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Boston right-wingers troll LGBTQ community with a “Straight Pride Parade”

Organizers claim parade, which has appropriated the rhetoric of the LGBTQ community, will take place at end of August

By on June 5, 2019

Photo: Boston Pride, via Facebook.

A group of straight guys in Boston are trolling the LGBTQ community and its allies by proposing a “Straight Pride Parade” later this summer.

Mark Sahady, the vice president of Super Happy Fun America — the group organizing the event — announced in a Facebook post that Boston city officials are “working with us on the parade.”

“We filed a discrimination complaint and it appears the City of Boston understands they would lose in litigation,” Sahady wrote. “…We will have the streets closed and be allowed floats and vehicles. The tentative date is 8/31 but will be finalized in the next few weeks.”

The proposed parade route is identical to the one being followed by marchers in the Boston Pride Parade, which will travel from Faneull Hall to Copley Square on Saturday, June 8.

“If you would like to come as an individual, march as a group, or bring a float or vehicle, then get in touch. This is our chance to have a patriotic parade in Boston as we celebrate straight pride,” Sahady concluded.

Super Happy Fun America has designed a “straight pride” flag and claimed actor Brad Pitt as their “mascot,” according to its website. The website appropriates much of the language around inclusion used by the LGBTQ community to cast straight people as an “oppressed majority,” in a dig at what many right-wingers see as LGBTQ people’s embrace of “identity politics” and “political correctness.”

“We will fight for the right of straights everywhere to express pride in themselves without fear of judgement and hate,” John Hugo, the president of Super Happy Fun America, said in a tongue-in-cheek statement posted on the website. “The day will come when straights will finally be included as equals among all of the other orientations.”

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Hugo previously told The Washington Post that a “very famous gay conservative” would serve as keynote speaker at the Straight Pride Parade, and that Super Happy Fun America is advocating for the addition of the letter ‘S’ for “straight” to be added to the acronym LGBTQ.

The Boston Globe reports that city officials have been in contact with the group, but have not issued the permits necessary to hold a parade.

According to Boston magazine, Sahady is involved with the group Resist Marxism, which has organized demonstrations trolling other left-wing causes. The group organized the 2017 “Rally for the Republic” that was intended to enrage the Left by mimicking the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va., that infamously ended in the death of a young woman and several violent skirmishes between alt-right protesters and left-wing counter-protesters. It also organized a pro-gun protest in response to the pro-gun reform March for Our Lives.

Boston Mayor Marty Walsh and organizers of Boston Pride both issued statements that effectively ignored the Straight Pride Parade and instead focused on this week’s pro-LGBTQ celebration.

The concept of a Straight Pride Parade was met with varied reaction on Twitter, with some people mocking the idea and others reacting angrily to it.

Comedienne Kathy Griffin took to Twitter with a joke, writing: “Ok #StraightPrideParade?? Honey, nobody wants to see a float made by a bunch of heterosexuals. At least outsource that part to the gays. Gays, make sure you give them a nice, healthy upcharge.”

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“Will ‘Straight Pride’ be a Freaky Friday type situation where all of our history books, movies, stories, media, news, etc feature mostly LGBTQ+ people & perspectives? Will people have to come out as straight? What would folks march in? Socks w/ sandals on? Dad jeans?” cracked U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).

One user mocked potential parade floats, including one dedicated to a “Giant AXE body spray,” eliciting a response from the deodorant company, which tweeted: “We’ll be at the parade that matters and this one isn’t it.” 

Actor Chris Evans and the band Smash Mouth blasted the organizers on their own Twitter accounts.

Actor Wilson Cruz echoed critiques made by several other Twitter users by pointing out that straight people are not an oppressed group.

“There are straight pride parades everyday ALL over the world. It’s called walking down the street safely. That said, we have #LGBTQ #Pride MARCHES because the first one was a RIOT!” Cruz wrote. “What do we want? EQUAL RIGHTS! When do we want them? NOW!!”

But other Twitter users pointed out that the whole idea of the parade — whether it actually occurs or  not — is to provoke an angry response from the LGBTQ community and its left-wing allies.

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