Pride is a time when you can be yourself. Even for those who in everyday life you may not be able to. It’s a celebration of humanity and our ability to love who we will without judgement. Unfortunately, this year’s Kansas City Pride was a bunch of crap (with the exception of the Missie B’s performers AND La Roux – even though her venue was crap too).
Lets start with the Power and Light district issue. There has been nothing less becoming on Kansas City than their love for P&L. It stars big name bars, bands and, what I lovingly refer to as, weekend warriors. These weekend warriors are generally white, twenty-somethings from Johnson County. Now, not that there’s anything wrong with revitalizing the city and bringing in business from our suburbs, but you CANNOT exclude the people who inhabit midtown. There have been numerous reports of “profiling” at P&L – whether that be against the LGBT, Latino or African American cultural groups.
Lovingly, P&L offered their main stage and venues to house Street Blast for Pride this year due to some with issues of blocking off Main street as we have done in the past. When it was noted that P&L would be the setting for Street Blast, Facebook was blowing up with protest requests by Gretchen Wieners. Gretchen wanted the ill will of P&L to be exposed and for the community queers to understand that this event was nothing but “good PR” for the collection of chad bars. Gretchen had a good point, but the show went on and all involved homos of the land were happy. Until, yet again, doom struck…After Saturday’s festivities at the river front several members of the LGBT community were denied entry to P&L establishments. The policy upheld by the corporate board of P&L is that any doorman at any bar can deny entry to any person for any reason. How about them apples? So if this schmuck thinks your girlfriend is hot you can be denied entry so he can have a bite of your biscut? Ridiculous.

Protest during Street Blast P&L
The cost to enter the River Front park was a little steep, there were about half of the attendees than in previous years. I, personally, would like to thank ROCKFEST for being a bunch of trashy assholes and fucking everything up like we all knew they would. We couldn’t host Pride with the title “Pride Mudslide and Backyard Wrestling,” so they gave us a gift of $10,000.00 for the relocation issue. Parking at $5.00 per car, per day was a bit steep considering everyone who parked in the great gravel pit would soon have to wash their vehicle. Then, the ticket prices to get in are another question. Granted, you can’t have an event like this one for free and Pride IS A BUSINESS OWNED BY AN INDIVIDUAL WHO DOES MAKE A PROFIT.
Not to drop names but lets talk about John Koop (aka Flo the bitchiest, holier than thou queen of the universe). Flo is notorious for the number he did on The Cabaret’s finances therefore driving it deep, deep into the ground. This started when I was just some twink looking to get laid and drink at the age of 19. I’ve heard all the stories about Missie B’s and the high demands of Flo and her haggard drag queen followers. When Flo’s Fabulous Cabaret opened he forced his queens to sign a contract stating that they would no longer perform at Missie B’s. It seems likely this was in hopes that he would take his famous drag queen bonanza and have a large following his new establishment. Well, he was wrong and now Dirty Dorothy has the drag community by the balls.
Anyhow, excuse my side tangent.
Flo was listed as owner of Show-Me Pride since 2003. Two years ago, the rumor was Flo gave up his position as Pride board member and owner to Rick Bumgardner. Rick did active duty as President of the board, as promised, for the last two years. I found Flo partaking in ‘incognito’ status this year and was left unsettled. Taking matters into my own hands, I checked the State of Missouri’s public documents website, I found an John Koops name listed as the continued owner of Pride.
If you’ve ever been into Flo’s Fabulous Cabaret you would know no one goes there. The establishment has a $500,000 kitchen, a beautiful stage and prime location for partying all night long…Benefits and the once monthly girl2girl certainly don’t pay the bills in a place like this one. How they’ve floated for so long is a mystery, but since they’re moving (somewhere near Uptown Theatre) it’s even more of a mystery how Flo will be able to afford a brand new kitchen in a commercial space. Not that I’m saying anything, I’m just saying, money is appearing with no business to back it and pride was expensive AND someone we all know and love, Love, LOVE owns it.
Much Love,
The Prideful Pony