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Almost all of the charges against the men were eventually dropped. The Toronto Police actions were roundly denounced by the LGBT community, who organized the next night to protest – 3,000 strong – against the police and their treatment of marginalized groups. More than 300 people were arrested – the largest mass arrest in Canada since the October Crisis of 1970 (precipitated by the kidnappings of British diplomat James Cross and Deputy Premier Pierre Laporte, who was later murdered by the FLQ), and a record that would be broken only in 2006 during the Stanley Cup playoffs in Edmonton.
Toronto gay pride day series#
On Februrary 5, 1981, the Toronto Police conducted a series of bathhouse raids, dubbed Operation Soap. These early marches were held on Saturdays, not Sundays as they are now, because that was when the downtown core was most likely to be busiest with other pedestrians and passers-by. Since the city was loath to give out permits for any official marches or protests, participants carried banners and signs along the sidewalks. The picnics grew larger and larger, and by 1974, Toronto had its first Pride Week: a small and unofficially recognized series of events that culminated in a march from Allan Gardens to Queen’s Park. These picnics – which were started one year after Pride marches took place in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Chicago to commemorate Stonewall – were the spark that led to the fire of Toronto’s Pride Parade. There, organized by the University of Toronto Homophile Association, Toronto Gay Action Now and the Community Homophile Association of Toronto, the first Toronto “gay picnics” were held. Two years later, in August 1971, the first meeting of what was set to become the Toronto Pride Parade happened at both Hanlan’s Point, the most westerly of the Toronto Islands (and, later, Toronto’s unofficial “gay beach,” though it wasn’t until 2002 that a small stretch of that beach was officially recognized as “clothing optional”) and Ward’s Island. It may be hard to believe but it was only 50 years ago, in 1969 – the same year the Stonewall Riots began on June 28 in New York City – that same-sex sexual activity was decriminalized in Canada by the Liberal government (the legislation was introduced by then Justice Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, the same guy who had famously quipped, “There’s no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation”). Now maligned by some detractors as “just a party,” “too corporate” or even “too political,” the Toronto Pride Parade has come a long way from its grassroots beginnings almost 50 years ago.