Melbourne Marches With Pride

Local News, By Travis de Jonk, 8th February, 2010

Under the theme of ‘one heart, one world, one pride’, a mammoth 97 queer groups braved a scorching Melbourne day, marching as a community with pride and in solidarity down St Kilda’s Fitzroy Street for Victoria’s 15th Annual Pride March.

This year’s pride had seen some small but noticeable changes, including moving the march back to a more family friendly start time of 2pm – making traveling to and from the event more convenient, safer and easier, and which received much positive feedback.

One of the traditions that stayed was the marchers being led by the Dykes On Bikes, and their gay male equivalents, the Melbourne Motorcycle Tourers. Pride March Victoria was next in the proceedings, later revealing Proudly Walking – a world pride song written and recorded in Melbourne specifically for the event.

While the numbers of onlookers had dropped, this year’s Pride March boasted one of the highest numbers of marching participants in the pride event’s history, and by far the best representation of the diversity of Melbourne’s gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer communities.

Queer youth and queer support groups, political parties, gay rights advocates, city councils, queer festivals and community organisations were well represented. Melbourne’s gay and lesbian sporting teams were truly out in force, as were the ethnic pride groups. Melbourne’s favourite queer venues and businesses reinforced their presence. It was exciting to see more of Victoria’s rural queer groups taking part in this year’s march as well.

“We are Pride March ‘Victoria’, not just Pride March Melbourne… that includes all our queer communities, not just the ones in inner city Melbourne,” said Pride March Victoria President Brett Hayhoe in an interview on JOY 94.9 show, The Conch with Paul Anthony.

“We are happy to say our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters in rural Victoria are well represented… You’ll definitely see excellent representation of the many facets of our community at Pride march this year… and every year.”

Victoria Police were without a doubt, the most popular marching group with onlookers. Chief Police Commissioner Simon Overland proudly led the Police along their march with a smile and a wave to the very supportive crowd. It is his first march since getting the top position. Despite coming under fire from mainstream media for participating in the Pride March and ensuring other officers that did got paid for their time at the march, Overland said he had no regrets at all.

“Victoria Police is proud to be a part of Pride. It’s wonderful to have this community confidence and support. We are here for everyone, for all Victorians,” he told Same Same.

Debuting in their first ever Pride March, the recently formed Melbourne gay rugby union team, the Melbourne Chargers were also very popular favourites with the crowd. Also making their debut was Victoria’s only Mardi Gras marching group, the Melbourne Pride Team who showed off their Peace Train to much cheer and amusement. Gay hotspots, the Greyhound Hotel and DT’s Hotel were popular with the crowd, helped along with some fabulous drag artists and some flouncy style. Equality campaigners Equal Love got lots of cheers, as did the Australian Sex Party who called for gay marriage equality, and an end to internet and entertainment censorship.

Other popular groups that received big applause included Greek and Gay, Italian and Gay, Minus 18, Melbourne Queer Film Festival, and queer radio broadcaster JOY 94.9.

However, not everyone got cheers and claps. A couple of floats received boos from the crowd as they marched down Fitzroy Street, such as the Liberal Party float.

Police presence at the event seemed down on last year, but then again so were the number of people attending to view the march. Also down, was the number of volunteers and marshals helping out at the event, with calls for volunteers and volunteer registrations taken till the last minute.

Council permits and changes to venue licencing also changed the landscape of the event, with popular bars and parade view points such as the Prince of Wales hotel and Bandroom balcony restricted to just 70 people each. There was a significant presence of representatives of councils monitoring that new codes were being adhered to with hefty fines dealt out to Fitzroy Street venues over the course of the day, including the Prince Of Wales.

On a positive note, the vibe in St Kilda was the best it has been in ages. People attending felt safe enough to dress more visually queer and flamboyant than in previous years. By all reports so far, the 2010 Pride March was incident free, adding up to be what was a very safe, peaceful and visually queer pride event.

As the march ended, crowds flocked to the Cantani Gardens for more celebrations, entertainment and festivities, scrambling for highly valued patches of shade from the hot sun. As the sun set, the hot summer day barely cooled into very warm and humid night.

A much bigger and faster bar kept the punters happy and hydrated. Community and business stalls featured as part of this year’s Pride March layout with varying degrees of success. What was a hit however was the Gasworks Arts Park stage, bursting with cool queer entertainment including lesbian magician Catch Jameson, a strip show by the King Vic Drag Kings, cabaret queen Yana Alana and the Piranhas, Melbourne’s sexy dance singer Anthony De Fina, and electro group Parralox.

It was the perfect accompaniment to the already popular main stage, which featured the likes of Tracy Bartram, Katie Underwood and the Vinyl Pusher DJs, which kept revelers feeling the pride well into the evening.

Check out Same Same’s photos from Pride March 2010 here.