At a time when the rainbow flag is threatened with banning in several Republican states, it is flying high in San Francisco. The “city by the bay” has never more deserved its reputation as the capital of the gay rights movement. From the Castro district to the pier, from the town hall to the department stores, the LGBT+ banner is everywhere, no offense to the elected officials of Florida, Ohio or Tennessee, who wanted to eliminate it at the beginning of 2024. official buildings and schools. “As a sign of defiance to all this hatred that is currently being expressed”explains Suzanne Ford, the executive director of San Francisco Pride.
Born in 1970 as Gay Freedom Day, San Francisco Pride has become one of the most impactful global events for the LGBT+ community. In the Californian city, where the first gay marriage was celebrated in February 2004, it is not limited to a one-day “Pride March”. It’s an entire festival, which lasts a month and sees celebrations, discussions, performances, to which is added a golf tournament, the aim of which is to introduce diversity into an eminently cisgender environment, according to the organizers.
For the second edition, this year, an international human rights summit was also organized. The conference echoed the fears of foreign activists, victims of hate campaigns like Nicolas Rodriguez, from El Salvador, where Pride, he testified, was the most difficult to organize in twenty-seven years. “We think we have taken two steps forward, and we realize that we are taken two steps back, and sometimes more, says Natalie Thompson, co-president of InterPride, which acts as a liaison between national movements. I’m afraid of what’s going to happen in November: the election [présidentielle, aux Etats-Unis] will have a global impact.”
“Everything is under attack: our health care, our art, our history”
In Republican states, businesses are increasingly hesitant to display support for Pride, for fear of being the target of calls for boycott or attacks from customers, like the supermarket Target, which preferred, in 2023, remove “rainbow” items from its shelves. In San Francisco, the participation of elected officials, managers, institutions and media makes sense. And there is no shortage of sponsors, from airlines to pharmaceutical laboratories and television channels. Drag queens are invited to stores to present their shows or perform in the street for “pop up” (improvised) shows. Suzanne Ford hopes that these images will give hope to young gay people who feel isolated, as was her case in Kentucky, the state she left around ten years ago to make her gender transition, at over 40 years.
You have 69.97% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.