WE WON!

OMG!!!! We seriously won.

We are happy and relieved to announce that, after 25 years of struggle, we have won! The NYC St. Patrick’s Day parade has dropped its bigoted ban: an Irish LGBTQ contingent will finally march with its own banner in the parade next March 17th.

From the beginning, our demand has been for an Irish LGBTQ contingent to march behind their own banner saying who they are, like all other contingents. Today’s decision to invite the Lavender and Green Alliance does just that!

This is a victory for the grassroots organizing, civil disobedience, and street protest of the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization and its successor, Irish Queers. Protests held the line year after year where politics constantly failed. It’s also a victory for our beautiful queer and Irish community of support, stretching from New York City to Ireland and beyond.

The parade issue has never just been about LGBTQ people. Irish people’s struggles are part of our identity: challenges to religious bigotry, demands for women’s rights, Irish republicanism, and struggles against racism in New York and Ireland are irreducible parts of the Irish experience. Irish queers have often been at the forefront of those struggles. We are proud of the complexity of our lives and histories.

The desire to march and the protests against exclusion began as part of Irish queer people’s work to stem the homophobia-fueled tide of AIDS deaths, to push back on the power of the church in Ireland, and to end the pretense that Irish queers are not a central part of Irish culture and politics. Even as other battles were won, the parade’s ironclad combination of bigotry, religion, money, and city politics made it a long holdout against justice. We are tired but happy to see the end of it.

Our thanks: we’re thankful to the many ordinary New Yorkers who supported us over the last 25 years, as well as the many elected official who refused to march in the parade while we were left out. We’re thankful for David Dinkins and others who made real, tangible tries at giving Irish queer people their rightful place in the parade. And we’re grateful to and proud of the original members of the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization – who were also part of ACT UP, the Lesbian Avengers, and other important queer activist forces – who laid the groundwork for this victory.

We look forward to marching up Fifth Avenue with our community!

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What IrishCentral says, and what it means.

Photo: Niall O'Dowd's Facebook page, where he declares
himself an "expert in all things Irish and Irish American."

We've often thought of starting a section on this blog called "Why does the Irish Voice/IrishCentral  hate us now?" The publisher Niall O'Dowd, and his wife/columnist Debbie McGoldrick, have devoted a LOT of effort to dumping on us. Especially when we're winning a little on the parade issue, they inevitably print a story that talks about how we're not really part of the Irish community and don't "deserve" a spot in the parade.

We've never bothered to write those posts before. But now we're close -- really close -- to overturning the ban. And O'Dowd has predictably come for us with his claws out. So we'll take this on, hopefully just the one time.

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What he says: Irish Queers doesn't have "real standing" in the Irish community, unlike another Irish gay voice who is "preferring to continue to negotiate."

What he means: Irish Queers is the follow-on group from the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization. O'Dowd was initially supportive of the group, which he claims to have started by publishing a meet-up notice in the Irish Voice in 1990. His vision, it seems, was that New York's downtrodden Irish LGBT immigrants would find each other, form a social circle, and have no politics other than his own. What happened instead was that Irish queer immigrants -- some of whom were already politicized and none of whom was interested in crowning O'Dowd as their rescuer -- formed a social and political group. ILGO challenged the Catholic Archdiocese, the sexism and racism of the New York Irish political establishment, and the regime of brutally enforced politeness that tried to muzzle queers, Irish republicans, and other protesters.

So when O'Dowd says Irish Queers don't have standing, he means we don't have standing with him, and with the entwined business, political, and religious power brokers who run official Irish politics.

He also means that the Irish community in New York is a tiny, closed circle of people who can be brought in or pushed out -- and not the expansive, bustling community of New Yorkers who share in different aspects of Irish culture, different relationships with Ireland, and wildly different politics. He means: "I own this b****!"

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What he says: "Irish Queers is a fit-for-purpose once a year serial boycotter of the parade. Their website is an angry harangue against the parade and cops who are alleged racists. They are the Irish equivalent of Act Up."

What he means: O'Dowd knows nothing about Irish Queers that he doesn't read in the paper or on this blog, and even there we're only of interest to him when we talk about the parade. He's not interested in our work on antiracism from an Irish perspective in New York, nor our support for Irish activism on Palestine, nor activities like supporting political prisoners. But he does think we're Irish enough to be the Irish equivalent of ACT UP, so there's something. (P.S. A lot of those ungrateful ILGO queers he "saved" were also in ACT UP!)

He also means that challenging racist policing has nothing to do with Irish politics or community. Really, he thinks that!!

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What he says: "Of all people, Brendan Fay and his organization deserve to march in the parade. They have earned it over the years, staging an alternative parade in Queens, being open and inclusive and above all involved on issues outside the parade such as immigration and Northern Ireland."

What he means: There are good queers and there are bad queers. Instead of asking politely for bigots to be nice to them, bad queers confront them on the street and in the press. Instead of negotiating deals in smoky rooms, they prefer public conversations about right and wrong. Good queers go to Mass, they attend fundraisers, they preserve the sanctity of the back room deal. Good queers are grateful to O'Dowd.

He means (it seems?) that homophobia and religious bigotry would have naturally faded under the withering pressure of an alternative parade. That the 25 years of protest at the parade, and of civil disobedience in which queers laid their bodies on the line against church and NYPD violence, were rude diversions by imposters "seeking a cheap headline."

He means he wants to rewrite the history, just at the moment that we win. He wants queer challenges to the NYPD, the church, the City, and the old conservative bastions of Irish New York fade to away. In their place, he wants the story to be that asking nicely is what did the trick. Fat chance.

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Irish & LGBTQ groups, elected officials renew boycott of 2015 parade (Press release)

Photo: @IvanPer4 (Ivan Pereira, AM-NY)

PRESS RELEASE – For immediate release

Date: Feb. 17, 2015

Contact:  Emmaia Gelman, 917-517-3627, irishqueers@gmail.com

BOYCOTT OF NYC ST. PATRICK’S DAY PARADE CONTINUES IN 2015

Irish and LGBTQ groups and elected officials reject parade’s discrimination; secret deal with OUT@NBC leaves in place the long-standing ban on Irish LGBTQ groups.

New York – Irish and LGBTQ community groups and elected officials today announced the renewed boycott of the NYC St. Patrick’s Day parade in 2015. They pledged to uphold the boycott until Irish LGBTQ groups can march under their own banners on the same terms as other groups. Protests will also continue at the parade.

Last year, as the Mayor and the City Council joined the boycott and corporate sponsors withdrew, pressure mounted on the parade’s remaining sponsors, including NBC. In September, parade organizers revealed a backroom deal in which NBC's gay employee group, but no Irish LGBTQ groups, would be admitted to the parade in 2015.

Irish LGBTQ groups duly applied to march as well. In reply, parade organizers claimed there was “no room” for Irish LGBTQ groups in 2015, but they “could apply in future years.” But parade organizers now reiterate that Irish LGBTQ people can only march if they are not identifiable – in other words, as long as they remain invisible in the Irish community – and that no future end to the exclusion is planned. The ban on Irish LGBTQ groups remains in place, as it has since 1991.

“After 25 years of trickery and bigotry by the parade committee, no one is fooled when they say the parade is too short, or that Irish LGBTQ people just have to wait our turn behind NBC’s gay employees. They’ve always tried to sweep Irish LGBTQ people under the rug, rather than admit we’re part of the Irish community.” said J.F. Mulligan of Irish Queers. “The parade organizers haven’t suddenly stopped being anti-gay. They still seem terrified that Irish LGBTQ people exist and walk among them. They’ve tried to evade us by making this deal with a corporate gay group.”

"The Fifth Avenue St. Patrick's Day parade, unfortunately, remains non-inclusive,” said Council Member Daniel Dromm. “This has always been about including an Irish gay organization, not some corporate backed gay group.  Until the parade is truly representative of all Irish people, I don't believe anyone should march in it. New York must do what is done in Ireland and allow Irish lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people to participate. It's just that simple.”

“We've boycotted the St. Patrick's Day Parade in Manhattan for a simple reason: refusing to allow Irish LGBT New Yorkers to celebrate their heritage and their identity by marching in the parade is discriminatory,” said Manhattan Borough President Gale A. Brewer. “Almost all New Yorkers know that continued exclusion of Irish LGBT New York organizations from the parade is wrong. This longstanding struggle isn't solved by cloaking a little-known LGBT group under a quasi-corporate banner.”

“People who support equality must not accept anything less then full, open participation for members of the Irish LGBT community,” said Allen Roskoff, President of the Jim Owles Liberal Democratic Club. “Full equality means participating as identifiable and proud members of the Irish LGBT community. The days of denying our existence by exclusion in the St Patrick’s Day Parade are over. This is not the time for acceptance of a gesture which is hollow, discriminatory and insulting. One must never compromise to bigotry." 

"We will never march in a parade that is not fully open and inclusive of all New Yorkers. Homophobia fuels the AIDS epidemic. It isn't just a personal opinion when it's on display for millions of New Yorkers to witness. NYC has to stop rolling out the welcome wagon for bigots. This public policy – which is what it is – is wrong. The parade should be inclusive or it shouldn't exist," said Jennifer Flynn of VOCAL-NY.

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Irish LGBTQs to Gay Inc: Please don't apply to march

[This letter was emailed to national LGBT advocacy organizations on Sept. 7 and 8, 2014.]

9/8/14

Dear LGBT advocacy organizations,

As we're sure you know, Irish LGBTQ groups have been fighting for inclusion in the NYC St. Patrick's Day Parade for over 20 years. Irish Queers (and its predecessor, the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization, and other groups and allies) has suffered hundreds of arrests for civil disobedience, many years of protesting from the sidelines, and an endless history of enduring insults, threats and beer bottles thrown by parade participants and spectators. Brendan Fay and His Lavender and Green Alliance created a now much-respected and beloved St. Pat's for All inclusive parade in Queens.

Nothing has deterred us from showing up every year on Fifth Avenue and continuing to demand inclusion as Irish people and Irish-Americans in what should be our parade, too. Our annual exclusion is the subject of worldwide headlines every year.

Now the headlines have changed. But the war is not yet won. Parade organizers are trying to finesse their loss of major sponsors by offering a place in the line of march to an LGBTQ employee group from NBC (the parade broadcaster). Parade organizers did not discuss this with any of us, nor have they made a single move to include an actual Irish LGBTQ group.

So we are making formal application for inclusion in the 2015 Parade. We would like your support. We would like you to show up at our press conference on Tues., Sept. 9, at 9am on the steps of the NY Public Library at Fifth Ave. and 40th St. We would like you to contact the parade organizers to support our application. 

And we would like you NOT to apply to march yourselves. This is an explicitly Irish heritage parade. That's why we should be included. Because we are groups of Irish LGBT people. This parade is unique. Unlike the LGBTQ Pride Parades or the Puerto Rican Day Parade or most others, this one does not welcome all comers. It's very closed and specific.

Please do not apply to march. Please support the application of Irish LGBTQ people to march.

Thank you,

Irish Queers

Lavender and Green Alliance

St. Pat's for All

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Statement: Still here, still queer, still Irish; and applying to march.

(Photo: Donna Aceto, Gay City News 9/9/14)

Sept. 9, 2014

Last week we learned that the NYC St. Patrick's Day parade made a backroom deal to invite OUT@NBC Universal, a gay marketing group, to march in the 2015 parade. Today, Irish Queers are applying to march in the 2015 St. Patrick’s Parade, along with Lavender and Green Alliance and St. Pat’s for All.

It’s no secret that parade organizers don’t want to admit that Irish LGBT people are part of the Irish community; and that they use their control over the parade permit to keep us out. Two decades of calls from Ireland and NYC to end the bigotry have not changed the parade committee’s minds.

They’re under pressure now, but they haven’t changed their tune. When Guinness, Heineken, and elected officials dropped out of the parade last year, NBC told the parade committee they couldn’t keep sponsoring unless the anti-gay ban were lifted. So OUT@NBC offered itself as a painless solution. Gay corporate staff can march (under a banner that doesn’t say the word “gay”), NBC saves face, and the parade keeps NBC’s sponsorship – without doing a thing to end the exclusion of Irish LGBT groups.

Parade organizers have said in the press that Irish LGBT groups “can apply to march in future years” and that inviting NBC’s gays is “a gesture of goodwill.” This is an unwelcome bit of Irish nostalgia. ILGO was also told by parade organizers in the early 1990s to "apply to march." The organizers pretended ILGO was on a waiting list because the parade was too long, and made excuses for refusing our application that were uncovered later in court.

Now, less than a week since their “gesture of goodwill”, the parade committee is saying they can’t entertain our application because they’re “under pressure to shorten the parade.” ARE. YOU. SERIOUS.

We’re submitting our application today. And we’re calling on OUT@NBC Universal to refuse to march until Irish LGBT groups march in the Irish parade, under our own banners. We call on OUT@NBC not to be pawns in this triangulation of homophobia, money, and PR.

We want to march up Fifth Avenue as an Irish diaspora that has finally joined Ireland in rejecting religion-fueled bigotry. Let Irish queer groups finally take our place in this year's parade.

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