Are "Gay Pride Parades" damaging to the community (enemies, controversial)
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That's crap. It's OK to be proud if you are gay but it is not OK to be proud you are straight. Talk about the ultimate double standard. Now, the gays don't think us heteros have ANYTHING to be proud of and we should not be proud, I reject that idea totally. They just can't get beyond themselves. The thinking must be that I can only be proud in comparison to THEM. Not only does the gay agenda tell us what we must think about them it attempts to tell me what I am allowed to think and to feel about myself. You know, I really don't care what the gays think or do in their lives but I do get pretty hot when they tell me what to think. I think any group hetero or gay or whatever that defines it's self mainly in terms of sex is pathetic.
Almost every city has all kinds of festivals. Our city alone has German festivals, Greek festivals, Russian festivals, Irish festivals, Mexican festivals, a festival for the Indy 500, the Black Expo, state fair, and almost every church I know has some kind of festival throughout the year. You know why those festivals rarely make the news and the pride festival does? Because it gets people like you worked up into a tizzy which the news stations love. Otherwise, there is no difference at all. Many of those festivals have their own parade, too.
I'm socially "libertarian" rather than chic-"liberal"; my sexual inerests are nobody's business but my own and those whom I share them with by mutual consent, burt i am a very strong economic conservative -- one who views both the growth of bureaucratic states and Orwellian-style management under business-state "co-operation" with equal suspicion. In other words, i believe. first and foremost in the protection of the smallest minority- the competent, responsble individual.
And the painful facr is that the most militant minority of the LGBT community views access to, and manipulation of the state's legal monopooly on power to pursue their particular agenda at the expense of everybody else, but particularly, the taxpayer, as their principal, and ultimate goal.
I have several friends who are gay, will discuss it in a respectful context with straight people they know and understand; they hold a position somewhere betwenn "the closet" and full "outing" -- often because they run businesses which are senssitive to the social undercurrents of a small community. This in contrast to the shamless, simplistic and self-proclaimed "militiants" who used to sink to silly tactics such as "gay blue jeans day" (Don't wear jeans an you might be xgharacterized as a homophobe) which were regrettably common twenty or thirty years ago.
People who wear their pet issue -- any pet issue -- like a badge, and go looking for controversy really shouldn't be so suprised when something ugly happens because someone turned over a rock in the wrong swamp.
Last edited by 2nd trick op; 06-12-2013 at 09:55 AM..
I've only seen a gay pride parade on TV, but I view it the same way as I do a person covered top to bottom with gawdy tatoos, or extreme body piercings, or a person having purple, green, yellow and red hair, or a mohawk cut spiked up with baubles on the end, or someone wearing hoop earrings that are about 3 inches around with the ear-lobe around it, or a woman who has more than half her private anatomy hanging out and looks like she's going to break a leg trying to walk in 6 inch stillettos... you get the message, whatever.
I'd say that they are portraying their message of the shock factor or "LOOK at me, LOOK at me"
Personally, I find them amusing, sometimes distasteful to view, but as long they aren't affecting me in any way, I see nothing wrong with it.
I'd actually love to see a gay pride parade in person. I think it would be a hoot!
Now to answer the question whether it affects the gay community? I think the happy, gay couples, who are commited to their partner and just want to live their lives and be able to love the one they love, then perhaps it gives gays a bad rap, but I'd say that it happens mostly with people who don't "get" that there is a difference between the gays who flaunt and flounce, and the gays who just want to live a normal life like most other people. (whatever normal is lol)
Now to answer the question whether it affects the gay community? I think the happy, gay couples, who are commited to their partner and just want to live their lives and be able to love the one they love, then perhaps it gives gays a bad rap, but I'd say that it happens mostly with people who don't "get" that there is a difference between the gays who flaunt and flounce, and the gays who just want to live a normal life like most other people. (whatever normal is lol)
...haha...yes sometimes the people who flaunt and flounce on Gay Pride Day are pretty normal otherwise....
...but you ask a good question, and maybe a disininction here....are gay pride parades and festivals (sometimes theres a big festival associaed with the parade...I think Milwaukee does this...) good for the gay community...for gays and lesbians among themselves, vs "are they good PR for the gay community?", which is what the OP was asking.
From my experience the Ohio, or Columbus, parade was good as it was a place to be out, not hiding. And it was a place where a community sort of recognized itself...not sure Im putting this right...were you got to meet gay folk from all over the state. It was an opportunity to do community organizing and activism. Sort of a positive experience.
Which could be a bigger reason the Right dislikes these events. Not the sexual aspect, but that its a positive, open thing, and a community-building thing.
Perhapst the difference for being or feeling more empowered vs being isolated and in hiding, dis-empowered.
Tell me!!! Can I have a "Straight pride" parade? Not on your life could I. It would be considered anti gay and not allowed.
When people start accepting people as they are, labels would no longer have special meaning.
Once women got the vote, they stopped protesting about getting the vote.
When gays are accepted for who they are, there would be no need to have Pride events.
And FYI - more communities are moving to family-friendly Pride events.
Although i'm not gay watching gay parades and related events either live or on the news seem to bring together a lot of happy people,much color and merriment,every one is having fun.
In the context of gay parades i'm not seeing a problem with these events.
In this day and age of much doom and gloom more parades gay or otherwise can only be defined as positive to a community and not damaging to a community..
Bingo! It's a place to meet people, and I'm not talking a hook up. It is an opportunity to meet people with like issues and interests. They have booths about adoption, non-discrimination, churches, businesses, job fairs, etc. Shocked to see "normal" booths? What were some of the C-D readers expecting - a gay porn booth? It's not all about sex.
For straight people, we have access to this stuff everyday. Gay people need to network more to find places to fit in.
Someday, they will accepted by much of the mainstream and these events won't be necessary.
I won't bother to write an opinionated post. I'll just say that, as usual, bUU speaks for me, too. I will contribute an anecdote.
I had the honor of interviewing Robert Pinsky on a radio program a few days after he was appointed Poet Laureate of the United States. If you aren't familiar with Pinsky, he is a brilliant man who has written many outstanding works and is the author of what is considered to be the seminal modern translation into English of Dante's Inferno. He is now in his seventies, has been married for decades to a psychologist; they have three children and many grandchildren. The only thing outside the ordinary about this family is their exceptional levels of accomplishment.
The Pinskys have a summer home in Provincetown, Massachusetts. We got to talking about that for some reason and he volunteered that his family all made a point to gather there in August because that is when the Provincetown Gay Pride festival, one of the oldest and largest in the land, takes place. I must have had an expression of puzzlement on my face because he explained, "None of us is gay, but it's the single most fun week of the year in P'town. My grandchildren LOVE the parade and we all enjoy the energy and festivity."
So apparently there's no danger in exposing your family to gay pride unless perhaps you fear them getting multiple degrees or being honored for their contributions to the arts.
As for the P'town event, this news will really make the conservatives' heads 'splode. The 2013 festival begins with Family Pride Week, a series of events designed for the children of LGBT parents. And don't miss the 35th annual parade; the theme is Viva Las Vegas and it will star the cast of the Las Vegas production of Cirque du Soleil's Zumanity. Be there or be square.
i have to admit, i also wonder about the parades. i have seen footage and heard stories of the parades in the past...not a good look. yes, overtly sexual and dare even i say just a hot damn mess.
but then again, i have been to many a parade where outlandish, embarasssing behavior was the norn...i guess that's just the way with parades. i can't really say these characteristics are limited to gay pride parades.
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