‘The debt is with us’ claims Buenos Aires LGBT+ pride marchers
Buenos Aires, Nov 5 (EFE).- Rainbow flags filled the streets of Buenos Aires on Saturday for this year’s pride march, which pushed against public debt, for a Comprehensive Trans Law, the use of inclusive language, and changes to the Anti-Discrimination Act.
The XXXI LGBT+ Pride March began in the Plaza de Mayo in front of the seat of the Argentinian government, and through a barrage of color stationed at the beginning of Avenida de Mayo, moved to the Plaza de los dos Congresos in front of parliament.
The event was marked with fairs and live music, with a stage in the Plaza de Mayo for Richi Star, Nikka Lorach, Invisibl3s and Cazzu and the closing in front of Congress for Jey Mammón and Sandra Mihanovich to sing “I Am What I Am.”
“It contains messages of vindication and work for what is missing and of celebration of everything we have achieved and of celebrating being who we are, responding to the shame that culture and society sometimes try to impose on us,” Argentinian LGBT Federation founder María Rachid told EFE.
The federation, one of the 16 organizations that participate in the organizing commission of the march, which has been held since 1992, hoped to exceed the 1 million people that it gathered last year, and the more than 45 trucks registered for the demonstration.
“In the political sense, we hope that our claims will be heard,” added Rachid, who urged the Ministry of Women, Genders and Diversity to “start working on the demands of the diversity movement in Argentina.”
The organizing committee was to read a speech at the end of the march with this year’s demands.
“In a context in which the International Monetary Fund is pressing for greater adjustments that affect the lives of citizens in general, what we say as diversity organizations is that the debt is with us – it is with the population, it is with the citizens, with the workers, with the vulnerable groups, it is with diversity in particular,” said Rachid.
She referred to the IMF financing program for $45 billion that Argentina concluded in March and that implies budget cuts for the fulfillment of quarterly goals of fiscal deficit, reserves and monetary issues in a country that also records annual inflation of 85 percent.
The other claim is for a Comprehensive Trans Law, for which the organizations presented a draft that proposes a set of public policies so that the group achieves social integration at the cultural, economic and labor levels and in the fields of health and education.
They also presented a petition to modify the Anti-Discrimination Act, because they consider that the current norm, from 1988, is old and does not include diversity.
A partisan issue was introduced in the march with the demand to say “yes to inclusive language” to respond to the ban in the capital, governed by the opposition to Peronism, of inclusive language in the capital’s schools, which Rachid considered “illegitimate” because it violates the National Gender Identity Law that recognizes non-binary identities. EFE
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