Shame on Pride

[muckefuck]

Something amazing happened at the Chicago Pride Parade this year: in the middle of a corporate-sponsored four-hour orgy of assimilationism, an actual challenge to the status quo broke out. You can read about the aims of the protesters here if you want. And then, just for funsies, you can compare this to the coverage in the local gay press. I first learned about this from a couple of a friends of friends who sounded put out less by the inconvenience (it's an overlong event full of delays anyway) than by the effrontery. Like, how dare those black folk turn on the very people who are on their side. I honestly do not understand where this notion comes from that gay White men in particular are such Civil Rights heroes.

It's hard not to view Pride as something that's outlived its usefulness. I remember it as the party which energised us to combat discrimination the rest of the year, but nowadays it feels more like a party for its own sake--a "rainbow St Patrick's Day", to quote one critic, and I don't go to that tedious drunken revel either. Back in the day, it was inspiring to see businesses represented, because for the most part these were delegations from grassroots employee organisations formed to pressure management for recognition and fair treatment and whose permission to exist was tacit at best. Now it's just whoever wanted to get some sun while advertising the company's products or services.

What are the alternatives? Despite having joined it years ago, I managed to forget that the Dyke March is still going on. On the one hand, it's much more in line with what I feel like a march should be. And while I'm tempted to join in, part of me would feel like exactly the sort of tourist the event was organised to get away from. But sometimes I think being a tourist might, in fact, be the best thing we could do. Many of the gay men I know can afford to fly to exotic destinations for their holidays. What if they timed them to coincide with local pride celebrations which don't have the full support of the authorities (like this year's Istanbul Pride)? Even if they find it too risky to participate directly, just their presence in the crowd would constrain the efforts of any government worried about its profile abroad.

Comments

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

It's hard not to view Pride as something that's outlived its usefulness.

I'm pretty sure I quoted Andrew Sullivan wondering, "What did gay men have in common besides oppression?" in my last entry.

It's a legitimate question.

In the meantime, Pride becomes a St. Patrick's Parade or a Puerto Rican Day festival, a legitimate celebration of shared heritage.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

Isn't that true for any minority identity? We're in this boat together because that's where the dominant society herded us for one reason or another, not because we necessarily have any sort of natural affinity. (And, yes, I think this is true of "ethnic" identity as well.)

On the other hand, Sullivan's an assimilationist and always has been. I worry that one of the immediate effects of a Republican surrender in the anti-gay Kulturkampf will be affluent gay men joining the party en masse because their concern for protecting their privilege trumps their concern for other people's welfare and always has.

I don't feel like we have a "shared heritage". The writers who are prized by the older generation don't speak to me for the most part, and the younger generation have only the dimmest understanding of what the AIDS crisis was like or a society where being out was as rare as being born with three breasts.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure whether that's true of every minority identity. As a Jew, for example, I feel connected to other Jews by the great lingua franca of sarcasm. Oh, I'm sure there are Jews who aren't sarcastic -- I just haven't met them.

My former brother-in-law is a gay Republican. I'm not sure whether that affiliation has anything to do with protecting "privilege" -- a word I suspect he wouldn't understand in the sense you're using it here. I think he just doesn't like change.