Video: Ken Coolen on the notion of “pride”

By Sarah Stenabaugh

President of the Vancouver Pride Society Ken Coolen is working on a documentary called The Big Gay Movie with Transmission’s Bob Christie. Due for release in Spring 2009, it aims to depict the truth about discrimination against homosexuality.

Coolen explained that the Pride Festival wasn’t just about the celebration but about the fight for equality for all gay men and women from around the world.

“Pride is about embracing diversity. We had people from as far away as Velamouse, Iceland, Poland, Sri Lanka.  Homosexuality is still considered illegal in about 70 countries in the world and punishable by death in approximately 8 or 9 of those countries, so there’s still a lot of fight to be done.

“The whole concept behind Pride is not just about the celebration, Pride is based in a human rights history. When Pride started 30 years ago in Vancouver, it was 17 guys walking down the street doing a protest march and being booed, hissed, and having things thrown at them.  So, the reality is that we’ve come a long way, but there’s still a long way to go.”

Related: Pride Parade fights for city dollars

Posted by Sarah Stenabaugh on Nov 13 2008. Filed under Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.