THE Society Against Sexual Orientation Discrimination (SASOD) has officially launched its Virtual Pride 2021 festivities with a bang. The launch on June 7 was streamed live on Facebook and Instagram. Head of SASOD, Joel Simpson, during an interview with the Guyana Chronicle, highlighted that the organisation has come a long way in its 18 years of existence.
He noted that the organisation was eager to celebrate all of its achievements; however, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the traditional colourful road festival will be held virtually.
“Because of the pandemic we are confined to virtual pride again this year, we started on Monday June 7 which marks SASOD 18th anniversary so this year we did virtual pride to coincide with our anniversary,” he said. He noted that the event, which is already in full swing, will see a week of exciting and new activities. “Usually, we would have the pride festival just after the day or so after Independence and conclude by the end of the May. This year, unlike last year, for the virtual pride where we had events scattered over a three-week period between June and July, we have a virtual pride week which started on Monday and it concludes of Sunday.”

Earlier in the week, a virtual launch was held, followed by a Pride Yoga and Queer Movie Night.
On Thursday a Global ‘Guyanese Gyaff’ will be held, followed by a Pride Games Night on Friday night and Caribbean Infernal Pride Party on Saturday.
Finally, on Sunday, a Pride Inter-Faith Forum will be held to conclude the week’s event.
“What we learn from last year is that some events are more popular that others and we got really good feedback on particular events so we just decided to focus on those particular events and just have in the similar way we would have the pride festival, being a week or 10 days, we decided to do virtual pride in a similar way.”
Simpson also disclosed that despite not being able to have the usual colourful festivities, the virtual activities have managed to engage and reach many more persons, especially those in the diaspora.