BOLD colours, a vibrant atmosphere, and a message of acceptance filled the streets on Saturday afternoon as several people turned out in support of the 2025 Guyana Pride Parade.

Since its inception in 2018, the parade has grown steadily, becoming a powerful platform for amplifying the voices and concerns of Guyana’s LGBTQIA+ community. This year was no different, with supporters showing up in full force, draped in rainbow colours and pride-themed gear.

Speaking to this newspaper during the event, founder and managing director of the Society Against Sexual Orientation Discrimination (SASOD Guyana), Joel Simpson, noted that while this year’s parade was a success, significant work remains to be done when it comes to the laws and policies affecting LGBTQIA+ people in Guyana.

Referencing progressive shifts across the region, Simpson pointed out that Guyana continues to lag behind.

“In Guyana, we face major legal barriers, because we still have laws which criminalise same-sex intimacy on the books here. And we’re the only country in South America with those laws, and we’re now a minority in CARICOM with them, because in other countries, they’ve either been repealed, as in the case of The Bahamas decades ago, or struck down by the courts,” he said.

Simpson added that SASOD and its collaborative partner, Sexualities, Women and Gender (SWAG), are ready to work with national leaders in pushing for legislative reform. “More recently, particularly in the last 10 years or so, a number of courts from Belize to Barbados to St. Kitts to Antigua have struck down those laws. So, we’re saying that Guyana shouldn’t be left behind. This is a non-issue, and the government, the new parliament, when convened after the September 1st elections, needs to make it a priority to have these laws repealed within the first year in office.”

It is with this in mind that SASOD is ramping up electoral-related advocacy.

According to Simpson, the organisation plans to launch its second-ever LGBTQIA+ Manifesto on July 16. “In the month of July, we’re going to have a focus on electoral-related advocacy, because the elections are coming up. And we want to have more impact than we did in 2020 in terms of our electoral advocacy. So, on the 16th of July, we’re going to be launching our LGBTQIA Manifesto,” he said.

This will be followed by the second LGBTQIA+ Elections Town Hall, scheduled for July 28. “And we’re going to have it in our second LGBTQIA Elections Town Hall. We had the first one in 2020, a mere week before the elections. We think it’s important to have it as early as possible, so it can have more impact. So, we’re having that on July 29th,” Simpson shared.

Highlighting community-driven initiatives such as the Guyana Together campaign, Simpson said the LGBTQIA+ movement in Guyana has been making steady strides, especially with the growth in support from individuals and organisations. This year’s parade, he said, drew even more allies and supporters than before. “I think what we’re seeing is that a lot of allies are willing to give support, not only to the parade, but to the activities during the week of the festival. We were able to, without any kind of major sponsorship to pull this off, because of contributions from our campaign endorsers, companies like Fresh Café. Professional Guard Service is also contributing in kind. A number of the campaign contributors, endorsers, have made contributions to make this festival possible without any kind of donor funding,” he said.

While the Pride Parade is a celebration of identity, love, and visibility, Simpson stressed that it also plays a vital role in shaping a more tolerant and inclusive society. “I see a great impact there, but we’re also seeing impact at the level of, at the interpersonal level and the level of the community, because more people are feeling comfortable coming out to people in their lives, their families, their workplaces, their faith communities. And I think that is having a ripple effect, because now more people know somebody who identifies as gay or bi or queer or trans. And what we know from our research is that when you have a personal connection, you know somebody personally, and it’s not just a caricature in the media or a character in TV, that personal connection is what makes you more accepting, more respectful.”