After two weeks of controversy, Pride Toronto has done away with a much-criticized new policy that would have required all Pride Parade participants to have their signs pre-approved by an ethics committee.
The reversal was confirmed Tuesday by Pride exec director, Tracey Sandilands, following a board of directors meeting Monday evening, called to address the community backlash.
Opponents of the short-lived decree, organized into the Facebook group, “Don’t Sanitize Pride: Free expression must prevail,” accused parade organizers of invoking censorship measures. In just two weeks, the group grew to almost 1,600 members.
The dustup started with a March 10 press release stating that, “Pride Toronto will now require all Pride Parade and Dyke March participants ensure their messages support the theme of the year’s festival.” Any groups that didn’t comply could be booted from the parade.
Pride’s Sandilands told NOW last week that the measure was simply intended to prevent hateful messages from entering the parade. “In previous years it was left to the parade volunteers to determine if messaging was suitable or not,” Sandilands explained. “We’re trying to be a little bit more transparent and a little bit more consistent and objective this year.
But Facebook group founder, Rick Telfer, called the move, “outrageous and highly bureaucratic,” and earlier deemed it a policy “very much intended to wield some kind of control over participants.”
One prevailing theory on the Facebook page suggested the placard monitoring was a move to avoid a repeat of last year’s conflict over Queers Against Israeli Apartheid (QuAIA) marching in the parade. Groups supporting the Israeli government, widely condemned the group’s inclusion.
But Sandilands told NOW on Monday that the measure was never about shutting out Queers Against Israeli Apartheid. The policy tweak, Sandilands said, was “not aimed at any one particular group or any one particular message,” and she indicated that she welcomed the group’s participation once again this year.
QuAIA member Natalie Kouri-Towe confirms the group’s intention to be back in the parade on July 4. “I think Pride Toronto has responded to the strong voice coming from the Queer community,” she says.
And she herself doubts Pride’s attempted measure was aimed at her group. “To be honest,” says Kouri-Towe, “I don’t think this policy would have prevented us from participating in Pride, and I don’t really think that was the intention of Pride at all.”
Still, she says the move would have changed the social contract between Pride and the LGBT community by creating an issue over “who gets to participate in Pride and who gets to police the contents of Pride.”
Telfer is certainly pleased. “Pride listened to the community and they obviously heard the message loud and clear.” But he is still critical of what he calls Pride’s increasing prioritization of corporate partnerships over community engagement. This means “Don’t Sanitize Pride” will continue as an online forum, despite the signage victory.
As for Pride, spokesperson Genevieve D’Iorio, explaining the about-face, says Pride Toronto “is not a censoring body, nor does it want to be.” Pride, she says, “began from a political movement, and as such our community is rooted in that identity.”[rssbreak]
