Seattle Pride Organizers Apologize for Complaining About Event Charging White People Reparations
The Seattle HRC said, “educate yourself on the harm it may cause Seattle’s BIPOC community in your pursuit of a free ticket to an event that is not expressly meant for you and your entertainment.”
Capitol Hill Pride organizers Charlotte LeFevre and Philip Lipson caused an uproar when they had the nerve to bring up an event charging white people a reparations fee.
LeFevre and Lipson learned the Take B(l)ack Pride event, hosted by Queer The Land, Trans Women of Color Solidarity Network, and Momma Nikki, plans to charge white guests up to $50.
From the Taking B[l]ack Pride event Facebook page:
****All are free to attend HOWEVER this is a BLACK AND BROWN QUEER TRANS CENTERED, PRIORITIZED, VALUED, EVENT.
The safety of Black and Brown Trans and Queer folks is PARAMOUNT and we will make sure the safety of our community is prioritized at all times.
White allies and accomplices are welcome to attend, but will be charged a $10 to $50 reparations fee (and given a wrist band as proof of payment) that will be used to keep this event free of cost for BLACK AND BROWN Trans and Queer COMMUNITY but to also ensure that performers can be paid well. ****
LeFevre and Lipson brought up the event to the Seattle Human Rights Commission, which posted the letter on its Twitter account:
It has come to our attention that an event called ‘Take B(l)ack Pride’ at the Jimi Hendrix public park June 26th is charging Whites only admission as reparations. We consider this reverse discrimination in its worse form and we feel we are being attacked for not supporting due to disparaging and hostile e-mails. Please review this event’s stated admission policy as we feel this event is violating Seattle, King County, State and Federal equality laws.
Additionally, we would like you to investigate the event as a possible ethics and elections violation as Take B(l)ack Pride is hosted by Nikki Etienne – a campaign manager for Nikkita Oliver who just recently dropped out of our event Capitol Hill Pride over non-support of “Take B(l)ack Pride”.
Nikkita Oliver is a candidate for Seattle City Council’s Position 9.
“We will never charge admission over the color of a person’s skin and we resent being attacked for standing in those values,” concluded LeFevre and Lipson.
Capitol Hill Pride sent us this note 1/2 pic.twitter.com/te62OaQPOY
— Seattle HumanRights (@SeattleHRC) June 18, 2021
It’s possible no one would know about this letter if the Seattle HRC did not post it on its Twitter page.
But it seems Seattle HRC posted the letter to humiliate LeFevre and Lipson. They responded that their concerns do “not in fact violate any of your human rights as stated in the UN Declaration of Human Rights, which is the charter by which our Commission operates.”
They also kindly told them to check their privilege:
Furthermore, we would like to urge you to examine the very real social dynamics and ramifications of this issue. Black trans and queer peoples are among the most marginalized and persecuted peoples within the LGBTQIA2S+ community. They often face shame not only from the cis-heteronormative community, but within the queer community at large as well. In making the event free for the Black Queer community, the organizers of this event are extending a courtesy so rarely extended, by providing a free and safe space to express joy, share story, and be in community.
We would like to recommend, if possible, that you educate yourself on the harm it may cause Seattle’s BIPOC community in your pursuit of a free ticket to an event that is not expressly meant for you and your entertainment.
If you still take issue with this and would resonate better with a reason explained from a white or white passing member of the queer community, we would be happy to connect you with a number of allies.
Our response to Capitol Hill Pride 2/2 pic.twitter.com/R7gcNNnvNb
— Seattle HumanRights (@SeattleHRC) June 18, 2021
Well, the humiliation worked because people started to pull out of the Capitol Hill Pride event.
LeFevre and Lipson caved. They apologized:
Dear Community,
We apologize for the inquiry to the City of Seattle regarding Take B(l)ack Pride, it was not meant to be an attack or divide but to ensure equality for all.
Capitol Hill Pride encourages community events and our mission is to recognize the LGBTQ+ community and all spectrums.We sincerely want to elevate the segment of the LGBTQ community especially of black transgender women, recognize the important history and contributions and support this segment of the hidden rainbow.
At this time we have requested an invitation of a meeting of hosting parties to resolve any issues and find common ground.
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Comments
Yawn. This is a fight in a forest. So the age old question applies, will anyone hear it?
Let them implode. At this point, I’m far beyond caring.
WAIT A SECOND
I disagree with reparations and I think proponents have no credibility unless they first get African countries to pay reparations for their role in African slavery.
I think we stop all discussion of Reparations until first Nigeria, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Ghana and other African countries who sold their own people into slavery pay billions of dollars to the decedents of the people who they enslaved and sold to slave traders. Start first with where this all originated.
Africa is still enslaving people, that is no doubt where slavery started so long ago. I guess we could say that slavery was probably invented in Africa.
Just the Africans? The biggest slave traders in Africa were Muslim, and they’re still enslaving Africans to this day (not to mention the million+ slaves they took from Europe and millions more enslaved in India and North Africa).
“Pride organizers apologize.”
Yeah, but they’re not sorry.
Of course they’re sorry they made the complaint. They’ve suffered a financial loss because of it, and they’ve been forced to humiliate themselves with a public apology. That they haven’t actually changed their beliefs isn’t completely relevant. While the communists would like to effect an actual change, as in 1984, in real life even the USSR and Red China were not often that successful, and had to be satisfied with forcing people to act, in public and in private, as if they had been convinced of their error.
That’s right.
This a an official body, an appointed board by the Mayor and City Council, funded with taxpayer dollars.
Pretty sure that they need to find an Attorney from IRL (in real life) instead of the cosplay Attorney who told them they could ignore the US Constitution, State Constitution and almost certainly the City Charter in favor of a ‘UN declaration’.
Yeah, if I was in Seattle I’d be asking for a free ticket, getting told I have to pay and happily taking their money from them in court.
If Seattle Human Rights Commission tells me that I have to suck it up then it’s just more money.
Someone in Seattle find a contingency lawyer, this feels pretty straightforward.
the notion that black or brown people are “unsafe” around white people is disgustingly racist.
I guess it doesn’t disgust me because I stopped caring after the wokeness became a big thing. They can be around me, or they can be far from me, it’s up to them.
This is intended to be a segregated event. They just used the charge for white people to keep them away. Also, it will make sure that any white people who do come and pay the charge will be so woke that they won’t complain about the racist nature of the event.
“The Seattle HRC said, “educate yourself on the harm it may cause Seattle’s BIPOC community in your pursuit of a free ticket to an event that is not expressly meant for you and your entertainment.” ”
Yep, they’re practically asking for a separate event for whites. But the whites won’t dare do it.
The harm it will do? None. Absolutely none whatsoever.
In fact, quite the opposite. It’s important for the other attendees to encounter people with a different skin colour and sexuality to their own, that hold conflicting political views, and that are there for fun and a good time and really can’t be bothered with all the racism.
Actually, I’ve convinced myself. Straight white people have a moral obligation to attend. For free.
So who gets all these reparations? Find a race that at some point hasn’t been a slave many in the US. Natives, white for example. What this amounts to pandering by the guilty liberal low IQ types.
This odious trend of practicing blatant racism and discrimination against “white” people is now clearly in vogue, among the vile Dhimmi-crats and their constituent, self-perceived “victim” groups. And, this poison is spreading.
“event that is not expressly meant for you and your entertainment”
So, it’s meant for the entertainment of LGBTQA+ people? If the even is for entertainment everyone should be able to attend. Otherwise it’s discrimination.
I’m taking this to mean if you aren’t LGBTQA+ then they don’t want your support. Ok, cool.
The event is expressly meant for the entertainment of LGBQWERTY people who are BIPOC (and wait till that initialism starts expanding toward infinity).
Everyone is able to attend. They say so explicitly. But white people will be charged a fee and told that it’s not intended for them, they’re just bystanders.
Enter by the back door only. You may not order food or drink. Make your delivery of submissive ally foot-kissing to the cook on duty, then leave promptly.
Well, it turns out that this whole thing was the organizers’ fault, because they addressed their complaint to the wrong body. They sent it to the Seattle Office for Civil Rights, which was the correct body to handle it, but they addressed it to the Human Rights Commission, which was not.
Since they addressed it that way, the OCR forwarded it to the HRC, which dismissed it so insultingly. Now that the OCR understands that “Capitol Hill Pride intended their initial email to be processed as a civil rights complaint through the SOCR Enforcement division”, it has begun doing so.
When you make an official complaint your first duty is to find out what is the proper body to send it to. If you make a complaint to an advisory body that has no investigatory or enforcement role, you shouldn’t be surprised that it won’t investigate your complaint or enforce the law. Though you shouldn’t expect the sort of insult that the HRC made.
Still, since the organizers have now been forced to apologize or lose their livelihood, the whole thing may be moot. I assume they will also be forced to withdraw their complaint from the OCR.
People of White (POW) are not welcome under the Rainbow banner of inclusive exclusion or political congruence (“=”). Diversity breeds adversity.
That said, a symbol to represent the transgender spectrum, a mask for genderphobia, and, apparently, a banner waved by neo-Nazis. While Nazis bray Jew privilege, neo-Nazis bray White privilege. Progress: one step forward, two steps backward.
Speaking of pride parades, were there any lions, lionesses, and their unPlanned cubs playing in gay revelry?
My friend buzzsawmonkey prefers the term People of Pallor.
To paraphrase George Carlin, “You see them glowing at the beach.”
I prefer the term ‘people’. Better yet, by adopting that term I don’t exclude anybody because of their skin colour.
Because, frankly, why would I?
Learn your place on the Victim Totem Pole!
I’m alluz gonna be the pigeon on top, Bunky, doin’ what pigeons do.
I read the article linked above by Milhouse about the Human Rights Commission, and I think that part of their mandate is to fight against all forms of racial discrimination. Their recent stance is a mockery of their mandate.
In fact, the Human Rights Commission evidently hears the appeals for the civil rights cases. Thus, by pre-announcing its ‘opinion’ in this situation, the Human Rights Commission gives the appearance of trying to prejudice the outcome of the process before it began.
Here’s the link: https://ocr.seattle.gov/official-statement-from-seattle-office-for-civil-rights-regarding-capitol-hill-pride-letter/