Toronto Pride Meetup!

June 17, 2008 6:04 AM

Toronto Pride meetup?

Attn: queer MeFites (yes, okay, everyone here is a bit queer. I mean queer in bed. Well.. yes, ok. Uh.. boys who like boys and girls who like girls and so on and so forth). And of course non-queers who just want to go have fun with some queers.

I'm not going to the parade, but could be fun to meet somewhere after. Anyone in?

MeMail/email in my profile if you don't feel like outing yourself to the whole site.

posted by dirtynumbangelboy to MetaFilter gatherings at 6:04 AM (32 comments total)

a parade for people who are proud of toronto! sounds like fun!
posted by quonsar at 7:07 AM on June 17, 2008 [6 favorites]

Where's my Hamilton Pride Parade? Huh? Huh?
posted by the dief at 7:09 AM on June 17, 2008

Yeah, I thought Vancouver was the "it" city in Canada these days. Are people really that proud to be from Toronto? The city of Rush? More power to 'em!

(when did "pride" become synonymous with "gay pride"?)
posted by Eideteker at 7:13 AM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

Rush are from North York.
posted by dobbs at 7:22 AM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

Well, there's a rainbow in Toronto.
posted by bunnytricks at 7:25 AM on June 17, 2008 [2 favorites]

No, Rainbow are from England.
posted by jonmc at 7:32 AM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

No, Rainbow [wp] are from England.

England, Canada, whatever. They both love their queens.
posted by bunnytricks at 7:36 AM on June 17, 2008 [2 favorites]

Well, it is quite a borough.
posted by jonmc at 7:38 AM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

OED has a cite from the WaPo back in 1970. Synonymity surely came later, but there's a starting point.

1970 Washington Post 29 June A20/2 It [sc. the march] was the climax of what its organizers called ‘*Gay Pride Week’. 1972 Pride of Lions (Columbia Univ.) Apr. 2/2 What is important is that you come out, have gay pride and leave the dance with a sense of Gay power. 1987 J. RULE Memory Board vi. 96 She toyed with the idea of joining one of the early gay pride marches. 1993 R. SHILTS Conduct Unbecoming I. ix. 95 Hence, gay pride became a movement watchword. ‘Coming out’, or acknowledging one's homosexualityeither privately to oneself or publiclybecame like a born-again experience to the new gay activists. 2000 M. ALBO Hornito 27 Last weekend was Gay Pride, and I spent it on Ecstasy, howling, walking around in the gold boot-cut jeans I got at the Salvation Army for three dollars.
posted by cortex at 7:39 AM on June 17, 2008 [2 favorites]

I spent it on Ecstasy, howling, walking around in the gold boot-cut jeans

or what I call Thursday...
posted by dawson at 7:50 AM on June 17, 2008

Does North York even exist anymore? I thought it had been amalgamated into history.
posted by timeistight at 8:41 AM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

Its still there, ugly as ever.
posted by captaincrouton at 9:35 AM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

Does North York even exist anymore? I thought it had been amalgamated into history.

It's not technically a "city" anymore, but people still use the old city names to indicate specific areas of Toronto.
posted by orange swan at 11:45 AM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

a parade for people who are proud of toronto! sounds like fun!

Oh yeah, it's much more fun than the North Jersey Shame parade, which they don't warn you about on the tourism brochure.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:35 PM on June 17, 2008 [4 favorites]

Yeah, whenever I phone up Toronto Hydro on my semi-regular Sunday afternoon power outages, it still calls my neighbourhood part of the old city of York. Quaint, whot?

throws rainbow glitter at the dief
posted by maudlin at 12:36 PM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

Where's my Hamilton Pride Parade? Huh? Huh?

It was last weekend. www.hamiltonpride.com
posted by sevenyearlurk at 1:02 PM on June 17, 2008

Oh yeah, it's much more fun than the North Jersey Shame parade, which they don't warn you about on the tourism brochure.

Then there's the Delaware Ambivalence Parade, which is kind of meh.
posted by jonmc at 1:53 PM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

Y'all, Pride Week in Toronto is h-u-g-e huge, and no one ever calls it "gay pride" anymore. It's just Pride Week or Pride or Toronto Pride or Pride Toronto.
posted by loiseau at 3:41 PM on June 17, 2008

I think I'm still hung over from Pride last year.
posted by SassHat at 5:28 PM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

....yeah.

Okay, now that you've all got that out of your systems, can we please get back to the actual topic?
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 6:47 PM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

Yeah, for those not from Toronto, I think the (Gay) Pride parade now out-draws Santa Claus.

Of course, Santa has no Leather Men or Dykes on Bikes, so it's hard to compete.
posted by GuyZero at 7:07 PM on June 17, 2008

Seriously, I walked around most of that weekend drunkenly yelling, "I'm not wearing any pants!" (I was).

If that's not on topic, I don't know what is.

Sadly, I will be out of town for a wedding. A boring, straight wedding. Boo!
posted by SassHat at 11:04 PM on June 17, 2008 [1 favorite]

I'll come. That is, I will if there's going to be an actual date and venue for this.

I'm straight, but I love the gay. Platonically, yet passionately.
posted by orange swan at 6:09 AM on June 18, 2008

I think the Toronto meetup I went to a few weeks ago was 50% queer anyways... how many of us are there? I have a lot of stuff planned for Pride already (ooh look at me, mr popular) but set a date, and if I can attend, I will.
posted by sevenyearlurk at 7:07 AM on June 18, 2008

Why the hell aren’t you going to the parade? Nobody said you had to “march.”
posted by joeclark at 7:28 AM on June 18, 2008

Because I don't particularly feel like getting up at 8 am in order to get down there for 10 and get a decent spot, and then bake in the sun for the next two hours bored out of my skull and fiendishly guarding my spot against the asshats who are trying to push me aside, and then bake in the sun for another three hours once the whole thing gets started?

I'd rather nail a good spot on the patio at O'Grady's at around 1PM and stay planted there for the day.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 9:02 AM on June 18, 2008 [1 favorite]

Oh.. and I've been in a couple of parades, on floats, so been there done that, really.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 9:03 AM on June 18, 2008

Oh.

So is there a consensus on location, time, &c?
posted by joeclark at 8:14 PM on June 19, 2008

Only seems to be you and the Swan who are interested.. come find me, I'll be the drunk guy.

(more seriously, MeMail me and I'll send you both my cell number. Just call me when you're down there and we'll figure something out.)
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 9:29 PM on June 20, 2008

O'Grady's? I may come, I have sunday off. I'll have to find somebody to cockblock for me though. Those linesmen are huge.
posted by tehloki at 10:28 PM on June 24, 2008

Do you have my #, tehloki?
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 8:21 AM on June 26, 2008

The port-a-potties are gathering on Church street, so it can't be long now :P
posted by Chuckles at 12:05 PM on June 26, 2008