US: Parade organiser compares gay groups to Nazis and KKK
New York City Council’s first openly gay leader, who is boycotting today’s parade because organisers barred Irish gays and lesbians from joining the festivities for the 16th straight year, blasted its chairman for remarks that compared gay Irish-American activists to neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan and prostitutes.
“I don’t even think they dignify a response,” Council Speaker Christine Quinn said of chairman John Dunleavy’s comments to The Irish Times.
Quinn, who took office in January, said attempts at brokering a deal with the Ancient Order of Hibernians for the 245th parade fell through.
The city’s Irish gays had long hoped to march behind their own banner, like other groups.
As a compromise, Quinn said they were willing to walk with the City Council as a unified group.
“There were moments where I was hopeful that we could have come to some agreement. But that didn’t happen.”
In the Irish Times interview, Dunleavy said, “If an Israeli group wants to march in New York, do you allow Neo-Nazis into their parade? If African Americans are marching in Harlem, do they have to let the Ku Klux Klan into their parade?”
Referring to the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organisation, Dunleavy said, “People have rights. If we let the ILGO in, is it the Irish Prostitute Association next?”
Quinn told reporters that Dunleavy’s comments “in no way reflect the opinion of Irish New Yorkers; I don’t even believe they reflect opinions of most of the members of the Ancient Order of Hibernians.”
Dunleavy told The New York Times today’s editions that Quinn “is more than welcome to march as the leader of the City Council, but no buttons or decorations in any shape or form.”
Efforts to let Irish gays march under their own banner date to 1991, when parade organisers first rejected an ILGO application.
Instead, 35 ILGO members were sprayed with beer and insults as they marched with a Manhattan division of the Hibernians and then-Mayor David Dinkins.
It was the group’s last appearance in the parade, which draws up to 2 million spectators.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who was marching today, had urged the Hibernians to change their stance.
“I’ve always believed this is a city where all the parades should be open to everybody, and orientation, gender ... should not be the deciding thing,” he said.
Besides the Irish gays, the organisers barred the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform, which lobbies on behalf of undocumented immigrants.
| Related Stories: |
|
