There has been a series of events in New Zealand over the last fortnight that, to the dispassionate observer, seem inexplicable. First, there was the sacking of Santa—Neville Baker—from the Farmers’ Santa Parade because he stated the obvious—that Santa is a man and he wouldn’t hire a woman for the role. Then there was the replacement of Nelson’s Santa by a “Santa in a Korowai”—in effect, a Maori bloke that organisers told us reflected multiculturalism and diversity. It didn’t—it just messed with kids’ heads. Point is that both events were greeted with derision, a fair bit of gnashing of teeth and a whole lot of shaking of heads in bewilderment.
It would be fair to say that neither is likely to happen again, and lessons have been learnt. A reinstatement and an apology were forthcoming.
Not so the Pride Parade and its board.
Their decision last month to ban police in uniform from this year’s Pride Parade was almost as bad as the other two events in its conception and lack of perception. The difference, however, is that the Pride Board has aggravated what I call its grievous error by seeking and gaining majority support for its stance at a meeting held last night.
Who attended the meeting and how representative they are of the LGBTQIA+ community I have no way of knowing.
What I am prepared to bet though is the vote supporting the decision would in no way reflect the feeling of the wider community, who greeted the original decision with scorn. And nor should it. It is a gay parade and they can do what they want with it. Though I have to say that if this group gets to add any more letters to its already unwieldy LGBTQIA+
name, it soon will be encompassing all the rest of us. Perhaps we are already there, covered by that + sign.
But what got me was the board’s rationale for the less uniform decision. Among other things they cited police mistreatment of transgender people and people of colour. They also said some people who would be appearing in the parade would feel threatened by a uniformed police presence. Pride chair LGBTQIA+ (pick one) Cissy Rock reiterated that as late as this morning. I accept that police mistreatment (and misunderstanding) of the gay community may have occurred in the past and may even continue to do so today. But is penalising the police this way the best way to go about redressing the situation?
It cannot do that. Nothing is ever achieved by shutting down dialogue. Even Pride’s expressed values of inclusion, engagement and diversity suggest that on this occasion the board and its acolytes have acted against what Pride says it is trying to achieve.
Their compromise offer of allowing police to parade if they wore t-shirts is laughable. What should the T-shirt say? “I attended the Pride Parade, and all I got was this T-shirt”?
For our pride’s sake, let’s just get through the silly season and return (I hope) to a sense of sensibility and simplicity.
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