Tag: LGBTQ

Atlanta has reigned supreme on the national Black LGBTQ+ Pride circuit by attracting stars like Nicki Minaj and Brandy and by evolving into a bona-fide summer festival with food and retail vendors in Piedmont Park—as LGBTQ+ families sprawl across picnic blankets like they once did in Henri McTerry’s backyard.

Just one story tall and tucked between 7th and 8th streets on Peachtree, a tiny gay bar has built a reputation that towers over many of the skyscrapers that surround it.

“I have always been very clear on this. I do not believe being gay is a sin. This is the way people are born. God doesn’t mess up. We are all a part of God’s creation and need to be celebrated as such.”

Friends, family, lovers, and strangers stitched colorful, personal, and heartfelt tribute panels measuring three feet by six feet—the approximate measurements of a grave, Jones says—that when stitched together create a 1.3 million square foot symbol as iconic as the red ribbon worn to raise awareness about the disease.

While there’s nothing “step” about any LGBTQ+ parents who are present from conception onward, we are still subject to the terminology of the government and the whims of the people who run it.

While the AIDS crisis brought the gay community and its bars together, COVID is driving them apart.

"I didn’t start to feel like a woman at a certain age—I started to feel like a girl. I was five years old, growing up in Arizona, and I prayed to God to turn me into a girl. You can’t tell me that this is a choice."

Atlanta Pride. It is as much an aspiration of what Atlanta’s LGBTQ+ community can be as it is an articulation of what it is today. It is an emblem of queer visibility and power. It has strived toward worthy ideals—yet it has reneged on its central promise of inclusion.

Today, in addition to covering local and national queer art and culture, Wussy hosts events across the city, like drag shows, dance parties, and movie screenings—and founder Jon Dean doesn’t plan to stop there.

In 2012, Thom Baker and Don Purcell found a novel way to counter the anti-gay protesters who spit hateful chants at Atlanta Pride revelers: making out in front of them.