Activism is such a chore. Let's have another facebook page instead ;)
Wednesday, 18 August 2010
Sunday, 15 August 2010
Very nearly 102
Gosh. Issue 102 of BCN has gone for proof-reading. I'm doing several magazines with tight deadlines this month so it feels fab to have this one nearly put to bed!
Sunday, 1 August 2010
B is not for invisi-BI-lity, and London is not the World
This week's lefty weekly newspaper has a nice half-page piece about London LGBT Pride. Delga have it reproduced on their website already here, which is helpful.
See, mostly it's all good stuff: just two things make me go "Ah, but".
It makes that common mistake of making London-upon-Thames Pride sound like it's the national thing. Which I really don't think it is any more: in the 90s it was, back then it was so much bigger than the others and there was a real sense of momentum towards it, of spotting other queers on the road down south. But since then the other Prides have grown: I've not been there the last two years but by 07 and 08 it had nothing like that sense of build as you arrived in the city. We're not quite at the point equivalent to the Tony Wilson "wake up America, you're dead" line, but it is far more like that now. There are fifty or more Prides around the UK. If Pride was a corporation, London is no longer the majority shareholder. When evoking lefties to raise the stripey banner high, encourage them to do it everywhere, not just down in the bottom right-hand corner of the island.
But more than that, there's a difficult line in reference to "gay" marriage: "next year will be the 41st year of the London Pride marches - I hope that we might be marching with some married LGBT couples". There are already lots of married LGBT couples. Most LGBT people are not lesbian or gay. Even most LGB people are not lesbian or gay.
See, mostly it's all good stuff: just two things make me go "Ah, but".
It makes that common mistake of making London-upon-Thames Pride sound like it's the national thing. Which I really don't think it is any more: in the 90s it was, back then it was so much bigger than the others and there was a real sense of momentum towards it, of spotting other queers on the road down south. But since then the other Prides have grown: I've not been there the last two years but by 07 and 08 it had nothing like that sense of build as you arrived in the city. We're not quite at the point equivalent to the Tony Wilson "wake up America, you're dead" line, but it is far more like that now. There are fifty or more Prides around the UK. If Pride was a corporation, London is no longer the majority shareholder. When evoking lefties to raise the stripey banner high, encourage them to do it everywhere, not just down in the bottom right-hand corner of the island.
But more than that, there's a difficult line in reference to "gay" marriage: "next year will be the 41st year of the London Pride marches - I hope that we might be marching with some married LGBT couples". There are already lots of married LGBT couples. Most LGBT people are not lesbian or gay. Even most LGB people are not lesbian or gay.
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