Pride NYC
 

this sunday is the pride parade in NYC, I'll be at 5th and 23rd prolly if anyone wants to meet up. Looks like its gonna be a blast ^_^

yay for pridizzle.

If I were anywhere near there, I'd absolutely come by.

I may be at the one in Atlanta on friday night.

I was convinced to go by two friends of mine and I have no idea what to expect.

i think it's pride week in toronto right now so i guess one of these days there will be some kind of big parade in the gay village. maybe that's where neil is..? haven't heard from him lately

when's Shame Week?

Probably just after people see footage of themselves at the pride parade;)

Toronto Chief of Police:

Gay Pride Parade ... I don't get it man. People want everybody treated equally, they want everybody to be blind when it comes to sexuality, and race, and gender, and what not .. but then at the same time, want to advertise it and announce as loudly as possible that they are different.

That's the typical statement. But Pride Parade is more than overtly showing everyone that they're different. It's showing that the population exists, and they are real people and a real presence in whatever city. There are a million reasons for it, and they just celebrate the ways that they are different in a public scenario instead of stuck in a basement club in short shorts shaking their hienies around with joe and jane average having no idea what they're doing.

former! chief of police.

"It's showing that the population exists, and they are real people and a real presence in whatever city."

I think that Gay Pride Parades do nothing but show that they are not "real people." Examples:







Just three pictures out of hundreds of pictures when you google "Gay Pride Parade." I could give a shit when people want to make it known that they exist in a city or area ... Whether it's lobbying, running campaigns, making advertisements. But from the perspective of the typical American who really could give a shit about gays, having a parade where people dance around in ridiculous, nearly-illegal outfits, publicizing what should be something private... I think it makes them look like an UNreal group of mental patients.

ANd those parades are rarely celebrating the ways that they are different. Last year it seemed like everybody wanted to make the case that the only difference between homosexuals and heterosexuals is that homosexuals simply like people of their own sex... and that the love is real and genuine, and that nothing else is different. However, when Gay Pride Parades advertise homosexuality as people clowns pushing dogs, naked men on floats, and frivolous guys wearing next to nothing and dancing provocatively in public with one another ... it sends a very different message. The notion of having a parade, itself, to separate homosexuals and heterosexuals undermines any efforts for others to see anybody else as simply "people." Everybody calls for society to be blind, but then do as much in their power to make themselves stand out apart from everything else.

If Gay Pride Parades were all about solidarity and togetherness in the community, then that'd be great, I'd have absolutely no issue with it (and I really don't have any issue with it now)... but... when what is celebrated most is a ridiculous flandering of skin and pompous difference ... it's audacious. I've yet to have a parade with my girlfriend where we publicize and simulate our sexuality ... and if I did, we'd probably be arrested. Doing the same at a Gay Pride Parade is celebrated, and if anybody were arrested, it would be a hate crime.

--edit--

Why should Joe or Jane Average have to know what people are doing? I don't think that Joe and Jane Average setup nationally televised and advertised events proclaiming their sexual misadventures ... I don't see why who somebody likes to have sex with should be a public affair ... worthy of celebration.

I'm with Mike on this one. Gay Pride events liberate the gay community, but they alienate them from everyone else. If there was a Straight Pride parade held in some big city people would have a fit. Just like if there was a Caucasian Pride parade, although cultural/heritage pride parades are much more appropriate.

I think we all have some sort of "gaydar". If a gay person wearing similar clothes as me told me he was gay I'd respect it. If a half naked man ran up to me on the street and danced around while telling me he was gay I'd be so fucking annoyed and I wouldn't want to be seen around them. It's OK to be different, but don't forget that there are other people around you as well.

Maybe I should've said it this way. It's important to the gay community. So who cares.

As part of the community, I appreciate the exposure that it brings, and I'm not the one in the short shorts or parading around without a shirt on, I'm not in the business of slapping people in the face with my pride. But in smaller places (ie: not toronto) the community showing it's face IS a big step. Like Edmonton, Alberta for example. I'm not offending anyone, so I don't see why I should be discouraged in taking part of something that doesn't offend me. *shrug*

it's easy for me to say it doesn't bother me because i live in the middle of nowhere, but if i was living in the a bigger city and it was thrown in my face, like raub said, i feel it might be a little annoying. but i can't really say either way except that its good that people can get together to celebrate who they are, it just doesnt need to fill in the blatant stereotypes most older people have and will never stop believing. i get annoyed whenever a stereotype is fulfilled. at magfest last year, there were a lot of cool people, but there were also the "convention" people, the uber nerd assholes who complained that the minibosses played too long and held up their cosplay show. or when i go to a concert and see the people who have become obsessed with the image of the fans of the band less so than liking the music themselves...or the big fat shitheads who just come to mosh and hurt people. this isn't indicative of the majority of the population, but often times these are the people inadvertently representing it.

ah loosen up, party boys

gay pride parades are important in terms of getting attention and being noticed. i don't think they do much in terms of acceptance. there are a lot of people out there who have absolutely no problem with gays, but they do have a problem with flamboyant gays. so while the community may think it's important it's really for the wrong reasons. i'm all for being different and individuality, but i also think there is, and should be, a decent universal public behavior. for example, my mom was telling me that there was a girl that applied as a receptionist at her office who met all the qualifications. but, she asked if all her piercings (i think more than our friend Jesse) would be a problem, and they most definitely would so she didn't get the job. it's ok to act how you want around like-minded people or people who can accept that behavior, but when you go into a public setting you should know how to tame it down. i like to be really vulgar with my friends, but i know some people just don't like that, so i try to act politely when i'm in a different setting. being an individual is more than just being "who you are", it's being a dynamic person who can adapt to different social settings while still retaining their own beliefs and opinions.

Something being important to a particular community cannot be justification enough to let it pass. Lynching Black people was important to the KKK community. Now while Gay pride parades are not Klan rallies... though it'd be funny if they were ... it seems that they're counter-productive.

I just don't see why it has to have exposure. I don't feel the need to advertise who I prefer to have sex with... I don't see the need for anybody else. As an individual, a heterosexual person and a homosexual person are just as unique... they like the same things, they love for the same reasons, and have a very similar way of life... at least, that's the census from the last two years. So why should one person be less proud, and why should one person feel that they need to display who they like by walking around dressed up as a clown? Why is one deserving of exposure?

I couldn't agree more with Raub. When I watch movies in my house, I LOVE yelling "FIRE" in the middle of them and going absolutely crazy in my house, running all around. IT's one of the few things I really enjoy doing, and nobody cares. But, people really don't like when I go to movie theaters and yell "FIRE" in the middle of them... so I usually don't.

Someone throw something in here for me an Mike to disagree on, cus I feel really weird right now.

What it boils down to seems to be this. You guys think that gays shouldn't act flamboyantly gay in public.

I can't even argue against that, it's ridiculous. If there is a small amount of the population who are douchey in their representation of the whole, who the fuck cares. Similar to those idiots who get more excited of the image of a band instead of seeing or enjoying the bands music, there are gay people who are so excited about representing the most flamboyant end of the bell curve of gay society, that they go a little overboard. That is their right. If that's how they choose to present themselves, power to them. Same to the idiots with the music. It's not my place to say how they should enjoy music or how they should dress.

A lot of the people in pride parades that you don't see on the news are just walking with maybe a rainbow painted on an arm and holding the hand of their partner, marching in support of the idea of the pride parade. After the parade there are usually events where you have the oppertunity to learn about gay friendly events in your area and stuff like that. There isn't a gay clubhouse where we all meet and decide stuff, so it's good to have an oppertunity to meet people who are similar to you. Of course there are going to be idiots dressed up certain ways and making the general population look silly, but who cares, it would happen anyway. Sort of the, I will never support that, but I support the right to do it.

Mike: Of course you don't have to advertise who you sleep with. It's fucking obvious because it's the norm. Black people don't have to wear pride pins because they're BLACK and you can see it. They're a MINORITY. You sleep with women. Of course you don't have to have a pride parade because you're in the majority and you don't get discriminated against because of that. If you want to have a parade expressing your pride in enjoying Vagina, fuck it, I'll join you. But gays are in the minority and deserve the right to at the very least show their numbers in a public setting, so that Joe McDuff of Rural wherevertown can actually be shown that gay people exist. And don't give me the shit that everyone knows gay people exist, they don't. When I came out to my parents, my Mom confessed that she thought it was the sort of thing that happened on TV, and she'd never honestly encountered someone who was openly gay.

It is an important event so that people can watch the news and say "Oh, wow. Look at that, there's a bunch of gay people in our town." It's for gay people to congregate and not be afraid of the paradigms that exist in a lot of the rural places and unite in a cause of being a recognized population that shouldn't be ignored. If gay people want rights such as marriage, they (we) should be showing that we are a significant portion of the population that can't be overlooked.

It's nothing at all like the KKK. The KKK deserve no recognition for what they are or what they do. Look at it more this way, think of a group of cancer survivors who get together for meetings as a part of recouperation and healing and adjusting back to their regular lives, or even perhaps if they're still going through treatments or whatever. Now, these people have a right to be recognized, if, for example, they were lobbying for money in Cancer research. They would want their numbers to be known. Freedom is a right that we have in America and Canada, and if they wanted to have a parade of some sort, why shouldn't they be able to be? Cancer victims are another minority that would get less attention if people didn't actively campaign for money for more cancer research or for individuals with cancer to get money to pay for treatments or WHATEVER.

The point is, they're a part of the population that deserves to be recognized, and just because of some of the outfits offend your delicate sensibilities you think that they don't deserve a parade.

wtf is so offensive about this?
http://www.prideedmonton.org/2004%20...photos/CSF.jpg
http://www.prideedmonton.org/2004%20...tos/lambda.jpg
http://www.prideedmonton.org/2004%20...ephotos/LC.jpg

Source: http://www.prideedmonton.org/2004-Parade%20route.htm

well i live in a city which has fairly big pride festivities every summer, and if it weren't for the occassional mention of pride week in news reports and newspapers, i probably wouldn't even have known that it was going on. it's not like all of toronto turns into queertown for a week.. the parades and all the other parties mostly happen in and around the gay village area, so it's pretty easy to avoid if you don't want to see/hear about it.

I got in from the parade last night around frikkin 9pm, the fair was tubular. Btw, I didnt see that guy but two other guys, hair old, and in lingerie, I hugged one, it was hawt. haha, everyone laughed and had a good time, especially the (dare I say) guys in drag. I think thats a good thing, while there are proportionally more visible forms of fuck-upedness among queer folks, I bet you could find just as much among straight people. From the straight people who are unassuming business suit wearing people in the day, but at night are very very naughty boys who need to be punished. *brandishes whip*

Or the 40 year old men who have a penchant for 20 year old (or even earlier, fucking freaks) and insist when being intimate being called "daddy." Thats far more terrifying and potentially damaging to both people, but you never see it.

How about that maybe-gay guy in the parade that from the front was holding hands with a girl and cheering and was covered in ropes which I found interesting at first, but when he passed us, you could see a FUCK of a lot of whip marks on his back. very unassuming, and rightous fun if you ask me.

Also, I saw the orthodox jewish gay float, which was playing jewish music and everyone was dancing, it was grand.

I think that there are plenty worse things to do than have a gay pride parade. Straight people and black people have affirmation all the time from simply the way they talk, to weddings, to the million man march, to kwanza (whoever the fuck celebrates that.) and valentines day. or just go to the movies, you wont see ANY queer romances. (theres one or two indie ones.)
But my affirmation just happens to be a parade in which a HUGE HAIRY gay guy with "Bear Pride" written all over him slapping a "BRIDE To Be" sticker on me.

I have to say, I was slightly annoyed when I saw the crossdressers, if only cuz I was like, "This? This is whose represnting me?" Fuck it, next year, I'm getting my own float. And this is why theres a parade to make visible the big ole spectrum of gender and orientation, so when joe average meets big gay al at a frat party, he wont immidiate think hes a freak and stab him. (like this fucker, Lil Macho who christine might have heard of, did once when I met him. Not to me, he relayed the story to me.) Even as little visibility as queer people are allowed, its a step in the right direction. It lets people know they exist are people, and folks'll get pissed if they hurt or maim them just as anyone would be for a straight person.

"I think that Gay Pride Parades do nothing but show that they are not "real people.""

Go to one and then say that.

the ONLY person who didnt have a great time and a sore throat by the end of that parade was this asshole on a bike going to everyone and saying: "Gay people are the reason that the twin towers came down. Any idiot can see that. Thank you." and then walking off to accost someone else. THATS damaging, THAT is annoying, THAT is hateful and is what the parade is all about discouraging. Also, two little kids pushed me out of my spot at the front, how about an excuse me, little brats...

I also saw a car with two old men and a plaque towards the back showing that they've been together 60 years and were married in canada. (im not sure if that means they were married for 60 years.)

thank you jep, that's awesome. I love the energy of the whole thing.
Btw I've been following the fate of same-sex marriage legislation and up to now it's been uncertain, as the Conservatives had a few aces up their sleeve to stop or at least delay its passage. But as of last thursday it's all but guaranteed to be passed very shortly. gOh Canada

Straight, white guy pride parade/million man march in Akron next week. Who's in???

Ok.

fyi gay marriage isn't legal in all of canada, it's only legal in one or two provinces. And not my redneck province, our premier states SPECIFICALLY that he would fight the law heatedly to make sure that Alberta doesn't get gay marriage.

I typed a long post in response to Baboinga's reply up there, but realized it was mostly useless ... picking apart various things and making points off of accidental fallacies in the post (I had particular fun with the cancer thing)... But anyway, it was all useless and would have led to just more and more posts about the same thing.

My general point is that homosexuality and heterosexuality are the same thing, in that they involve individuals being sexually attracted to individuals... and there is no difference. If it is not made a public affair, then nobody will ever be judged by that sexuality--at least, today. I think that we've made great strides in moving society towards an ideal of sameness between homosexuals and heterosexuals, because they're at root the same thing... And so I have contention with people who seek to actively separate the two... both the heterosexuals who paint unfair pictures of homosexuals, and then the homosexuals who paint unfair pictures of homosexuals. I then take issue with those homosexuals painting unfair pictures who then turn around and demand blindes and equality in society ... the very society that they are actively seeking to see them as something different from everybody else.

I also have a really big problem with who determines who or why somebody is part of a minority. Minorities tend to be more "who can cry the loudest" as opposed to people who are actually minorities and who are actually discriminated against.

omg you are all fighting like a bunch of fags



edit: you fucking fags disgussed me. i hate your limp wrists, your little fag lips.. and your faggy... tight... hard asses...

Liberals and Conservatives must be the biggest minorities around then!

What the fuck? This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever read.
I've been trying to be polite in my responses thus far, but really, I can't even respond to this legibly, because your entire post is bullshit. There is a huge amount of discrimination against gays throughout Canada and the US. If gays didn't have parades, it wouldn't be "Oh, I met a gay guy at work today, what a nice fella" it would be "I met one of those sick fucking AIDS bearers at work, I hope he doesn't talk to me by the watercooler."
It is necessary to have parades and such to show the population, as I said before. You can't just pretend that discrimination doesn't exist because you'd rather there not be a gay pride parade. You're an idiot. Seriously.


Gays can't even get married. Why? Because it's "against" christianity, seems to be the unspoken truth, and christianity is so engulfed in our politics and societal structure that for some reason people continue to support the idea of not letting gays marry or adopt children because of this archaic state. The church is supposed to be separated from the state, but it's not. ATHEISTS can get married, but gays can't? WTF is that? And in a lot of places (mostly rurall, where they have little exposure to gays) the majority opinion is that gays shouldn't be able to marry because marriage is some sacred thing that they think their religion invented, which is bullshit anyway. The union between two people came waaaaaaaaay before Catholics made it into what they did.
Whatever, the point is, that gays are actively discriminated against, and we have taken strides, sure, but we are FAR from having homosexuals being accepted as actively as heterosexuals. The idea of having a heterosexual pride parade is stupid BECAUSE every fucking day for straight people is a pride parade. People openly walk down the street hand in hand, on posters, in advertisements, commercials, books, magazines, everything is straight this and straight that. The cliche story is "boy meets girl" or "adam and eve" or whatever else you want to see it as. When is the last time you saw a mainstream movie that's main characters involve a gay or lesbian couple? I can barely think of any ever. Oh, Kissing Jessica Stein, but she turned out straight in the end. That's a GREAT message.

Anyway, the point is, straight people don't deserve a parade for being straight, because they don't live in a society that stifles their sexuality.

............................
Gay people have sex with the same gender, and they have their own culture. It's something to be proud of. As a society we should celebrate our similarities and our differences. It's like Quebec in Canada, some people think they should just fall in line and stop bitching about losing their culture and being so bitchy about everything. I don't mind that Quebec is like that, because they're the only province left that actively stays bilingual. I'd rather them have their own culture and the rest of Canada have our culture and each learn from each other, than force them to be more like the rest of Canada which way Anglo.

i think the bill on same-sex marriage (bill c-38 i think it's called...?) will be passed without much trouble, because the liberals are working with the ndp and the bloc quebecois, so things will be different soon. ralph klein and stephen harper will probably keep on bitching and moaning about it, but they're a pair idiots. (in fact, yesterday stephen harper was saying that if the bill passed it would lack legitimacy because the liberals are working with the bloc, who really have no interest in canada--just quebec. which is somewhat true, but right now they're still all canadians, and harper and the conservatives worked with the bloc to try to topple the government in april and may. i guess it's only lacks legitimacy if somebody other than stephen harper votes with the bloc!)

it's gonna be passed tonight

should provide a good story for night-time newscasters to go on and on about.

Although I agree that some of Mike's post was a bit... bullshit... I still don't thinkthat kinda stuff is necessary. I live in a very rural conservative area, I'm one of the very few democrats in my town, the rest are bleeding heart conservative republicans. This is not a very gay area. So what was my first experience with a gay person outside of the media? It was when i was 16 and got hired at a job where one of the managers happened to be gay. It wasn't hard to tell that he was gay, but he wasn't so flamboyant that he was annoying.

The point is that I didn't need a parade or any awareness activity to help me become aware and accepting of gays. All I needed was contact with a gay person like I would have with any straight person. THere's no way I'm gonna try to say this is the universal case, because there will always be those who will fear anything out of the norm. But I think a lot of people would benefit more from normal human contact with gays than a parade that they'll probably ignore or be annoyed with.

something nice like that happened in my last year at university. My roommate was a big homophobe, real smart aleck too. Then he befriended this guy steve, who i think he really looked up to. When he found out steve was gay, instead of tossing out his friendship he changed his opinions. He still jokes around about queers and i'm sure he would be damn uncomfortable with alot of gays, but he's softened up.

I'm pro pride because it's alot more fun than anything you hetro stiffs come up with.

Christians or catholics? two different things you can call yourself Christian but not catholic.

new thought:

id love to see one example of a union of a man and a woman that takes place before two believers in God did it.

if you are a Christian you believe in the creation of the world with Adam and Eve. If you're not a Christian looking at history there has always been a belief in a god, the oldest recorded documents showing the Jewish church who believed in a sacred union of a man and a woman referred to as a marriage. marriage was formed by the church like it or not. do i think people just hooked up with out being married back then, well yeah. was that refereed to as a holy union of two people? well no. as far as what we call marriage today, it came down right through the Jewish church. it is a tradition from the church that is believed to be a commandment of God. so if you don't believe in God then why would you wanna follow his commandments? you are letting yourself be manipulated by the church if you feel it is that important to be married.

Is it a matter of expectance by the rest of the world? You want everyone to validate your feelings for your girl/boy as being equal to there feelings for there wife/husband? Thats fine but marriage is something that comes from the church. The problem here is that the state is interfering with the church. The church, not the state is what kept records and preformed marriages. Looking at the history of the world it is fairly a new thing that the state is the one in charge of marriages. For example i have a family tree dated back to the 1700s starting 3 generations into Germany directly to me that my family has been working on for a while. the records of marriage are not found in the German governments vaults, but in the Lutheran church's books. Marriage is the creation of the church from a atheists point of view, and a creation of God from a Christians point of view. If you are gay and consider yourself Christian and feel you should be married then this would be a completely different argument. As far as Atheists being married goes, that also came around after marriage was taken over by the state in the church they would not preform marriages unless the two people would at least fake there beliefs. By todays standards of what marriage is, fuck it let gay people get married no one even takes marriage seriously for what it was intended.


edit: not to play my best friends are gay card.. but my best friend at work is gay, i have nothing but respect for him and love hanging out with him. even was about to go to the gay pride parade with him.

marriage, before it was called that, was an advent of sultans and prussian princes who kept a menagerie of women that wouldnt sleep with anyone else, as a matter of protection against disease that spread easily through the hetero and homo sexual peasents as there was no marriage. (fun factoid: the rulers also HIRED castrato men to guard their palaces. No sex, but room, board, and respect (maybe) maybe that was a big deal back then.)

Marriage was made out of nessesity before public sex education was invented, out of fear, not for love or anything. And with the spread of aids through the homosexual community, that kind of protection is just what homosexual people need right now.

Its not strictly christian, it wasnt made by believers or god, its not only between a man and a woman, its now a bond of love, and you can better fucking believe there was horny have mores before there was the advent of god, morals, and whats in the good book.

hex, that thin line between church and state is ALSO a new thing, so just because there arent records doesnt mean thats how it has ALWAYS been.

in conclusion, Marriage was never an advent of god or the church, just of horny (hetero and homo sexual) males who were in charge and didnt want their royal dick to fall off with the syph.

omg your talking out of your ass jep. tell you what you show me the first doccumented marriage you can find that wasnt done by the spiritual leaders of the time and ill show you where you made something up or didnt do enough research.

"Marriage was made out of nessesity before public sex education was invented, out of fear, not for love or anything. And with the spread of aids through the homosexual community, that kind of protection is just what homosexual people need right now. "

since aids didnt come around untill after the vaccine for polio was developed are you implying marraige came after that? furthermore what are you even basing thats what marriage was intended for? you are just saying what seems to make sense in your head nothing that you know to be fact.

omg, I'm not playing this game anymore hex, you provide evidence that marriage was created by the almighty, and I'll gladly go scour the earth for evidence that your a stupid prick who should learn to listen to logic and not the priest that touched you when you were little... i mean, evidence that proves my point.

::has a migraine::

::and is going to go play some Xenosaga::