April 18, 2024
Gary Kinsman
Letter of Resignation from Pride Toronto: The Struggle Continues!
To : Pride Toronto Board of Directors and Executive Director, Kojo Modeste
This has been a very difficult letter to write. It is no longer possible for me to remain a member of Pride Toronto given your refusal to respond to the call from Queers in Palestine and your complete refusal to address Canadian state –and your own sponsors—direct involvement in supporting the Zionist genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza and increasingly in the occupied territories as well.
Javier Davila and I proposed holding a Special General Meeting to discuss and adopt Queers in Palestine’s Liberatory Demand from Queers in Palestine,along with other actions to mobilize members against the ongoing genocide in Palestine The Queers in Palestine statement is supported by more than 550 queer and trans organizations around the globe. Our proposal was supported by 19 current members of Pride Toronto, which is a considerable portion of the active membership, along with 8 former members, 64 community activists with the support of Jews Say No to Genocide, the Queer Muslim Network Toronto, Queer Ontario, the No Pride in Policing Coalition (NPPC), Standing Up for Racial Justice – Toronto (SURJ-TO), and Queers 4 Palestine Toronto (Q4PTO). These groups represent hundreds of queer, trans, and gender-diverse people in Toronto{1]. Despite this, you refused to hold this meeting. To deny calling this SGM is a violation of what members asked for and means there is clearly no community accountability for Pride Toronto. Unfortunately, this is what Pride Toronto has become.
As well, Pride Toronto’s main sponsor –the TD Bank not only has $16 million invested in General Dynamics which makes arms and arms components for Israel in both Canada and the US, but is also invested in Coastal Gas Link which is attacking the land and water rights of the Wet‘suwet’en Nation. This breaks entirely with global Pride and queer and trans solidarity with oppressed people. I cannot be associated with this.
I am also the last member of Pride Toronto who was a founding member of the Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee in 1981 that Pride Toronto traces its history back to. This resignation letter is therefore very much about history and memory — a rejection of the social organization of forgetting of the actual history of what becomes Pride Toronto and the importance of the resistance of remembering, our actual rebellious histories. For these reasons this is not a short letter.
When I first came out in 1972, I participated in Pride Marches in 72, 73, and 74 held towards the end of August to celebrate the We Demand demonstration in Ottawa in 71, against the major limitations of the 1969 criminal code reform. I spoke at the 1972 Pride rally on behalf of the Young Socialists that I was then a member of. I was very aware of the Stonewall rebellion against police repression at the end of June in 1969 and its major influence on the emergence of gay liberation, lesbian feminism and gender-diverse organizing in Toronto.
Jumping ahead. In 1981, I was involved in Gay Liberation against the Right Everywhere (GLARE), an organization formed to fight the anti-gay, anti-feminist and racist right-wing attacks on or communities and the Right to Privacy Committee (RTPC), the mass defence organization for those arrested in the police bath raids. Following the mass demonstrations against the bath raids in Feb. 1981 members of GLARE proposed that we needed to do a festival and March to celebrate our lives and Pride while simultaneously pushing forward all of our struggles, including against police repression.
We wanted to celebrate the global impact of the Stonewall riots in the context of the rebellions against the police bath raids that year. GLARE, Lesbians Against the Right, the RTPC and a few individuals came together to form the Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee as a community-based group. That year on the march outside the HQ of 52 Division where the bath raids were organized more than 1,000 people chanted ‘Fuck You 52!” and “No More Shit!”[2], I stayed actively involved in the Lesbian and Gay Pride Day Committee until 1986, including being involved in organizing the combined Pride Festival and March, the ”Sex and the State” history conference , and the International Gay Association (IGA , now ILGA) conference in 1985.
I was also involved in the Simon Nkoli Anti-Apartheid Committee (SNACC) that supported Black gay anti-apartheid activist Simon Nkoli and the struggle against apartheid and racism in South Africa. SNACC participated in Pride marches/Parades and Pride was at this time supportive of the anti-Apartheid struggle.
I remained more distantly connected with the Toronto Pride Committee until I moved to the east coast and then to Sudbury. When in St. John’s I helped to get Pride week organizing started there in 1991[3] and in Sudbury, I helped found Lesbian and Gay Pride in 1997[4]. When I went to Toronto Pride in the 1990s and early 2000s I was increasingly disturbed by the growing presence in the festival, and what was now called a parade, of Banks, Corporations, the Police and sometimes the Military[5]. This was not at all, what we were organizing for in 1981. Support for rebellions against the police, building our struggles with our allies, and support for all the oppressed groups our liberation is bound up with had almost entirely disappeared. Instead, it often seemed to be Corporate, Bank and pro-Police Pride Day. I started avoiding going to the Pride Parade since it was a betrayal of what we did in 1981 and the resistance to police repression at Stonewall and in the bath raids.
There have been various community efforts over the years to develop community and ethical guidelines for corporate sponsorship going back to the corporate code of conduct proposed by the Worker’s Organizing Rainbow Coalition in 1998 [6.]. Unfortunately, these efforts were never successful with Pride Toronto coming to adopt a corporate form of organization with an Executive Director, a Board of Directors, staff and a largely passive membership.
I did not really go back to Pride Toronto events until Queers Against Israeli Apartheid (QuAIA) was formed and was developing the global queer solidarity that we had hoped for when we organized in 1981. I had been involved in Palestine solidarity activism for a number of years and was inspired by QuAIA rekindling the spirit of Stonewall. I then experienced the Pride Board and Executive Director trying to ban QuAIA from the Pride Parade because of pressure from Israel supporters, funders and mainstream politicians. I joined QuAIA contingents in Pride and supported QuAIA being able to march in the parade against bans and censorship. I helped to get many of the founding members of the Lesbian and Gay Pride Committee in 1981 to make a statement supporting QuAIA’s participation and joined in the community protests that forced Pride Toronto to let QuAIA march in the parade[7].
This opposition to Palestine solidarity activists was a precursor of Pride Toronto’s current refusal to support Queers in Palestine and to oppose Canadian state and corporate/financial support for the Israeli genocide. Instead of the history of global queer support for oppressed people around the world by portraying the genocide against people in Gaza as only a “humanitarian crisis” Pride Toronto refuses to address what is actually going on and their own complicity in it as well as their responsibility to listen to and take up the call from Queers in Palestine.
In 2016 Black Lives Matter – Toronto was the honoured group in the Parade. I joined their contingent to make sure people in it were safe. I was there when they stopped the parade for about 30 minutes with a series of longstanding community demands and getting the Toronto Police Services out of the Pride festival and parade given the institutionalized anti-Black violence and racism of the Toronto Police. I remember the torrent of white racist abuse against them including from many white gay men that BLM and allies/accomplices then faced. I rejoined Pride Toronto to support BLM. At the AGM in January 2017, I helped to organize so that all the demands of BLM-TO including the barring of the racist police were supported by about 80% of the membership [8].
It became very clear following the member’s decision to support all the demands of BLM-TO that the then Pride Toronto Executive Director, the Board of Directors, funders, then Mayor John Tory and provincial and federal governments all tried to get the police back into the festival and parade sometimes through grants and funding. This struggle continued with the No Pride in Policing Coalition (NPPC) which was formed in 2018, which I am involved in. The Pride membership has continued to oppose the police having any institutional presence within the Pride festival and parade. More recently, Pride Toronto has participated in training police and also “harm reduction” work with them [9]. Permits signed with the police are now used to increase cooperation and collaboration with the very same police that are barred from participating within the festival and parade.
In 2023 when Pride Toronto along with other Pride Committees got more state funding for the police major problems ensued at the Toronto Pride Trans march when the Indigenous Drumming Group had to leave the march because of the major police presence. When some participants raised concerns about the police, the head Pride Toronto marshal told them to leave the march. The police took numerous photos of participants and did surveillance work on them [10]. A few days later when 2,000 people joined the No Pride In Policing Coalition (NPPC) initiated Abolitionist and anti-Fascist Pride March the police threatened to arrest our marshals. Currently the police are intensifying their criminalization and harassment of Palestine solidarity activists, including queer and trans activists. Pride Toronto has said absolutely nothing against this!
NPPC, in the context of the 2020 global uprising against anti-Black racism and police violence and the Indigenous and Two-Spirit No Pride in Genocide organizing in 2021, in consultation with Black, Indigenous and racialized activists moved in a clear abolitionist direction calling for defunding and abolishing the police and instead developing community-based safety[11]. Pride Toronto, when the late Brian De Matos was involved on the Board, did show some support for defunding the police but even this has now disappeared with Pride Toronto not speaking against the expanding police budget being used against our communities.
This brings us to the current western (including Canadian state) backed Israeli genocide killing tens of thousands of Palestinians, including queer, trans and gender-diverse people. I am firmly involved in Palestine Solidarity as a member of both NPPC and Queers4Palestine. Unfortunately, Pride Toronto while finally months late calling for a ceasefire by portraying what is going on as only a “humanitarian crisis” — without even clarifying that this is crisis is caused not only be the Israeli military but also by western governments including that of Canada — and without breaking with those supporting this genocide is on the wrong side of this conflict. Pride Toronto cannot pretend to celebrate queer and trans lives this June without calling for an end to genocide in Gaza. We cannot celebrate during so much carnage and pain without opposing this genocide and calling for a Free Palestine!
In closing, I am returning to what we were doing in 1981 and the queer and trans celebration of our resistance to the police and our global support for solidarity with oppressed people everywhere.
I am resigning and will instead devote all my time and energy to those carrying forward the spirit of Stonewall, including Abolitionist Pride 2024, which will centrally take up support for Palestine as well as the continuing activism of Queers4Palestine.
In queer shame regarding Pride Toronto but at the very same time wonderful Abolitionist Pride. The struggle continues!
Yours sincerely, Gary Kinsman
References.
1. Statement from Pride Toronto members, community activists and organizations demanding that Pride Toronto hold an emergency Special General Meeting to take urgent action against genocide in Palestine.
To: Pride Toronto
We are writing to follow up on the motion (see below) proposed by Javier Davila and seconded by Gary Kinsman at several recent Pride Toronto meetings: the November 16, 2023 Town Hall, the January 12, 2024 Board of Director’s Q & A, via email on January 19,2024 ahead of the AGM, and officially during the AGM on January 25, 2024. Additionally, the proposal was submitted in writing immediately after the AGM, 2024. Since the proposal was not rejected by Pride Toronto within 10 days of official notice, we request written confirmation that it will be included on the next agenda for an emergency Special General Meeting to be held by April 30th.
We emphasize the urgency of the situation. There is an ongoing and escalating genocide with tens of thousands of Palestinians killed, hundreds of thousands under rubble and critically wounded without medical aid, and over 2 million Palestinians starving and displaced — all with economic, military, diplomatic and political support from Canada.
Many of these are Palestinian queer, trans and gender diverse people. Therefore, we demand Pride Toronto convene a Special General Meeting to discuss and vote on this emergency proposal by April 30th, 2024.
Unfortunately, the rather unpublicized statement issued by Pride Toronto in November 2023 was wholly inadequate. It failed to name or condemn the genocide of Palestinians and neglected to address the root causes: Israeli settler colonialism, ethnic cleansing, illegal occupation, apartheid, and the use of pinkwashing by Israel to justify these actions.
Additionally, the statement did not condemn increasing police repression, violence, and criminalization of anti-genocide and Palestine solidarity protestors in Toronto, nor did it endorse the Liberatory Demand by Queers in Palestine which hundreds of queer and trans groups have supported around the world.
Pride Toronto has also failed to propose or take any meaningful actions to address Canadian economic, military, diplomatic and political support for Israel’s genocide, including the defunding of UNWRA (now finally ended) and the ongoing transfer of arms and war materials to be used in these genocidal actions by Israel as well as the complicity of some of Pride Toronto’s own partners and sponsors (including the TD Bank and its $16 million investment in arms manufacturer General Dynamics).
Organizations like ACT UP NY, which played such an important part in fighting the continuing AIDS crisis have recognized that its obligation to fight in struggles for queer and trans liberation, includes anti-colonial and anti-imperialist struggles. In January 2024 it endorsed the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign called for by Palestinian civil society and is now actively supporting Palestinian liberation.
Palestinian liberation is a queer issue!
Given this emergency, we demand that Pride Toronto take a meaningful stand and mobilize members to take action.
SIGNED BY:
Organizations
1. JEWS SAY NO TO GENOCIDE
2. Queer Muslim Network Toronto
3. Queer Ontario
4. No Pride in Policing Coalition (NPPC)
5. Standing Up for Racial Justice – Toronto (SURJ-TO)
6. Queers 4 Palestine Toronto (Q4PTO)
Individuals
1. NA, Pride Toronto Member
2. J W, Pride Toronto Member
3. Javier Davila, Pride Toronto Member
4. Gary Kinsman, Pride Toronto Member
5. BF, Pride Toronto Member
6. AV, Pride Toronto Member
7. AW, Pride Toronto Member
8. Tom Hooper, Pride Toronto Member
9. AB, Pride Toronto Member
10. JC, Pride Toronto Member
11. MJ, Pride Toronto Member
12. G, Pride Toronto Member
13. AM, Pride Toronto Member
14. ER, Pride Toronto Member
15. Em, Pride Toronto Member
16. ML, Pride Toronto Member
17. E, Pride Toronto Member
18. LG, Pride Toronto Member
19. AK, Pride Toronto Member
20. JP, Pride Toronto Member (former)
21. JM, Pride Toronto Member (former)
22. LB, Pride Toronto Member (former)
23. florence ., Pride Toronto Member (former)
24. AS, Pride Toronto Member (former)
25. SP, Pride Toronto Member (former)
26. NM, Pride Toronto Member (former)
27. IT, Pride Toronto Member (former)
28. AM, Community Member
29. DU, Community Member
30. KL, Community Member
31. BS, Community Member
32. AG, Community Member
33. LG, Community Member
34. TM, Community Member
35. JT, Community Member
36. CG, Community Member
37. FB, Community Member
38. ja, Community Member
39. ÉB, Community Member
40. DH, Community Member
41. AB, Community Member
42. AC, Community Member
43. EB, Community Member
44. HH, Community Member
45. NW, Community Member
46. Ak, Community Member
47. MS, Community Member
48. NW, Community Member
49. F V, Community Member
50. DC, Community Member
51. MCi, Community Member
52. KCl, Community Member
53. MA, Community Member
54. LB, Community Member
55. M, Community Member
56. SM, Community Member
57. NA, Community Member
58. SK, Community Member
59. AJ, Community Member
60. DC, Community Member
61. SR, Community Member
62. PR, Community Member
63. ks, Community Member
64. LG, Community Member
65. FI, Community Member
66. EB, Community Member
67. AA, Community Member
68. GL, Community Member
69. VM, Community Member
70. CW, Community Member
71. CG, Community Member
72. CB, Community Member
______________________________________________________________________
MOTION: Endorsement of A Liberatory Demand from Queers in Palestine
Whereas, Pride Toronto acknowledges the importance of solidarity with marginalized communities globally, and recognizes the ongoing struggle of the Palestinian people against genocide, displacement, land theft, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and the impact of Israeli settler-colonialism;
Whereas, Queers in Palestine have articulated Liberatory Demands that reflect their collective aspirations for justice, equality, and the liberation of their lands and futures;
Therefore, be it resolved that Pride Toronto officially endorses the Liberatory Demands put forth by Queers in Palestine;
Further resolved that Pride Toronto expresses its unwavering solidarity with the Palestinian people in their resistance against oppression and injustice;
Be it further resolved that Pride Toronto commits to signing the statement accompanying the Liberatory Demands and publicly endorsing these demands on all official social media platforms, the organization’s website, and in an email communication to its membership;
Lastly, be it resolved that Pride Toronto undertakes to actively promote awareness, education and understanding of the struggles faced by the Palestinian people and take concrete actions to meet the Demands.
This motion signifies Pride Toronto’s commitment to standing alongside oppressed communities worldwide and contributing to the collective pursuit of justice and liberation.
Moved by: Javier Davila (Pride Toronto member)
Seconded by: Gary Kinsman (Pride Toronto member)
[Re-submitted as an official motion to Pride Toronto via email at
membership@pridetoronto.com on Thursday, 25 January 2024 at 21:28]
2.Gary Kinsman, “Fuck You 52!: Some Notes Towards a Radical History of Toronto Pride 1981,” Radical Noise June 7, 2021 http://radicalnoise.ca/2021/06/07/%ef%bb%bffuck-you-52-some-notes-towards-a-radical-history-of-toronto-pride-1981/
3. Rhea Rollmann, A Queer History of Newfoundland, Chapel Arm, NL Eugen Books, 2023, pp. 129-131
4. Gary Kinsman, “A Contribution to the History of the First Sudbury Pride March,” Radical Noise, Nov. 7, 2017, at: http://radicalnoise.ca/2017/11/04/a-contribution-to-the-history-of-the-first-sudbury-pride-march-in-1997/
5. Gary Kinsman, “Remembering and Resistance the Transformation of Pride Toronto, 1981-2017,” Paper presented at Fierté Canada / Canada Pride Montréal 2017 Conference, August 2017.
6. Gary Kinsman, The Regulation of Desire Queer Histories, Queer Struggles, Montreal Concordia University Press, 2024, p. 350.
7. Gary Kinsman, The Regulation of Desire, (2024),pp, 356-359.
8. See Gary Kinsman, The Regulation of Desire, (2024), pp. xxxv-xxxvi, 359-362.
9. See Gary Kinsman, The Regulation of Desire, (2024),p. 361.
10. See Gary Kinsman, The Regulation of Desire, (2024), Note. 108, p. 430.
11. See Gary Kinsman, The Regulation of Desires (2024), pp. xxxvii-xxx.