CHENNAI: Past the sea of the rainbow that paints the post-summer season of June, the heart of Pride Month lies in resistance, community, and celebration of inclusivity. From coming out during an open mic event, or demanding rights during protests, ‘Pride’ has many expressions, rooted in liberation and love. While the community had long been asserting its identity, the Pride Parade tradition traces its roots to the 1969 Stonewall uprising.
On the morning of June 28, New York’s queer community — led by activists including Marsha P Johnson — fought back against the police raids on gay bars. A year after that, in honour of the uprising, the first-ever march was conducted. In 1999, Kolkata followed suit.
Over five decades since the uprising, over 5,500 people — the highest that the Chennai parade has seen — took part in 2023’s Chennai Rainbow Pride and Self Respect Walk outside Rajarathinam Stadium. “Pride walk is the symbol of protest. We are telling everyone that we are also humans. It is only in Tamil Nadu, a lot of organisations come together to collaborate. We have Sahodaran, Thozhi, Nirangal, TamilNadu LGBTIQ movement, Kattiyakkari, SAATHII, Orinam and a lot of activists and members under the Tamil Nadu Rainbow Coalition,” says Jaya, general manager of Sahodaran and an organiser.
Organising the pride is no easy feat. Jaya points out that eight to nine meetings are conducted before the parade to delegate work like handling social media or getting permission. “It takes a lot of effort to run the pride parade and getting a place for the walk is hard,” says Srijith Sundaram, theatre artist and LGBTQIA+ activist.
Queerphobic attacks
Yet, in a month filled with dance, song, and revelry, several queer persons flag queerphobia spewed on online spaces, and the media’s insensitive coverage. In an already-discriminatory world, slurs, trolls, and hate speech take over social media, punctuating Twitter threads and YouTube comment sections.
Moulee, co-founder of Queer Chennai Chronicles (QCC), says, a picture of him and his friends, clicked in 2018, carrying a placard with leaders like Dr BR Ambedkar and Thanthai Periyar resurfaced this Pride on an Instagram Tamil meme page. Much like other stray posts during Pride Month, this meme sparked queerphobic comments. “There have been homophobic memes using the picture. But in general…even when persons share their pride pictures, there is a moment of joy and celebration. These pictures are then used by trolls on Twitter for homophobic comments, memes, and other abusive aspects,” he says.
From users with anti-caste ideologies to those with right-wing leanings, most comments on the post had queerphobic sentiments and comments about ‘how these leaders are related to queer rights’. “People box us to one single queer identity, and expect us not to talk about other politics…It is disheartening when we look into groups that are standing up for marginalised communities, they don’t let us kind of talk about our struggles and rights and how these leaders have played a key role in our lives,” says Moulee.
Echoing this thought, Senthil, QCC programme director says, “Followers of Periyar, Ambedkar, and the left ideology often ask us if these leaders talked about LGBTQIA+ issues. We tell them that under social justice, LGBTQIA+ issues will also come.”
Instances of pictures being misused from Pride are not a new phenomenon, say Moulee and Senthil. The QCC co-founder cites the example of a men’s rights group using a picture of a gay person with a placard ‘my body, my rights’ out of context. “These (pictures) are used for abuse, and it is also used by other groups out of context to fulfill their agendas,” he adds.
Referring to the need for policies, Moulee says, the community lacks legal protection. “If I’m being called a homophobic slur, I’m not sure if that would be taken seriously. There needs to be more work done on policy on protecting queer persons, especially anti-harassment and anti-discrimination policies and laws need to be in place,” he says.
Insensitive media coverage
In August 2022, the Tamil Nadu government released a glossary of terms in Tamil for the media to correctly address the persons of the LGBTQIA+ community, with dignity and respect. This came after a Madras High Court order and was a result of sustained efforts from several organisations including QCC and Orinam. According to Jaya, while most of the print media write about Pride with sensitivity, the visual media — especially YouTube channels — are the opposite. “There are media houses that launched videos at the beginning of Pride Month bashing the community and saying that everything is just a Western influence. They did all these cheap advertisements for publicity,” she adds.
During the parade, queer artiste Nethu Night Neelambari recalls an incident where a photographer approached them for a snap. “But the photographer asked, “Bro, can we take a photo?” I got triggered purely because I am always getting misgendered when I do either my drag or in my real life. People assume I am either trans or somewhere in between…Even if you are practicing consent, you are using wrong pronouns.”
Srijith says, “A lot of YouTube channels took the video and put thumbnails and clickbaity video descriptions like “One boy is kissing another”. As Neelambari also says, the media sees these stories with views and numbers. “They never say: love is love or that we need to love one another, support, fight for their rights, their marriage.”
Uninformed, unsafe, uniformed spaces
While the Stonewall uprising was anti-police in nature, over the years, the various editions of the Pride Parade have seen the attendance of the khaki-uniformed personnel posted on the fringes. “We received very good treatment from the police this time. The Egmore inspector told me that even though a lot of people attended, nothing went wrong, everything happened calmly. Complaint maathiri ethumillai (There were no complaints),” says the Sahodaran director.
However, Hari, a gay person who took part in this year’s walk, says, “Compared to last year, there were many police but it was not of any use. They did not talk to us with respect, so many people formed a circle and were laughing at us. Whether they came to give us protection or laugh at us, why were there so many personnel?” After the parade, Neelambari recalls walking on the pavement back to where they parked their bike. “A policeman was reversing a tow truck and he looked at me and said: orama po. I don’t need fancy words like pathu ponga, I need general human treatment.”
A Madurai-based queer person, a first-time participant at the march, recalls a few friends feeling unsafe. They mention “A guy was sitting on a bike asking the girls and transpersons in the community how much (money) for a selfie. It was you like how one would ask the price to a sex worker. In what was supposed to be a safe space for us, we went out for protest and celebrations.” They add that even if the community reacts, they would have no support in society.
There were also instances of a few corporate firms joining the parade under the pretext of rendering support but ending up selling their brand name, in a tokenistic manner. “We didn’t collect any money from any corporates for conducting the parade. We strictly made sure that it was a people’s parade. During this year’s parade, one woman and her colleagues changed into pride T-shirts at the venue, making everyone think that they were some sort of organisers,” shares Srijith, adding that Pride must be given back to the people.
According to Moulee, “A lot of the allies who come to pride say they feel safe and can express themselves in these queer spaces or Pride. What is missing in the general ”regular” spaces? What is it that restricts heterosexuals in just heterosexual spaces to be themselves? I think they need to strive to create these spaces everywhere. It’s their responsibility to create that space for everyone.”
In times where firms, governments and institutions limit Pride to a one-day march, there is still a long way to go in obtaining rights in different sectors. As Senthil says, “Pride started as a riot. Asking us to tone down or shutting us down doesn’t make any sense. If these things continue to happen, Pride will continue to be a riot.”