Black Lives Matter get police float kicked out of Pride Parade

[CliffFletcher]

The bewildering folly of identity politics and the hierarchy of victimhood has reached new lows. Black Lives Matter was invited as guests to the Pride Parade in Toronto. They stopped the parade, called out the Pride organization as racist, and then demanded they meet several conditions, including permanently kicking the Toronto Police float out of the parade, or they wouldn't let the parade go ahead. The organizers gave in.

Black Lives Matter protest scores victory after putting Pride parade on pause

When are more liberals going to start standing up to this nonsense? Surely there's a limit to how much bullying and extortion people will tolerate out of a misplaced sense of guilt. And surely anyone who is genuinely inclusive and capable of rational thought sees the folly of preventing police from publicly showing solidarity with the LGBTQ community.

[burn_this_city]

I don't understand why they're in Canada. Their organization has merit in the US, but here it seems unnecessary.

[Weitz]

Didn't the organizers say they just signed to get the parade moving again?

They aren't going to following the "demands" but negotiate for some things. Also said they won't be banning the police I believe.

[PsYcNeT]

So wait, are Pride Parades some form of sacred cow now that they can not be used as a stage for activism on behalf of marginalized peoples? That's horribly ironic.

Lord knows Pride communities are lousy with TERFs and other terrible people, so seeing BLM ask for increased presence for black performers, reinstatement of South Asian representation, hiring more indigenous persons, etc. isn't a horrible thing.

You can call it bullying I suppose, but only if you disagree with their goals. That said, CP is terribly authoritarian so anything anti-police goes over like a lead balloon here.

[Resolute 14]

I realize you are just trolling, as usual, Psycnet, but in this case, BLM was entirely out of line.

Or do you actually, seriously, in your heart of hearts, believe that the answer to their concerns is more divisiveness and to burn bridges rather than build relationships? PrideTO invited them in, and their guests basically chose to take a giant crap on the carpet. This is not behaviour worthy of the slightest bit of respect.

[PsYcNeT]

So you do agree that Pride Parades are not to be used as a stage for activism on behalf of marginalized peoples, and are basically glorified family fun days?

What a time to be alive.

[PepsiFree]

I think it's great.

It's nice that you can bring your kids to Pride, but at the same time it's become a bit of a catch-all celebration that's a bit meaningless.

This was political, as it should be, and a lot of their "demands" had to do with greater inclusion for visible minorities in queer events (the community, admittedly, does tend to white wash a lot of things). The organisers knew what they were doing by inviting BLM and from the article it sounds like they were perfectly happy it went the way it did.

No trolling here. I agree with Psychnet. It's meant to be political and represent marginalised LGBT groups. The inclusion of a police float is nice but pretty irrelevant for the parade.

[PsYcNeT]

People often talk about leftist disconnect when it comes to Muslims, terrorism, and insular communities, but the same can be said in situations like this in regards to moderates.

Just because Pride is organized by LGBTQIA groups does not mean its policy-making and culture is exempt from things like racism. Protest the protest is a perfectly valid form of making a statement.

[OMG!WTF!]

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

So you do agree that Pride Parades are not to be used as a stage for activism on behalf of marginalized peoples, and are basically glorified family fun days?

What a time to be alive.

You still mad Taylor Swift won bro?

And yes. Pride parades are more family fun days not misplaced anger days. The activism on behalf of marginalized people happened when BLM was invited to the parade, not when they jumped on stage and stole the mic.

But yo i'ma let you finish now.

[PsYcNeT]

Originally Posted by OMG!WTF!

You still mad Taylor Swift won bro?

And yes. Pride parades are more family fun days not misplaced anger days. The activism on behalf of marginalized people happened when BLM was invited to the parade, not when they jumped on stage and stole the mic.

But yo i'ma let you finish now.

This was a good analogy.

That said, why are Pride Parades family fun days?

[jammies]

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

So you do agree that Pride Parades are not to be used as a stage for activism on behalf of marginalized peoples, and are basically glorified family fun days?

You can be an activist without sabotaging someone else's legitimate activism.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Hey look! Malcolm X's civil rights attitude won! #### MLK, that wimp.

Look, I pretty much give up. An event like this speaks for itself and peoples' intuitions about it tell you how they look at the world. If people like Psycnet and Pepsifree can look at an event like this and say, "Yeah, this represents the sort of thing I'm in favour of. This isn't at all misguided or counterproductive. Good job guys. Keep giv'n'r"... then there's nothing left to talk about. I'm seriously out of hope for any possibility of convergence. We're speaking different languages.

I just really hope everyone stops capitulating to these #######s.

[PsYcNeT]

You heard it here first everyone; the struggle is over.

[CaptainCrunch]

I file this under a big fat whatever. I mean frankly they went about it the wrong way, but a lot of their demands were probably fairly reasonable. I wonder if they asked for these things previous to the parade or just decided to make the biggest political points score by hijacking the parade. If they did the later, then shame on them, they didn't want to negotiate they wanted to bully.

As well, its disappointing that in a parade that's about community inclusiveness that Black Lives matter didn't understand that by having the police banned. What about the lesbian and gay cops who are proud to be cops and should be held up as an example to the community? I just its just a big FU for them right?

At the end of the day the solution is pretty simple. Let them do their thing, and then don't let them have a float in the parade next year. Sorry you were disruptive, its not about your activism, its about your actions.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

If they did the later, then shame on them, they didn't want to negotiate they wanted to bully.

Why, I've never noticed this tendency from BLM protesters before!

[PepsiFree]

Lesson: don't let BLM protest for black gay rights amongst the community.

You'll upset the straight white people?

Isn't it telling that you guys are upset and not the people that actually invited them to the parade? It doesn't give you the faintest clue? The fact that in the article BLM garnered a lot of support amongst gay rights activists?

Hey everyone, we upset Corsi. He used swear words. Let's await his final word on what Pride is supposed to be about.

It basically just goes to show that a portion of the people involved in it really have zero concept of it at all. It's origins are meaningless. It's just a "family friendly community parade!" The BLM movement took issue with the way the racially marginalised groups are treated amongst the queer community. That is a REAL problem. What do any of you know about it?

It's basically a reason I don't go to Pride parades. They are often meaningless. This one had meaning, and surprise, it upset a bunch of straight white people. Shocker.

[fatso]

I don't know that I agree with BLM's approach to having the police floats removed from future parades, but I'm not seeing much drama here between the LGBT and BLM movements. From the Star article:

The parade resumed after Pride executive director Mathieu Chantelois and board co-chair Alica Hall reviewed and signed the list of demands on the spot.
“Their [BLM's] requests were extremely reasonable,” Chantelois said. “Everything was making a lot of sense.”

Doesn't really sound to me like they took "a giant crap on the carpet" of the parade. But maybe there is other info out there to the contrary. Anyway, the theme of this year's parade was social justice, which included black rights with the LGBT community (as explained in the article), so I'm not getting the outrage over this (police issue notwithstanding). Seems like the parade organizers and BLM attendance organizers were all effectively on the same page.

Interestingly, the tension between whether the pride parade is a family fun day or an activist moment isn't new to this year or exclusive to BLM. From the article itself

The need to return Pride to its community roots hit a flashpoint in 2010 as debate raged over the inclusion of the Queers Against Israeli Apartheid group, programming for Dyke Day was moved away from the locus of activity, the Trans March was organized without consultation, and Blockorama was moved to a smaller location.

“At that point I think a whole lot of people in the community realized that this was no longer an event that had notions of community as its central focus. It was becoming more of a tourist event that had making-money for people as its focus,” McCaskell said.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

I don't understand why they're in Canada. Their organization has merit in the US, but here it seems unnecessary.

Agreed, I wonder if #femalenativelivesmatter was busy that weekend.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Lesson: don't let BLM protest for black gay rights amongst the community.

You'll upset the straight white people?

More identity politics. You continue to prove my point. Different languages, different view of morality, different view of the world... everyone in their corner.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

More identity politics. You continue to prove my point. Different languages, different view of morality, different view of the world... everyone in their corner.

You heard it here first. We're all the same and treated like it. No need to stand up for awareness. It's us homos and blacks that are causing the ruckus!