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Gay Pride 2004 in Boston
BY NINA MACLAUGHLIN
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To give folks some perspective on the size of this year’s Boston Pride Parade and Festival, which takes place next Saturday starting at noon, Aandre Davis, the operations director of the New Boston Pride Committee, tells them that last year there were nine floats and this year there’ll be 30. More than 140 groups will march in the parade, he says, and 130 vendors will set up shop on Boston Common. But 25 days after same-sex marriage became legal in Massachusetts, a 30 percent increase in floats — or anything else that can be measured in numbers — hardly seems the point. Davis runs through a list of Pride Week highlights — the Gay Pride Idol Contest on Wednesday, the Dyke March next Friday, the interfaith service with V. Gene Robinson, the first openly gay Episcopal bishop, next Saturday morning, the closing block party on Stuart Street Sunday afternoon, a closing dance party at Avalon Sunday night, and of course the parade and the festival themselves — in a way that suggests he’s given the same spiel to dozens of people. "I’ve been getting calls from all over the country." But it’s when he moves away from the actual events and starts talking about the energy surrounding Gay Pride Day that he sounds like someone accepting an unexpected award. "I’ve never seen the gay community more energized or more excited. Marriage is an issue of civil rights, and there’s a feeling that finally the gay community’s civil rights are being acknowledged." And for Boston’s 34th annual Pride Parade, the largest of its kind in New England, members of the gay community aren’t the only ones getting caught up in the chest-swelling excitement. Pride Week follows in the celebratory wake of the SJC ruling and the first flurry of same-sex marriage licenses and weddings, and both the ruling and the celebrations "are energizing young, old, gay, straight, male, female, everyone, to get out there and make their representatives know that we’re going to support those who support us." The political point of Pride partying has never been more evident. Davis refers to the "disgraceful" way that Governor Romney is handling the issue, saying, "This is a community that is hoping the issue backfires in his face. We want to do everything we can to try and elect a new governor. This year’s Pride is going to speak to that, to say that this governor needs to be replaced. It’s clear that this is something that people are going to get behind not only this year but next year, and in 2006." The Boston Pride Parade steps off June 12, at noon in Copley Square; for more information, call (617) 262-9405 or visit www.bostonpride.org. The Dyke March begins June 11, at 7 p.m. at the Parkman Bandstand on Boston Common, between the Boylston and Park Street T stops; visit www.dykemarch.org. The Pride interfaith service takes place June 12, at 10 a.m. at Old South Church, 645 Boylston Street in Copley Square; call (617) 536-1970. The Boston Pride block party takes place June 13 at 2 p.m. along Stuart Street between Arlington and Berkeley Streets in Boston. And the Avalon closing party takes place June 13 at 9 p.m. at Avalon, 15 Lansdowne Street in Boston; call (617) 262-2424 or visit www.avalonboston.com
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