QUEZON CITY – Around 25,000 people were estimated to have attended this year’s Pride event in Quezon City.
Themed “Alab for Love”, said to emphasize “diversity, inclusion and gender equality”, the event was organized by Pride PH, a new network of select LGBTQIA organizations, with the Quezon City local government.
Pride in the Philippines has a long history with Quezon City, with the city seeing the very first Pride march held in the whole of Asia on June 26, 1994. At that time, members of ProGay Philippines and Metropolitan Community Church organized “Stonewall Manila” or the “Pride Revolution” both to commemorate the Stonewall Uprising and to “march against the imposition of the Value Added Tax (VAT)”.
While this year’s organizers move to work with the local government could help ensure the city’s Pride’s sustainability, this may also be seen as a tricky approach as it is dependent on the current city head’s priorities. It can be remembered that in 2013, the city was supposed to host Pride; but two weeks before the event, former Mayor Herbert Bautista, a former actor, canceled the event sans consultation with the LGBTQIA community to donate the money that would have been incurred by Pride to the victims of Typhoon Yolanda. Seeing how Pride can be used to honor the LGBTQIA community while also raising funds for those affected by the typhoon, LGBTQIA individuals and organizations organized their own Pride then in only two weeks.
Though Pride in the Philippines had been held in various days in the past, though usually either in June (to follow the Western-dictated ‘Pride Month’) or December, Quezon City actually has an anti-discrimination ordinance (ADO) that mandates for the city to commemorate Pride on the first Saturday of December every year. But this year’s gathering marks the moving of the Pride celebration from December to June in this city.
Already, the next Pride for Quezon City has been scheduled on June 24, 2023.
Pride PH is composed of – among others – #Pantay, Philippines LGBT Chamber of Commerce, Side B Philippines, ASEAN SOGIE Caucus, Galang Philippines, PFIP, Spark!, Babaylanes Inc., and Iloilo Pride.
