"Members only": 20 years on, Manchester’s Queer Scene

Pride Is Still a Protest. Some of Us Never Had the Privilege of Forgetting

I grew up in Manchester in the 90s and 2000s. I left Manchester in 2005 and then moved up and down the country for studies and then work. I would often return to Manchester during this time, sometimes in between studies, in between jobs, and randomly for weekends. For about 1 year I even lived in Manchester and commuted between Manchester and Bradford for work. Finally in 2016 I moved to Belgium. So when I say I know Manchester, I know Manchester before the IRA bombing. I know Manchester before Manchester Fort. I know Manchester before Salford's makeover and when Ancoats only had ToysRus, and I know Manchester when Manchester's Queer scene had Essentials.

I left the UK for a lot of reasons. Racism was one of them. Not the only one, but certainly one of them. There was also the cost of living, the lifestyle, and the opportunity to build something different. To create a life where I wasn't constantly navigating the same exhausting calculations that many Black and brown people know all too well.

Over time, I built an amazing life in Belgium. Friends. Community. A home. A future. The sort of life that takes years to build and becomes woven into your identity. So, coming back to the UK this year in Feb 2026 wasn't an easy choice. In fact, it wasn't a choice I particularly wanted to make at all. But I moved for love.

The reasons are more complicated than that, but that's the short version. It was a calculated decision. One that made sense. One that I hope will be temporary. What I didn't expect was how quickly Britain would remind me why I left.

A few weeks after moving back to Manchester, where I grew up, my partner and I were walking through the city centre on what I assumed was a normal Saturday afternoon. At first, I couldn't understand why the streets seemed so crowded. Then I noticed the St George's flags. The shaved heads. The Rottweilers. The groups of angry men moving through the city centre.

And my stomach dropped.

How the fuck did I end up here again?

Images flooded back into my mind. Oldham. Bradford. Birmingham. The race riots. The clashes between English nationalists and Black and brown communities. The atmosphere that many white people can choose not to notice because it was never directed at them.

Suddenly I wasn't standing in Manchester in 2026. I was every brown kid I had ever been.

Only two years earlier, after the horrific murders of young girls in Southport, disinformation spread rapidly linking the attack to migrants and asylum seekers. What followed were riots across the country targeting Muslims, migrants, Black people, brown people, and anyone who looked foreign enough to be blamed. There was even a video of a man chasing a family with a chain saw.

Let's call them what they were.

Race riots.

Not anti-immigration protests.

Race riots.

The Prime Minister called them anti-immigration protests. Much of the media followed suit. BBC. Sky. Politicians. Commentators. Everyone suddenly tying themselves in knots to avoid saying what many of us could see with our own eyes.

Fuck off.

Honestly, fuck right off.

When people are attacking mosques, threatening Muslims, smashing businesses, targeting migrants, and terrorising Black and brown communities, don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining. Don't tell me this is about immigration. We've seen this movie before. The only thing that's changed is the branding. EDL, National Front, UKIP and now Reform. It's all the same.

I remember sitting in Brussels watching the footage on my phone and thinking, what the fuck is happening to this country?

Then correcting myself.

No.

Not what is happening.

What is happening again.

Because for many Black and brown people, none of this is new. White Britain often experiences racism as an event. We experience it as a pattern.

Fast forward to June 2026. The country is tense following the tragic death of Henry Nowak, following a stabbing and subsequently dying in police restraints. Once again, words that have become painfully familiar enter public consciousness.

"I can't breathe."

What has struck me following Henry Nowak's death is how shocked people seem. For decades, Black and brown communities have spoken about over-policing, excessive force, deaths in custody, and institutional violence. Too often those concerns were dismissed.

Now the names being discussed are Henry Nowak, Alex Pretti, and Renee Good.

Maybe this isn't something new.

Maybe the difference is that some of the victims are white?

Whether it's the police in the UK or ICE in the United States, many Black, brown, and migrant communities have long experienced what happens when institutions are given extraordinary powers with limited accountability. The warning signs were always there.

Many people just chose not to see them.

And then, as if to remind me that racism doesn't only exist in institutions but also in everyday life, I found myself sitting outside On Bar on Canal Street with five other Queer brown people.

The night before I'd gone to Club Zindagi with friends, Manchester's long-running Queer South Asian club night. The music was awful. Honestly. I hadn't been in years and somehow the playlist hadn't changed since 2010. The same Bollywood tracks. The same Bhangra songs. The same remixes. Ok maybe they had 2 or 3 new ones but come on. Absolutely awful.

But it was our awful music. Our people. Our space. Our freedom. Sometimes home isn't about quality. Sometimes it's about belonging and feeling safe.

The next day I attended this Queer Brown Meet at the On Bar I'd found on Instagram. Having moved back to the UK, I wanted to meet other South Asian Queer people and start rebuilding a community and Zindagi the night before motivated me to keep going.

I was the oldest there, which still makes me feel a but uncomfortable but I'm learning to lean in to it and so assigned myself as the designated Didi (older sister). One person had travelled from London, another from Coventry, another from Middlesbrough, another from Burnley. Four people had crossed counties simply to spend an afternoon around other Queer brown people.

Think about that for a moment.

People travelling hours just to be around people who might understand them.

That tells you everything you need to know about belonging.

We weren't discussing politics. We were talking about work, family, relationships, identity, culture, music and the usual things people talk about when they're trying to get to know one another. Somebody was Pakistani, somebody was Indian, somebody was Sri Lankan. We were laughing, sharing stories, comparing experiences.

For a couple of hours, it felt easy.

Then the organiser mentioned he'd tried to get into Via bar the night before.

"They told me it was members only."

Members only.

My entire mood changed.

Members only.

Oh yes.

I've heard that one before.

Many of us have.

Members only.

When I was coming out almost twenty years ago, "members only" was often the excuse used to keep us out. The brown kids. The Asian kids. The Black kids. The Queer people who didn't fit the image of who belonged in Manchester's Gay Village.

MEMBERS FUCKING ONLY!

So what did we do? Well, we learned strategies.

Don't go in groups.

Go one by one.

Try to look/behave camp.

Make friends with some white guys before trying to get into Cruz 101.

Your chances improve.

For anyone reading this and thinking I'm exaggerating, I'm not. If anything, I'm toning it down.

Almost twenty years later, I was listening to younger Queer South Asian men describe experiences that sounded painfully the same.

And honestly? It broke my heart.

Not because it surprised me but because it didn't.

I tried to stay calm. I tried to make jokes. I tried to be the older person offering wisdom rather than rage. I explained that this is racism and that they shouldn't let it ruin their night. Unfortunately, they need strategies.

They listened politely.

But I got the impression they thought I was being dramatic.

I wasn't.

No sooner had I finished explaining this than something came flying towards us. At first, none of us understood what had happened. Luckily it missed everyone. We looked around and saw that a JD Sports bag with something inside had been thrown towards us.

The whole thing felt surreal.

A few moments later, a white guy walked over.

"Sorry lads, my cousin is mentally ill."

He picked up the bag and started walking away.

I calmly replied, "You should get him to be more careful."

"Yeah, but he's my cousin."

And that was that.

Now I'm not saying what happened.

I'm saying six brown Queer men were sitting together and a white guy threw a bag at us.

You do the maths.

What struck me wasn't even the incident itself. It was the calculation that immediately happened in all our minds.

Was that random?

Was it racism?

Was it hostility?

Are we overreacting?

Are we underreacting?

That constant assessment is exhausting.

People often think racism is only the obvious incidents. The slurs. The violence. The attacks. But much of racism exists in anticipation, in vigilance, in your nervous system constantly trying to determine whether you're safe.

In traditional Didi fashion, I tried to lift the mood. I joked that if he was going to throw something at us, he could have at least made it a Chanel bag.

Who shops at JD anymore?

Everyone laughed. But the feeling stayed because for me whilst no one would recognise Manchester now, for a Queer brown person entering the scene, nothing had changed.

Now let us zoom out and look at another angel of the context we Black and brown Queers exist in. Enter the 'pick-me's'.

Every time mass unrest happens and conversations about race take place, they appear. The handful of Black and brown faces standing beside far-right movements. The influencers attacking migrants. The Queer people attacking trans people. The people convinced that if they repeat the right talking points loudly enough, they'll somehow be spared when the machinery turns.

I look at the Sikhs joining Reform and I genuinely wonder what they think is waiting for them at the end of this road.

A Sikh woman in Walsall was raped by a man who wrongly believed she was Muslim.

Let that sink in.

He didn't stop to check.

He didn't care.

The distinction mattered to her. It didn't matter to him.

Because racism has never been particularly interested in accuracy. That's the point.

Today it's brown Muslims.

Yesterday it was a Sikh woman because somebody thought she was Muslim.

Tomorrow it'll be somebody else.

Racism doesn't know better. More importantly, racism doesn't care.

And then I think about the viral video from the Israel Day parade in the US. The Indian guy screaming "fuck Muslims" at pro-Palestinian demonstrators while throwing transphobic slurs around. "you're a fucking tranny, you're fucking trans, get the fuck out of here. Queers don't like you."

Mate.

Do you really think you're special? Do you think the people cheering you on see you as one of them? Do you think the Zionists are going to give two shits about you? Do you think Christian nationalists in the US give a shit about you? A brown gay guy? Really?!

https://youtube.com/shorts/e8cOslfli6I?si=zzF8NWrJTsJRhOVD

The people obsessed with migrants, Muslims, demographics, gender, sexuality, and protecting so-called British or American values aren't carefully distinguishing between Indian, Pakistani, Sikh, Hindu, Arab, Muslim, or anyone else they decide doesn't belong. That's the point.

For some Gay people, being Gay is currently convenient because, in their eyes, it's better than being Muslim or Trans. For now! But acceptance based on usefulness isn't acceptance. It's a transaction, and eventually the bill comes due.

Today it's Muslims. Today it's forced migrants. Today it's trans people.

Tomorrow it's who?

Gay men?

Lesbians?

Disabled people?

East Asians?

The elderly?

Movements built on exclusion always need another enemy. Someone else to blame, fear, or sacrifice. Every generation produces people convinced they'll be the exception: the "good" immigrant, the "good" Muslim, the "good" Queer person, the "good" brown person.

History has a phrase for this now: leopards ate my face.

The moment when people support cruel and exclusionary politics, only to act shocked when those same politics eventually come for them too.

That's why Pride matters. Not because we're all the same. Not because we agree on everything. But because our liberation has always been connected.

Pride was never about getting a seat at the table while someone else was being dragged out of the room. Pride was about refusing to let that happen.

Which is why, if I'm honest, I don't feel proud.

I feel scared and I feel angry!

I think about Queer Palestinians trying to survive and organise while living through genocide. I think about migrants being rounded up in the United States. I think about trans people being turned into political footballs. I think about Reform rising in the polls. I think about Britain falling from first place to twenty-second on LGBTQ+ rights.

And I think about a young brown Queer man being turned away from a bar in Manchester in exactly the same way I was twenty years ago.

Twenty years later, the music at Club Zindagi hasn't changed.

Apparently neither has Manchester.

Fuck "members only"!

And if Pride doesn't make room for Black and brown Queer people, migrants, Muslims, trans people, and everyone else still fighting to belong, then what exactly are we celebrating?

Maybe Pride means telling the truth.

And the truth is this:

White Britain often experiences racism as an event. Black and brown people experience it as a pattern.

Pride is no different. Pride is still a protest. Some of us never had the privilege of forgetting.