Dozens of pride celebrations in Southern California this month are undergirded by the celebrants’ steely defiance against recent anti-LGBTQ legislation, pointed rhetoric and protests at local schools.
While the 53rd annual Los Angeles Pride Parade in Hollywood on Sunday, June 11 will feature floats of waving participants, often dressed in drag or colorful costumes, and as smaller pride events this month dot communities from Van Nuys to Pomona, participants say this year’s gay Pride celebrations are taking on added significance.
“Pride becomes more important as a form of resistance, to subvert these negative, inaccurate views about queer people and queer lives,” said Thuan Nguyen, a gay man and LGBTQ+ rights activist from Montclair who is researching race relations and ethnicity in queer communities, and is a sociology lecturer at Cal State Fullerton.
At least 17 states have enacted laws banning or restricting medical procedures for youth who want to change their gender, which the medical field calls gender dysphoria. Some laws have banned drag queens from performing in public spaces.
The laws, some of which are being challenged in court, and some protests in local schools have increased tensions between conservatives and gay rights advocates in Southern California. The debate has raised the temperature at Pride events during June Pride Month which celebrates gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and nonbinary residents who are estimated to number about 500,000 in Los Angeles County.
Tension over school protests
In Temecula, the school board recently rejected an elementary school social studies curriculum that mentions gay rights leader Harvey Milk, drawing criticism from teachers, parents and California Governor Gavin Newsom.
At Saticoy Elementary School in North Hollywood on June 2, conservative parents and Armenian-American parents protested against a LGBTQ+ assembly in which students were read a book that talks about different kinds of families, including same-sex parents.
“I don’t like the idea of my little kid coming home and saying it’s fine for a family to have two dads, two men to love each other. We don’t respect that, it’s not in our culture as Christians and Armenians,” said Sean Karapetyan, a father of two students at Saticoy Elementary School in a comment reported by the Daily News.
In May, a pride flag placed outside a transgender teacher’s classroom at the school was burned and the incident is being investigated by LAPD as a possible hate crime. The parents who protested said they had nothing to do with burning the flag. The teacher is in good standing but was removed from the school for safety reasons.
And outside of a Glendale Unified School Board meeting, a brawl broke out June 6 between LGBTQ+ advocates and protesters who were opposed to teaching children about sexual identities in school.
Gay rights advocates and Pride organizers said laws in states in the South and Midwest, plus protests in Southern California, are influencing how they view Pride celebrations this month.
“It is more important this year because of all the anti-gay legislation and the anti-gay rhetoric,” said actor, comedian and LGBTQ rights advocate, Margaret Cho. “Plus, we are battling in schools this weird notion that we are a danger to society. We are very much in a very scary place.”
Cho, who is bisexual, is grand marshal of the L.A. Pride Parade on Sunday. She said during an interview June 7 that the parade, one of the oldest in the nation, is more than a celebration of the LGBTQ+ community but part of a half-century struggle for acceptance “that is very vital to our survival.”
After the parade, revelers can enjoy the L.A. Pride Village, a free festival on Hollywood Boulevard between Vine and Gower streets featuring 90 vendors, 11 food trucks and musical acts from 12 noon to 8 p.m.
Kathleen Rawson, president and CEO of the Hollywood Partnership, which put together the event with L.A. Pride, said the event is free to all. As a lesbian who is raising children with her partner, she said the rhetoric shouted during the Saticoy Elementary School protest must disturb the children of LGBTQ parents at the school.
“Look at what is happening at the schools. You don’t have to go far to find a lack of understanding,” she said.
Parents at the school say they don’t oppose LGBTQ parents per se, but don’t want that message taught to their children by the schools. LAUSD has reiterated its commitment to the curricula.
Drag “nuns” cause stir
Lindsey Horvath, Los Angeles County supervisor in the Third District and former West Hollywood city council member, will participate in the parade after riding a float in the West Hollywood Pride Parade on June 3.
“We are seeing an unprecedented dark backdrop of legislation and attacks on the LGBTQ+ community throughout the country,” she said on June 7. That’s why pride is more important than ever in Los Angeles County.”
The LGBTQ+ community took flak from conservative Christians after the L.A. Dodgers invited, then cancelled, and then re-invited the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence to the team’s Pride night festivities. The group members dress in drag resembling nuns, a practice seen as mocking women of faith by the Catholic Church and the Los Angeles Archdiocese.
When the group was honored by state legislators for their charitable activities, some lawmakers took umbrage.
“I have supported every Pride Month resolution throughout my time in the state legislature,” said Sen. Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh, R-Yucaipa, in a statement. “However, I viewed the recognition of Sister Roma with the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence as a separate item about whom I heard concerns from my constituents. Respectfully, I did not applaud, acknowledge, or show support for Sister Roma on the Senate Floor.”
Horvath said the Pride celebrations are a way to open dialogue with those who oppose the events or the satirical troops, such as the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. She brokered a discussion between the Sisters group, the Dodgers, opponents, and pro-LGBTQ groups that resulted in re-inviting the group.
“It was through a meaningful, heartfelt dialogue where people learned from one another that a different outcome was reached,” she said. “Listening to each other and seeking understanding is what we need to do more of.”
Aaron Saenz, 46, of Duarte, a gay man with a long-time male partner who has organized numerous Pride events, said the queer and transgender community is moving rapidly, making it difficult for many people to understand. Marriage equality in the U.S. was allowed when, on June 26, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down all bans on same-sex marriage.
“It takes time for people to process change,” Saenz said. “The idea that sexuality and gender is a spectrum — maybe there should be more time to allow people to process.”
He is still getting used to his old friend, Nicole, who transitioned to be a man. “I need to reframe my brain to say ‘Hi Nick” when I see him. The whole country is going through that.”
Using Pride to bridge gaps
Saenz organized and ran the San Gabriel Valley Pride event from 2001 to 2018. He also attended community Pride events in Whittier and Downey.
A few years ago, he stood in front of the Whittier City Council showing slides of scantily clad males and drag queens, pictures taken at larger Pride events. He told the city council that it would not see that at Whittier Pride.
Likewise, the San Gabriel Valley LGBTQ Center in El Monte is hosting “a Pride tour” to community Pride events in Alhambra, La Puente, Pomona and Glendora. An Altadena LGBTQ+ Pride Walkabout runs Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., featuring a walk to businesses by the gay and trans community, a free picnic, live music and a “spiritual exploration” with a sing-along and talks from LGBTQ-affirming churches.
Led by Nic Arnzen, a gay member of the Altadena Town Council, a husband and a father of three who wanted a place where families could celebrate and have fun, said the Altadena event fits the category of community-supported.
“The point of Altadena Pride is definitely about visibility but it goes beyond that,” Arnzen said. “Altadena Pride is created in a way where people celebrate with the folks they run into on a daily basis. Knowing they have the support of their neighbors can make all the difference.”
At a Whittier Pride event, Saenz approached a teenager sitting on a bench looking distraught. The teen told him he was thinking of killing himself and Saenz, a former teacher, provided resources who could respond. (The L.A. County Department of Mental Health emotional wellness hotline is: 800-854-7771.)
“At one of our events in Pasadena, a grandmother came up to me and we spent 10 minutes with her. It allowed us to answer her questions,” Saenz said.
He said there are many different kinds of LGBTQ+ people, just as are there many different kinds of Pride events. The larger ones focus on entertainment, such as LA Pride and LA Pride in the Park on Friday, June 9 and Saturday, June 10 at the Los Angeles State Historic Park at 1245 N. Spring Street, Los Angeles. Pride in the Park on Saturday features music superstar Mariah Carey.
“The community Prides are for the communities that live there,” he said. “The big city Prides are for the party, the fun and celebrating who you are.”
Horvath says that after June, the real work begins. “After the parade is over we need to continue conversations, in order to build bridges,” she said.