I like this post.

Have you actually been to a pride parade? Every single one I've been to had a healthy mix of the more rambunctious floats and religious groups, employers, teachers, cops, firemen, etc.

Then don't go

Why do you say that? Surely not every young person I've met who accepts me for who I am hasn't taken a course in the history of gay pride... Does it really have an effect on individual people's perception?

All you're doing here is exposing that you know absolutely nothing about where the freedoms you experience as a gay man today came from.

If you think homophobia started with gay pride, you are a fool. Gay pride is what helped us move past homophobia.

Yes. They've all been brought up in a society that has been affected by the gay pride movement.

It's like someone in 2014 saying there wasn't really any need for the "Black Pride" marches in the 60s. Read a history book

I'm gay and love being gay but I really think that all of that multicolor flag thing, the parade and that **** is annoying but that's just my opinion.

It's honestly disappointing how unaware of your own history so many of you are.

Do you think the gay rights movement started from masc bros on the DL or something? Christ

Oh, and saying "Oh I don't support the parades, they make us look bad!" won't make homophobes like you more. You're still just as gay as the man clapping his ass on a tequila float. You're just having less fun. It also exposes that you haven't actually been to a pride parade. Google search =/= the real thing, sweethearts.

Pride is not about as achievements there's white pride black pride female pri etc. Y'all are appeasers y'all want to walk on eggshells so you don't offend homophobic people. Y'all also worry about being stereotyped yet the y'all enforce every gay cliche on this site yet look down on people who do in real life. I really don't have much respect for you guys cause your all nothing but hypocrites.

Phew don't hurt 'em Donte!

unfortunately that's how all generations work. These gays that "hate" gay pride think its dumb but they sure wont have a problem taking advantage of the rights that we gain when people fight for us.

Ok...

You realize "that ****" is literally the origin of the gay rights movement, right? You'd still be living in a closeted society without it.

Gay rights don't come only from parades What kind of mentality is that?

Look, I love costumes and all of that, but selling sex on a gay pride parade is not what I want to see...

I do. I know a lot of gays that LOVE being gay and publish it everywhere, it's like their identity.

I personally hate being gay, it's quite uncomfortable to live this way, always being talked about something you can't change by other people, the prejudice, not being able to choose the guy you like because they won't ever like you (I'm not saying that girls can, but for gays it's even harder), blah blah.

Every right we've gotten over the past 40-50 years can be traced back to the gay pride movement and pride parades. It ALL stems from that. There was nothing before the Stonewall Riots and the ensuing pride movement. Nothing. It's the truthful mentality that respects the work the generations before us did.

And selling sex isn't something that only gay people do, so why should only they be judged for it? Halloween and Mardi Gras have just as much scantily clad straight people as a pride parade.

It didn't come from gays shaking their asses and dicks on a giant rainbow penis float either. It came from gay men and women sticking up for themselves and fighting for their equal human rights through protests and pickets, etc, and showing the world that gay love is no different from straight love.

I get where you're coming from for sure, but how can you tell someone they're having less fun by not engaging in a festival that promotes the type of activities that they don't want to engage in? If you enjoy "clapping your ass on a tequila float" then by all means go ahead. But don't tell other gay men and women that they have to enjoy it too in order to be supportive of gay pride and equal rights.

The whole point of the gay rights movement is to put homosexuals on equal ground with the rest of society, not for them to stand out and be even more marginalized. There will come a time when we all have to move past the idea of rainbow flags, leather whips and chains and public sex being the "face" of the gay rights movement and for us to just "be" among the rest of society.

I'm not saying you have to enjoy it, I'm saying people seem to think "condemning" those particular gays will make them look better, or more appealing to homophobes. The people who dance in thongs in a gay pride parade aren't doing any more damage to the gay rights movement than a piss-drunk Bostonian is doing to Irish-Americans during the St. Patrick's Day parade. It's just an easy scapegoat insecure gay people use to make themselves feel less gay.

And the people who were "fighting back" that started the entire gay rights movement were the drag queens and flamers in feminine outfits at Stonewall because they had nowhere else to go. The people who could blend in did.

Well, I've never been to one, but from what I've seen in the media and online, it just seems like a bunch of lustful gay men walking around half-naked, acting inappropriately. And the majority of people who know of gay pride parades probably view it the same way, because they've never been to them either. So even if the parades are more reserved than they're made out to be, most people do not know this. It simply has a negative impact on people's views of the community more so than it should.

Besides, not every gay man's idea of fun is losing his own dignity as he twerks on a float in front of many people.