What exactly is Pride Month and why is it celebrated?

So, it’s June and you’re suddenly seeing rainbows everywhere. Then you realise it’s Pride Month, but you also realise you may not be too sure what Pride Month is all about. 

For those with loved ones who fall under the queer umbrella, the question of whether or not Pride Month is worth celebrating given the current status quo often comes to mind. Depending on who you speak to, that answer varies. 

So, what exactly is Pride Month?

According to youth.gov, Pride Month (officially Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Pride Month) is celebrated annually in June, to honour the 1969 Stonewall riots, and the month is also aimed at commemorating the ongoing work to achieve equal justice and equal opportunity for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) Americans. 

The holiday has since become so popular that it is commemorated in many countries around the world. 

What are the Stonewall riots?

In June 1969 a series of spontaneous demonstrations by members of the gay community sprung up in response to a police raid at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighbourhood of Lower Manhattan in New York City.

Patrons and supporters of the business staged an uprising to resist the police harassment and persecution to which LGBT Americans were commonly subjected, and the moment has since become an iconic moment in history. 

The events surrounding the riots are considered the beginning of a movement to outlaw discriminatory laws and practices against LGBTQI Americans.

This work continues today all over the world. 

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There has been criticism of major global corporations for trying to capitalise on the commemoration, by releasing rainbow themed products – sometimes at a significant mark-up – geared not only towards people in the LGBT community but their allies as well. 

People in the LGBT community are among some of the most disenfranchised people in the world and, therefore, do not always have the disposable income they are often assumed to have.

Being charged a premium for certain products and experiences is also not considered to be doing much for the cause of equality for the community. 

When is Pride Month in South Africa?

Here at home, Pride month is often observed in October, the same month in which the first South African pride parade was held towards the end of the apartheid era, in Johannesburg on 13 October 1990.

The parade was the first such event on the African continent and it was initiated by the Gay and Lesbian Organisation of the Witwatersrand (GLOW) – an organisation founded by gay anti-apartheid activist Simon Nkoli in 1988.

According to an entry on Wikipedia, the first pride parade event was attended by 800 people and the crowd was addressed by Nkoli, Donné Rundle, Beverly Ditsie, Edwin Cameron, and gay Dutch Reformed Church minister Hendrik Pretorius.

While there are other Pride events in various provinces throughout the year, as of June 2019, Johannesburg Pride was listed as the largest Pride event in Africa.