Last year, NYC Pride was the biggest it’s ever been in celebration of WorldPride | Stonewall 50 — but it was also the most corporate the event has ever been. With companies covered in rainbows and toting silly logos like Chipotle’s “¿Homo Estás?,” Pride can sometimes feel less of remembrance and more of a celebration.
If you’re someone who wants an event that pays tribute to the queer community (especially Black trans women) that came before us and started this movement — for safety, for acceptance, for visibility — there’s the Queer Liberation March, a separate event happening this Sunday.
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The march was started last year by Reclaim Pride Coalition, “a growing global coalition of over 100 organizations and thousands of individuals who are reclaiming the NYC Pride March so it better represents the TBLGQIATSNBGNC community + allies.” After the organizers at Reclaim Pride Coalition decided Pride had been too commercialized and had diverged from its original intentions, they split from the Heritage of Pride event in favor of something smaller and more radical. The plan was to mimic the feel and spirit of the original Pride March, originally called the Christopher Street Liberation March, that began in 1970 to mark the anniversaries of the Stonewall Uprising. The march even followed the original route, moving from Greenwich Village up to Central Park, and allowed no corporations, cops, or major funding.
This year, the Queer Liberation March is happening in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement and starts at 1 p.m. on June 28th at Foley Square in Manhattan. While the official route has not been announced, the flyer states the group will march to “Queer history landmarks” and end in Greenwich Village.
At GO, we recognize that we are still in the middle of a pandemic and encourage anyone who wants to participate but stay home to consider taking part in many of the virtual Pride events this year! But as this is happening on Pride Sunday, we feel it’s important and necessary enough to share. No matter how you remember Pride, the community sees you, thanks you, and honors you.
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