June, as most of you know, is Pride Month here in Lansdale and across the country. Pride is all about people coming together to celebrate the freedom to be their authentic selves in unabashed fashion without shame, condemnation, or judgement. In Lansdale, our Pride celebration is commemorated in a half mile walk up and down the sidewalks of Main Street where revelers can fly flags, play music, and chant to help celebrate the LGBTQ+ community and to support everyone’s freedom of expression.
Pride is organized around June to commemorate and pay homage to the Stonewall Riots which took place in New York City in 1969, where NYC police officers raided the Stonewall Inn, a known LGBTQ+ club located in Greenwich Village, and violently dragged patrons and staff out of the establishment for breaking New York State’s “Gender Appropriate Clothing” Statute (this law has since been repealed).
This sparked six days of protests, riots, and violent clashes with police in and around the Stonewall Inn.
Pride’s celebration in Lansdale is a recent, but extremely positive, development. Several years ago, a local resident decided to carry a pride flag up and down Main Street to celebrate the month. Within a few hours several others joined him to help honor Pride. The following year, the Pride Walk had begun! Going from a few dozen walkers that first year to several hundred expected this coming weekend.
It is important that we continue to celebrate Pride because it lifts our whole community up. When we support our LGBTQ+ community members we are helping to create a Lansdale that understands that the welfare and success of each of us is dependent, fundamentally, on the welfare of all of us. We cannot allow people to live in the shadows or feel shamed into being something they are not.
When, as a community, we accept people for who they are, as they are, we are building a Lansdale that helps everyone to thrive. In my eyes, that is the critical test of a democracy. It is our duty to elevate the condition of all people, to lift artificial weights from all shoulders, and to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all. If we can achieve that, we can build a Lansdale that is truly moving forward together.
For details on this year’s Pride Walk, click here.
(Mayoral Musings is a weekly op-ed column submitted to North Penn Now, courtesy of Lansdale Borough Mayor Garry Herbert.)
See also:
Mayoral Musings: Memorial Day 2022
Mayoral Musings: Vacancy Ordinance Discussion
Mayoral Musings: Lansdale’s Dr. Frank Boston Memorialized
Mayoral Musings: Lansdale 150th Parade and the Class of 2035
Mayoral Musings: Municipal 5G and Fiber Infrastructure
