It’s been three years since Cristin Elle, the president of Cowichan Pride Society, started organizing events for Pride month. She still remembers the first march vividly.
“We really weren’t sure how we were going to be met with this festival. We had no clue,” she said. “We went in expecting that, if we get 50 to 100 people to show up, we’re going to call this a great success.”
That first year, close to 500 people showed up for the march and Elle said she was blown away by the reception. Since 2021, the celebration has expanded from the march and festival in Centennial Square to a month-long celebration with multiple events and this year is no different.
“We’re adding in some local vendors and a couple of community resources, so there’s lots to do and tons of really great family-friendly fun,” Elle said.
Pride celebrations in the Cowichan Valley and beyond
Last year, hundreds of people attended the Cowichan Pride month kick-off concert at Red Arrow Brewing and Elle hopes that even more people will attend this year’s kick off event on Saturday, May 31.
The evening will feature a performance by The Peachy Sundays and a drag show featuring Jerriana and Eddi Licious.
After the kick-off, Pride festivities will continue through June with Cowichan Pride expanding its offerings and events.
New this year is a staged reading called Bits of Bliss, with selected pieces from Breaking the Binary Theatre’s Bliss: A collection of Commissioned Scenes and Monologues, performed in partnership with the Mercury Players.
Elle said casting for the reading is still open and that they are looking for transgender, non-binary and gender non-conforming people from the community to be a part of the production. The reading only requires a few rehearsals and no memorizing of lines so the barrier to participate in it is low. Up-and-coming actors or anyone interested in trying out theatre can audition.
Another new addition to Pride Month in the Valley is the Teddy Bear Picnic, a casual “hang out” for community members to meet other 2SLGBTQIA+ families and friends in Centennial Park. The event is co-sponsored by PFLAG Cowichan Valley. Elle said a guiding principle while organizing Pride is to make sure there are family-friendly events on offer and the picnic is one example of that.
The details are still being finalized, but Elle told the Discourse in an interview that Cowichan Pride also plans to host a dance at The HUB at Cowichan Station.
The celebration culminates in the Pride Festival and March on June 22. The march will make its way down Duncan Street and into City Square, followed by an afternoon of entertainment, drag shows, vendors and food trucks. This year, the festival footprint has grown to encompass parts of Ingram Street, similar to the space occupied by Duncan Farmers’ Market on Saturdays.
“The last two years we’ve just been in City Square, so we’re hoping to offer some accessibility so if people have small children, or they just can’t handle that many people, they can still participate,” Elle said.
A full list of events being held by Cowichan Pride Society in June can be found on its Facebook page.
Pride in the Cowichan Valley is one of the many celebrations taking place on Vancouver Island. A list, compiled by Cowichan Pride Society, shows that there are more than 15 different Pride festivals happening on the Island from June 1 to August 23.
“We try to connect with each other to make sure when we’re planning our events so we’re not conflicting with our neighbors. And some people, they do a road trip and do all of them,” Elle said.
Last year, The Discourse covered pride events in Nanaimo and the Cowichan Valley.
“There’s so many different organizations that all put things on,” Elle said, “and there’s always room for more people to get involved.”
Community members interested in volunteering for pride can inquire by emailing Cowichan Pride Society.
Pride is still a protest
Elle recalled one man that she met at the first ever Pride Festival and March who was struggling to find a community that accepted him in the Cowichan Valley.
“When he moved to the Cowichan Valley, he went back in the closet because he couldn’t find his community. And this was the first time in 20 years that he’d actually told anybody he was gay,” Elle said. “It gave me chills that this poor man had not been living his truth for over 20 years because he couldn’t find community.”
Despite being a more conservative area of the Island, Elle said there haven’t been any instances of heckling or counter protests at Cowichan Pride. But online, it’s a different story.
Recently, Cowichan Pride hosted a discussion panel for Transgender Day of Visibility and while the in-person event went off without a hitch, the online event posting received “a lot of hateful comments,” including death threats, Elle said.
“These are keyboard warriors who feel very empowered to attack from a distance, but do not feel very empowered to come out in person. The actual in person events, I find, are very safe,” said Elle, whose account was reported to Facebook for supporting the event.
With the political climate right now in the U.S. “leaking over to our country,” Elle said it’s even more important to be visible in the community.
“Some people were like, ‘Oh, we’re not doing Pride because, you know, it’s too politically dangerous’ but it started as a riot. It started as defending our rights. It’s never going to stop until that undercurrent changes,” Elle said.
That’s the essence of Pride that Elle said makes visibly celebrating the 2SLGBTQIA+ community so important.
“It’s about being in everybody’s face, and saying we’re here and we’re not going anywhere.”
