A Lesbian bar which went viral after announcing it would offer one night for patrons not to wear an N-95 mask has ‘soft launched’ its closure.

The Last Ditch bar in Greenfield, Massachusetts, only opened its doors last year, long after the COVID pandemic first hit the world. The bar had one very strict rule: patrons must wear face masks.

The bar found itself embroiled in a viral dispute over a teeny, tiny change in policy on Saturday nights – allowing masks to be optional.

It was casually included on a poster promoting a new club night, which many critics took as too flippant, failing to address the issue with the care it deserved.

As a viral article in The Boston Globe reported, one commenter wrote, ‘just say you’re being complicit in a mass disabling event and get it over with,’ while another said, ‘I hope your venue gets firebombed for robbing my fellow immunocompromised people of their Saturday plans just to scrape extra revenue from ablists [sic].’

There were some 400 comments in the end, many of which were accusing the venue of failing to take the COVID pandemic seriously. This is in spite of the fact that Greenfield hadn’t seen a single reported Covid case for two months at the time the article was published.

Despite the owner pleading with patrons to forgive her and explaining how she had amassed thousands of dollars in debt and was living out of a car, they didn’t let up.

Now, Last Ditch announced they would begin soft closing immediately, but keep all booked events scheduled.

‘We need new owners ASAP, we close this winter,’ the bar wrote.

‘We have put our lives on hold to foster networks of care, resources, and a home base for organising. It’s time we pass it on. We’ve been fighting since the beginning to fill out the team, and we still don’t have a board/leadership to manage workers’ owned Co-op transfer.’

An accompanying graphic detailed that the venue has $70,000 worth of equipment, furniture and inventory.

The Last Ditch believed that no one should be turned away for not being able to afford their cover charge, a policy which includes ‘unhoused people.’ 

The Guardian pointed out that while this is ‘very generous,’ it’s ‘also a formula for losing money.’ It’s a fair point.

Fast forward to 2026, and the community ripped itself apart because the owners changed their policy on masks in a bid to, well, actually make a profit.

A subsequent statement from the bar said it was ‘sorry to disappoint valued community members with access changes by a casual announcement’.

Now, they’ve announced a ‘soft closure’ beginning this winter.

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