The past couple of weeks have seen various newspapers and websites filled with the same shit from a number of politicians and parties who are just after what little publicity they can get, whilst showing themselves up as the discriminatory, biased and un-Christian and judgemental people they are.

Belfast Pride, along with Gay Pride events of many other cities throughout the world, is a celebration of equality, diversity and a fight for greater acceptance of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender people. No matter where one stands on the issue, whether it is an inherent belief that only the “traditional/conventional” family is the one which should be allowed, or by following an interpretation of the bible, homosexuality is wrong, the point is that homosexuals exist in society. Both men and women have same-sex attractions, and why should any one person’s belief stop this from taking place. Who are you to tell another how to live?

The Christians who protest such an event have every right to do so, but I would like to think they would not give themselves a heart-attack in the process, as one gentleman looked like he was close to doing; yelling abuse at the revellers as they passed by. However, believing that the LGBT “community” has no right to this one day in which gay couples can hold hands while walking through the city, is such a shame.

With their exclaims of “SODOMISER!”, “REPENT!” as well as shouts of “YOU’RE GOING TO HELL!” — now, to me that just doesn’t sound very Christian at all — it seems that their reason for attending is to attempt to show up the gay “community” as being unruly, flaunting their sexuality or shouting abuse at them. It is unfortunate that these people stand at the side with their angry faces whilst everyone else lining the streets and those taking part are having a great time, soaking up the sun, enjoying the party atmosphere and simply being themselves.

The very fact that the DUP, Northern Ireland’s largest political party, is so against this parade, going so far as to use words like “repugnant” when describing those who do take part; men, women and children alike only shows their backwards and outdated their views which need to be drastically reassessed. Whereas the majority of other political parties can be found in the paradeas well as a number of union groups.

Green Party

Sinn Féin

Alliance Youth

Workers Party

It was a completely tongue-in-cheek banner, which got the knickers of Jim Allister (TUV) in a twist, but it’s okay to shun those LGBT people and tell them they’re going to hell? Because it [allegedly] says so in your bible. It’s only extremely hypocritical. The banner in question read: “Jesus had two dads and he turned out ok”, is not entirely false, but still not how Christians like to see it.

And then there was the case of the Connor Kerr, who brandished a large sign with the words “Jesus, save me from your followers”, unfortunately it is clear he was looking for trouble from the beginning. When he got round to the protesters (who, for some reason were moved to the corner of Donegal Square North and Donegal Square East) he decided he was going to stick around and get some publicity. Mr Kerr proceeded to shove his sign in the faces of the protesters, most of which were silently holding their own banners, and then shouted in the face of one of the protesters — who wasn’t being particularly quiet himself — but when asked to move on by myself, a fellow Pride organiser and then a police officer, he continued to antagonise them and give a bad name to the parade. Later claiming that he was assaulted in an article in The Gown, since retracted (see cached article).
Here is a YouTube video which shows the embarrasing behaviour of this individual.

Sadly, this is not what Belfast Pride is about. This is not in accordance to the rest of the day’s events, and so to pick out one or two of those amongst 30,000 as very petty, and says a great deal about the parades and riots around the Twelfth July.

As the bible says: “There is One Lawgiver and Judge… So who, then, are You to Judge your neighbour?”

But as I like to say: “Be as gay as you like, the bible is entirely fictional anyway.”

Tagged: Belfast Pride, LGBT, Photography, Politics | no comments »