Kelly

The same reason the Irish, Italians, Puerto Ricans, etc have parades - to celebrate who they are.

Justin

Race, gender, age, height, skin color, eye color, hair color, nose size, breast size, penis size, and sexual orientation are superficial, congenital attributes over which people have absolutely no control. The world was made aware of the immorality of judging or discriminating against people on the basis of superficial, congenital attributes over which they have absolutely no control when civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his I Have A Dream speech. In that iconic speech, Dr. King eloquently spoke about his dream of a world in which his "four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character".

Dr. King’s most famous speech makes it abundantly clear that sexual orientation is not an element of people’s character.

Because sexual orientation is merely a superficial, congenital attribute over which people have absolutely no control and not an element of people’s character, it is not a proper basis for judging or discriminating against people; and it is not a proper source of people’s pride. Gay pride parades, which are organized for the purpose of having gay people claim and display pride in the superficial, congenital attribute of their sexual orientation, conflict sharply with the ideal society dreamt about by Dr. King. It would be painfully embarrassing to watch a parade organized for the purpose of having people of any sexual orientation claim and display pride in their race, gender, age, height, skin color, eye color, hair color, nose size, breast size, or penis size because those superficial, congenital attributes do not convey anything meaningful about people’s character; and it is equally embarrassing to watch gay people march in parades organized for the purpose of having them claim and display pride in their sexual orientation, which conveys just as meaningless information about their character as their race, gender, age, height, skin color, eye color, hair color, nose size, breast size, and penis size do. If gay people desperately want to march in a parade organized for the purpose of claiming and displaying pride in an attribute that conveys meaningful information about their character and for which they can legitimately claim responsibility, they should try looking deeply inward to see if they possess virtues like honesty, altruism, gratitude, humor, temperance, creativity, nonviolence, or – hold onto your hat - humility. A parade organized for the purpose of having gay people display pride in their humility would be quite an oxymoronic spectacle to see, but don’t be surprised if some seriously misguided homosexuals are organizing one as you read this column.

Gay people can learn a great deal about the proper sources of pride from the legendary screen actress Elizabeth Taylor. In life, "Liz", as she was affectionately known, was blessed from birth with the heavenly gift of rare and exquisitely beautiful violet eyes. Liz’s violet eyes were a beautiful feature of a beautiful human body, and Liz very wisely and appropriately expressed her heartfelt gratitude for such a wonderful gift from God. Despite having what were arguably the best eyes in the movie business, Liz understood that her violet eyes were never an element of her character, that she could never take any responsibility for them, and that they were not a proper source of her pride. Consequently, she never once marched in a parade organized for the purpose of having people claim and display pride in the superficial, congenital attribute of violet eyes. Instead, she put her emphasis on improving the content of her character by exercising virtues she had mastered, adding new virtues to her repertoire, learning from her mistakes, and performing an abundance of good deeds that benefited other people including many gay and straight AIDS patients. Liz has crossed over now. Her violet eyes do not live on. Like her sexual orientation, race, gender, age, height, skin color, hair color, nose size and breast size, her violet eyes have proven to be temporal attributes relevant to the physical realm of existence only; but the meaningful attributes that always made up Liz’s character and defined the person she was continue to, as John Lennon wrote, "shine on like the moon, the stars, and the sun" in the spiritual heart of her eternal soul.

In addition to mistakenly linking pride to the superficial, congenital attribute of sexual orientation, gay pride parades are highly improper because there are purposely intended to glorify the sexual orientation of gay people only, not the sexual orientation of all people. Straight people’s participation in gay pride parades is strictly limited to literally and figuratively standing on the sidelines and filling the separate, but unequal role of cheerleader for gay people who are busy claiming and displaying pride in their sexual orientation. It is true that gay people have historically suffered discrimination at the hands of straight people, but the correct response to discrimination is never reverse discrimination. Reverse discrimination is an especially heinous sin because if anyone should realize that it is always wrong to discriminate against others, it is people who have suffered discrimination. The only correct response to discrimination is equality for all; and gay pride parades, which exclude straight people from equal participation in them, fall far short of that exacting standard. As long as our society condones parades in which the participants ridiculously claim and display pride in a superficial, congenital attribute over which they have absolutely no control like sexual orientation, gay people need to summon the estimable attribute of courage from the content of their character and stand shoulder to shoulder with their straight brothers and sisters by refusing to march in gay pride parades until the day when it is equally acceptable for straight people to finally stop flogging themselves for their majority status, which arises from no fault of their own, and start marching in straight pride parades.

In conclusion, gay pride parades are morally problematic because they are reversely discriminatory and teach the erroneous lesson that gay people are defined more by their sexual orientation than the content of their character. It is regrettable that some gay people have chosen to respond to the discrimination gay people have historically suffered at the hands of straight people by annually organizing highly publicized gay pride parades that flagrantly ignore the core teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; but readers of this site now know better than to participate in those parades.

This site thanks you for your important question. It has provided a golden opportunity to demonstrate the truth that gay people are as varied in their opinions as . . . straight people are.

I wish you fair winds and following seas.