A festive event, it will regain all its colors after two years of restrictions due to the Covid: the LGBT+ Pride march takes place this Saturday in Paris. Others take place simultaneously, notably in Montpellier and Biarritz. Update on this emblematic event, which was broadcast throughout France.
A massive demonstration
The Paris parade usually brings together 500,000 people, making it one of the most important recurring events in the capital. This year, the participants will march from the Porte Dorée to the Place de la République, under the motto “Our bodies, our rights, your faces!” “. This is in particular to protest against the “trivialization” of “LGBTQIphobic and especially transphobic speech”, too often ignored by the public authorities, according to the associative collective Inter-LGBT, which organizes this march.
“Today, the notion of gender is very much under attack, especially when it is deployed in the school environment,” laments Matthieu Gatipon, one of its spokespersons. “The rhetoric of the far right is that associations are brainwashing young people. And the result of this discourse fueled by transphobia is that we have 89 RN deputies, ”he added during a press conference on Thursday.
“LGBT centers are being attacked, LGBT people are being attacked every day. We would like a little more support from the government, which claims to be our ally but does not do much, ”added Elisa Koubi, co-president of the collective.
–
45 years ago, the first Parisian march
A movement for the defense of homosexual people was formed from 1971 in France and first took part in the May Day parades. “This is the moment when homosexuality becomes a political issue”, recalls Antoine Idier, sociologist and historian.
The first independent homosexual demonstration in Paris took place in 1977 (7 years after the first Pride in the world, in 1970 in Chicago). Participants rail against repression and discriminatory laws.
Sequins and Politics
Sequins, rainbow flags, songs and dances: Pride marches are usually festive. “The homosexual movement has always claimed to be both political and festive,” emphasizes Antoine Idier. “The festive dimension makes it possible to break with traditional politics”.
The homosexual movement claims “a form of politicization of the body, of the intimate, of private life, but the party also embodies all these elements”, adds the historian.
Saturday, some 30,000 people are expected at the arrival of the Parisian march, for a free show involving a hundred artists, including Bilal Hassani.
–
Alternative processions
In addition to the usual demonstration, alternative marches have appeared in recent years, displaying other slogans and demands, often more protesting. This demonstrates “a proliferation and enrichment of LGBT + activism”, rather than a “scattering”, recently analyzed in The world sociologist and historian Ilana Eloit.
On June 4, a thousand people marched in Saint-Denis for the second “suburban pride”. And on June 19, there were some 50,000 in Paris at the anti-capitalist and anti-racist “Radical Pride”, according to estimates by the organizing associations.
“There has always been a debate within the homosexual movement to know whether it should speak only of homosexuality or criticize society as a whole”, describes Antoine Idier.
For Elisa Koubi, of the inter-LGBT, “it’s very good that there are other steps”. “We are always someone’s radical”, and the different manifestations are “complementary”, she adds.
Multiplication of steps
Pride marches take place in many countries. In France, they are organized locallyby associations, without coordination at the national level.
In the early 1990s, the first marches took place in the regions. “For a long time, we stayed with a march in Paris and a few others in the main big cities”, notes Denis Quinqueton, co-director of the LGBTI+ Observatory. “We have observed a swarming for a few years”.
Marches were thus organized for the first time this year in cities such as MulhouseChâlons-en-Champagne, Carcassonne or Périgueux, as well as in rural departments such as Lozère and Oise.
“Society has evolved a lot on these subjects. 30 years ago, some people would not have dared to demonstrate”, but “today, this is less the case”, notes Mr. Quinqueton.
–
