Whom Is Pride For?

An Early Farewell

The Manchester Pride Weekend comes to an end today, and it could not have come much sooner. The August Bank Holiday, from Friday until Monday, is taken over with festivities, revelry, and debauchery, depending on what takes your fancy.

I would rather be elsewhere, however. Last year I was in Cape Town, in the company of my husband and taking things at my own pace.

Falling Out

In the thirteen years that I have lived in Manchester, I have grown progressively disillusioned with the event, both for its commercialisation and its seeming lack of broad representation.

From the day in the Easter break of 2013, when a friend and I were refused entry to a club for no discernible reason beyond bouncer ego and racism, I have fallen out with Canal Street, which constitutes the main part of the Manchester Gay Village, along with the adjoining streets.

What frustrated us further was that there seemed to be no recourse, no obvious means of registering our displeasure. Yet a search of the Internet turned up news reports of exactly these discriminatory door policies, predicated not on fact but on prejudice, assumption, or the subjective judgement of the door staff at many venues.

An Unfair Assessment

That experience coloured my view of the Gay Village and left me with the impression that all the associated voluntary support organisations were of the same ilk. It was an unfair assessment, I concede, but it took hold because none of the ones I hoped might help were willing to do anything.

I live on the border of the village, yet I am the least engaged with the place, apart from walking through it if I need to get to other parts of the city.

Rights and Nuisance

As for Pride itself, the whole area is cordoned off into an enclave of activity that requires a ticket to attend; even so, you cannot be denied the public right of way to traverse it if you need to get through.

That, some years ago, became a point of contention between the security personnel, who did not know the law, and the police, who affirmed our rights.

Beyond that, there is the unneighbourly inconvenience of the cacophony, and of inebriated and sickly attendees becoming a nuisance on our side streets.

Not My Demographic

For what is supposed to be a community event, given the cost to attend and the interest in whatever entertainment is arrayed, I have found that I am probably not the demographic best served by most of what goes on there.

When I have deigned to purchase a ticket, I have never attended any of the performances; and once caught in the thickened crowd, I am already suffocating, so I rush back home for respite.

It is simply not a place of any comfort, whether alone or in the company of others. Now, I avoid it altogether and skirt the place, rather than insist on my right of passage.

Losing Its Way

Beyond community, Pride is supposed to help good causes, and we have many that represent different interests.

A few years ago, the establishment running Pride hiked prices, made their greatest profit, and then reduced their charitable contributions. It had lost its way, trying to rival and outdo the events in Birmingham and London by bringing in global acts best viewed at entertainment venues.

These acts were an exorbitant waste of resources in the quest for fame, and it led to the eventual, and just, collapse of the organisation, which still owed lesser acts who had given their time, resources, energy, and talent in the community spirit.

A Case for Change

This year, we were assured that the event would be more representative. I have not noticed as much. The ticket prices were still high; and whilst the acts celebrated more local talent, so that the total cost came to twenty per cent less than what was paid to the main act last year, I am still failing to find any sense of engagement.

My premise for sponsorship is broader accessibility and affordability, without anyone having to declare that they are in straitened circumstances to qualify for a concessionary ticket, assuming any are available at all, or so few that access becomes a lottery.

The influence sponsors hold over Pride management should be codified as invitational rather than institutional, never commanding or directing what Pride can and cannot do. There must be strict autonomy, alongside broad community representation in the decision-making process.

Watching from Afar

Apart from stepping out of my apartment block onto the street with my folding chair to watch the parades on Saturday, which had over 150 distinct participants, including organisations, companies, clubs, charities, establishments, and political parties, I have done nothing more.

The clouds did gather and rain on the parade at certain times, but it did not dampen anyone's enthusiasm. I was in my rain jacket and poncho, which kept me dry, though some braved the chill and the wet as if it were a bright summer's day.

Even the Service for Pride at Manchester Cathedral, which I would usually steward and sometimes take part in, I gave a miss. Two invitations to garden barbecues I ignored, rather than offer my regrets and risk being persuaded against my own inclination.

Protest and Celebration

It is my view that the Pride principle has long deviated from its founding ethos of both protest and celebration; it has become an over-commercialised affair that now merely grants access to those with the means, rather than a broad community celebration that recognises the diversity it comprises, in groups large and small. Pride has drifted from access towards exclusivity.

So the question remains: whom is the modern Pride for? The answer I have seen suggests it is not for everyone, nor for the well-meaning members of the wider community who wish to embrace one another in the pursuit of human rights and dignity, both for those affected and for their allies. These are all reasons why I am no more supportive of Pride in Manchester today than I have been for the past few years.

No Curmudgeon

As peace returns to my city by the end of today, I am not being curmudgeonly. We can simply agree that not everyone is energised by these things, and that there should be acceptance of this without heaping on any kind of excoriation.

Maybe, next year, I shall be just as absent from this annual charade, in the company of my husband, who, for his lack of exposure to these settings, is far too easily excited about Pride events for my liking or comfort.

Manchester Pride 2024 - Between disinterest and stewarding

For a parade and a charade

The August Bank Holiday weekend in Manchester is for the Manchester Pride and one those of us who live on the borders of the Gay Village sometimes dread out of inconvenience and frustration. It is a time of endless cacophony that begins from Thursday night through to Monday evening with possibly a vigil in remembrance of those we lost to the AIDS plague.

For those who come the attend the events and many from out of town and even from abroad, it presents the prospect of wanton debauchery and the prescient profiteering of all the hospitality and services establishments that find the footfall irresistible to exploitation, even as punters and patrons submit themselves too willingly to the abuse of their respect and their wallets.

The Pride Parade on the Saturday afternoon is something to look forward to, though I could be inspired to residents’ rage just for the loudspeakers that get put close to my window or on the main street, not so much for the event, but for the testing of equipment that starts early in the morning when we are trying to lie-in and continues almost every quarter of an hour as if suddenly the equipment had given up. Let’s not think of if I were an American with a gun.

Diversity, not as we think it

This time they plonked down a mobile 120-seat grandstand on our street which I found out to be the judges view to rate the floats that passed by towards the end of the parade. I had a guest who had just moved to Manchester and a friend had asked me to chaperone him. Not much to be done, I would have stepped out of my apartment block with a folding chair and some bottles of water. I provided rainproof clothes and umbrellas too, when it rained.

However, I do wonder if the judges as my guest did see the diversity we observed was not as diverse as our community would suggest apart from accounting for the diversity in faces of the same identity group, like say, race? Not to talk of the fact that one float dressed up a black man in full uniform to drive their Bentley. Then the Gay Gordons in full Scottish attire had one of their contingent playing the bagpipes who was noticeably of African descent.

In the probably 250 that participated in the parade, there could not have been 10 that were representative of ethnic minorities, and this is where Manchester still fails to embrace the broader expanse of identity within this diverse community.

It was not helped by one such group removing themselves from the parade because of concerns about sponsorship in relation to the Israel – Gaza conflict. They were invisible when they should have erred on the pragmatic side of things, because there were Palestinian groups represented on the parade.

Just let me through

I was surprised that I stayed to watch the whole parade that lasted over 3 hours, and it was time to retire and that was for a good long nap. The only other times I ventured through the Gay Village that was gated off for the festivities was for church on Sunday and then the Pride Eucharist in the evening.

At least now, apart from security checks of bags, right-of-way is no longer questioned as it was even refused to people who just wanted to pass through about a decade ago.

Besides, I had on principle decided for years now, that I will not pay the extortionate prices for attending any of the Pride events even as those who find themselves shortchanged denied access to venues quickly at capacity to watch their favourite bands.

My plate did overflow

As a church steward at the Manchester Cathedral, I had offered to be on the rota for duties at the Pride Eucharist which was organised by the leadership of the Village Church that meets on the 2^nd and 4^th Sundays of the month at the LGBT Foundation offices on Sackville Street. [Manchester Cathedral: Pride Eucharist pamphlet (PDF)]

Cover of the Pride Eucharist pamphlet.

The typical activities would have been handing service pamphlets to people who had come to fellowship, doing the collection during the offertory hymn, and ushering the congregation towards the altar for Communion.

Then one of the wardens asked me to take the plate of offerings to the altar for blessing and I had hardly said yes to that when the convenor of Village Church came to ask if I would participate in the intercessory prayer part of the service. She already had my name on the prayer sheet before coming to chat to me. I obliged willingly at the honour.

My part included a 30-second pause for silent prayer, my clock ticked a bit faster than it should in my head, I counted to 10 twice, losing my ways somewhere in the simplicity of the aura of scrutiny as I continued to the end of my contribution.

It’s a wrap until next year

After the service, we remained for tea, coffee, biscuits, and cake, before a young man on army leave who had asked to speak with me earlier requested if he could play the grand piano.

He had such talent but was expecting of rebuke or derision when we so readily praised him. Sadly, some people are subjected to so much criticism that even what they are so good at, they are too unsure of demonstrating.

I guess all that became the highlight of my own Manchester Pride, disinterested, uninvolved, and almost curmudgeonly, except where it mattered more in cheering the parades and serving at the Pride Eucharist, until next year when again, we suffer, or we leave town.