• Boston, Los Angeles and Seattle are among cities where Pride events will be online-only.
  • Several cities are offering a hybrid of virtual and in-person Pride celebrations.
  • Miami and Chicago are among cities that have postponed in-person Pride events to later in the year.

Jamie Park fondly remembers the sense of belonging she felt attending her first Pride event in Chicago in 2016.

“I just fell in love with the culture and the vibe that they brought and just how everyone felt so free and liberated to be themselves and be proud of who they were,” she said. “I identify as pansexual, so I think it was just a way for me to kind of see my own community.” 

Like so many LGBTQ Americans, the high school advisor from Lansing, Michigan, missed celebrating Pride Month in person amid the pandemic and looks forward to attending this year’s festivities, as more people get vaccinated and travel ramps back up. 

“This year, I am going to New York City Pride, which has been a dream for a while,” Park said, knowing that NYC Pride will look different with it being ahybrid of in-person and online offerings. “I’ve never actually been to the whole shebang. Like I don’t really know what I’ll be missing, so I’ll just go. I know I’m gonna have fun regardless.”

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Jamie Park offered up free kisses at Lansing Pride, which she attended with her friend Brooke Hansen in 2018.

LGBTQ travelers ready to hit the road

A survey of approximately 6,300 LGBTQ travelers around the world found that 73% planned to take their next major vacation by the end of this year, and 43% said they were either likely or very likely to attend a Pride event.

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“In the big cities like Atlanta, you draw a lot of people from smaller towns in the Southeast, where they may not have Pride events or maybe they’re not out at work or with their family,” said John Tanzella, president and CEO of the International LGBTQ+ Travel Association, which conducted the survey. “So it’s sort of an escape to go into a bigger city like a DC or Atlanta, where you can kind of be yourself, amongst other people that are like yourself.”

Tanzella said LGBTQ travelers from larger cities also attend events in smaller towns for a variety of reasons ranging from small town charm to supporting the local LGBTQ community and calling for policy changes and protections.

“It can be more of a political statement,” he said.

Activism is at the heart of Pride

Pride Month itself sprang out of the Stonewall Riots, the June 1969 uprising sparked by a police raid of New York’s Stonewall Inn, a bar popular among drag queens and gay men of color.

“Black and brown trans women started this Pride rebellion that led to everything that we have now,” said Lilianna Angel Reyes, executive director of the Detroit-based Trans Sistas of Color Project. “Unless folks are focusing and pushing services with, not for, trans women of color, then the work is happening void of them.”

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In the U.S., nearly 50% of Latino and Latina transgender adults, nearly 40% of Black transgender adults and 35% of Asian American and Pacific Islander transgender adults live in poverty, according to a study by the UCLA law school think tank The Williams Institute.

At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Trans Sistas of Color Project delivered care packages to transgender women of color around the Detroit area and sent financial support outside the region. For Pride Month, Reyes said they added rainbow or pink slippers, colorful shirts and other bright things to the packages, but “we didn’t really get to celebrate Pride.”

Lilianna Angel Reyes can't wait to celebrate Pride in person this year. While she found ways to support and connect with fellow trans women of color throughout the pandemic, she said they didn't really get to celebrate Pride.

Reyes said she had been “nervous about COVID,” even though she’s used to living in fear. “Trans women, especially trans women of color, often live at a level of fear that is nauseatingly normal. You think, ‘Oh my God, this is a virus gonna kill people.’ I could be killed going in a gas station, simply for being me.” 

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She said she had a difficult time with everything just being virtual.

“I’m really excited for this summer and to see my people again,” Reyes said.

She plans to both travel and attend events closer to home, like the Hotter than July Black Pride celebration and Motor City Pride in September, as well as numerous events with Detroit’s ballroom community of drag queens of color.

COVID-19 concerns remain

Many Pride celebrations around the country will remain online-only this Pride Month, like Boston Pride, LA Pride and Seattle Pride.

Ross Showalter says stories of people who refuse to wear face masks or get vaccinated despite COVID-19 numbers has made him of

In pre-pandemic times, Seattle-area writer Ross Showalter would “typically go to the city parade” or grab drinks with friends.

This year, he said, “I might see a couple of friends and celebrate our queerness in a small gathering, but I won’t be going to any public events or restaurants.”

“Because there’s been so much news coverage and footage devoted to people who refuse to mask up or refuse to get vaccinated despite the numbers, it’s made me wary of people in general,” Showalter added. “I know my friends and their beliefs, but I don’t know a stranger’s beliefs and if they have empathy for someone who might be immunocompromised. I can’t trust strangers to care about those most vulnerable. Plus, I live with immunocompromised people, and I don’t want to bring COVID home to them.”

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