May the Best Generation Win'
It will come as little surprise that when the leaders of Canada's LGBT community met in Montreal last week, they were determined not to repeat the divisions of the Pride Parade two years ago.
'I think the leadership has been very strong and has done what they should have done — but I really think the membership has,' said Evan Kilmartin, director of communications for Rainbow Action Montreal. 'What's important is that we get out there and we support. We don't need divisions; we don't need rivalries. We have more in common with each other than we have with anybody else.'
The leaders' message was one of inclusivity and inclusion.
'For me, the pride movement really is just about loving and being who you are. It's about being comfortable and proud in your own skin and being open about it. And that's how I like to portray it to others,' said Montreal Pride board member Alanna Devine. 'If you're in it for love, you're in it for it.'
The idea of inclusiveness is particularly important as Pride events in Toronto and other Canadian cities prepare to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, the rioting that started the modern gay rights movement.
'You can't separate what we do from Stonewall, you know?' said Glen Squire, Pride committee member for the Toronto Public Library and one of the parade organizers. 'There's a lot of rhetoric in the community where everybody says 'No, no, we're not doing Stonewall, because we're all about inclusion.' But the 50th is upon us and there will be a lot of rhetoric to deal with.'
After an ugly and divisive debate two years ago, Pride Toronto's 2013 parade is being organized by a committee including both people who were against a corporate float and those who wanted one.
'It's so important that we reflect the diversity of our entire community,' said Squire. 'There's no one Pride in this world. I'm gay, but so are my brothers. This is a place where you should feel free to come and celebrate who you are, and everyone needs to be comfortable.
'We have an incredible opportunity to be proud of the work that's been done and the progress that's been made, and to celebrate who we are as a community and how we want to be seen.'
Squire said the organizers have taken pains to ensure that people feel comfortable.
'The parade itself will be something people can look forward to. If the weather is good, it will be a good time. It's just a lot of effort to make it successful,' said Squire.
And as he's become more involved with Pride Toronto, Squire said he's come to see that it's not all about the parades.
'The pride party is in June, but there are so many other events in between. We should be doing the parade and that should be the party for the year. That's the official start of Pride, but we want to continue to celebrate.
In fact, there's a whole series of events and parties running from June 11-21.
Another challenge facing Canada's LGBT community is one of leadership. It was just two weeks ago that the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs severed its relationship with Egale Canada, the organization that has been the national voice for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights in Canada since 1987. Egale says a small number of board members — seven out of 17 — called for the firing of executive director Itai Pinkas.
But Egale's outgoing president, Stephen Bank, stood firm in insisting the firing was entirely his decision and that he and Pinkas had worked together on a vision that would move forward in a way that would be 'most helpful to the movement.'
Bank now says Egale has become a political organization that is 'no longer about helping Canadians.'
Despite the rift, Toronto's Egale Toronto organization said it will mark Egale Canada's last anniversary with a pride party.
'There is still a great need for a national organization to support the work of Queers across Canada,' said Meg Ollivier, a Egale Toronto board member.
The Egale Toronto's event will be the culmination of the Toronto Pride Parade, and Egale Toronto hopes to attract LGBT activists from across Canada.
The Egale Canada leadership is expected to announce its decision about a leadership contest at a meeting next week.
Meanwhile, the debate about police participation at Pride events continued. There was nothing stopping police from marching in the Winnipeg Pride parade, but many people chose to stay home rather than march alongside police officers. The argument against participation was that many gay men in Canada have negative opinions of police because of how they've been treated.
A similar situation occurred at Edmonton's pride parade. While the Edmonton police did not participate, officers did give the peace, handing out pamphlets to people in a van nearby. The message: If you do something criminal in the future, you will be reported to police.
The police were also present in Toronto this year, but there was nothing about this year's parade that would attract the same media attention as last year's.
Winnipeg's parade did not attract the same attention as the Edmonton parade, but even in this much smaller city police officers participated in the parade.
For some reason it's almost as if we Canadians are the only ones who are really outraged about our new president. I guess it’s because we live in a democracy where if people disagree they don’t get thrown out. You Americans have a lot to learn about that.
And so it is the case that people in the U.S. are very upset about the election, and with good reason. I was out on the streets during the last Republican Presidential primary in South Carolina, canvassing for the gay rights group, Log Cabin Republicans.
So I know how upset they are. But the first thing that struck me about this is the fact that a good number of gay people in this country don’t seem to care at all.
Take, for example, a recent episode of the NBC comedy ‘Community’ that has a pretty prominent gay character, who is very comfortable with being gay and very happy about it. This is an extraordinary development from the past, when such people either weren’t allowed to be out at all, or else they were put in shows that were almost all about how horrible it was that they had to keep this secret.
Now this is really important.
A lot of straight people don’t care about gay people. They think that gay people have it easy; there is no discrimination and they don’t really have to think about being gay at all. Which is also true. But it’s because of this that many gays are so often left out of popular culture, and have to figure out how to navigate a non-existent world that is defined by anti-gay sentiment.
And, in my opinion, the same goes for all minorities in the U.S., like those who are black and Hispanic.
But now people can’t be so blind to the fact that these things happen in the real world. And perhaps this can be changed.
I’ll see if I can get you another guest in the next few weeks who will discuss the recent election.
That's what's happening in the next few days in Europe; that's happening tomorrow in the U.K.; and that's happening Sunday here in North America. All eyes are on the European Union as it enters the final phase of negotiations for a new treaty that will replace the failed European Constitution. We will be following it closely. There are two things you should know about it.
First, you should know about the European election last week, which saw a big success for the right wing, by which I mean anti-EU, nationalists parties. (Nationalists, by the way, are those that believe in some form of national identity and a nation's right to self-determination.) Second, you should know that the European Union, for a variety of reasons, has never been more necessary and more relevant.
Because the people who run the European Union are the only thing standing between us and disaster.
The European Union is the most important peace project that the Western world has to offer. It was born from the ashes of the Second World War, when hundreds of millions of people died for reasons that defy understanding, when millions of people were displaced from their homes, when millions more were condemned to live in poverty, only because of a mad dictator's ambitions.
And we must remember that many of the refugees who fled Europe were not just ordinary refugees, they were people who did not want to be ruled by others, especially those in positions of power. It was those people, not the people who just happened to be in their way, who created the problem.
And they are still out there. And so we must remember, even as we celebrate what democracy is
