Across the world, June is celebrated as Pride month by the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex and Ally (LGBTQIA+) community. The month celebrates the members of the community, highlights on the issues of equal justice and equal opportunity for all and the ongoing fight about gay rights around the world.
It focuses on the idea of freedom, right to live a dignified and happy life.
Pride month educates about pride and its history, acceptance and above all, love. In recent years, celebrations can be seen across the world with month long series of events including, parades, campaigns, and concerts.
How did it start?
On June 28, 1969, police raided Stonewall Inn bar in New York City and harassed the queer patrons present there which led to Stonewall Riots. After the raid, thousands of people- gay men, transgender people joined the riots and voiced against the atrocity by the authorities. It was the first time anything of this sort or big happened against the ruling forces. Before the riots, LGBTQIA+ individuals never came out to public about their sexual identity. The riots sparked the whole gay rights movement around it. In 1970, on the one year anniversary of the Stonewall riots, the first pride march in New York City was organised, with thousands of people marching in support of it, hence becoming a tradition since years. The pride demonstrates how individuals are against abuse towards individuals, or for the whole community, discrimination, and homophobia. In India, the first pride was held on July 2, 1999 in Kolkata.
Global Pride Day
Every year on June 28, Global Pride Day is celebrated worldwide. With colourful flags, rainbows, individuals or groups of people associating themselves with the community come out and celebrate the day. The day is marked to improve visibility, acceptance and legal protection for LQBTQIA+ people. Several campaigns across the world are organised to accept the idea of same sex marriage, trans rights and child adoption laws by gay couples.
Pride and pandemic
With the unprecedented year of 2020, all forms life and activities went under lockdown to battle the fight against virus. Due to the risk of virus transmission, many events were cancelled, as a response many opted to virtual events and celebrated it on online platforms. On June 1, over #Pridemonth was trending with over 907k tweets.
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