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The board said it had “strived to foster an environment of diversity and unity within our organization and community”, but recognized “there is still work to be done” . The board said it hopes “new leaders emerge from the community to lead the Pride movement in Boston.”
A spokesperson for the organization said its board had no further comment beyond the statement. DeMarco did not immediately respond to a request for an interview.
Athena Vaughn, who co-founded the advocacy group Trans Resistance MA last year, when many felt left behind by Boston Pride, called the board’s decision a “bogus”.
“It’s disheartening because it seems that instead of giving the community… what they want, they would rather disband,” Vaughn said.
The disbandment threatens the city’s 50th anniversary celebration, which has already been postponed twice due to the coronavirus pandemic and was loosely postponed until the fall.
The annual celebration of LGBTQ lives, which grew out of the Stonewall Uprising in June 1969 in New York City, has grown into New England’s largest one-day parade and provides a huge economic boost to Boston.
LGBTQ activists and community members said on Friday that they expected the parade to continue in one form or another, with other organizations stepping into the breach. They plan to re-imagine the celebration in a way that better represents the diversity of the community.
“There will be a new parade,” said Jo Trigilio, co-founder of Pride 4 the People and former member of the Boston Pride communications team. “I have no doubts that there is going to be a new form of parade, because trans resistance is already underway.”
Trigilio would like to see an event that combines the pageantry of a parade with the purpose of a political march.
“Pride is both a celebration but also a political event, and I think that’s the part of the pride that has been lost,” Trigilio said. “This is what people want to recover, this is the emphasis on the political aspects. Examine the ways in which LGBTQ people, especially those who experience intersecting oppression, are still affected by institutionalized racism, et cetera. “
Julia Golden, interim president of Trans Resistance MA, said the organization hopes to conduct a listening tour in the coming weeks and collaborate with other LGBTQ groups to develop a new vision of pride.
“In order to give this back to people, we want to hear from them,” Golden said. “Trans Resistance is not interested in leading this effort alone. It must be by the people. This is what pride has always been.
Boston Pride has a long time has been criticized by some members of the LGBTQ community who say he has forgotten his activist mission and has become marketed by corporate sponsors, many of whom do not share their other social justice concerns.
Sue O’Connell, co-editor of Bay Windows newspaper , said he heard criticism that Pride had been too corporate for almost 30 years.
“This doesn’t represent everyone, and they’ve certainly had some serious and obviously serious challenges to get through the moment we are in, and frankly, that challenge hasn’t been just last year for them, but at least all 10. in the last 15 years “, said O’Connell, host of NECN, the official media sponsor of Boston Pride. “Unfortunately, they just weren’t up to the occasion that calls for change, and that’s a shame.”
The long-simmering conflict spilled over last summer, after nationwide protests erupted over the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The Pride board rejected a statement drafted by its own communications team and released a watered-down version without consulting members of its Black Pride subcommittee.
Many activists felt the Pride board was ignoring their comments and being out of touch with their concerns. Eighty percent of Pride volunteers quit in protest and some 2,000 people flocked to the first Black Trans Vigil in Franklin Park on the day that would have marked Boston Pride, but for the pandemic.
At the end of last year, critics called for a boycott of Boston Pride by refusing to register for the next parade or any other event and refusing support and donations until a majority of board of directors be overthrown.
Trigilio was part of the Pride communications team that put together the George Floyd murder statement that the board rejected. They then resigned and co-founded Pride 4 the People.
They said Boston Pride was fundamentally organized in a way that did not respond to the community.
“The board has a hard and fast rule over how Pride works,” Trigilio said. “The way the bylaws are written, they don’t require any kind of community input on how Pride is run. I think… that was part of the problem. It was not designed to respond to the voices and needs of the community.
Material from earlier Globe stories has been used in this report.
Jeremy C. Fox can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on twitter @jeremycfox.
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