We’ve adopted that word – Pride.
The problem is, we don’t show it.
The reason that we hold pride events is because we don’t have it. One of the more notable events of the weekend – the parade through the centre of London – was hijacked by people eager to shame the LGBT community; or more directly the event organisers. And those hijackers, those shamers?
They came from within the LGBT community.
They struck out into the parade route immediately in front of the parade, dressed in black, carrying a pride coffin and banners bemoaning RIP PRIDE.
They claim that the LGBT community have forgotten why prides exist – that the message has been lost. Indeed – and you will spare me the irony here – it is an argument I myself have made. But their argument is two-fold: firstly that we’ve given up the fight; and secondly that we’ve sold out, capitulated. Capitalated, if you will.
Of the first, they say that pride parades do not do enough to protest, to lobby, to challenge and to represent. It’s far too much about pissy queens spending all of their time decorating their costume and not thinking about their history, their future. They say we have all too readily accepted that we have won – that we are forgetting the fights that have been fought in favour of complacency and a party.
Their argument is that we feel we have nothing left to fight for and they argue that we do – that despite (now) legal equality, there is still a social stigma, an invisible inequality, where people still get turned down jobs on the basis of a lisp or a limp wrist. For their argument they evidence that along the parade route there were a couple of minor counter-protests; half a dozen or so Christians or Muslims holding a placard with some scripture quoted on it. They ignore the scores of Christians and Muslims in the parade – whether an organised religious grouping or as an otherwise unidentifiable member of another group; whether gay themselves or an ‘ally’ (it’s the latest thing to be) – they ignore the hundreds, thousands, millions of religious members who didn’t turn out to protest, who don’t care or may even be an armchair ally.
They concentrate on the few; and – until someone does develop the thought police – you are not going to change those minds in the same way as you can’t change the mind of the yob who thinks it’s socially acceptable to shout at his girlfriend in the street.
Their other argument is that Pride is no longer about the LGBT community. I have to say I understand their point. I stood and watched quite a considerable amount of the parade. Too much of the parade. So much of the parade that I couldn’t get in to the celebrations in Trafalgar Square by the time we left; that Old Compton Street was almost immovable with bodies. I left after “Section D” had gone by. There was still “Section E” and “Section F” to go. In all, there were well in excess of 250 groups. Everyone needed to have their representation. It was dull, it was boring and it was long. As I say, we left after D. This was at around 4:30/5:00pm, the parade started at 1:00pm. One can only presume that it carried on until 6pm.
But the argument of the protesters was that the parade had sold out. Yes, there were political paraders, however there were an awful lot that weren’t. There were a lot of corporations – this was the major gripe of the mourners – however there were other associations or groups. And the protesters argument is that the parade was not an attempt to advance a single message, but for each of these organisations to advance their own, individual messages.
The banks were there to advance their own Corporate and Social Responsibility policies – to make it clear that they are a bank you would want to bank with or to work for. The social groups – the sports and the singers – were there on their own private recruitment drives. Even UKIP (who managed also to piggyback themselves in, despite having been denied an official place) had their own private message in the same way as the LGBTories: despite rumours to the contrary, you can be both.
Now, the LGBT community has long had strong links to the unions – indeed, it’s in the very ethos of the unions to protect their minority or oppressed workers by mobilising the other masses on the grounds of “it could happen to use – you could be the minority – who would you turned to then?” It therefore works by natural expansion that there is also a connection with political parties – at the very least Labour and the Liberals. But the banks? The supermarkets? Surely that’s just pure, plain, blatant advertising?
Well … perhaps. But don’t forget that this is a capitalist society. These parades are not free – they cost money. No longer can it be done out of Tim and Jenny putting in a few hours a couple of nights a week to paint a banner; no longer can we rely on a few charitable donations without having to give back.
The bigger these events get, the more they cost. There is a cost for the barriers along the parade, for the security, for the street cleaning; there is the cost of the big stage, the lighting, sound and electricity; for the portable toilets. You’d hope that the installation of a bar would pay for itself but a lot of the rest of the infrastructure behind the parade (often invisible) costs. And if your parade is tiny you may be able to convince the local loo company to let you have half a dozen for the day on the basis that everyone will see the sign on the front and hire their toilets from LocalLoos in future; but when it gets to four trailer loads of toilets? A few thousand metres of barrier? 100 security personnel for a day? It costs.
Almost every Pride has gone through it's "commercial moment" - London, Brighton, Manchester, even Nottingham Pride realised it had to change its whole structure if it were to be economical.
And where once they merely wanted their name displaying on a couple of signs at the entrances or a discrete mention of “supported by BiggerBank” on the tannoy announcements; the more they give, the more they want. Hence why the first group in the parade after the flag bearers was Barclays –
Barclays who as well as their enormous branded bus, who as well as by far more dancers than the social dancing groups put together, had very prominent advertising along the route, in all the publications, even on the sides of buses in the week leading up to Pride. Don’t worry though: Lloyds, Santander, HSBC and Halifax all had their own bus.
So, is it killing Pride? Is it capitulating?
Is it merely Pride developing into modern society?
Is it actually a very, very good thing – encouraging social or ethical change within big corporations; getting them on board with the LGBT agenda in return for a little publicity?
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