(no subject)

[olivermoss]

Fuck, this June I haven't even seen Pride discourse. Not that I miss it, but... the usual focus from content creators I follow, the pride fan art and fics, the events, just.... file non found. Also, fuck Target so I haven't done my usual shopping of their pride collection. Haven't seen pride collections elsewhere, really. I haven't seen chalkings or yarn bombings. No sudden rainbow flags up in corporate owned stores or the cognitive dissonance of 'don't assume our employees pronouns!' signs in stores where those employees are aggressively mis-gendering me because friendly-style customer service tends to be very gendered. Not to mention the queer art and craft events where creators try to get my attention by going 'ma'am, ma'am, ma'am' and then get louder when I don't respond.

June's fucking annoying, but this quiet isn't good.

Comments

[mistressofmuses]

The more indie area was nice, and it's something I'm very glad the event has.

But yeah. The corporate stuff isn't great, and as is the issue right now, can be very fair-weather. At the same time... yup, things cost money, and getting that money from big donors IS a really great way to fund the outreach and community aid and social group stuff for the rest of the year. I heard that the event here was down anywhere from $100k to $250k due to loss of major sponsorships (different numbers from different sources; not sure which is most accurate or current.) Wherever the number actually falls, that's a lot of money, and the need for the services the center provides hasn't gone *down.*
And yeah... same re: cops. Good thought to not want a group with a really fraught history and current problems with the community to be present/no good cops/etc... but yeah, an event of this size *can't* go without something, and private security is also not without problems.
It's all trade offs, and there aren't any perfect, drawback-free solutions.

[olivermoss]

Yeah, that's a lot of money no matter how you slice it. Sponsorships take the burden of funding off of the community. That really sucks.

Someone I know who ran her town's first Pride this year had private security, but also had the local fire fighters there as 'community outreach' with a truck and everything. Fire fighters aren't cops, but they are a deterrent and have medical training. That was super savvy of her.

[mistressofmuses]

That's exactly it... Individual donors from within the community aren't likely to manage multiple hundreds of dollars in donations, as nice as it would be to be completely community funded/supported.

Ooh, that's a great idea, having firefighters present. Definitely less fraught than true law enforcement, but still with a bit of authority and some of the emergency training that would be helpful in case something went badly.