Pride and Prejudice

GLO’s annual PrideFest has always been a hot topic and not always in a positive way. Many in our community believe GLO mismanages the event and holds it back. The members of this year’s Pride committee set out to quiet those complaints.

Full disclosure, until a few weeks ago, I was a member of the committee. I left for personal reasons, I spread myself way too thin the last year. The Wife has often commented I need to stop trying to save the world long enough to spend some time with her. I can’t argue with that.

I also strongly felt the Pride Committee was over ambitious this year. However, I will say this year’s Pride was much better attended and planned than last year’s event. I suspect that’s due more to the attention the Nazi’s brought to the event than the organizers.

Cabaret was well advertised. Pride was not. At least until Roger Ray got an opportunity to grand stand over the Nazi’s coming to protest.

There were more vendors. PROMO, APO and several church groups were out in full force and likely got some much needed exposure. In addition to the drag entertainment, the committee was able to get live music. The last act, Summer Osborne, kept the party going until 9:20.

I was also pleased to see Jeanette Oxford there, she is an out state lawmaker. She came to help PROMO’s cause. She also got a chance to talk to Cory De Vera from the News-Leader. Sadly, Ms. De Vera didn’t really use much of that interview and chose to focus on the protest instead.

There are three out lawmakers in Missouri. It’s a great story. But I’m sure for the News-Leader it’s a bit too edgy.

And I’m not saying the protest wasn’t newsworthy. At least KOLR 10 and the News-Leader covered it, which is more than can be said for KY-3 and KSPR. Which is sad, because I know the big news is the triple murder in Cole Camp, but given the shooting at the Holocaust Museum this past week, the Nazi’s protesting is also a good story those outlets chose to miss.

However, GLO needs a lot of work in the public relations arena. They can hardly advertise a major event like Pride and didn’t do a whole lot to get their own message out about the folks protesting the event. I hope they can get better at that because it’s really hurting the organization.

GLO offers a lot of great services, from support groups to movie nights. Yet, very few in our community take advantage of it. Sure you can chalk some of it up to people not wanting to hang out on Commercial Street but most of it comes down to poor marketing. Granted, GLO is a volunteer organization and that can be a challenge.

Reaction from the crowd attending Pride was mixed. I heard everything from Pride was better than last year to “This sucks.”

From my vantage point, it seemed most folks were enjoying themselves but Pride was still mostly the same, just with a few more vendors and some loud mouths. And truthfully, unless the GLO Board sees fit to court more business support and run Pride more like the Black Tie affair, it will likely never be more than a big party next to the GLO Center.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with it being a big party next to the GLO Center, but it all comes down to what the Community wants. Which is also problematic because we as a community are SO good at being divided and often our own in-fighting does far more damage than a protest by a fringe group.