International Day
Against Homophobia A Massive Success
by
Peter Steele
The marking of International Day Against Homophobia (IDAH) May 17th in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality (CBRM) was a massive success, drawing a substantial amount of public attention. The Pride Cape Breton Society, PFLAG Sydney Chapter, Addiction Services and the Gay-Straight Alliance from Breton Education Centre in New Waterford, and the AIDS Coalition of Cape Breton marked the occasion with a week of activities aimed at putting a major focus on the horrible problem of homophobia that still exists in our society.
Mayor John Morgan first recognized Homosexuality Knows No Borders with the raising of the Pride flag in front of the Civic Centre on the Esplanade in Sydney. The Honourable Mayor spoke eloquently about our community, stating that our municipality has an obligation to respect, honour, and protect all of our citizens. At year’s flag raising, more spectators turned out for the ceremony than in earlier years. The event also garnered a substantial amount of media attention, including a great story that kicked off CTV’s Live At 5 show the same day.
Later in the evening, the Gay-Straight Alliance group from Breton Education Centre in New Waterford featured a free public screening of Milk, at the school’s audio-visual room. Harvey Milk, San Francisco’s openly gay city supervisor became a hero as a gay rights activist, and his story played a pivotal role in the history of equal rights for gay and lesbian people. Harvey Milk’s assassination brought a nation’s gay community together, and inspired the international symbol of gay pride, our six-coloured rainbow Pride flag. It was somewhat disappointing that the students didn’t get a lot of support that evening from teachers, parents and fellow students, but certainly, they did make a huge step in abolishing homophobia. Kudos to these brave students, along with their faculty advisors Irene Gresel and Diane MacKinnon. For their efforts to bring the gay, lesbian, bisexual and straight students together, they were presented with the inaugural Proud Steps award. This award will be presented each year to a person, group, organization or business that goes above and beyond to support our gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community, and rid society of homophobia.
As mentioned, this year’s recognition of IDAH received a huge amount of media attention. Besides two articles leading up to May 17th, the Cape Breton Post ran a story about the day activities. Cape Breton Radio and the Coast ran news items, and the CBC ran a number of news of news articles, including a morning Party Line with myself, and a story on BEC’s Gay Straight Alliance. IDAH was covered by Global News, and Glace Bay’s the Coast radio ran an hour-long story about the events and the gay community in general on Jennifer Ludlow’s Coastal Conversations Sunday night magazine program. Other news outlets may have done news items based on the press release, but did not send any reporters to any of the events.
International Day Against Homophobia itself was recognized with a rally and march, and a bar-b-que and reception. Close to 100 people participated in the day’s activities, a major increase over last year’s attendance. Thanks to our friends at M&M Meat Shops, an on-going supporter of our community, the event started with a free public bar-b-que at 12-noon in the Sydney Credit Union parking lot, located on the northwest corner of George and Townsend Streets. What hamburgers and buns were left over were donated to the men’s homeless shelter and Transition House on behalf of the gay and lesbian community and M&M Meat Shops.
After much socializing, guest speakers spoke to the crowd before participants from both the gay and straight community took their stand against homophobia to the streets of downtown Sydney. More than half the participants were from the straight community, proving we have made huge inroads over the years. The Cape Breton Regional Municipality is demonstrating to all other Canadian municipalities that we are truly a safe and welcoming community for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.
After a very colourful, roistering and successful march, activities concluded with a reception at the Family Place Resource Centre. There, everyone celebrated with refreshments, food, great friends and lively discussion. Michael Gillis and Sana Kavanaugh on behalf of PFLAG, as well as Bree Fitzgerald and Kellyanne Larade on behalf of BEC’s Gay Straight Alliance made presentations on homophobia and ways to rid society of this dreadful plaque.
Although International Day Against Homophobia is recognized but once a year, the Pride Cape Breton Society will continue to address homophobia on a regular basis, as its members continue to make Cape Breton Island a safe and welcoming environment for its gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people!
