Doubtful, but we'll see. It would certainly be refreshing to see a gay-pride parade just "happen" without the usual wingnut hullabaloo.
3rd gay-pride parade in Conway, Ark. has yet to draw protest
BY DEBRA HALE-SHELTON ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
CONWAY — The city’s third gay-pride parade is set for Sunday, so far without the protests that accompanied the first two events. Co-organizer Robert Loyd said Tuesday that he was glad the parade has become almost a nonevent when it comes to publicity. “It’s been great,” he said. “I can’t tell you how thrilled I am.”
The parade is to begin at noon outside what is known as the Pink House on Robinson Street and end at Simon Park on Front Street, which is adjacent to City Hall. Loyd and parade co-organizer John Schenck live in the Victorian-style Pink House. Joining Schenck and Loyd in planning the parade is the Little Rock-based Center for Artistic Revolution, a statewide organization that combines education, community organizing, art and cultural work, and civil-rights advocacy.
Conway has loosened route restrictions that angered parade organizers last year. This time, the parade can cross the downtown railroad tracks, pass the Conway police station and go down part of Oak Street. “We anticipate everybody being orderly,” police Chief Randall Aragon said. Loyd said that, except for two pellets shot through the front windows of the Pink House recently, no complaints about this year’s parade have been made.
“No death threats, no hate mail, no protesters,” he said. “People are getting used to it,” Schenck added. Post-parade festivities will include food vendors, bands, singers and a belly dancer. Plans for the city’s first gaypride parade, in 2004, stirred emotions to the point that a Greenbrier farmer dumped a truckload of manure on the streets around the Pink House the day of the event. Scores of people later stood along the parade route, where they prayed, sang and held signs displaying their opposition to homosexuality.
No major problems occurred during last year’s event despite the presence of some protesters, including several white supremacists.
A couple of pellet holes in a window isn't what I'd call an official "complaint."
1 comment:
I think using children to promote "adult" bigotry is child abuse. That's why I'd like to slap the living shit out of the Phelps clan when I see them with their children holding "God Hates Fags" signs.
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