Celebrating Gay Pride

October 10th and 11th, 2015: Atlanta’s Gay Pride Festival and Parade enlivened downtown and Piedmont Park for two days. From its brave, but inauspicious beginnings over 20 years ago, the festival has grown to one of the largest, and certainly the most colorful, happenings in Atlanta.

MADSA, together with ‘Georgia for Bernie’ and ‘Latinos for Bernie’ contingents, marched proudly in the Atlanta Pride parade, to the frequent applause of huge crowds of spectators, whose energy matched that of the paraders. The weather was great, and the parade marched along for the better part of three hours.

Paraders assembled on Sunday morning at the Civic Center MARTA station, marched eight blocks up Atlanta’s main drag, Peachtree Road, and turned down 10th Street to Piedmont Park, where it dissolved into the Park’s hundreds of booths, which had been going strong since Saturday morning.

In the park, our booth was mobbed by supporters, who took more than 2000 Bernie Buttons and lots of MADSA literature. Many signed up for our mailings.

Park booths and parade contingents truly reflected a rainbow, from the overtly commercial establishments, to church groups, to entertainment venues, to, well, just groups, whose raison d’etre seems to be a celebration of diversity and the right to be oneself.

Special thanks to organizers Travis Reid Rebekah Joy, and Barbara Segal, sign and button maker Daniel Hanley, and everyone who marched and helped staff the booth.

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