Just the other week, on July 22nd, we celebrated the Dyke* March in Berlin.
Yes, the parade is the ultimate paradise for lesbians but it’s also a demonstration to show the world that we exist and that we are here proudly celebrating who we are and the community that we have been building for decades from the shadow. “Look over here, look over there, lesbians are everywhere!”
The last weekend was full of queer joy for us with several pride parades and queer parties going on. It felt a bit like Christmas for the LGBTQIA+ community and there was something going on for every sub-group. This year, we not only visited the main pride on Saturday but also the Dyke* March on Friday and the Internationalist Pride that happened on Saturday evening at Hermannplatz. Both of these were pretty much in contrast to the main Pride parade, but nonetheless what stood out was the smiling faces and happiness of all the queer people who joined. And that makes us very happy. Because queer joy matters so much – it’s the rebellion, the antidote, the protest against discrimination, hate, prejudice, prosecution, and inequality.
After a few years of preparation, and another year of delay due to covid, the first edition of the Rave the Planet parade finally took place last Saturday bringing back the magic of the iconic Love Parade to the streets of Berlin. Around 200.000 ravers from young to old came together along the track of the parade that lead from Ku’damm over Nollendorfplatz, Potsdamer Straße, Brandenburger Gate all the way over to the Siegessäule in Tiergarten. A caravan of 18 trucks filled with DJs, performers, and ravers made its way through town filling the air with the finest techno the city has to offer.
It was pretty incredible to witness this first edition, especially since I never went to the original Love Parade that took place in Berlin from 1989 to 2006. The energy in the city was incredible, the people were so ecstatic and it felt like seeing Berlin back to its old strength that we almost thought lost due to the last years.
For the first time, we also had the privilege to experience a parade from the perspective of a truck as our friends from Das Techno Team invited us onto their float. It was a really special pleasure to celebrate this event with their crew and performers. It also gave me the opportunity to capture the event in ways I never could before during big street parades. Check out our Instagram and Tiktok for our video recap. And below you’ll find out photo impressions.
Last Saturday around 1 Million people came to the streets in Berlin to participate in the 40th Berlin Pride Parade. It was a big anniversary for Berlin and possibly also the biggest turnout in terms of people who came to walk or watch. But it was also a meaningful anniversary for the entire Pride movement worldwide. Exactly 50 years ago the Stonewall Riots took place in New York which started the entire LGBTQI movements and all the Pride Parades in the rest of the world in the years and decades that followed.
Even though the parade might seem like a big colorful and joyful street party that celebrated sexual liberty and hedonism there are still important messages sent out into the world with such events. We don’t even have to look very far: Hate crimes against LGBTQI people have gone up in Berlin in recent years. In many countries in the world, Pride Parades are suppressed by governments, such as in Russia, Turkey, and Poland. And most dramatically, many countries still criminalize homosexuality – in the worst cases even punish it by death.
So when we go to the streets in Berlin, we don’t just march for our own accomplishments in terms of LGBTQI rights, but also in solidarity for all those queer people in the world who are still fighting for acceptance and equality.
This week is Pride Week in Berlin which means there is a whole string of fabulous queer events happening. In fact, there are so many events and parties that it might be hard to figure out which ones to go to. But don’t worry, we got you covered. We selected the highlights that you can trust will extra cool!
At the last European Elections in 2014, only 46,7% of Berliners went to the voting booth. This number is fucking disturbing because this means that less than half of the population even cared to make Democracy work.
But in 2019 we can’t afford to be that careless anymore. In the last couple of years, the rise of populism and anti-Europeanism made it clear that we can’t go on with our lives and leave the boring government stuff to the politicians. They will fuck it up if we don’t initiate a movement and start a counter-revolution to these reactionary forces that are unchallenged.
Yesterday, we were again proud of Berlin for showing up and making noise for a progressive and positive European Democracy. One week before the elections for the European Parliament over 25 000 people walked through the city to demonstrate for a free, human and ecologically aware Europe.
Berlin is a crazy bubble in terms of diversity. Nowhere else in Germany are there so many different spaces, places and outlets for the members of the LGBTQI Community. Of course Berlin is not perfect in terms of safety for the said community. We still have harassments of transsexuals on a monthly basis, and I would not always dare to kiss a man at Kotti at night because you never know how the surroundings might react. Despite that, I am more than happy to call Berlin my home, since I feel that no other place in Germany has the same amount of freedom, tollerance and possibilities for people of different sexual orientations or gender identities.
The biggest celebration of this diversity is definitely the annual Christopher Street Pride Parade. Since I came to Berlin at the age of 18, I have been visiting the parade regularly. Some years I remember as stressful because of the heat and too many drinks. Or I felt that the event had turned too commercial, so I decided I’d rather visit an alternative demonstration instead. Other years the weather was a bit tricky. But nonetheless every parade has had its highlights and stolen kisses to tell of afterwards.
My personal highlight of this year was to bring along my little sister to Pride. It was her first big Pride parade and as I wanted to make the experience as memorable as possible, I showed her all the typical Pride rituals.
One sunny afternoon I was minding my own business cleaning my house when all of a sudden the sound of my vacuum cleaner was overpowered by a thumping techno beat that got louder and louder. What. The. Fuck. When I looked out the window there it was: The Train of Love (a.k.a. Zug der Liebe) stomping down Prenzlauer Allee right under my window. I knew it was happening that day, but I didn’t really pay much attention to the details of it so I had no clue it would come past my house.
The street parade (that is not supposed to considered be a second coming of the Love Parade) was not what I expected it to be at all. It was loud, yes, and trashy, oh yes. But it was also one thing: A getting together of all kinds of people! Like a the laziest paparazzi on Earth I sat down on my balcony snapping away pictures of the people who came by. I saw cute hipster kids, costumed crazy people, 90s-style ravers, hot gay guys, moms and dads, happy bottle collectors, flower girls, people in wheelchairs, bodybuilders, Asian trans women, all skin colors, all ages, all styles, all nationalities. This was probably the most diverse and inclusive event that I’ve seen in Berlin and I watched, deeply fascinated, sipping on my Rhabarberschorle on my little balcony…
UPDATE: If you want the Zug der Liebe parade to happen again this year in 2019 you can get involved and support their crowdfunding campaign right here.