Pride Month in Edmonton is more than just a series of events—it’s a testament to everything we have worked towards and all the work we still need to do. As we embrace the Summer of Pride in 2024, we here at YWCA Edmonton reflect on the work Edmontonians and our neighbours have done to build the community we have today. Pride Month also serves as a reminder of the challenges still to come. In the face of legislative threats and increasing hostility towards the 2SLGBTQIA+ community, we take every event and celebration, big and small, as a moment of respite and a chance to reorganize.
Pride in Edmonton
2SLGBTQIA+ people have always existed, but the roots of the modern Pride movement as we know it began in the 20th century. In Canada, same sex activities were criminalized under “Sodomy” and “gross indecency” legislation, resulting in mainly many gay and bisexual men and trans women being jailed for assumed sexual activity. In 1969, one day before the famous Stonewall Riot that would kick off the modern Pride movement in the United States, Canada decriminalized homosexual activity for adults over the age of 21. In 1972, the first recognized pride event was held in Toronto to celebrate that decriminalization, with other cities holding their own events the following year.
In 1980, Edmontonians celebrated the decriminalization of homosexuality with a Picnic in the Park. This was the first recognized Pride event in the city, with 75 people joining the campfire, picnic, and softball game held at Camp Harris.
Despite the decriminalization eleven years earlier, 2SLGBTQIA+ people were still subject to violent oppression and the 1981 Edmonton Police Service raid on the Pisces Spa bathhouse. The community responded with solidarity, offering legal support and spaces to help, and six people banded together to enter a protest raft into the Klondike Days Sourdough Raft Race.
Pride events grew in frequency, intensity, and size over the next decade through one-off events like BBQs and drag shows, with different groups and committees forming to organize them. The first Pride Parade was held in the 1990s, with some participants hiding their identities to highlight the risks they faced and the lack of protection they had based on who they were.
In the thirty years since that first Pride Parade, Pride events in Edmonton have grown and changed to reflect the community it serves, bringing us to 2024: the Summer of Pride.
Pride Today
This year, large organizations across the city will hold Pride events from June through August, including the Edmonton Drag Festival at the beginning of June, Pride Day at K-Days in July, and the Edmonton Pride Festival in August. Small organizations and groups will hold book crawls, poetry readings, dance nights, lecture series, social mixers, concerts, comedy shows, sports events, and queer history walking tours. In homes and apartments, found families will gather to celebrate their loved ones and the lives they’ve worked so hard to build.
Amongst the celebrations, the people trying to keep making the world a better place will have conversations about how far we’ve come and the work that still needs to be done to ensure that Pride can be a safe place for everyone: conversations about decolonizing, conversations about accessibility, conversations about ensuring everyone’s voices are the table.
Those conversations are also about how easily it could all be lost.
In the last year, legislation has been tabled across Canada, targeting 2SLGBTQIA+ people with a heightened focus on trans youth. These policies mirror legislation passed in the United Kingdom and the United States and serve as a reminder of how much work still needs to be done.
Pride is still important. It serves as a chance to recharge and celebrate everything we have worked for in the last year while preparing for what comes next. As hostility towards 2SLGBTQIA+ people increases, those moments of respite found with friends and community will become even more critical, whether they come from late nights up dancing, afternoons in with friends and loved ones, or through intentional work to resist and stand up for those who need it most.
Happy Pride from YWCA Edmonton.
Thank you to CPHS and Rainbow Story Hub for their information on the history of Edmonton Pride.
