
Using this form, you can send a letter to all stakeholders at Pride Toronto, or Mayor Ford and all City of Toronto councilors, or all major sponsors.
Write a letter, send an email, make a phone call. Make your voice heard. It does make a difference! Write us at info@reclaimingourpride.ca and tell us what you did.
Along with the contacts are some suggested letters. Please be respectful. You can use the subject line: Anti-Israel Groups in the Pride Parades.
To Tracey Sandilands, Executive Director, and the Board of Directors
Dear Board of Directors,
I am concerned that the Pride parades are losing their focus. Disgruntled groups are using Pride as a platform to further their own political agenda. Does it make sense that anyone, gay or straight, can say anything at all in a gay Pride parade? Anti-Israel groups are creating a hateful, dangerous environment in a Parade that is supposed to promote gay rights. Please take control of the contents of the parade before it erupts into violent demonstrations.
What has happened to Pride? Hundreds of anti-Israel demonstrators have hijacked the parades! Would this be allowed in any other parade? It is time to set firm guidelines, and enforce them, that only groups supporting gay rights can be in the parades. Pride has evolved. The little march has grown into two super parades, and it needs regulations before it destroys itself. With 2014 on the way, the whole world is watching. Will they see the headline “10 people injured as pro and anti Israel demonstrators clash in Toronto’s Gay Pride parade”? Will Toronto no longer be seen as a safe destination to celebrate Pride?
The inclusion of groups that brand Israel as an apartheid state are hurtful and harmful, and fuels the flame of anti-Semitism. It has no place in a gay pride parade. It excludes and divides the gay community. It will invite other disgruntled groups into the parade and could lead to violence. At some point sponsors and supports will no longer fund if the parade as it becomes a hate fest.
Your responsibility is to keep gay pride true to its charter, mission statement, and value statement. Pride is not a platform for groups that spread hate, and create tension. Pride is for everyone. Pride is about gay rights.
Dear Sponsor (fill in name)
Thank you for supporting Toronto’s Pride parades.
You are aware of the hateful anti-Israel messaging that is taking place in these parades. Middle East politics have absolutely nothing to do with gay rights, and do not belong in the parades. Furthermore, Ontario MP’s unanimously condemned the linking of the word ‘apartheid’ with Israel. Your sponsorship of the parades is seen as an endorsement of this hateful messaging.
I ask you to contact Pride, and ask them to keep anti-Israel groups out of the parades.