only getting more depressing. I remember the days when I was 22-23 years old and living in NYC and it was easy to make new friends and meet other gay guys. But now in CT, everyone is either married or just not into the scene at all. It's very stagnant. Over the course of the next 3-6 months, I will be searching for a job, and I want it to be in a metropolitan area with a legit, vibrant gay population. Since the choices are overwhelming, I was wondering if you could help me focus on maybe 3 cities instead of just one, since it's very hard to get a job as a nonlocal candidate.
So, here is my criteria. I don't believe in imposing too much criteria.
Required:
Democratic/liberal/progressive metro area
Gay population must be adequately large, satisfactory and continuously refreshing
Preferred:
Direct flights to BDL (Hartford-Springfield, CT-MA) or reasonable drive
Ability to afford a nice small home for no more than $250K within a 25-minute commute
Hopefully not a stressful place to live, but I can try to adapt
About me:
Introverted, educated, white collar (corporate tax accountant), fairly masculine, love nature and the outdoors. Not really into clubs, bars or partying. Not a superficial kind of guy. Not the stereotypical gay guy. I try to live a simple, unsophisticated, laid back lifestyle. My appearance/style is rather conventional. Nothing crazy.
Some of the metro areas I had in mind are Philadelphia, Miami, Austin, Atlanta, Chicago, Columbus, Minneapolis, Denver and Seattle. Job prospects are strong in pretty much all of these cities except for Miami and Austin, which appear to be oversaturated.
I am staunchly opposed to Pittsburgh, Charlotte, Nashville, Dallas, Houston, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Salt Lake City and Phoenix.
The only city on your list that fits your personality best and doesn't really fit the stereotypical gay image overall would be Columbus in my opinion. The dropoff to the next options of Chicago and Minneapolis isn't major though. The rest are going to provide the usual environment that gay men like yourself (and I) find tedious and want no part of generally speaking. Just as an aside, but have you considered Cleveland? It might be a good fit for you and worth looking at in my opinion.
I think I want to move to a gay mecca now. I am tired of living in Connecticut, which has a dying, stagnant, cliquey gay population. And now that I'm 30 years old it's only getting more depressing. I remember the days when I was 22-23 years old and living in NYC and it was easy to make new friends and meet other gay guys. But now in CT, everyone is either married or just not into the scene at all. It's very stagnant. Over the course of the next 3-6 months, I will be searching for a job, and I want it to be in a metropolitan area with a legit, vibrant gay population. Since the choices are overwhelming, I was wondering if you could help me focus on maybe 3 cities instead of just one, since it's very hard to get a job as a nonlocal candidate.
So, here is my criteria. I don't believe in imposing too much criteria.
Required:
Democratic/liberal/progressive metro area
Gay population must be adequately large, satisfactory and continuously refreshing
Preferred:
Direct flights to BDL (Hartford-Springfield, CT-MA) or reasonable drive
Ability to afford a nice small home for no more than $250K within a 25-minute commute
Hopefully not a stressful place to live, but I can try to adapt
About me:
Introverted, educated, white collar (corporate tax accountant), fairly masculine, love nature and the outdoors. Not really into clubs, bars or partying. Not a superficial kind of guy. Not the stereotypical gay guy. I try to live a simple, unsophisticated, laid back lifestyle. My appearance/style is rather conventional. Nothing crazy.
Some of the metro areas I had in mind are Philadelphia, Miami, Austin, Atlanta, Chicago, Columbus, Minneapolis, Denver and Seattle. Job prospects are strong in pretty much all of these cities except for Miami and Austin, which appear to be oversaturated.
I am staunchly opposed to Pittsburgh, Charlotte, Nashville, Dallas, Houston, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Salt Lake City and Phoenix.
The only city on your list that fits your personality best and doesn't really fit the stereotypical gay image overall would be Columbus in my opinion. The dropoff to the next options of Chicago and Minneapolis isn't major though. The rest are going to provide the usual environment that gay men like yourself (and I) find tedious and want no part of generally speaking. Just as an aside, but have you considered Cleveland? It might be a good fit for you and worth looking at in my opinion.
Yes, I've been to Cleveland and liked it. I think it's a great place and there are plenty of jobs for me. But virtually all of the gays I met and talked with from there seem to complain about how much it sucks. They have made the following comments:
"I think most gays in Cleveland have given up."
"The gays here are trashy and feudal."
"The gays in Cleveland are crazy....no joke."
"There's no one worth dating here."
"Gay bars are closing down and there's only like two left here."
"The gay community in Columbus is much more vibrant than Cleveland."
"It's refreshing to meet someone who has their life together, unlike most gays here in Cleveland."
"Why would you move to Cleveland?! If I were moving somewhere, it wouldn't be Cleveland."
"I hate Cleveland."
They have also repeatedly said that the gay scene sucks and leaves a lot to be desired. So yeah...they basically convinced me to steer clear of Cleveland. Many of them seem to fantasize about moving out of Ohio and to somewhere else like Florida or California. So, I would conclude that Cleveland is a net gay population loser, just like Connecticut. Columbus, for example, would be a net gay population gainer. The gay community of Cleveland just seemed to be rather pessimistic in general, kind of like the gay community here in Connecticut. Although, one native Clevelander (gay) was very optimistic and passionate about Cleveland and he did a wonderful job at showing me around the metro. I did like it, although the roads were HORRIBLE and most areas looked rather gritty and old.
Also, when you look at websites like a4a for Cleveland metro, there's way less guys than one would expect for a metro of 2.1 million. In fact, New Haven, CT has almost as much of a gay population that Cleveland has. Something is wrong with that picture.
Last edited by nep321; 04-30-2015 at 11:10 AM..
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