Gay Rodeo Bucks Stereotype
Half a dozen cowboys are exercising their horses around the dirt arena where the pennants of corporate sponsors flutter from the sun-faded blue metal grandstands.
Over two days, participants will rope calves, ride bulls and broncos, maneuver their horses around barrels and poles -- typical rodeo activity.
Some of them will also race goats, decorate steers and dress in drag, because this isn’t exactly a typical rodeo. It’s a stop on the International Gay Rodeo Assn. circuit.
The association, which formed in 1985 and stages the events partly to raise money for charity, has more than 20 rodeos in the United States and Canada planned this year, with a finals rodeo Oct. 14-17 in Omaha. Most of the participants are gay, although organizers concede that there is no way to check, and the vast majority are amateurs.
“It’s a chance for them to be comfortable. It’s just a lot of fun,” said Ron Lindblad, assistant director of the Arizona gay rodeo.
Most say they are drawn by the camaraderie, the chance to connect with other gays who love horses and rodeo without the fear of being scorned.
“It was really nice to be around people who didn’t care” whether you were gay, said Diane “Craze” Vosseller, 45, of Albuquerque, N.M., who has participated in about 25 gay rodeos. “You have to be gay-friendly or you can’t be here.”
However, she and Keenan Allen, 39, of Mesa, Ariz., say the friendly atmosphere belies the competitive nature.
“Everyone wants the coveted belt buckle,” Allen said.
The gay community is closer-knit than other rodeo communities, said Tee Tramp, 39, of Lancaster, Calif., sitting atop one of his 12 horses. “I loosen up here a little more. You make friends here a little more than you do at straight rodeos.”
Organizers of the association say the discomfort felt by rural gays and lesbians -- because of their sexual orientation and rural roots -- was a driving force in the development of gay rodeo.
Gays and lesbians who grew up in rural communities, especially in the 1970s and ‘80s, often believed they had to leave for urban areas so they could find other gay people, said John King, owner of three western gay bars and an early organizer of the rodeo association.
“The need for socialization would push them into the city, and when they came into the city, they were misfits,” said King, 62, who grew up on an Iowa farm.
Rural gays would stick out in urban gay communities because they didn’t talk right or wear the right things, he said.
Tommy Channel, who has been involved in gay rodeo for 20 years and is an administrative assistant at the association’s Denver headquarters, said he originally left his hometown in eastern Texas for Houston so that he could be around other gay people.
“But you still have the farm boy in you.... You still need the culture also. You can’t come out of your skin totally,” he said. “When you are born into something, whether it be gay or the rodeo world, you can’t just leave that.”
Organizers didn’t always find the rodeo world very open, especially in the early days. Many facilities turned down organizers once they learned that the rodeo was for gays.
King recalls trying to negotiate for an arena in Gilbert, Ariz., in 1985.
After making a proposal to rent the facility, King and others explained that they were from the Arizona Gay Rodeo Assn., a state association that combined with ones from Colorado, Texas and California to create the international association that same year.
“Three of the men, you could sort of see the red rise from the neck to their faces,” he said, laughing. “It’s just that the concept of gay rodeo was so foreign to them.... We knew our presentation was done.”
For years, King feared that those outside the gay community would discover gay rodeo. He worried that it would invite violence or scare away gay participants who didn’t want to be outed.
Today, the gay rodeo circuit has mainstream corporate sponsors, including Bud Light and American Airlines.
“I never thought I would see the day,” King said. “Society had moved faster than I had.”