LGBTQ people are pushing Pride events to reject pinkwashing, endorse BDS and show solidarity with Palestine.
A group of marchers holds a banner that reads,"No Pride In Genocide" during the 2024 WeHo Pride Parade on June 2, 2024, in West Hollywood, California.Every June, as rainbow boas and blue and pink banners unfurl, and jello shots and plastic cups of light beer tumble onto the streets, borne by tens of thousands of happy gays, a cultural battle ensues. Pride season is here, and everyone is pissed.
Recognizing that queer people exist everywhere on earth, including Gaza, LGBTQ Palestinians and their allies have been calling on queer organizations to support a ceasefire, oppose apartheid and take firm stances against the genocide and occupation of Palestine by a powerful U.S.-funded military. Since October 7, 2023, Israel has killed over 37,000 Palestinians in Gaza, injured more than 85,000, and destroyed most of the Gaza Strip’s key institutions including universities and hospitals.
“The Western imperialists claim that they are progressive, and they protect queer people, and they are the ones who globalized homophobia in the first place,” says Benny Koval of the Raleigh Wake Workers Assembly and Meals for the Masses. “That’s the chutzpah of it all.” “It is very refreshing to see queer people come out and say no, you cannot weaponize my identity to enable a genocide,” she says. As a queer Muslim, “often we are told by these systems of colonialism and imperialism that our identity is inherently a contradiction. But we are here to say, no, that is not the case, and that our experiences and perspectives must be centered in the conversation. Any liberation movement for Palestine has to put those intersectional identities at the forefront.
In the U.S., the Dyke March has always maintained an explicitly political identity and defied the corporatization and whitewashing of Pride. Over the years, Dyke March organizers in San Francisco, Chicago and D.C. have declared their support for Palestinians and their alignment with other anti-imperialist causes.
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