Prague Pride 2017. | Photo: dominique cappronnier / Flickr
This year’s Prague Pride will put the focus on the LGBTI family.
The organisers aim to raise awareness of LGBTI family members to challenge the tendency to label them as just gay or lesbian, the Prague Daily Monitor reported.
“In the campaign, we want to mainly focus on how often homosexual children are considered black sheep of the family,” festival director Hana Kulhankova said.
The festival also aims to highlight the complex and diverse personalities of people in the LGBTI community.
“We would like gays, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people to be perceived as comprehensive personalities who are something more than the gay or lesbian labels,” Kulhankova said.
The Pride festival will take place from 6-12 August, with over 100 LGBTI-themed events including film screenings, theatre performances, seminars and debates.
As always, there will be a march through the city center on 11 August.
Focus on LGBTI families
Prague Pride has chosen a family-theme for a reason.
Awareness of LGBTI rights in the Czech Republic has grown over the last few years, but campaigners are still working to push through progressive legislation.
LGBTI people still cannot adopt or foster children, and registered partners have no right to joint property and widow’s or widower’s pension, the organisers said.
Transgender people must also undergo sterilisation in order to change their registered sex.
This year’s Pride week will celebrate a major piece of legislative progress, following the submission of a draft law in June which has opened the possibility of legalizing same-sex marriages in the Czech Republic.
The festival programme offers 127 events for Prague Pride.
The festival has also established a cooperation with the Safety Helpline to take questions from LGBT children and their parents.
There will also be discussions on LGBTI rights in Turkey and Central Asia, and participants will have the opportunity to be tested for HIV and hepatitis A and B.
The organisers hoping to test over 1000 people in a single afternoon.
