ANNUALLY, DEBATES RESURFACE about whether corporate sponsorship and rainbow branding has made Pride too commercialised, and has led to the movement losing some of its meaning.
In Ballymena, however, as organisers prepare to hold their second annual event, the Pride still carries the hallmarks of a protest.
The large Co Antrim town is one of the North’s most socially conservative. Last year – before the first Mid-East Antrim Pride – a man spread slurry across multiple streets along the route.
And once again this year, the organisers have worked hard to scrape together funding as the local council, where the DUP holds the most seats, have opted not to provide any funding.
Despite the challenges, Curtis Lee, the 25-year-old youth worker who founded the organising committee, remains upbeat about the celebrations to come.
“We started it because we could see a lack of queer community and queer spaces, and there was this feeling that queer people had to look over their shoulder and be guarded when they went out, and we wanted to change that,” Lee said of the event’s origins.
Last year, Lee wanted to hold a Pride-day event, “no matter how small it ended up being”.
“We just thought OK, even if it’s not great and no one comes, let’s make this happen. We thought it might be a one-off thing, and we wouldn’t get the chance to do it ever again,” he said.
At the time, just three weeks prior, chaos had broken out in Ballymena when there was rioting in response to the alleged sexual assault of a young girl.
What started as peaceful protests was quickly overcome by what the PSNI Assistant Chief Constable of the PSNI described as “racist thuggery”.
People who had immigrated to Northern Ireland were burned out of their homes, and locals felt compelled to put signs in their windows declaring that they were not foreigners.
“That was the backdrop but as a committee we said we weren’t going to give into the fear, we wanted to present a different vision of the town. The PSNI officers working with us were very much asking, ‘Are you sure you want to do this?’, but we decided to push ahead,” Lee said.
It was “heartbreaking” then, when Lee awoke on the day of the festivities to hear that the streets where the parade was to take place were smeared with slurry, but he said the town’s business owners rallied behind them.
“That was one of the most heartwarming things. We’d been on the phone to businesses to ask them to decorate their shopfronts – even more have agreed to decorate this year – but after that happened, people got involved to help with the clean-up and see it go ahead,” he said.
The PSNI put out a statement to say that ahead of tomorrow’s event, there will be “increased police presence in Ballymena to ensure everyone’s safety”.
The police force said that Pride is “an important event” for those in the community who are LGBTQ+, and for those who want to show their support.
A PSNI spokesperson added that “protest activity” in opposition to the event is due to take place, and is expected to remain peaceful.
Lee said that parade marshals will be on hand to “form a guard” and to try and “mitigate face-to-face contact and abuse, as was the case last year”.
Lee said that he is confident that the event can go from strength to strength, and continue to bring people from across Mid-East Antrim together.
In particular, he said that he noticed that the event meant a lot to older people who took part last year.
“There’s a man called Phil, he’s coming 80 this year, and one of my real highlights last year was seeing him get to walk around Ballymena with everyone. This is someone who grew up there and was there in the 60s, 70s, the 80s. And the parade, it just meant so much to him,” Lee said.
Mid-East Antrim Pride kicks off on Saturday morning with Pride at the Braid, followed by the parade.
More details are available on the event’s Facebook page.