London's annual Gay Pride parade through London's West End celebrated 40 years of the Gay Liberation Front, which first brought LGBT rights into the public arena. London, UK. 03/07/2010
At the head of the march was the London Gay Liberation Front (GLF) banner, along with activists including Peter Tatchell and other original members. In June 1970, the first Pride march took place in New York City, and in October that year the GLF was founded and called for an end to discrimination in law, in employment, in education and by society at large, and an end both to feelings of guilt and shame around homosexuality and the eradication of prejudice.
As Lisa Power says on the Pride web site, the "GLF organised the first and the best gay demonstrations; they invented gay nuns, Gay Days, gay communes; they made demands instead of requests; and they improvised the first London Gay Pride."
In 1970 when gay people in the GLF marched on the streets for the first Gay Pride it was the start of a new open and radical gay movement. Almost all of the groups in the parade of thousands of people today owe their existence to the GLF, and before its pioneering work the idea of such an event was truly unthinkable.
Even into the 1990s, Gay Pride was very much a protest, a radical event that many people agonized about before coming out to take part. Now it is more of a carnival, attracting as corporate sponsors major companies who want to promote themselves in the gay community, chasing the "pink pound" as well as other commercial organisations providing more targeted services.
But something of the old Pride still remains. Many of the unions that take part have played an important role in combating discrimination in employment, and there are still radical groups such as those calling for asylum for LGBTI refugees, Unite Against Fascism and some student groups.
