This June, millions of participants and spectators attended Pride celebrations across the country. On the heels of the United States’s 250th anniversary, June’s Pride Month and July’s Black Pride Month serve as more than a celebration. They are a necessary corrective to the nation’s revisionist history, selective memory, and deliberate attempts to erase the struggles, achievements, and contributions of LGBTQ+ people.
Pride is about more than a single day or month of celebration. Without a commitment to justice, restoration, and lasting social change, our celebrations risk becoming merely performative. While Pride is undeniably a celebration of our lives, resilience, and achievements, it has always also been a public declaration demanding equality and justice.For many, like myself, celebrating Pride and making a political statement are inseparable, because the freedoms we celebrate were won through activism and continue to require vigilance and advocacy.
But views on Pride are deeply divided—and not simply along the lines of race, class, gender, or sexual identity. Some LGBTQ+ Americans feel that activism, such as protests against police brutality and in support of Palestine, has made Pride too overtly “political,” and would prefer it serve primarily as a celebration where queer people can simply gather and enjoy themselves. Others, like religious conservatives and rightwing Republicans, see Pride as sinful and indecent behavior on public display. They dismiss Pride as a month-long bacchanalia of drugs, alcohol, and sexual excess, believing it desecrates the legacy of the Stonewall Rebellion and diminishes the political significance of the LGBTQ+ rights movement.
But Pride need not be reduced to either a political protest or a carefree party; such an either/or framework creates a false dichotomy. Throughout LGBTQ+ history, political resistance and joyful celebration have always been inseparable. Our celebrations are acts of defiance, and our activism is sustained by the joy, resilience, and hope we share with one another.
Pride Month also lays bare division among the queer community on the fault lines of race, gender, and class. Celebrations in many cities and towns remain predominantly white events, leaving revelers of color to experience social exclusion, alienation, and cultural invisibility. In response, events have emerged centering people of color, such as Twin Cities Black Pride in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Southern Fried Queer Pride in Atlanta, Georgia.
Black Pride grooves to a different beat. Black LGBTQ+ people use these events not only to celebrate, but also to define and advance their own priorities. The Center for Black Equity, formerly known as the International Federation of Black Prides, organizes performances, parties, gatherings, and getaway weekends rooted in affirmation and belonging for Black LGBTQ+ folks.
Sunday gospel brunches, Saturday-night poetry slams, Friday-evening fashion shows, bid whist tournaments, house parties, the smells of soul food and Caribbean cuisine, and the beautiful display of African art and clothing are just a few of the cultural markers that make Black Pride distinct from the dominant queer culture.
Health and wellness are also central. At Black Pride events, attendees often encounter health booths offering screenings for sexually transmitted infections, vision care, hypertension, and HIV/AIDS. Black Pride often addresses broader social determinants of health affecting the community, including unemployment, housing insecurity, gang violence, youth homelessness, mass incarceration, prostate health, trans health, domestic violence, and depression.
But in the media, our stories and our agency are too often erased, marginalized, or misrepresented. Too often, white-dominated mainstream and queer outlets only focus on Black LGBTQ+ struggles, including our communities’ transphobia and homophobia, HIV/AIDS, homelessness, and conflicts with the Black church. While those issues are important and deserve coverage, they should not be the only lens through which Black LGBTQ+ lives are seen. Our struggles, then, become the only stories told about Black LGBTQ+ communities. Left behind are the proactive, community-led efforts to confront and reduce these challenges. Our resilience, leadership, creativity, and contributions deserve equal visibility.
Since President Donald Trump first took office, LGBTQ+ civil rights have faced sustained rollbacks. During his first administration, many of these policies were justified in the name of religious liberty. His current administration has framed similar efforts as protections for free speech and parental rights. While the rationale has shifted, the result has been the same: the erosion of legal protections and the marginalization of LGBTQ+ communities. The Supreme Court has provided legal protection for conversion therapy and made it more difficult for transgender youth to access gender-affirming care. Lawmakers across the country have introduced anti-trans bathroom bills, invalidated gender-affirming identification documents, and pushed to rebrand Pride Month with labels such as “strong families month,” as Alabama Governor Kay Ivey officially proclaimed it this year. In Washington, D.C., organizers had to reschedule the annual Pride parade after the President announced an Ultimate Fighting Championship event on the same weekend.
We are confronted with restrictions and bans that truncate our quality of life and full participation in public life. We’re experiencing a sweeping effort to censor LGBTQ+ stories, erase LGBTQ+ visibility, and closet us as second-class citizens. And these are not isolated policy debates. They shape where LGBTQ+ people can learn, live, work, receive health care, form families, and live openly and safely. The cumulative impact reaches nearly every aspect of our daily life.
From here, we need to recognize as a queer community the need to build bridges beyond our own circles and with allies. We must network, forge coalitions, and embrace an intersectional vision of social justice that strengthens our cities and towns and creates healthier, more inclusive spaces for everyone.
There is much each of us can do to help usher in a more tolerant and equitable society. It’s up to us to organize our neighborhoods, encourage civic engagement, educate others about the issues affecting our freedoms, and protect each other. That means protecting LGBTQ+ youth from bullying, homelessness, and suicide. It means ensuring that transgender people have access to health care, housing, safety, and dignity. And it means speaking out, because, as Audre Lorde reminded us, “Your silence will not protect you.”
Although Pride events continue to reflect the diversity—and sometimes the divisions—within the LGBTQ community, at their best they invite us to unite political activism with celebration. Through music, dance, art, and public witness, Pride affirms the multicultural richness of LGBTQ+ life. It celebrates not only our individuality but also the many ways our communities embody resilience, creativity, and belonging.
Pride ultimately embodies the highest ideals of American democracy. It reminds us how far we have traveled in the long struggle for civil rights, while also reminding us of how much further we must go. As our nation approaches its 250th anniversary, Pride calls us to fulfill America’s enduring promise of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—not only for some, but for us all.