Gay pride

The gay pride campaign of the gay rights movement has three main premises: that people should be proud of what they are, that sexual diversity is a gift, and that sexual orientation is inherent and cannot be intentionally altered. Marches celebrating gay pride (pride parades) are celebrated worldwide. Symbols of gay pride include the rainbow flag and pink and black triangles.

The movement may arguably be seen as analogous to the "Black is Beautiful" movement in the United States during the 1970s. Just as African-Americans argued that beauty should not be solely defined by the standards of the ethnic majority, members of the gay pride movement argue that the inherent worth of homosexuality should not be defined in terms of the heterosexual majority.

Activist L. Craig Schoonmaker claims to have coined the term "gay pride" in description of the 1969 Stonewall riots. [1]

Opposition

Social conservatives generally disagree with the premise that sexual orientation is inherent and fixed, and many of these persons thus oppose the gay pride campaign.

A portion of homosexual men and women reject the notion of gay pride, perceiving therein an undue emphasis on sex and a lack of discretion and modesty to the detriment of either public morals or the cause of gay rights. They believe it necessary to forgo what they perceive as strident activism in order to better integrate themselves into the mainstream. Others see gay pride as putting too much emphasis on the view that sexual orientation is fixed, and that as such, homosexuality is more of a sexual disability than a natural phenomenon. Still others see it as depreciative of the identity of the individual; that one's sexual orientaion should not be one's qiuntessential defining characteristic.

Critics of this position regard it as pandering to homophobia.