by Daniel Waldron
“We will no longer tolerate empty words, virtue signalling, or hollow support from those who refuse to protect LGBTQIA+ rights in practice.” – Foyle Pride statement
Foyle, Causeway, and Mid & East Antrim Prides have all announced that the Stormont Executive parties will not be invited and are not welcome to take part in this year’s parades and other events. Other local Pride groups are likely to follow suit in the coming days. This move comes after the Executive’s unanimous decision to indefinitely extend the ban on access to puberty blockers for trans and non-binary young people.
The Socialist Party fully supports and commends activists and organisers for taking this stand. The ban on access to gender-affirming care will lead to needless suffering and potentially irreversible harm for those young people impacted, denying them bodily autonomy and the right to live authentically, and putting lives at risk as a result. Pride began as a protest and must remain so as long as oppression and discrimination against any section of the LGBTQ+ community remains a reality. It is not a publicity event for politicians and corporations who only support our rights when it is popular and convenient.
Many in the LGBTQ+ community will feel particularly betrayed by Sinn Féin and Alliance, parties which claim to fully support our rights. In reality, these parties have not been drivers of change. They have opportunistically adapted to positive shifts in attitudes in society, reflecting decades of work by activists and campaigners, as was the case on the issue of reproductive rights.
Despite constant promises, they have not developed an LGBTQ+ strategy to tackle inequality, for example, in housing and access to services. It took a mass movement to push some who now posture as our allies to support marriage equality. Even before the recent ban, accessing gender-affirming care through the NHS locally was and remains an extremely lengthy and often degrading process.
The Executive parties have shown they are willing to throw us under the bus when it suits them. Foyle Pride’s statement also made clear that those parties “that remained silent when trans lives were under attack” are not welcome either, presumably a reference to the SDLP.
When the ban was initially introduced, Sinn Féin First Minister Michelle O’Neill stated that it was on the basis of “clear and unequivocal” medical advice. The Executive has so far refused calls to publish the detail of this advice. In reality, they are following the lead of Keir Starmer’s right-wing government at Westminster, on the basis of the fundamentally flawed, biased and unscientific Cass review, which has faced widespread criticism, including from the British Medical Association.
The puberty blocker ban is part of a reactionary backlash against trans rights and LGBTQ+ rights more generally across much of the globe, most graphically illustrated under Donald Trump’s new administration in the US. Ideologues of the capitalist system are seeking to demonise and scapegoat trans and non-binary people, as well as other marginalised and oppressed groups, in order to distract from the decay and crisis of their sick system. If this goes unanswered, it will only be the beginning. An injury to one is an injury to all. We must stand up and fight back.
Return to Pride’s radical roots
We need to return to the radical roots of Pride. This absolutely means that parties that betray LGBTQ+ rights should not be asked to speak at Pride events and should not be welcomed either. Neither should corporations that pose as allies here but not in parts of the globe where it is more difficult, including those currently reversing ‘diversity, equality and inclusion’ policies in the US.
This should not mean that Pride becomes less political, but rather the opposite. Campaigning and political groups who have consistently supported LGBTQ+ equality should be freely able to take part in Pride and put forward their views on how we challenge the puberty blocker ban and take forward the fight for liberation.
The stand against the Executive parties responsible for the ban should be taken by every Pride and LGBTQ+ group across the North, and our community should demand that this is the case. Given its size and influence, it would be particularly powerful if Belfast Pride adopted this stance.
This year’s Pride parades should clearly place to the fore the demand for the overturning of the ban, and demand that gender-affirming care be made freely available through the NHS for everyone who wishes to access it. This should be the springboard for a campaign of ongoing protests and civil disobedience, aimed at forcing the political establishment to reverse this ruthless attack on trans and non-binary young people.
Prides this year should also express our solidarity with our siblings in the US and elsewhere facing attacks on basic rights, and fight for an end to discrimination and oppression against all LGBTQ+ people around the globe.
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