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Thoughts on Pride from an old lesbian. (TLDR: Pride was a riot, not a marketing opportunity!)
I came out in the 80s in Florida. The AIDS crisis was at its peak, and I lived in an incredibly conservative area. We didn’t have a Center on Halsted with all the programs now available to newly out folks, we had a gay bar on a back road where folks gathered to create community. And that bar was where we felt safe being ourselves. We loved it and each other, sometimes more than our own families loved us. I am sure there were issues between law enforcement and the establishment and their queer clientele since that was the norm then. Still, aside from everyone knowing there was always a cop car across the street waiting for someone too drunk to drive, the patrons were largely left alone by law enforcement. That wasn’t the case a couple of decades earlier at another bar where folks found community, The Stonewall Inn in New York City’s Greenwich Village was the site of a riot in 1969 set off by police harassment and repeated raids. This was all in spite of the owners paying the bribes that were a regular part of doing business for gay bars across the country at the time. From June 28 to July 3, patrons of the bar fought back against the constant harassment and arrests that had become commonplace, giving birth to our modern gay rights movement with the first Pride Marches taking place in Chicago and Los Angeles on the anniversary of the riot.
What we now celebrate with rainbow t-shirts purchased at Target at its core is a reminder of where we’ve come from and what it took to get here: a community coming together to protect each other and demand being treated with dignity. I remember my first Pride March in St. Petersburg, Florida in 1987 or 88. I was nervous about whom I might see (or who might see me), but that anxiety quickly melted away as I got closer to the starting point for the march and saw the amazing array of humanity, the colorful signs, and banners demanding action to end the AIDS crisis, and secure our basic human rights - in short, I found my people. I finally understood there was a place and community for me and I will never forget that feeling of finally belonging. That march, like so many at the time, was a true march. We were taking to the streets, celebrating the beauty and diversity of our community, demanding our place at the table, and building collective power to create change.
Here in Chicago, our march has become a parade, which in itself is not a bad thing. Over the years, marching groups like Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, school Gay-Straight Alliances, synchronized stroller brigades, drag performers, marching bands, and so many other creative expressions of our community’s many facets have brought joy and hope to so many. I’m fine with Pride becoming a celebration by and for our community. Still, over the years, we’ve moved further and further from that tradition while also constantly pushing back against attempts to completely ignore the origins of Pride by trying to force the parade out of the North Halsted community and commercialize the parade. I can’t remember a year when there hasn’t been an attempt to shorten the parade, limit who can participate, or totally move it downtown.
When I first started participating in Chicago’s Pride parade, floats were mostly used by organizations working in our community, local small businesses like bars and restaurants, and the occasional rare political ally in a convertible. Over the years, the parade got really long and folks complained there were too many politicians, so first they were limited to shared floats or cars, then no floats, then no cars. This year, elected officials, including our record number of openly LGBTQ electeds, are only permitted to walk in a single entry together without banners and limited to a single person to walk with them, forcing someone like me to choose between my spouse and each of my three kids. And while the overall number of entries has been reduced, corporate entries paying for floats are centered and granted the most leeway.
This year has brought the most drastic changes to the parade’s composition, causing consternation among community members frustrated by the lack of community engagement in decision-making and the disconnect between the changes and the problems they purport to solve. The Mayor’s LGBTQ Advisory Council has shared significant concerns about the process. Click here to learn more. Just as with other marginalized communities, relationships between LGBTQ people and law enforcement agencies are complex, with mistrust built up over decades of harm, so there’s an organic unwillingness to simply accept the public safety and staffing concerns raised by the Chicago Police Department, especially in the absence of an actual dialogue with stakeholder organizations.
There is no denying that post-parade revelry has been challenging to the neighborhood. But that’s not unlike the impact of a Cubs playoff victory or a concert after-party in a neighborhood known for its hospitality and nightlife. So many of the changes pointed to as responses to safety challenges post-parade are hard to reconcile with the problem they purport to address. Condensing the parade crowds into a shorter route doesn’t seem to be a recipe for a more docile crowd. An additional outcome of that condensed route means that people with disabilities attempting to get to the parade have severely limited options to get to and from the parade route.
Had there been a robust community discussion about concerns and potential solutions, perhaps ideas could have been found to help disperse the crowds post-parade in a way that could also address safety concerns. For example, taking a page from the Rogers Park community’s establishment of neighborhood-based celebrations with Pride North on Glenwood and Family Pride on Jarvis Square and establishing other similar events around the city could be a creative way to encourage folks to spread out the celebrations and minimize the crowds on Halsted.
As this controversy has played out, the specific details of the changes have been a bit of a moving target, with the total number of entries shifting as well as shifting limits on how many participants can march with entries, which has only added to folks’ frustration and confusion. At one point, all student-led school-based groups were excluded, which might have been the most egregious offense. If we’re not creating space for our youth to be their authentic selves, we shouldn’t pretend this is about our rights and liberation. The parade organizer’s website doesn’t include a final list of entries or rules to confirm, but I’ve been told that student groups, like elected officials, will be grouped together with a limit of a total of 100 marchers in each group.
Ultimately, I’ve been frustrated for a while by the evolution of our parade from a celebration of the strength and resilience of our community in the face of police abuse to a commercialized and packaged experience not necessarily aimed at our community but at spectators spending money, so in some ways, these changes really only represent the final straw. Somehow, having these constrictions imposed by a progressive administration at a time when our community is under such hateful attack worldwide hits differently this time, adding to my concern that we’ve strayed too far from our reason for marching in the first place.
When I shared my initial concerns on my Facebook page recently, I was a little surprised by the vociferous reaction of community members who shared my frustrations, some asking me to organize an alternative march. I honestly don’t know that that is the answer either. It might be, and maybe that’s something to consider moving forward for folks who wish to remain more directly connected to the actions that won our rights that are under such vicious attack today.
But I’m still struggling with what to do about this year’s parade. I want the amazing visual of our community’s broad diversity and strength in the face of these attacks, of course. I want some young newly out lesbian to see that she’s not alone. But I also resent the way CPD and the Mayor’s office have made shallow excuses to justify the gutting of the heart of our community’s celebration and want to find my own way to mark the occasion. If I had more time to plan, I might find a smaller city to celebrate in, where the event hasn’t been overtaken by commercial interests but that’s not in the cards this year. Also, the parade’s Grand Marshalls include some of my most beloved friends in our community, particularly Precious Brady-Davis and her husband Miles Brady-Davis and Arthur Johnston and Pepe Peña of Sidetrack. Undermining their celebration is not my wish, so I’m hoping to find a way to acknowledge our city’s effort to recognize Pride even if it’s not what I’d like, while also recognizing a desire for a more meaningful observation of Pride given the intensity of the threats against our community.
I’m thinking of going down to the parade kick-off to thank our LGBTQ electeds and allies for standing strong against hatred and bigotry, and then spend my day visiting and spending money in LGBTQ-owned small businesses as I make my way back north to Rogers Park and the Jarvis Square Family Pride festivities where I plan to share some stories of our history from Women and Children First books with the families in attendance while providing information about The Legacy Project, an amazing resource in our community seeking to ensure our history is not forgotten.
I’m trying to put together as many places between Lakeview and Rogers Park to try to make a stop in, and would love your suggestions which I’ll publish later this week in a newsletter and social posts. Let me know your favorite LGBTQ-owned business, north side or not, tell me what you love most about supporting the business too and we’ll share some of the responses as we close out Pride Month.
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