Dancing in the streets with strangers: Celebrating Pride NYC

Photographs by Tracie Williams

Every year since 1970, NYC has celebrated Pride on the last Sunday of June to commemorate the Stonewall Rebellion. Last year the official Pride March was cancelled due to Covid and this year it was held virtually. The Queer Liberation March, now in its third year, took to the streets nonetheless. Founded by an alliance of “community organizers, activists, and queers of conscience” known as the Reclaim Pride Coalition, the march was created as the antithesis to the corporate and political spectacle that the official Pride March had become. Absence of official permits and police presence meant the removal of physical borders that previously created division in the parade-like structure, which now allowed people to freely join at will and without intimidation. The sole mission of the coalition is to reclaim the spirit and meaning of pride as a true expression of protest and cultural legacy, without state oppression. Their mantra? “No cops, no corps, no BS!”

Although I was little apprehensive of the masses that Pride draws, my yearning for human connection on a fundamental level superseded my fears. As I navigated the collective awkwardness of emerging from isolation, I joined pre-march festivities in lower Manhattan under the blazing midday sun. Within a landscape adorned with a sea of rainbows, boisterous music and spontaneous dance parties, there was an atmosphere of freedom, acceptance and pure elation. New Yorkers are creatures who thrive on our shared magical, sometimes very brief, experiences and the excitement of returning to our lives pre-Covid was palpable. 

I then made my way to Bryant Park to join the march that culminated in a beautiful cacophony of debauchery in Washington Square Park.  As I meandered and mingled, there was a sense that people not only wanted, but needed to be seen. The energy was electric and the joy was infectious. And nothing else mattered, but being there with, and for, one another. It felt as though there was an unspoken understanding that our liberation and happiness were interconnected. After all, there’s nothing like celebrating life and love, while dancing in the streets with strangers.