Police said one was charged for graffiti, while two were charged with resisting arrests and assaulting an officer. and it just wasn't enough for folks.”Ī spokesman for the NYPD said at the time that it arrested three people involved in the incident. We were pepper-sprayed and attacked.’ We took a stance of - ‘Well, we weren't there. “Members of our community said, ‘Please stand up for us queer people.
“Our organization, NYC Pride, was called to the table and asked to take a stance,” Correa said. In some videos, officers seem to be using pepper spray against the crowd. Viral videos of the confrontation showed officers rush the crowd of protesters, curse at them, and shove and hit them with batons. Police asserted that demonstrators were vandalizing NYPD vehicles near Washington Square Park. They say that a clash between queer liberation demonstrators and the NYPD during Pride month in 2020 also played a role in the decision. Heritage of Pride said they will be working with a private security team on the day of the parade, Saturday, June 27, to ensure the safety of event participants.
Nyc gay pride incidents archive#
New York Daily News Archive via Getty Images The decision comes as event organizers reckon with the legacy of brutality and abuse against the LGBTQ community by police that they say still continues today. However, this June, the annual march will look slightly different - law enforcement officers won’t be marching in the parade for the first time since about 1981 and there will be a reduced police presence at the organization's events. The Stonewall Uprising of 1969, the culmination of days of protests and clashes with police, was the catalyst for the modern gay rights movement and is what NYC Pride commemorates each year. The 1969 police raid of the Stonewall Inn, the famed gay bar in New York City, was no different than many others before it.įor decades, before and after the riots, some law enforcement officers and agencies targeted known LGBTQ-friendly establishments in an effort to shut them down, brutalize patrons, and arrest people who violated the homophobic and transphobic policies of the time, according to the National Park Foundation, an organization that focuses on U.S.