Berlin Pride goes virtual due to coronavirus
July 25, 2020
The 42nd Berlin Pride was almost an exclusively online affair on Saturday, as opposed to the usual street festivities, due to the coronavirus pandemic.
A studio with a live stage was created at the House of Statistics in the centrally located Alexanderplatz in the German capital.
Roughly 30 organizations and representatives of various lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT+) groups participated under the motto "Don't hide your Pride!"
Read more: Berlin remembers homosexuals killed by Nazis in World War II
Equal rights
"In our city, in our country, we must not accept that there are homophobic attacks," Berlin Mayor Michael Müller said in front of a rainbow banner at City Hall, with his comments being broadcast on YouTube. "There is trans and homophobia, there is exclusion, there is violence."
The vice president of the German lower house, the Bundestag, Claudia Roth of the Greens Party, called for "equal rights and not just a bit of equal rights."
While the afternoon program was made up of initiatives and their objectives, entertainment with music was planned for the evening's celebrations.
Christopher Street
While the focus of this year's event was on online activities, some smaller events were also included people gathering on the streets of Berlin. A "Dyke March" with roughly 1,000 registered participants made its way from the Neptune Fountain at Alexanderplatz to the Brandenburg Gate.
The latest event comes after several thousand marched for equal rights in the German capital last month, in what was described as a "substitute" Pride parade.
Pride celebrates LGBTIQ rights across the globe. In Germany, it is known as Christopher Street Day, in memory of the events of June 1969 when LGBTIQ New Yorkers fought back against police who had stormed the city's Stonewall Inn bar on Christopher Street.
jsi/dj (dpa, epd)