COUNTING ON PRIDE

There are few headlines that can bring a smile to your face, but this one did: ‘Straight Pride attracts zero participants’. These are the sort of words that let you know all is ok in the world, even if they were slightly incorrect because you see one person did show up – a gay blogger hoping to report on the event.

The Straight Pride idea came from reggae music label TCOOO because they believe the ongoing assault by gay activists who condemn lyrics that condone and incite poofter bashing is unfair.

What’s wrong with kicking a few ‘batty boy’ heads in they say? And then they say, and if the gays are going to get so upset about it then we’ll put on our own parade of heterosexual rapture in New York City just because we can; as it turned out, they couldn’t.

The problem started when gay activists like Peter Tatchell called for the banning of some reggae which has been labeled, ‘murder music’. TCOOO said in a media release, “The gay community targets reggae because 99 per cent of the artists are African-American”, conveniently forgetting the problem is actually lyrics like “Jah Jah gonna hit them hard/All the men who visit men backyard,” or the even more direct, “I’m dreaming of a new Jamaica, come to execute all the gays”. Thankfully the lack of attendance showed that most people don’t share that particular dream.
But what does it say when the only person who shows up at a Straight Pride parade is a curious gay blogger? What are we meant to assume by this, that no-one is proud to be straight, or that there are no straight people in New York?

Having been there on several occasions I can tell you this is far from true. There are whole areas where heterosexuality is a palpable force and contrary to the belief that gay men run NYC, my response is, “Uh huh Shereal, if you ran that city the former Mayor, Rudy Giuliani, would never have been successful implementing a law that made it illegal, yes illegal, to dance in bars and nightclubs. It’s true, to legally dance in New York you need a special license, which is near impossible to get”

The zero attendance level for Straight Pride is a great blow to TCOOO because numbers are the most telling aspect at any pride event. Just ask religious group The Salt Shakers or George Pell and his cronies who go along to every Melbourne Pride or Mardi Gras with their number counters. They consistently refute our reported figures. We say there were 50,000 at this years Pride March, the Salt Shakers say there was 5,000. Mardi Gras claimed 350,000, the detractors say it was at most 100,000.

It is interesting to note that even if one person had have showed up at either gay event it would still be 100 per cent up on TCOOO’s Straight Pride farce.

It is difficult to know exactly why Straight Pride failed so embarrassingly. Bad publicity? Incompetent organisation? Who knows, but for the only attendee at a Straight Pride Parade to be a gay man says something about why there really is no need for Straight Pride at all.

Rachel Cook: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

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