Disaffected by the annual parade, members of San Francisco’s LGBT community are choosing alternative events to celebrate identity and solidarity with Orlando

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

San Francisco resident Katy Birnbaum is eager to gather with other queer people on Pride weekend, especially after such a violent attack against LGBT people in Orlando. But when roughly a million people pack into downtown on Sunday for one of the largest, most high-profile Pride festivals in the world, Birnbaum won’t be standing in the crowd.

“It just feels like a big Miller Lite tent,” said Birnbaum, 31. “With the corporate floats … it’s co-opting queer identity as a way to make money.”

Instead of attending the formal SF Pride events at civic center on Sunday, Birnbaum will be going to an intimate LGBT film festival in a community space six milesin an area known as the Bayview – one of the only remaining black neighborhoods in the city.

Birnbaum, who helped organize the all-day film event, is one of many LGBT people in the Bay Area who plans to skip the mainstream Pride festival in the northern California city known internationally as a mecca for gay people.

While queer people said it’s important to come out on Pride as a way to stand up to the violence in Orlando and discriminatory laws across the country, some said the San Francisco parade has become too corporate, straight and white to feel like an appropriate setting to show LGBT solidarity.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A banner advertising the Toyota Scion as the ‘official car of San Francisco Pride’ in 2013. Photograph: Arun Nevader/FilmMagic

On Friday, Black Lives Matter announced that it was pulling out as a grand marshal, due to concerns about the police’s plan to have an increased presence at the parade and heightened security measures.

Some local LGBT people are finding alternative ways to celebrate. Whether the Trans March on Friday, the Dyke March on Saturday, or other queer art shows on Sunday, the city has a number of events that organizers hope will attract much more diverse crowds than the Pride parade.

“Pride really should be for queer folks,” said Amy Sueyoshi, a lifelong San Francisco resident, who identifies as genderqueer. “It’s not for straight people to demonstrate their queer-friendliness. I’d like that they do that in their daily lives.”

SF Pride officials said that corporate sponsors are critical to offsetting the costs of the massive event that attracts people from all over the world.

Although the festival adopted a “racial and economic justice” theme this year, the dominating presence of corporations, including the major Silicon Valley technology companies, is still a source of tension in a city struggling with rapidly rising rents and displacement.

LGBT activists said it can be frustrating to see Facebook, Google, Uber, Lyft, Salesforce and other tech firms sponsoring and marching in the parade, knowing that they are part of an industry that is greatly exacerbating income inequality in the region.

Last year, Apple had a comically large contingent of 8,000 marchers, who contributed to the parade dragging on for a record seven hours and 33 minutes.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Apple employees carry rainbow flags as they march in the San Francisco Gay Pride parade in 2014. Photograph: Noah Berger/Reuters

For progressive queer people, it’s also disheartening to see corporations like McDonald’s and big banks marching in front of community groups.

“It’s ironic to walk alongside tech companies that have displaced us,” said Isa Noyola, a transgender Latina activist and director of programs at the Transgender Law Center, which relocated from San Francisco to Oakland in 2013.

In addition to low-income queer people who can no longer afford to live in San Francisco, queer social justice groups and beloved gay bars have also struggled to stay in the city.

“It’s a shame, because you think about LGBT organizing in San Francisco ... and it’s kind of disappearing little by little,” said Noyola.

Andrew Jolivette, a 41-year-old gay man who was born in San Francisco and now lives in Oakland, said the city’s Pride events and parade were a critical part of his upbringing and queer identity.

“It really was a symbol. By the time I came out, it had all this new significance,” said Jolivette, a professor at San Francisco State University. “It felt like home.”

But in recent years, he’s stopped going to the Sunday parade.



“It’s basically commercial advertising everywhere,” he said. “It just seems like what I’d call Gay Inc. We’re just one more thing for people to purchase.”

Each year, Jolivette said, the parade looks more and more like a carnival for straight people coming from outside of San Francisco. “When it starts to feel like the straight people are outnumbering the queers, that’s not a Pride parade to me,” he said.

Anietie Ekanem, who runs a social media consulting firm, said it can be inspiring to see so many different groups celebrating LGBT people on Pride.

“Marching together, you’re feeling that real support,” said Ekanem, 43.

But, Ekanem added, it’s important that wealthy corporations participating in the celebrations donate funds in a substantial way – to marginalized groups and causes that most need the financial support.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A float sponsored by Salesforce, a San Francisco-based firm, goes by. Photograph: Alamy

Last year, SF Pride said it distributed more than $166,000 to over 60 community groups.

Sam Singer, spokesman for SF Pride, said he expected attendance would swell this year due to the tragedy in Florida.

“Many people have contacted SF Pride to say they are coming this year in solidarity with those who lost their lives in the Orlando terrorist attack,” he said, adding that corporate sponsors have become an essential part of the parade.

“It wouldn’t be Pride without the individuals, without the community groups, and without the corporate sponsors.”