I know this has been a hot topic around the country but I’d like to focus on my hometown for a minute. Minneapolis, MN is a majority white city in a majority white state. The queer people of color living here, myself included, often find ourselves lost to the loud voices of our white counterparts. So when the Pride committee here, Twin Cities (TC) Pride, announced that they were not going to allow uniformed officers to participate in the parade this year, we actually felt like our concerns had been heard. However, two days later they reversed their decision, stating that the police felt “hurt” and thought that the LGBTQ community was being hypocritical since we’re “supposedly all about inclusion.”
I want to sidebar for a moment to state that I hate the way the message of inclusion has become a weapon to use against members of the LGBTQ community. Queer spaces, including Pride, were created with the intention of including those were typically and systemically excluded from mainstream spaces. That sentence alone means that there are certain people and groups, namely those who have little to no problem existing in public spaces as they are, who will not be included simply because they don’t need to be. This unarguably means the police.
When TC Pride announced their reversal and that they’d be allowing uniformed officers into the pride parade, they said doing so was because they were committed to “bridging the divide and continuing conversations on both sides of this issue to ensure we consider alternatives that make each group feel comfortable and safe.” I don’t even have the patience to go into why the idea that it’s civilians’ responsibility to make police feel comfortable and safe is laughable. So I’ll say this in response to every city that allowed corporate sponsorship and uniformed police in their pride festivals:
The police are a tool of systemic oppression against minority groups (please educate yourselves on the government’s use of the police as a weapon against citizens), so to say you wish to consider both sides is to effectively allow the continued pain of the oppressed in favor of the feelings of the oppressor. It is not the job of the civilians to bridge the divide created by our government and their tools. If the cops want to be included in community events, they should start by treating members of that community with dignity and respect, not by strong-arming their way into things.
I didn't choose to be queer or black. To compare a group of people who CHOSE their career, a career steeped in violent history against minorities that continues to be violent against them, to LGBTQ and people of color is completely ignorant. Cops are not a race, ethnicity, creed, or sexual orientation. They're a government group paid for by citizen taxes, and we should be free to criticize and reject them if they do not make us feel safe. And they should be professional enough to be able to do their jobs correctly and without bias in the face of criticism, or they have no right to call themselves protectors.
All of this stated: there's no reason to have uniformed police officers in the parade except as performative allyship. Which is to say, to put on a front that police “support” LGBTQ people and people of color, when in actuality their actions speak differently. LGBTQ people and people of color have, for decades and decades, been fighting and advocating for radical police reform that we still haven't seen happen. So to have cops marching in a parade meant to celebrate the very people who often get the brunt of police brutality, is disingenuous. We don't want to see police perform allyship. We want to see them actually be allies in the form of serious change to their policing tactics and behavior toward marginalized peoples.
Of course, there are officers of color and queer officers as well, but their personal identities do not stop them from contributing to and being part of the systemic issue that is police brutality and profiling. One would hope those officers with marginalized identities understand why their fellow community members seek spaces separate from police, and are putting effort into creating radical change from the inside.
Especially in a city where just a week ago an officer was found not guilty of the murder of Philando Castile, it is wholly disappointing and egregious that police were allowed to march in the Minneapolis Pride parade. Shameful.
[FAQ in response to the statement No Police in Pride]
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