If you’re like me, you suffered from SERIOUS FOMO yesterday during the NYC Pride Parade (FOMO is fear of missing out for all you non-millennials). Pride is always an amazing celebration of love, equality and tolerance, but this year it had extra meaning as it’s also the 50th anniversary of Stonewall. With society luckily getting more and more progressive each year, it can be easy to forget that Pride is about a lot more than all of your favorite brands rolling out rainbow logo merchandise for one month and Taylor Swift releasing a music video with the Fab Five.
This CNN article explores 50 years after Stonewall, what does Pride mean today? When you truly sit down and think about it, it’s incredible how much things have changed. After all, 2019 marks just 50 years since queer folks fought back against police persecution at the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, sparking the modern LGBTQ rights movement. Back then, legal and social protections LGBTQ people have today, like marriage equality and employment security — let alone widespread celebrations like Pride — would have been inconceivable.
This year, the New York Times published a recap of New York’s Pride celebration, and noted that amid a rainbow palette and high spirits, there was sober awareness of the past struggles and present-day challenges faced by the L.G.B.T.Q. community. It’s important for us to recognize that while more gay rights have been affirmed than ever before, the LGBTQ+ community’s issues remain a flash point in the nation’s culture wars. Sometimes it’s truly difficult to fathom just how much prejudice was once directed at LGBTQ+ individuals. As this article notes, in 1969, laws in 49 states made gay sex between consenting adults a crime. In New York, it was illegal for two men to dance together until 1971. The Pride movement has advanced so much that it’s become much more acceptable for such behavior to happen, even to the point where people can watch gay men having sex and do so with pride!
Ultimately, while we’ve made great progress in the gay rights movement, it’s important to remember that there is still progress to be made. I’m proud to be an ally of the LGBTQ+ community not only during Pride Month, but year-round.
