Pride is Protest | Journeyman Pictures

Transcript

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What if your daughter or son were

gay? How would you react?

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My daughter and son aren't gay,

so I don't have to worry about it.

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And if they were...

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Then we’d be done.

I’d be done with them.

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If you want to be gay, you be gay

by yourself. Not around me.

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Would I still love them?

No, I wouldn't.

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I would not recognize them.

They would be dead to me.

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Dead to you?

- Yes.

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I believe we are about to have

the greatest Pride celebration

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in the history of this globe.

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Hello, hello, hello, everybody.

Make some noise.

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Are you as excited as we are?

When we say "happy," you say

"Pride."

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Happy...

- Pride.

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Happy...

- Pride.

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My name is Marieke Dermul.

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I don't call myself gay.

Not straight, not bisexual.

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What am I, anyway?

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Maybe I like people.

When I fell in love with a woman,

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my family and friends embraced

this new idea.

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So, I'm lucky.

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But unfortunately, I know

a lot of other stories, too.

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So, I belong to the LGBTQ community,

but which letter do I represent?

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Actually, I don't know, myself.

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And maybe I don't have to.

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I like to go to the Prides

in Belgium.

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For me, the Pride is always

one, big party:

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an extravagant parade

and an ode to freedom and diversity.

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It's the same in New York,

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where the biggest Pride ever

takes place.

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This is where it all started,

with the uprising at Stonewall.

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I want to ask you...

Why are you here?

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Why am I here?

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I'm here for the 50th anniversary

of Stonewall,

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and also to celebrate World Pride.

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Stonewall is important

to the LGBT community,

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but it also is important to black and

brown LGBT community members.

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And me being the latter.

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It's an emotional experience for me.

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It reminds me of everyone who came

before me and brought me here.

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Without Stonewall, we wouldn't

be able to be who we are today.

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It was the catalyst

in just changing everything

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and forcing...

almost forcing everybody to get up

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and fight for what they believe in

and fight for their rights, you know?

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It was a riot, and now it's this.

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And it just means a lot to me.

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I notice Stonewall is still alive

with younger generations.

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The Stonewall Inn was and still is

a café for LGBT people,

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transgenders and drag queens.

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Fifty years ago, gay bars serving

alcohol were officially banned,

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but they were tolerated

in exchange for kickbacks.

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If they didn't pay, the police raided

them, and people were arrested.

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In a park near Stonewall,

I am meeting with Mark Segal.

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He was there when the riots broke out

after yet another police raid.

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Can you tell us about

what happened during the riots?

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The police burst in,

and I mean burst in.

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They slammed people

up against the walls.

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They called us every profanity

that we’ve ever heard.

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Fairy, fag, dyke, queer...

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I was terrified inside the bar.

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But when I got outside the bar,

we were in great numbers.

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Fifty to seventy-five of us.

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I felt empowered

for the first time in my life.

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We started throwing stones

and anything we could pick up.

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The police were trapped in the bar:

the first time we imprisoned them.

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They were always the ones

to imprison us.

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They were scared of us.

We were not scared of them.

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What were you fighting for

at that time?

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I don't think we knew it then,

but what we really were fighting for

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was a change

in how society thought of us.

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There’s one word I've used

throughout my entire life,

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or for the last fifty years:

visibility.

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If you know who we are, we're

no longer the monster in the closet.

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Stonewall marked the start

of the worldwide rainbow movement.

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Exactly one year after the riot,

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the very first Pride ever

took place in New York.

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At the forefront of the battle were

Latinos, Afro-Americans,

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transgenders and drag queens,

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such as Sylvia Rivera

and Marsha P. Johnson.

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Even 50 years later,

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the Pride is still the day

when equal rights are celebrated.

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However, I also hear

a lot of criticism around me

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about what the Pride

looks like today.

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Straight people come

to the World Pride.

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It's not a safe space

for gays only anymore.

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In a fancy loft in Manhattan,

I meet Alexandra Tereshonkova.

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She organizes the Dyke March,

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an alternative march

next to the big Pride parade.

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The Dyke March is necessary

because we need representation

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of lesbians and dykes in Pride.

We’ve been around for 27 years,

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and we began as a protest

to a mostly white, gay male

movement.

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She says that "dyke" used to be

a swear word,

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but is now a name embraced

by the community itself.

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It's a collective word for women,

lesbians, trans persons

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or those who don't feel at home

in the man/woman pigeonhole.

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We want to raise awareness

of how many women

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are in the gay movement.

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Over the last 10 years

that I’ve been in it,

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it has grown from 10,000

to 20,000 that show up,

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just for New York City alone.

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I ask Alexandra if any men

are welcome at the Dyke March,

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for example men who want to show

that they, too, support the movement.

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We don’t want to involve cis men.

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In my experience,

the cis men take over the movement.

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So, we want to prove

that we can do this on our own.

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Cis men, men who are born men

and who feel like men,

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are not welcome at the Dyke March.

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It's why the marches are a safe space

where we can all take off our clothes

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and be ourselves

and be among 20,000 queer women.

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Send her Victoria

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Mary and Gloria

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she’ll lick clit on the floor with ya

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God is a dyke

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How has life changed for lesbians

and dykes since Stonewall?

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I think lesbians and dykes are now

able to assimilate better in society,

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which is both good and bad.

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And I think people are able

to be out more than they were.

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There are no gay raids happening,

like Stonewall.

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But I can say I have a close friend

who wore a Dyke March T-shirt

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and got beat up on the subway

last year.

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I feel a lot of resentment

from Alexandra.

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She is convinced

that the fight is still not over.

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You have to be frustrated,

the way society is now.

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You have to be angry.

We can’t afford to be comfortable.

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It's impressive to feel

Alexandra's activism.

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The creativity, daring

and political slogans

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with which she fights

for more visibility

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of lesbians and dykes at the Pride

move me.

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Later that evening,

at The Stonewall Inn,

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I meet Miss Simone,

a black trans woman.

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A lot of people of color feel

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that Pride has discriminated

and excluded them.

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That’s why they have their own Pride.

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She attends the World Pride

and the Black Pride,

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a march especially for black gays

and transgenders,

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the group that experiences

the most discrimination.

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Now that we've got

all of these rights,

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you have all this other gay people

coming out,

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excluding and discriminating

against their own community.

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And anyone who says differently

is a liar.

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And it comes more

from the gay community

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than from the straight community.

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You don’t look the way I want.

Get out of here.

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You don’t have what I want.

Get out of here.

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Even about The Stonewall Inn bar,

the haven for gays and queers,

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she feels a lot of frustration.

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This place means nothing

to me personally.

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The bar owners don’t want to hire

a lot of black girls doing shows

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or Latino girls doing shows.

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We have our own bars.

You understand?

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This is a museum to a lot of us.

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It's just one day in the year,

which is Gay Pride.

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But the rest of the year,

this is nothing.

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A lot of this is for television.

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A lot of this sounds great.

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A lot of this is for media.

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Do you understand?

It’s a beautiful story.

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It’s a beautiful lie.

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What Alexandra and Miss Simone

told me keeps coming back.

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The more I talk to people,

the clearer it is

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that not everyone is happy

with the Stonewall legacy

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or the evolution of the Pride.

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Many think that the Pride is

being hijacked by companies

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as a marketing stunt.

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Pinkwashing,

that's what they call it.

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Now that I pay attention,

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you can't walk past a shop window

without seeing a rainbow flag.

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One might think:

ah, that's good, all that support.

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Only... the rest of the year,

those flags won't be there.

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There's also the criticism

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that companies pay

for a nice spot for their float,

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while the real LGBTQ organizations

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sometimes have to walk

at the back of the Pride.

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These frustrations are heard

in another protest march:

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the Queer Liberation March.

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One day later,

I meet one of the organizers

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on the outskirts of town,

in an abandoned building.

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We forgot that

we didn't finish our march

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before we decided to parade.

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The work is not close to done.

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Bizzy and his colleagues make

pamphlets and artwork

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that will help shape

the Queer Liberation March.

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We’re making art in protest.

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It's... These are all pieces

that are going to march

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from Christopher Street

up to Central Park.

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And so this, right here,

that you are seeing in front of you,

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is part of a series of puppets

that we’re making.

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Actually, I don’t know if you want to

pan over to him a little bit, but...

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Can you hold your puppet up

a little bit?

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This is our Keith Haring,

the ghost of Keith Haring.

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And so, we're making these forms

that evoke queer ancestry.

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Our past.

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In ways that are sort of symbolic.

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Sort of a raising of the dead, making

enough noise to raise the dead.

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And like: who would we want

to come back

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and be in this march with us?

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For Bizzy, Keith Haring is

a role model.

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He was one of the first artists to

openly express himself as a gay man

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in the '80s and later died of AIDS.

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The fight against HIV and AIDS is

one of the group's major actions.

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Every 30 seconds,

someone dies of AIDS on this planet.

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And every 20 seconds,

somebody else gets infected with it.

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That’s outrageous.

Young kids are dying.

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Still, in 2019, I know

twenty-somethings dying

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of AIDS-related complications.

And that’s heartbreaking to me.

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This is an important theme for Bizzy.

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He tells me

he's HIV-positive himself.

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Here's a personal thing:

I went to the pharmacy

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to get my medicine after they said

everything was in order.

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They showed me

a 9,999-dollar price tag

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on my one bottle of medication

for one month.

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Obviously, I did not leave

the pharmacy with medication.

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This... We are not there.

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Give me my fucking medication.

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What should Pride then be,

fifty years after Stonewall?

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It should be personal.

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It should be a kind of liberty

that says:

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this is what makes me proud,

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and I will move through the world

in the way that I want to,

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with the body that I want to,

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with the morals that I want to,

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with the sex that I want to.

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Be queer in the streets

and in the sheets

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and not have to pretend.

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We can’t parade.

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We have to fucking march.

But we must dance while we do it.

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Stonewall was a riot.

Queers don’t deny it.

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We want liberation.

Fuck your corporation.

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We want liberation.

Fuck your corporation.

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Now.

What do we want?

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Gun control. Now.

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Fuck Trump. Fuck Trump.

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We’re queer.

- We're queer.

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We’re fabulous.

- We're fabulous.

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Trans lives: they matter here.

- Trans lives: they matter here.

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Stonewall never ended.

It has never ended for me.

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It's normal for you to hate me.

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No, it is normal for our people

to hate those who hate...

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Why are you here?

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I’m here because I am defending

this nation against the devil.

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Because it’s an abomination to God.

- Why?

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It’s against God’s law.

- You mean the Bible?

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Yes, the Bible.

The Ten Commandments.

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Where in the Bible is it written

that gay love is forbidden?

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I can show that.

Hold this for me.

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If a man also lie with mankind

as he lieth with a woman,

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both of them have committed

an abomination.

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They shall be put to death.

Their blood shall be upon them.

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And this was written 2,500 years ago?

- Even longer than that, yes.

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But I think, if you look

at all these people,

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you are the only one

with this cross.

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So, don’t you feel alone in this?

- That’s fine. That’s okay.

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I just have Jesus.

That’s my number one friend.

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And that's the one friend

who died for me.

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What if your child

turns out to be gay?

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I’d pray and supplicate to my God

to save my son

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from abomination, from sin.

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So, you would never agree

or support him or her?

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Never, no.

- Wow, that's...

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Because it’s wrong.

It’s wrong. It’s wrong.

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That same night, I never expected

to walk into a church

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which is open to LGBT people

and queers.

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Stronger still,

besides karaoke on Saturdays,

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the church is also there

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for the difficult moments

in their lives.

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I don't believe my eyes.

I haven’t seen anything like this.

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We practice a radical welcome.

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That means everyone is welcome

in the church.

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This is Mark Ersan,

a Lutheran pastor.

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You can’t just say:

Oh, come on in and be like us.

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We have to make space for people

to be their authentic self

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in a loving, safe environment

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where we also talk

about the love of God.

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It’s very revolutionary.

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In fact, for the first couple

of years that we were doing it, I...

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I was actually hesitant

to tell my colleagues

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what we were doing.

I thought people would think:

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you’re nuts, you’re crazy,

you can’t do this.

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There are some people who will look

at what we’re doing and be outraged.

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And so in that way,

yes, I’m pushing.

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I’m pushing boundaries

from traditional practice.

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Would you call yourself an activist?

- Was Jesus an activist? Yes.

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And am I following in His way?

I do the best I can.

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I keep stumbling from one surprise

to the other.

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So many different opinions,

and all of them emphatic.

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It's really: take it or leave it.

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Hence all those

different protest marches,

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sometimes even directed

against World Pride.

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Then I think: don't they weaken

the strength of fighting together?

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Or are they just necessary,

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so that each group can

really make their point?

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What is certain is:

the battle hasn't been fought yet.

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Not even fifty years

after Stonewall and the first Prides.

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I hope the people watching this

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do not think that Pride is

something that is a historical event:

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okay, we’re done, we fought,

we’re good.

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It’s a pride to have in ourselves.

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This is Je'Jae Cleopatra Daniels,

an artist, writer and activist,

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who identifies as non-binary,

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not fitting into one of

the classic gender pigeonholes.

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I meet Je'Jae by chance

on Christopher Street Pier,

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and we start talking.

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We are now at the pier

near Christopher Street

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that was known since the '70s to be

a place of organizing and support

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for people who were LGBT,

who felt discarded.

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00:18:46,039 --> 00:18:48,880

Gay men, in the '70s,

came to find love.

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It moved and evolved

into homeless people coming

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and voguing and dancing,

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to people coming here to still

be able to be themselves

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in a safe environment.

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00:19:00,720 --> 00:19:04,960

It’s like walking down memory lane,

because both for good and for bad,

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there are people

who are here to be themselves

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and some who are not here.

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Marsha P. Johnson was found

drowning here...

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00:19:12,960 --> 00:19:14,680

well, floating.

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00:19:14,759 --> 00:19:18,480

And they said it was a suicide,

but actually she was murdered.

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00:19:21,079 --> 00:19:25,240

If you could make a wish

for the future, what would it be?

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This year, I said:

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the biggest gift you could

give yourself, to your pride, is:

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00:19:29,920 --> 00:19:32,839

celebrate your body

and celebrate your worth.

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Because the more people who are

in pride with themselves,

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the more we have power together

to fight for a good world.

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Finding pride in yourself:

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that's what Je'Jae says

is at the heart of the protest.

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At times people wonder

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00:19:48,279 --> 00:19:52,119

why a Pride always has to be

so extravagant.

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00:19:52,200 --> 00:19:55,799

But according to Je'Jae,

you can only break open the boxes

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by putting it in the spotlight,

loud and clear.

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Like a cry for freedom.

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00:20:16,880 --> 00:20:20,519

This is World Pride,

and we're here for a party tonight.

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It isn't a show, it's a party, so if

you're having fun, make some noise.

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We're happy to have you if you're

a boy, a girl, gay, bi or lesbian,

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00:20:32,559 --> 00:20:36,519

if you're in between, transitioning

and everything else happening

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00:20:36,599 --> 00:20:40,240

and all that. You're welcome

if you don't hurt anyone.

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Can we abide by those rules?

335

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It's my last day in New York.

After a week full of protest marches,

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it's confronting

that after 50 years of struggle,

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there is still no real

equal opportunity for everyone.

338

00:21:19,160 --> 00:21:22,799

How long will it be

until all homophobia and transphobia

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have disappeared and

everyone can really be themselves?

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00:21:26,720 --> 00:21:27,720

Here we go.

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We, as an LGBTQIA+ community,

need to fight now,

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more than ever.

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00:21:35,119 --> 00:21:38,920

More than ever, as the rights

of our community are rolled back.

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We are to be united, and not divided.

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And if you're a straight person

here today,

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use your privilege to speak out

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00:21:49,079 --> 00:21:52,160

against the oppression

happening to us today.

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Pride will never be the same

for me again.

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I will dance, laugh and party,

but at the same time,

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I will experience it

more consciously as a protest.

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I will think of Bizzy, Mark,

Alexandra, Je’Jae and Miss Simone

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and all the others

who made me feel

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why the protest is

still necessary today.

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But also to all of us,

who don't feel free or happy,

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and for whom we have to keep

fighting in the Prides, but also beyond.

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Happy Pride

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Film: Pride is Protest

http://www.journeyman.tv/film/7955

Transcript