Trashing Pride

[talktooloose]

One tale to tell from lux_apollo's visit this last weekend. We went out to Church Street for Pride events twice; once on Saturday night and once Sunday afternoon. The experiences couldn't have been more different: it was dark Saturday night and sunny Sunday afternoon.

Both times were underwhelming and ultimately maddening. Public events soften as they grow (unlike other things) and by 2007, Pride consists of 1,000,000 people shuffling aimlessly up and down past merchandise. The parade has virtually no imaginative floats (where's your fabulous pride, queers?!!) and there doesn't seem to have been an original idea in drag in 20 years.

I'm terribly embarrassed by what happened on Sunday after the parade. I completely, out-of-the-blue lost it at some security people. Post-parade, Lux and I were pushing through the heat and the crowds looking for something worthwhile. I noted in the program that there was an alterna-queer music stage and we headed for it. After the previous evening's fiasco seeing Kids on TV (who are entirely hype and nothing else), I was pleased to hear some decent music being played by real musicians as we approached the parkette.

There we found at most three dozen audience members in a fenced-in area and FIVE security guards. We lined up, turned down the proferred pink arm-bands that would have allowed us to purchase alcoholic drinks and proceeded forward to the bag-check station. I was told I could not bring in my water bottle. She said, "You can leave it on the table here if you like." I replied, "I'm supposed to leave a $20 Nalgene bottle on an open table?"

I then began to scream "THIS IS BULLSHIT" at each of the five guards in turn and turned to storm away, ranting incoherently for at least five minutes. To his credit, Lux didn't freak out at what must have been my scarily bizarre behaviour. I've been analyzing it since then.

I'm furious that Pride has devolved into a meaningless, by the numbers, neutered EVENT. The very fact that it is called PRIDE with no sexuality or gender markers is entirely for corporate comfort. The festival is now about Molson's and Air Canada and Rainbow Tours. Like television, like Disney World, this shift in focus from activism to corporate sponsorship breeds a passivity and people react by not bringing their energy. They wander like a herd of cattle into beer gardens where they line up for 35 minutes to buy a $7 ticket so they can line up to receive a singe-serving cup of Molson Dry Ice.

I'm furious that an "alterna-queer" stage is a licensed venue when clearly it should be an all-ages area. The fact that the Pride organizers have made all the cultural experiences at the event into oppportunities to sell alcohol is itself maddening. They are, in that way, emulating an insufficient and potentially destructive side of queer life: commercial venues selling intoxicants are the primary meeting places for people seeking others of their sexuality.

I'm furious that art is again reduced from a primary vector for cultural change into background music for the sale of beer. No, I'm more than furious about that one; I'm torn to the core by it. It is not when we have a Dry Ice at a bar that we are faced with new ways of thinking of gender and identity -- it is when artists and intellectuals show us through their work and invite us to question our assumptions.

The misuse of art as entertainment at Pride is emblematic of everything that is wrong with it. That I was unable to access art because I wasn't willing to part with an environmentally safe way of drinking potable tap water is madness. The Pride Committee is effectively telling me: "If you aren't willing to play by our corporate rules, we have no place for you at our event." I'm just a paying customer at Disney Pride now.

At the same time as we were listlessly partying, the Anglican synod was rejecting gay unions within its churches nationally. Why was it not one of the primary efforts of the organizers on the weekend to mobilize 1,000,000 voices in Toronto to scream about this issue? To call it the blatant homophobia that it is? Why weren't we wearing banners and singing chants, saying, "We have experienced the alienation and pain and neglect that such policies create! You are hurting your children, your neighbours, your community!"

Instead, with our only leadership a twirling beer logo writ in laserlight, we were left shuffling aimlessly through the burning streets, looking for something to quench our thirst.

Comments

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

yeah OK, so what to do about it? I guess I've been ranting this rant for oh ... 10 years or so? and I'm bored with my own ranting about it. I just go and enjoy what I can and don't bother expecting "more" cause we aren't going to get "more". Although I'm still kinda surprised that the performance artists aren't trying to hijack at least a little corner of it.

I'll take my energy and go to Hamilton, or Sarnia, or London, where people are still being beaten to death every year, and being out is a highly political act.

Is it worth trying to organise an alternative event yet?

[talktooloose.livejournal.com]

Oh, I don't actually want to do anything. I'm a very busy man!

Realistically, my rant is like expecting McDonald's to start caring about each meal it makes or Bill Gates to feel bad about PowerPoint. I've already come to terms with the fact that the mass and the meaningful are rarely in bed together. Maybe it's just because Pride meant a lot to me in the late 80s and now is the antithesis of what I strive for.

I'm up for alternatives, sure! They probably already exist and I didn't even notice. Shall we look? Shall we find like-minded types and kick some ass?

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

Well I think to some extent yes it is already out there. People have parties before and after, that are alterna. And there are tons of art events that go on specifically because it's Pride - all up and down Queen for example there are shows up that provoke the questions you mention. My show for instance (the queer content one) got put up specifically because of Pride.

I see no point in directing my energy to McPride by pouring out my anger on them, effectively wasting it. Let them go on serving what they serve, and let us just make sure there are salads and organic peanut butter sandwiches if people want them. And some do!

I think what cuts closer to the bone for most of us alienated alterna-types is the hype of "one heart, one love" where all our brothers and sisters come together in a festival of philia. And when it (predictably) doesn't happen, we are disappointed and angry. Once again on the outside looking in. I think we have to turn that around and realise that it's the people who think they are the "inside" who are actually cut off from the world.

[talktooloose.livejournal.com]

"One heart, one love"

Yes. And after I fished around through a lot of less compelling points, I finally got to the one where I said there are still political struggles and the waste of the 1,000,000 voices united is shameful.

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

Perhaps the thing to do next year is to pick your issue and work the crowd.

[painglass.livejournal.com]

Wow, I have so much to say, but I can't get it out. It would require a rant of my own.

[lux-apollo.livejournal.com]

The weekend was great not because of Pride, but because I got to meet you and your partner. Pride was a total waste of time for me as well. I'm sure you noticed that.

It should sound odd, considering that it is my first ever public 'LGBTIQ Pride' event ever. Other than the odd feeling of euphoria from being surrounded by 1 million people who are queer identified or allies, I can't say that Toronto Pride did anything to make me a better person. Bitter, maybe, but not better.

I totally agree about the lack of speaking about the Anglican synod decision. People seem to have forgotten that, as much as Pride is a staple in Toronto, it is 2007 and if I were to kiss another man in public during any other time of the year, it would be a political statement. It is not a statement to walk around half-naked during Pride. It is not much of a statement to kiss your bf or gf or whateverf during an event that celebrates those unions and makes them 'safe' when that safety doesn't exist any other time of year.

There was a lot of people but not much happening. It was pathetic. I don't know if I'll ever bother going again, unless I live in the city. And even then, I won't be buying shit from them.

Maybe what we need is an Alterna-Pride. But even that would get ripped up and watered down were it to become a big public thing.

[lux-apollo.livejournal.com]

A small aside:

I'm interested to know if the Conservative party was the only major Ontario party to not have any sort of delegation during the Parade. As much as I'm loathe to approve of the presence of *any* party politics that takes away from what Pride is supposed to be about, it would be quite telling if Harper's own homos couldn'd be bothered to put in a presence.

And also... I love that picture. :-)

[rfmcdpei.livejournal.com]

For me, Toronto Pride is simply a secular carnival, no more an dno less.

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

OK here it is. I was talking to Stewart at SPIN gallery, and they and a group of Queen West people are mulling over the idea of shutting off a section of Q West on the Friday before the Sunday and having an alternative Pride-Art thing.

[talktooloose.livejournal.com]

Just wrote to Lux_Apollo that one problem with Pride is that there is no longer one big stage from which political statements can be made in between drag acts. There is a large portion of the crowd that would be moved to chant in support of various causes. I'd like to see the alterna-Pride event have a political component to it in that fashion because that's also missing.

As usual, it's the stage-set that can help determine the action.

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

When I hear more from SPIN I will certainly give you all the contact info. But what mystifies me right now is why no preformance artists have done "interventions" at Pride Day.