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Without notice, Mayor Paula
Hicks-Hudson began busting a move. Councilwoman Yvonne
Harper, caught up in the music and celebratory vibe of Pride
Day, also spontaneously broke out in a complex but
coordinated choreography of spins, twists and other bodily
gyrations. Neither lacked confidence in their ability to
move to the contemporary rhythms at last week’s Pride
Parade.
This year’s festive event was
an opportunity for the LGBT Community and its allies to come
together to celebrate winning the fight for marriage
equality. The crowd, estimated by some to be in excess of
20,000 people, was “our most diverse Pride ever,” according
to Sheena Kadi, former field director for Why Marriage
Matters Ohio.
Without a doubt, the festival
was a “Party with a Purpose.”
Among the participants were
Faith Organizations, churches, small and large businesses,
local politicians and advocacy groups, including the
Community Solidarity Response Network and representatives
from the local Black Lives Matter movement.
Does the diversity of
Toledo’s Pride event represent a trend for the politics of
social change and if so, will the black community, including
its religious network, be “tardy for the party?”
For the most part, the
chronic pain of black struggle has monopolized black
attention and desensitized the African-American community to
the pain of other people’s struggle.
“I think there’s still a
hesitation in the black community to get behind some LGBT
issues, but that’s just something as individuals and
collectively, we have to get people to realize that it’s
important that they make connections to fight against all
oppression,” says Julian Mack, local Black Lives Matter
movement leader.
“Getting more black people to realize that all Black Lives
Matter, so that it’s not necessarily like you’re trying to
talk them into getting behind necessarily the LGBT movement,
but if one of us aren’t liberated, then none of us are, and
that’s why it’s important. I think some people still don’t
want to make that connection. Even at times in the past,
what brought awareness to me specifically, is I realized
that all races are really connected and we’ll never get
there unless we stand against all oppression.
As Dr. King said, ‘Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice
everywhere.’ It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about the
LGBT community, if we’re talking about women, if we’re
talking about our Native American brothers and sisters, it
doesn’t matter. Or, if we’re talking about members of the
homeless community, it’s all connected.
As black folks, we also need to realize that, say for
example, women’s issues and the fact that women as a group,
make like 73 cents on the dollar for what an average male
makes, well its worse for black women. Whereas you look at
the struggle that members of the LGBT community go through,
it’s worse for black people. And, you can even look at the
homeless population and the things that homeless people go
through. Black people are over-represented.
And so, we have to realize that these fights that each
individual group goes through aren’t separate. The ideology
of white supremacy is connected into all these different
areas of oppression. It’s all connected,” Mack adds.
For certain, then, success in fighting an inclusive and
interconnected system of oppression will necessarily require
a diverse but coordinated response. No one group, alone, can
carry the entire spectrum of oppression on their own
shoulders.
For the LGBT community, spreading the burden of fighting
oppression more broadly across other oppressed groups was a
Soul Train Moment.
Now if the black community can get in step and join the Soul
Train line of “distributed struggle,” we too, can overcome.
Contact Rev. Donald Perryman, D.Min, at
drdlperryman@centerofhopebaptist.org
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