Hundreds of thousands of people marched, danced and waved rainbow banners through San Francisco for the most jubilant Pride festival in living memory on Sunday, capping a weekend of celebrations around the world.
Music bands led a parade of floats for the city’s 45th annual Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride festival, a party swelled by straight allies, cheerleaders, tourists and exhibitionists, all basking in the glow of sunshine and the US legalisation of same-sex marriage.
Around a million people were expected in San Francisco, a crucible of the gay rights movement, following equally ebullient Pride marches in London, New York, Dublin, Paris and other cities.
The US supreme court’s landmark ruling on Friday that same-sex marriages were constitutional cast a mainstream, feel-good aura over a parade which at times in the past has felt edgy and defiant.
“It feels more normalised – in a good way,” said Eugene Chisenko, 31, as he and his husband, Chuck Goldhaber, 27, watched a cacophony of revellers, including families with children, whoop their way down Market Street.
“It feels less like we’re insisting on being normal and that we just are normal. It feels less about sex.”
Goldhaber, wearing rainbow suspenders over a bare chest, agreed. “It feels that the [straight] allies are here more to celebrate and less for the spectacle,” he said.
Nalasa Cutler, 30, attending her first San Francisco Pride, said the city felt united. “Everyone is being so festive and happy. I was expecting it to be a bit more crazy; see a lot more nudity.”
Organisers said the festival’s theme, Equality Without Exception, was timely because the LGBT rights movement would now focus on fighting discrimination in housing and employment.
“Queers and allies alike need to vote and stay vigilant,” Gary Virginia, the head of SF Pride, said in a statement.
Overall attendance for Pride events around the world was expected in the millions. In New York, revellers and well-wishers turned Fifth Avenue into a colourful, boisterous, open-air party.
“What do we want?” they chanted, a familiar refrain.
“Marriage equality!”
Then the twist: “When did we get it?”
“Friday!”
http://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2015/jun/29/gay-pride-parades-around-the-world-video
New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, presided at a same-sex wedding ceremony in front of the Stonewall Inn, where in 1969 gay patrons resisted a police raid, launching the modern gay rights movement. Mayor Bill de Blasio wore a rainbow tie and his wife, Chirlane McCray, and their son, Dante, held rainbow flags.
David Studinski, march director for New York City Pride, tweeted that this was the most historic Pride march since the first.
Dublin hosted Ireland’s biggest ever gay rights parade on Saturday. While covering London’s Pride parade CNN earned widespread mockery for an “exclusive report” which mistook a flag displaying sex toy symbols for that of the Islamic State.
Chicago, Seattle, Paris, St Louis and Manila, among other cities, hosted rallies of varying size on Sunday. At some marches, trouble flared.
In Chicago, during the largest Pride celebration in the city’s history, a protest related to another progressive cause briefly erupted on the parade route. Two hours into the celebration, activisits chanting “Black lives matter!” staged a “die in”, briefly holding up the march.
According to protest organisers, approximately 60 people stopped the parade for 15 minutes on Halsted and Addison in the Boystown neighbourhood.
“We went out today to remind people that Pride comes out of queer and trans people of colour like Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P Johnson,” Page May, an organiser of a protest that was dubbed #BlackOutPride, told the Guardian.
“We were here to talk about the challenges we are still facing as a community,” May said.
Chicago police could not immediately confirm how many arrests had been made, but according to police scanners 15 to 20 officers were dispatched to the scene.
In Istanbul, meanwhile, for reasons not immediately clear, police used water cannons to clear a rally.
In San Francisco on Sunday, though, the mood remained celebratory. Dykes on Bikes, a lesbian group, kicked off the parade, followed by dancers, cheerleaders, fire trucks, floats and music bands. The march wound its way to city hall, which was ringed by more than 20 stages and venues and nearly 300 exhibitors.
Police said a bystander was shot in the arm on Saturday after several men got into an argument unrelated to the celebration. The injury was said to be non-life threatening.
Earlier on Saturday, dozens gathered on a slope of Twin Peaks, a nearby mountain, to assemble a pink triangle several hundred feet wide, which was visible for miles. The symbol the Nazis used to identify gay prisoners in concentration camps, the triangle was intended to be a reminder of hatred and intolerance. Mayor Edwin Lee and other dignitaries attended the ceremony.
Parade participants on Sunday included Nancy Pelosi, the House of Representatives minority leader, California lieutenant governor Gavin Newsom, who as mayor in 2004 allowed the first gay marriage ceremonies at city hall, and Laverne Cox, the star of Netflix’s Orange is the New Black, who unveiled her wax figure at Madame Tussauds.
Jim Obergefell, the lead plaintiff in the supreme court case, also attended.
Speakers include Alicia Garza, who started the #BlackLivesMatter movement, and Kate Kendall, leader of the National Center for Lesbian Rights. Rick Welts, the president of the Golden State Warriors, the Oakland-based NBA champions, served as celebrity grand marshal.
Philip Cravens, 62, a retired hotel worker, marched wearing only factor 100 sun cream.
“It’s one of the only days in the year you can legally be naked,” he said. Why did he want to be naked? “It’s liberating and it’s free. And I like to be the centre of attention.”
A man running a “free hugs” stall near city hall embraced a perpetually replenishing line of people.
“Business is booming,” he beamed.
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