Wellington activists the Queer Avengers are unmoved in their mission to up the ante heading into Pink Shirt Day by carrying out the second edition of their Queer The Night march through central streets of the capital. The march will begin at 7PM on Friday 11 May at Waitangi Park by Chaffer St, and end at the Bucket Fountain on Cuba Street. "This is an opportunity for us to come together as a community to show solidarity with our youth fighting against queer oppression in their schools, to respect and remember those who we have lost this year due to homophobia, biphobia and transphobia, and to join us in saying that it doesn't get better until we make it better," the Queer Avengers say. The event is going ahead despite calls from some members of the community for it to be canned in light of backlash over the case of two lesbians who complained they were thrown out of Wellington's Public bar for a brief kiss, then retracted their complaint when CCTV footage revealed they had enjoyed much more than just a kiss, and the media and public scrutiny became too much for them to take. "In spite of recent calls to cancel Queer the Night due to the fallout from the Public bar media backlash, the march will still be going ahead," a Queer Avengers spokesperson has confirmed. "Despite the events that took place, the issue of bullying against our youth still continues, and we firmly believe that this will not get better until we -make- it better. "We hope that you will still all continue to support us on this march." Queer The Night 2011 On 9 June last year, the group held its inaugural Queer The Night march to reclaim the streets and take a stance against homophobia and transphobia. Since then the Queer Avengers have held regular community meetings, marched to the Education Ministry calling for our schools to be made safer, and made international headlines when they glitterbombed notorious feminist Germaine Greer in response to her litany of transphobic tirades through the years. You can discuss this gay New Zealand community news story on the GayNZ.com forum here
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Saturday, 28th April 2012 - 5:04pm