Pride festivities are now over 30 years old, so theoretically they’ve reached adult status.
Too bad that isn’t true of the straight world, which still can’t wrap its head around the complexities of queer life.
The cold shoulder Mayor Rob Ford’s giving Pride this year makes the point, but city council isn’t the only place where queer-dissing is tolerated.
Noticed how everyone’s not loving that rainbow flag? We may think of Toronto as worldly and cosmopolitan, but the Dufferin-Peel Catholic School Board doesn’t want to see that multicoloured symbol in its so-called places of learning. And many Catholic schools are still having conniptions over a term like “gay-straight alliance.”
The stats aren’t friendly either. Queer-bashing happens regularly, and the suicide rate among gay teens is higher than in almost every other demographic.
And while kids have it tough, so do aging gay couples in retirement homes.
But beyond these obvious considerations I’ll make a more daring assumption. Admit it. About half of you LGBT readers (yes, I mean NOW readers) are either not out at work and/or still dread the predictable interrogations you face at family dinners.
All across the spectrum, from those who experience the devastation of bullying and other toxic manifestations of homophobia to those of us who are lucky enough to harbour relatively trivial concerns – like, where does a well-endowed butch dyke shop anyway? – the world is not always a welcoming place.
But there’s no question, to paraphrase the It Gets Better campaign, that things are better than they were.
And a lot of that has to do with Pride. The activists who helped found Pride from the roots of gay liberation worry that festival organizers have lost sight of the event’s history of resistance. But as it’s turned out, the festival continues to remind those who want to shut us out that our numbers are huge, our vision is strong and we can attract nearly a million people – straight, queer and beyond – for a mammoth party that generates not one single violent incident.
Better still, the festival gives those kids from small towns and everyone else who feels like an outsider a safe zone to be themselves.
Pride Day presents a magnificent spectacle demonstrating the power – financial and political – of Toronto’s queer community and celebrating sexual diversity and inclusiveness.
Come on down and hang out alongside a vibrant community that values freedom and is passionate about our city.
And you can wear whatever you want.
susanc@nowtoronto.com
