The Akron Equity March and Pride Festival was today and in the days leading up to it the Mayor’s facebook page shared information about roads being closed and the schedule for the day.
I knew better, but I opened the comments.
There was some excitement about the day and messages of support and kindness. But they were far outweighed by the same, tired, old hate – and valiant attempts to counter that.
“When is Straight Pride?” (Feel free to organize, get sponsorships and permits – and have your own. Also, every other event is for straight people.)
“Why do we have to do this twice?” (Akron celebrates pride in August instead of Pride month so as not to conflict with other celebrations.)
“Why are my tax dollars supporting this?” (They aren’t. There are sponsorships and donations.)
And then an assortment of bible verses and calls for banning the perverts.
It was the same trash that always surfaces – from people who only repost Republican memes on their facebook pages and only have selfies and landscape photos. The lack of real, human, connection is evident.
It made me sad and vaguely angry to read those – which I guess was the point.
But, it wasn’t enough to deter me from attending. Jim and I met up with our fellow Akron Zips to participate in the parade (aka the Equity March). I talked to a few of my co-workers and we listened to the music and got some photos with Zippy while we waited for the parade to start.
When it was time, I took Jim’s hand and we began our walk down the middle of main street.
And immediately came to a halt as the marchers in front of us backed up. Unfortunately, we got stopped next to a guy on the sidewalk with a megaphone who called on us to repent our evil ways or we would burn in hell.
It’s one thing to walk past someone doing this – you just keep on walking – but we were stuck. One of the people in our group started a positive chant to drown him out, but it was only partly effective. We got moving soon after that, but it put a damper on things for me.
A little further down was a guy wearing a sandwich-board that read “Are you right with God?”
He, at least, was quiet.
We waved to people, Zippy was her usual 10% kangaroo and 90% ham, and we started a few more positive chants. Jim had made a sign that said, “We won’t go back” and he got a few cheers from the spectators.
As we got closer to the venue, there was another guy with a megaphone. He was calling out bible verses and claiming were were condemned to hell. He had a few people with him and the usual “Homo Sex is Sin” and “God hates fags” signs – and while there was crowd of event attendees trying to drown him out, there was only so much they could do.
We got past him and on into the venue. I saw more of my friends and waved to everyone – all the while holding Jim’s hand.
It’s something I think we’d both like to do more often in public, but are uneasy to do so. Pretty special to be able to do that walking down main street.
We reached the end of the parade route and got our picture taken. As we started to explore the booths and vendors, we had to cross the parade route again. A group of people walked past – all dressed in costumes and gear from the bad guys in Star Wars, for some reason.
As they went past, I impulsively shouted,
“LONG LIVE THE EMPIRE!”
The stormtroopers turned towards me and raised their fists to salute me.
It was a moment of geek pride for me.
Jim collected a few different pride flags and I got a tote bag. We didn’t stay long – the crowds and noise weren’t doing us any favors and anyway it was very hot out.
We had to pass the “God hates fags” folks again, but there was music playing and it was easier to ignore them.
So, a good day with thousands of good people all happy we were there – and a few people who wanted us to be miserable and/or dead.
I don’t get that. I don’t get disliking or hating someone enough to get a megaphone and shout it at them. I don’t like everyone, but I just can’t imagine doing that. Or spewing that poison on facebook.
What, exactly, is wrong with people?
We did our best to ignore them and they missed out on the hope and joy and love today.
And it was a loss that they couldn’t understand.