One marcher held a sign that read "NRA Sashay Away." At one point in the parade, some 100 men dropped to the ground for 30 seconds, as a megaphone-wielding woman led them in a chant of "What do we want?" "Gun Control!" "When do we want it?" "Now!" Others walked silently down 5th Avenue with their faces covered in ghostly white gauze, drawing applause from the sidelines. New York's celebration included dozens of visual tributes to victims of the Orlando massacre, some as simple as an Orlando Magic jersey, others more pointed at the National Rifle Association.
"We need to be out loud and proud more than ever, but it comes with mourning and anger." "I've been so heartbroken and outraged by Orlando," said Dorothee Benz, 50, who was marching with a group called New York Supports Orlando. But the shooting in Orlando served as a grim reminder that bigotry and hatred remain very much alive. Nearly a half-century later, LGBT supporters can celebrate a string of victories, especially last year's Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage. In New York City, tens of thousands of marchers paraded through Manhattan, dressed mostly in rainbow-tinged outfits per a tradition that dates to the 1969 Stonewall rebellion, a spate of demonstrations by members of the LGBT community after a police raid at the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village. This year, many of the participants in annual marches demonstrated their opposition to America's obsession with guns.
Supporters of gay rights took to the streets of New York, San Francisco, Orlando, Chicago and other cities across the globe on Sunday in annual celebrations of gay rights with a brooding twist, in the wake of this month's massacre at a gay nightclub in Florida.