00:00:10.000Well, in its most insane form, it will look like a lesbian bar in Massachusetts in what has to amount to the best story of the last 10 years.
00:00:18.000Now, there's a story that came out from the Boston Globe that has apparently shattered all of their records in terms of subscriptions because it demonstrates full scale how psychotic the bleeding edge of the left is.
00:00:30.000Okay, the piece is about a Western Massachusetts lesbian bar that had required for years KN95 masks.
00:00:40.000Now, as you know, because you have a calendar, the year is 2026.
00:01:02.000This particular story, I'm just going to tell you, is again indicative of the mindset of the bleeding edge of a Democratic Party that, if they gain power, is going to be crazy, crazy.
00:01:18.000The August 31st Instagram post from Last Ditch Bar and Arts Venue, a lesbian bar in Greenfield, was upbeat, teasing a new DJ lineup and a volunteer meetup.
00:01:26.000But part way down the rainbow hued post labeled updates was a sentence that would splinter the queer community in this small Pioneer Valley City and beyond.
00:01:35.000Okay, and the update said that they were going to change the rules with regard to KN95 masks.
00:01:43.000Quote It is with love we inform our immunocompromised disabled divas we'll be opening Saturday night as mask optional to try out typical club nights with themes host DJs full capacity.
00:01:52.000Accessibility is a pillar of our mission, and our mission is also to make the space work for everyone and everything radical.
00:02:24.000According to the Boston Globe, the new policy was not received with love.
00:02:27.000Just say you're being complicit in a mass disabling event and get it over with, wrote one commenter.
00:02:33.000People like you kill disabled people in the name of your own leisure and convenience, posted another.
00:02:38.000I hope your venue gets firebombed for robbing my fellow immunocompromised people of their Saturday plans.
00:02:43.000Just to scrape extra revenue from ableists, wrote a third.
00:02:46.000The people running the bar were accused of being ableist, eugenicists even, for relaxing their signature policy in the face of what commenters considered an ongoing pandemic.
00:02:55.000Greenfield has not reported any COVID cases in more than two months.
00:02:59.000Two days later, Last Ditch ended up posting an apology for all this.
00:03:04.000Quote All 99% of us marginalized deserve to be welcome.
00:03:08.000Accessibility is a pillar of our mission.
00:03:11.000We are sorry to disappoint valued community members with access changes by a casual announcement.
00:03:15.000Our diverse disabled immunocompromised team.
00:03:17.000Make decisions by multiple open community meetings, feedback form review, and advice from intersectional business advisors and elders.
00:03:24.000Well, instead of defusing the situation, the apology made things worse.
00:03:28.000It posted an Instagram card without providing alternative text for the visually impaired.
00:03:36.000This set off a fresh round of accusations of ableism, so they didn't put a visually impaired card up, and people got madder and madder.
00:03:43.000According to the Boston Globe, quaint, crunchy Greenfield, population 17,700, isn't a bad place for a COVID cautious lesbian bar in 2026, all things considered.
00:03:52.000Rainbow flags next door windows downtown.
00:03:54.000On a recent weekend, a community theater was advertising a workshop for masked performers down the street from a bookstore with a medical masks required sign in the window.
00:04:02.000Men in ponytails and N95s were ordering hibiscus tea from the coffee shop off the main square.
00:04:07.000Greenfield is close, both physically and spiritually, to Northampton, sometimes referred to as Lesbianville, USA.
00:04:13.000In the Pioneer Valley, every bar is a lesbian bar, a friend who lives there told me.
00:04:17.000Nevertheless, Last Ditch, which opened last year as a bar for dykes, transsexuals, gender freaks, workers, and their friends, is struggling.
00:04:24.000Three housemates in their mid 20s opened it together, hoping to Fill the void left by two local queer bars that had shuttered.
00:04:29.000One of the trio, Aza Rosario, is a drag performer who uses it, its pronouns.
00:04:39.000Envisioned a venue where it and its friends could perform.
00:04:42.000I love that the Boston Globe then does it.
00:04:44.000Where it and its friends could perform.
00:04:46.000This object and its friends could perform.
00:04:49.000The three were intentional about the kind of values they wanted to bring to the Divey Basement Bar, which they decorated with discoveries from Facebook Marketplace and pieces from local artists.
00:04:57.000No one would be turned away for space.
00:05:03.000So basically, you don't have to have money, you don't have to have a house, and you don't have to have a human gender in order to go to this bar.
00:05:13.000This is a picture of the bar owners Jackie Metellian, Sage Tarito, and Aza Rosario.
00:05:20.000That's a fine looking trio right there.
00:05:25.000I'm sure that's going to pack them in.
00:06:13.000But by the time of Last Ditch's monthly community meeting on September 11th, only one of the original founders, Metellion, is still involved.
00:06:19.000The two others stepped back from the daily operation months before, Metellion says, setting various pressures and health issues.
00:06:34.000You can be the owner of a lesbian bar that doesn't charge for admission and at which the patrons simulate lesbian sex acts while wearing masks.
00:07:43.000That means that I bring balance of nature with me and it ensures that I'm getting the nutrients that I require because that's what balance of nature is.
00:07:49.000It is essentially taking all those nutrients from actual fruits and veggies and condensing them into a form that you can imbibe without having to, you know, just guzzle all sorts of zucchinis and cucumbers and peppers and all that kind of stuff.
00:08:02.000Instead, go to balanceofnature.com, subscribe to the whole health system, use promo code Shapiro for 35% off your first subscription order.
00:08:10.000That's 35% off at balanceofnature.com with code Shapiro.
00:08:13.000It's going to make you getting healthier a lot easier.
00:08:16.000Again, you don't want to be like those people.
00:08:17.000I mean, we're showing pictures on this particular program.
00:08:20.000Of the people who are clearly not using Balance of Nature.
00:08:24.000Go to balanceofnature.com with code Shapiro, get 35% off.
00:08:27.000Well, again, this piece continues, and with every sentence, it gets weirder.
00:08:31.000There are some 10 people seated in a circle on the dance floor, all wearing masks.
00:08:34.000Metellion, a handful of volunteers, some bar patrons, and two designated mediators who will facilitate conversations between parties who disagree.
00:08:41.000Another 10 or 15 people join the meeting via Zoom.
00:08:44.000The plan is to go clockwise, sharing views on the masking decision and the financial future of the bar.
00:08:50.000It begins with a calming breath exercise.
00:08:53.000Almost immediately, the proceedings are derailed.
00:08:56.000One of Last Ditch's most vocal critics, the head of another queer COVID conscious collective in Western Massachusetts, a performer and artist who goes by Zoe Noir, has been posting complaints about Last Ditch for days.
00:09:58.000These are the internal conflicts of the revolution.
00:10:00.000It's like the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks of weird gay people.
00:10:04.000Moreover, the Zoom attendees speculate that the mediator's licensed status makes her a mandated reporter, an agent of the state akin to the police.
00:10:13.000One person going by Moss asks if the mediator could have them hospitalized against their will, adding that her presence is wildly unsafe.
00:10:21.000When Metallion's turn comes to speak, she begins haltingly.
00:10:24.000She had never envisioned running Last Ditch alone.
00:10:26.000It was not my passion project, she says.
00:10:27.000My main goal was to support Sage and Asia, the other two founders.
00:12:19.000Nor asked to be referred to by his stage name because he says he has been stalked and fears for his safety.
00:12:24.000I'm not going to give grace when someone is spreading rhetoric that can and will get people hurt, he says, referring to the fact the bar's account had liked a few comments supporting the relaxed rule.
00:12:32.000Moreover, the mask policy change promotes those ableist ideas that disabled people, immunocompromised people should either risk their health or just be pushed out of spaces, he says.
00:12:41.000Saturday, September 12th is the second weekly mask optional night at Last Ditch, down a set of stairs in a small concrete courtyard, says the Boston Globe.
00:12:49.000Another handful linger inside near the bar under string lights.
00:12:52.000The dance floor, a wide checkered expanse with a stripper pole at the center, is empty.
00:12:56.000Metellion is one of the few people inside wearing a mask.
00:12:59.000I talk with her and another volunteer, Melody Young, in a small library tucked inside an alcove by the bar filled with zines and lesbian classics, such as Stone Butch Blues.
00:13:08.000There is also a free store which carries food clothes, fentanyl test strips, Narcan, literature about STIs, and other supplies.
00:13:16.000Above us hangs a sign prom canceled because lesbians.
00:13:20.000I ask whether the people behind the angriest posts have genuine connection to the bar.
00:13:59.000It's the evil capitalist system, it's the hetero patriarchy.
00:14:02.000It's a bunch of lesbians who are angry at each other and have given themselves weird genders and looks and are pissed off because apparently some want to wear masks and force everyone to wear the masks and they're yelling at each other.
00:14:14.000And then, if they fail, they go to the well known clown school nearby.
00:15:13.000Well, you know, if you think so, head on over to dailywire.comslash subscribe to watch the full show ad free or check out this crazy story here.