Toronto Pride parade shut down by pro-Palestine demonstrators and frightened police

[quote]About 30 demonstrators, calling themselves the Coalition Against Pinkwashing, held banners and chanted on Yonge Street, just south of Wellesley Street, three and a half hours after the parade’s 2 p.m. start. Floats and marchers making their way south toward the parade’s finish at Nathan Phillips Square were stranded behind the protesters, who chanted “Free Palestine” and “Pride is a protest.”

[quote]And 45 minutes after the protest began, Pride Toronto announced the remainder of the parade — billed as Canada’s largest — was cancelled.

They shut down Canada's biggest Pride because of 30 people?

More Pride in New York.

Massive brawl breaks out at Washington Square Park in NYC as Pride Celebrations Continue, NYPD do not appear to have succeeded in shutting down the park.

Apparently somebody was disrespected

What a charming group of people r2

When did gay men stop going to Pride? When did they drop the Gay from the name? Today in NYC it is majority female. And more queer than gay.

R4 fourth-wave feminism (aka 'woke') began in the early 2010s... so within the past decade.

Pride could be a protest, for gay rights. Not for gay haters’ (Palestinian) rights.

Whatever. It sucked after it stopped being about real gays and lesbians.

Why the FUCK are Gay Pride parades always taken over by some other group? And we just fucking allow it?

Of all the places - these are most like Muslims leading the protests. I get there CAN be some gay Muslims, but I doubt it.

Gays and Lesbians have allowed everyone else under the tent and they've taken over.

They have used our compassion against us.

Oh - and they had a list of 'demands' - WHAT THE HELL ARE PRIDE DIRECTORS SUPPOSED TO DO? What power do they fucking have to divest a country's investments?

Seriously these people need to be slapped viciously and forcibly removed. Why don't gays fight back and remove them?

[quote]Gays and Lesbians have allowed everyone else under the tent and they've taken over.

Inclusivity just lets in the riff-raff.

Picture this: an intimate celebration of well-dressed, well-spoken, and well-adjusted individuals celebrating their identities in a walled garden free of activism. They hire Maya Rudolph to dress as Donatella and she tells the personas non grata to “Geetttt outttt now!”

R8 makes a good point. People have a right to express an opinion on Palestine, but if they think Canada isn't being supportive enough then they need to petition the Canadian government to change their policy. The people who run the Toronto Pride Parade have no control over it.

[QUOTE]Police said they had “adequate resources to address the protest,” but were respecting Pride Toronto’s request that officers not interfere if protesters disrupted the parade, police spokesperson Laurie McCann told the Star.

Sorry, but who were the frightened pussies here? Why did organizers not give the OK to haul the blockers off?

Can't find any mention of this on CBC or CTV news... at least Radio-Canada covered it (must be the holiday)

R13 God, that picture looks demonic.

Is it Pride or Halloween?

[quote] I get there CAN be some gay Muslims, but I doubt it.

There have been Gay Muslim groups marching in the parades for well over a decade.

[quote] Of all the places - these are most like Muslims leading the protests.

If you look at the photo in the article, those are some pretty pale-looking blond muslims.

So… groups of assholes linked up with Islamic fundamentalists are organizing to disrupt and shut down gay pride parades.

Because “genocide.”

Sure Jan.

Iran must be laughing its ass off at the stupidity of these sheep.

I might have canceled the parade on the basis of the celebrant at r13 alone.

They're going to do this shit and get away with it just days after those two lesbians were attacked in Halifax? Like, fuck off.

Imagine waiting in the staging area for literally hours. And maybe this is your first Pride or your first Pride in your new country, only to have it cancelled and you can't match because of these assholes.

Go protest in Gaza. See how well that works out for you.

Remember when Edmonton pride or was it Calgary pride was cancelled because of a local group protesting to basically have all attention pointed toward them?

Then the BLM interruptions across multiple pride celebrations.

We can not take on every group's cause - and this is NOT the place for it. You wanna do that stuff? Fine - but do it elsewhere.

It's like they KNOW how compassionate G&L people can be and seek to abuse it. Any other parade and these people would have been beaten up or removed.

Lastly - the decision to NOT use police force and to cancel the parade over 30 people is the biggest shittiest move. Because you want people to feel safe? The mental gymnastics here is disgusting.

I can’t believe a tiny group of people cancelled an event for thousands. Canada seems quite fucked.

The police encouraged them, I'm thinking.

A pro Palestinian group also stalled Winnipeg's Pride parade earlier in the month with a list of demands.

R24, I'm beginning to think that the police aren't doing anything about the pro-Palestinian groups that are disrupting cities across Canada (arson at synagogues, university protests which block students and staff, disrupting traffic etc...) to stick it to Trudeau. We have our own election coming up next year and Trudeau is WAY down in the polls. These pro-Palestinian groups and protests are not helping him.

R26 - the parade organizers told the cops not to do anything. What you're saying may be true - but they did this to themselves. Yet again.

I wonder how the 100,000+ parade attendees felt about waiting for a parade that never fucking came. Or the thousands who spent so much time and energy for their spot in the parade but never got the chance to march.

The parade organizers should be about the people watching, the people marching and the community. Not some punk-ass group of 30 people who want to hijack it for their own performative glory and sense of righteousness.

Pride has become ghetto fest. No thanks. I'll be on my lanai having sippy poos and listening to my hummingbirds. I'm proud of that. Whatever those animals are doing in that clip R2 have nothing to be proud of.

R27 and another thing - those who stopped the parade BETTER NOT have gone to the rest of the pride events and enjoyed themselves.

Fucking selfish assholes.

The problem with these groups in Canada they seem to ONLY protest when there are gay people involved.

They protest the parades. Nowhere else.

They protested when the police apologized for bathhouse raids. Nowhere else.

What that tells me is they have zero respect for gay people and think that anything related to gay people is insignificant compared to their “cause”.

Do they protest at Caribana? No.

Do they protest at any muslim festival? No.

Do they protest at any other insert-country-here festival? No.

Do they protest at parliament? No.

These people are homophobic assholes and don’t deserve anyone’s attention.

There may have been one protest that affects the general public but anytime a group is involved that they want to fuck over it’s always one that includes gay men.

Wghich means the right is paying for it.

R30 - the problem is because the Pride organizers ALLOW it. Yes, it's outrageous that our events are held hostage by these groups, but the organizers also cave into them.

Gays and lesbians need to develop a backbone for all these groups that want to come in and take over.

Asexual? Questioning? Your opting-out of sexual behavior does not include you. Don't get me started on the obvious other groups who have tried to re-write gay history and have taken over our resources.

[quote] Do they protest at parliament? No.

Uh, I'm in Ottawa and they have protested pretty much every week since October. However, since the convoy of spring 2023 the police here are a lot stricter about blocking traffic, etc. Curious to see if they block Ottawa's pride in August (or Montreal's for that matter).

The parade itself really wasn’t disrupted. The “protest” started at 5;30, which was shortly before the parade was to end anyway which is probably why the police and Pride Toronto didn’t bother to intervene.

Not defending these cunts, but the parade for the most part went off without a hitch.

What are they up to today, Canada Day?

I know one of them got into Trudeau's face the other day when he was visiting some Asian market.

Justin was on Church Street yesterday, I think, but I don't think he marched in the parade this year.

Good. Canada is another western country giving carte blanche to a bunch of fascists to commit mass murder for real estate.

Think back to when the Serbs were committing ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. The West intervened to stop it. Imagine if, instead of fighting it, we actively funded and encouraged it. People would have been in an absolute uproar, and they’d be right.

[quote] The police encouraged them, I'm thinking.

Keep your woke head in the sand.

Police are banned at Pride because blacks find it triggering.

𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐘𝐎𝐑𝐊

The New York City Pride March was temporarily held up on Sunday when a small group of pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel activists broke through the barricades and blocked traffic from passing for around 30 minutes, resulting in several arrests.

The protesters, numbering around a dozen, broke through the barriers on the sidelines of the LGBTQ pride parade as it wove its way through Greenwich Village on Sunday afternoon, and threw red paint, intended to symbolize blood, on vehicles driving along the route.

They then sat cross-legged in the middle of the road, holding banners proclaiming that there would be “no queer liberation without Palestinian liberation,” and “Palestine will be free.”

The demonstration lasted for around half an hour, during which the protesters led a series of call-and-response chants with onlookers. “Free, free, free Palestine,” they chanted.

WAWOG said the "actionists" had vandalized the float of the Human Rights Campaign, alleging the NGO had partnered with arms manufacturers.

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𝐒𝐓 𝐋𝐎𝐔𝐈𝐒

Nineteen people were arrested by the St. Louis Metropolitan Police on Sunday after they had blockaded the city's Pride parade. Parade organizers had requested the SLMPD give dispersal orders for the protesters who had created a human wall by connecting their arms with chains and PVC pipes. Three warnings were reportedly ignored before the police made the arrests.

"SLMPD requested assistance from the St. Louis Fire Department to respond and used an assortment of saws to cut through the pipes and chains extricating the individuals," said the police.

Resist St. Louis said that the parade had then resumed, but the crowd had supported their cause by chanting anti-war slogans even after the activists had been arrested.

The group had been joined by St. Louis Activist, St. Louis Palestine Solidarity Committee, Resist Washington University, and St. Louis Jewish Voice for Peace to protest Boeing's corporate sponsorship of the parade.

"[The 1969] Stonewall [riot] was an Intifada," the groups said on Instagram. "We will never accept merchants of death at Pride."

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𝐋𝐎𝐍𝐃𝐎𝐍

𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑟𝑡𝑦 𝑎𝑛𝑡𝑖-𝐼𝑠𝑟𝑎𝑒𝑙 𝑎𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑠 ℎ𝑎𝑑 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑒𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑟𝑢𝑝𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐿𝑜𝑛𝑑𝑜𝑛 𝑃𝑟𝑖𝑑𝑒 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑎𝑑𝑒, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑀𝑒𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑝𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑎𝑛 𝑃𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑐𝑒 𝑎𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚 𝑜𝑛 𝑆𝑎𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑑𝑎𝑦 𝑖𝑛 𝑎 𝑝𝑟𝑒-𝑒𝑚𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑜𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛𝑠𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑠𝑝𝑖𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑦, 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑇𝑒𝑙𝑒𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑝ℎ 𝑟𝑒𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑑.

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𝐒𝐀𝐍 𝐅𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐈𝐒𝐂𝐎

In response to SF Pride’s growing corporatization, association with police, and response to the rising civilian death toll and ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza, some have decided to opt out of the event. How many boycotted Pride altogether or attended alternative events is unclear.

But one counter event, a “No Pride in Genocide” march co-organized by Jewish Voices for Peace, attracted more than 500 marchers on Sunday and created a two-block-long parade. Meanwhile, thousands watched the main event, which went on for blocks.

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Boston, Philadelphia and Denver. Yadda yadda yadda

They didn't do this for St. Patrick's Day parade, Memorial Day parade, Puerto Rican day parade, etc.

I know that most of these protestors ARE LGBT+, but fuck them about making it about them and their cause.

You think the powers that be - or Israel or Hamas - are going to see 30 queer activists in the middle of the street and go - hey, they're right. We should stop all of this!!

Bunch of fucking egomaniacs.

Shut the fuck up r39. I’m so sick of you fake ass idiots and your bullshit.

Uh, there's no Puerto Rico parade or Memorial Day in Canada, R43.

Anti-Israel agitators destroyed floats at New York Pride parade, block parade route. Ten in custody.

[Quote] Shut the fuck up [R39]. I’m so sick of you fake ass idiots and your bullshit.

This is how people reply when they know you’re right and they’re wrong — they melt down and tell you to shut up.

Maybe reevaluate a position they are unable to defend? Nah.

Also I love the argument that opposition to ethnic ckesnsing is “fake.” It’s such a shoddy defense mechanism.

Like saying “you aren’t really opposed to mass murder, who could be against that? Only FAKERS!!!”

WTF do American Pride celebrations have to do with a war on the other side of the planet? WTF do American GLBT people have to do with Israel/Hamas?

These protestors are so fucking selfish and ridiculous.

Absurd

If they disrupt Fourth of July celebrations, they will get a much stronger response from the crowd.

There is nothing to celebrate this year. The USA is no longer.

Queers for Palestine is the dumbest most toxic brand of gay ever minted. No, I don't think the pro-Hamas protestors are mostly straights, I think they're mainly the QUEERS!

Toronto isn't in the US, R52.

Canada is not woth celebrating either. It has clearly failed as a nation.

If we actually were to elect the conservatives I’m not certain they would do anything about immigration and I don’t agree with most of what they stand for.

Well no R47 actually you are a fake ass idiot phony baloney and full of shit. There is a full ass war going on and if you think it's nothing more than genocide you know nothing of war, religious fundamentalism, and you are one of the most stupid people on the planet. Nah, you're really a complete moron.