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News > World

US LGBTQ Pride Parades Protest Police Brutality

  • Banner at New York City Pride, June 25, 2017

    Banner at New York City Pride, June 25, 2017 | Photo: No Justice No Pride

Published 25 June 2017
Opinion

"There is no pride in policing, no pride in pipelines, no pride in prisons, no pride in deportations," said a Black Lives Matter-NYC statement.

LGBTQ Pride parades and related events held Sunday across the U.S. marked the 48th year since the Stonewall Rebellion of 1969. But this year wasn't just about celebrating. It was also about protesting and showing resistance against systematic atrocities and addressing some of the stagnant issues plaguing marginalized communities, like police brutality.

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In the face of exacerbating police violence, the Gay Officers Action League faced criticism for taking part in the Pride parade in New York City. Protesters forming a human chain at the historic Stonewall Inn were arrested for attempting to block the march route.

"GOAL-NY should be addressing ... local public safety issues within the NYPD Black and Brown communities across all precincts in NYC especially among those who identify as LGBTIQ, starting with supporting the Right to Know Act," Black Lives Matter-NYC said in a statement.

Throughout Pride Month, from Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Phoenix, Colombus and Minneapolis, LGBT Pride events embraced a larger unified resistance movement to show their solidarity with other movements and fightback against Trump-era atrocities.

Black Lives Matter — founded and led in part by LGBTQ people — stood against police brutality on a day of LGBTQ rights celebrations. The group demanded the "removal of uniformed police and PRIDE-detailed vehicles from the NYC Pride parade."

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"We can no longer support spaces where a force that can kill us, with impunity, is allowed to patrol a day of celebration. We are here for Pride, but not like this," the statement read in part.

BLM reaffirmed their commitment to support the most marginalized groups, "to transform the culture and events of Pride to center the lives of those most marginalized — queer and transgender Black communities." And in an effort to honor the ancestors and elders who showed their unabashed support for radical existence.

"It was Marsha P. Johnson, a Black transwoman, who was one of the first to resist the attacks on Stonewall Inn by the NYPD. It was Miss Major, a Black transwoman, who continues to stand with the current queer and transgender organizers as we push back against a system that deems us disposable both in life and death."

"There is no pride in policing, no pride in pipelines, no pride in prisons, no pride in deportations. No pride for some, without liberation for all," BLM added.

Within the LGBTQ community, Pride marches have faced criticisms for lacking diversity and being white-centric.

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"Queer and trans folks are fed up with the LGB establishment's complicity in a system of oppression and we're not gonna take it anymore," read the Facebook page of "No Justice No Pride," a D.C.-based collective that seeks to end police oppression within the LGBTQ community.

In San Francisco, the large “resistance contingent” leading its Pride parade included groups that represent women, immigrants, African-Americans and others along with LGBTQ people.

After the recent acquittal of the police officer who shot Philando Castille's to death, demonstrators staged a die-in and demanded police officers be removed from the Twin Cities Pride Parade in Minneapolis, leading to some arrests.

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