ORLANDO – You might recall a group marching in the Orlando Pride parade last November with a huge rainbow banner that said “Gays Against Guns.” That wasn’t just a one-off parade stunt. GAG Orlando is still at it and recently met at The Center Orlando to layout some gun safety directives for the next few months including joining the League of Women Voters’ Florida Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence.
The Orlando chapter of GAG also plans to step up pressure on gun retailers, lobbyists and elected officials to stop enabling gun violence. The group is part of a national network of GAG chapters focused on ACT UP-inspired direct actions and founded in response to the Pulse hate crime.
Sonia Parra and her wife Andrea showed up to the April 2 meeting sporting GAG t-shirts with their two kids in tow. Parra didn’t really like guns even before the shooting at Pulse. As the one-year anniversary approaches, her drive to change the gun laws has only intensified.
“Pulse hit me hard. I lost seven friends that day,” says Parra. “I joined GAG because I think guns encourage violence. It’s hard for some people to control themselves when they have a gun in their hand.”
Parra and her wife were supposed to go to Pulse that night but ended up staying home at the last minute.
Para and the others who attended the GAG Orlando meeting all shared personal stories about their overlapping ties with both the LGBTQ community and the gun violence epidemic. They collectively agreed that more must be done to prevent senseless gun violence like what occurred June 12 from happening again.
For Mark McMeley, a Valencia College professor, GAG is also deeply personal. He started the chapter not long after the massacre. Seven of the 49 people who were murdered at Pulse were students at Valenica where he teaches. While McMeley appreciates the push for unity and efforts to support healing in the Orlando community, he also wants to see more action.
“We must get at the root of the problem: GAG is a movement of people who will not stand by and wait to be the next victims of the absurdly lax weapons laws of our state and our country. Orlando was targeted last year and it’s up to us to fight back,” McMeley says.
Before the Pulse hate crime, gun safety wasn’t necessarily on the radar for many LGBTQ activists. The gun safety movement’s fight to close background check loopholes on gun sales, to ban assault weapons, to address the role of guns in domestic violence and police brutality and to allow federal research on gun violence among other policies wasn’t a priority.
Since June 12, all of this has changed. Over the Summer of 2016, the #sitinforthe49 coalition held three protests ending up with 10 protesters getting arrested and a direct confrontation with Senator Marco Rubio. GAG chapters spread out across the country from the backyard of the legendary Stonewall Inn in the West Village to LA, DC and now Pulse’s hometown here in Orlando. The Pride Fund to End Gun Violence launched also in DC. Equality Florida adopted a gun safety platform and joined the League of Women Voters-led Florida Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence. The Human Rights Campaign also joined the gun safety cause nationwide supporting Gabrielle Gifford’s Americans for Responsible Solutions PAC.
GAG Orlando hopes to work with all of these groups and more to help amplify the gun safety movement locally, statewide and on the national level.
“We have a core group who will commit time and effort to getting the word out about the local firearms business and the politicians paid off by the weapons manufacturers. We must confront them publicly and with all legal means possible,” McMeley says. “Continuing to memorialize our students, family and friends who we lost last year becomes meaningless unless we act now to stop the further spread of weapons. All of us are committed to this, and we heard that in very personal stories at our first meeting. All of us want to live.”
The rainbow banner GAG marched with at Orlando Pride was created by artist and LGBTQ activist Gilbert Baker. He designed the original rainbow flag that is now an iconic symbol of the LGBTQ liberation movement. Baker recently passed away unexpectedly.
The banner was on loan to the chapter from GAG New York. Natalie James, who was born and raised in Orlando and is one of the founding members of GAG in New York, brought the banner to Orlando Pride.
James, who says she is thrilled to see a GAG chapter taking root in Orlando, recalled her time marching with GAG last November.
“It was an incredible experience to fly down from New York to my hometown for my first Pride. To march with a rainbow Gays Against Guns (GAG) banner hand sewn by the visionary Gilbert Baker. To march with the incredible folks in Orlando who have joined the GAG contingent – including several of the courageous individuals who engaged in civil disobedience at Marco Rubio’s office, just wow!”
Before Baker died, he donated his time to make a similar GAG banner for the Orlando chapter.
