The Auckland Pride Festival is an annual festival held in

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The most populous urban area in the country and the fifth largest city in Oceania, Auckland has an urban population of about ...

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

. It began in 2013 and is New Zealand's largest Pride Festival. The festival has also brings together a number of other queer and queer supporting festivals and events in Auckland. They include the Same But Different Festival, Auckland Council's Proud Centres, Ending HIV NZ

Big Gay Out Big Gay Out is an LGBTQ festival in Aotearoa/New Zealand. It has been running in Auckland, New Zealand since 2000. The event was founded by the Hero Festival, but is now organised by the Burnett Foundation Aotearoa. During the event, Mr Gay N ...

, F.I.N.E Festival, Heroic Gardens (until 2019), and Bear Week New Zealand (until 2019). Alongside the annual festival, Auckland Pride also hosts 'The Queer Agenda', a year-long programme of events that allow people to have a taste of pride outside of the festival dates.

History

The Auckland Pride Festival was started in 2013, by Julian Cook, the inaugural festival director. In 2013 the festival had over 40 events spread out over Auckland. In 2018 the festival had grown to over 80 events in the festival and 70 floats in the Parade. In that same year,

Jacinda Ardern Jacinda Kate Laurell Ardern ( ; born 26 July 1980) is a New Zealand politician who has been serving as the 40th prime minister of New Zealand and leader of the Labour Party since 2017. A member of the Labour Party, she has been the member of ...

became the first New Zealand Prime Minister to walk in the Auckland Pride Parade. Auckland Pride's 2020 Festival had 154 events

Auckland City Council Auckland City Council was the local government authority for Auckland City, New Zealand, from 1871 to 1 November 2010, when it and Auckland's six other city and district councils were amalgamated to form the Auckland Council. It was an elected b ...

's Proud Centres added 81 events to the festival, offering free council venue use to groups wishing to have an event in the Auckland Pride Festival. The New Zealand AIDS Foundation's (Ending HIV) Hauora Series gave funding to events in the Auckland Pride Festival that "focused on improving the well-being of diverse rainbow communities", adding 18 events to the festival.

Spark New Zealand Spark New Zealand Limited is a New Zealand telecommunications company providing fixed-line plain old telephone service, telephone services, a mobile phone network, internet service provider, internet access services, and (through its Spark Digi ...

's Pride & Spark Empowerment Initiative helped fund 16 events. The 2021 Auckland Pride Festival was the first ever Auckland Pride Month, with dates expanded from the general two and a half weeks to the whole month (3-28 February 2021). The 2021 Festival under the theme, 'Karanga Atu, Karanga Mai' brought together 75,796 people from across Tamaki Makaurau, with 203 events. Over 9,000 people took part in the 2021 Pride March. Executive Director of Auckland Pride, Max Tweedie said, "The past year has been one of significant growth for Auckland Pride" In June 2021, Auckland Pride Festival also announced The Queer Agenda, a programme of year-round pride events. The purpose of this is to "

reate Rieti (; lat, Reate, Sabino: ) is a town and ''comune'' in Lazio, central Italy, with a population of 47,700. It is the administrative seat of the province of Rieti and see of the diocese of Rieti, as well as the modern capital of the Sabina re ...

a platform for event organisers to promote their events from March – December, and create a unified calendar for our community and queer visitors to Auckland to connect and experience the best of what Tāmaki Makaurau has to offer."

"No Police at Pride"

In 2015, the activist group People Against Prisons Aotearoa (then known as No Pride in Prisons) was formed to protest the participation of the New Zealand Police and Department of Corrections in the Auckland Pride Parade and Festival. People Against Prisons Aotearoa cited the conditions that transgender people face in prisons, and the systemic biases that police hold, mean that they should not participate in the festival. At the 2015 Pride Parade, one of the protester was injured during an altercation with security staff. In 2016, No Pride in Prisons brought the parade to a halt with a protest coming from the opposite end of Ponsonby road to clash with the parade. This protest was again for the rights of transgender people in prisons. In 2017, the board banned the New Zealand

Department of Corrections In criminal justice, particularly in North America, correction, corrections, and correctional, are umbrella terms describing a variety of functions typically carried out by government agencies, and involving the punishment, treatment, and s ...

from walking in the parade as they did not follow through with their promises to improve support for queer prisoners. The board worked together with the Department of Corrections and the community to implement change within the prison system for queer prisoners due to the previous protests that happened in 2015 and 2016. In 2019 The Auckland Pride Board made the decision after a number of community hui (meetings) to not allow Police to march in their uniform for the 2019 Auckland Pride Parade. This decision was controversial, and a number of sponsors withdrew financial support in response, including

Vodafone Vodafone Group plc () is a British multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates services in Asia, Africa, Europe, and Oceania. , Vod ...

NZME New Zealand Media and Entertainment (abbreviated NZME) is a New Zealand newspaper, radio and digital media business. It was launched in 2014 as the formal merger of the New Zealand division of APN News & Media, APN New Zealand; The Radio Net ...

, ANZ, BNZ,

Westpac Westpac Banking Corporation, known simply as Westpac, is an Australian multinational banking and financial services company headquartered at Westpac Place in Sydney, New South Wales. Established in 1817 as the Bank of New South Wales, ...

, Fletcher Building, and SKY City. In response to this withdrawal, those who supported the Board's decision created a crowdfunding page, which raised $30,468.40. Some of those who opposed the Board's decision signed a motion of no confidence, and called for a SGM. This motion was defeated at a SGM on December 6, 2018. A splinter group, "Rainbow Pride Auckland" formed to recreate a ''Parade,'' following a controversial period which saw the Auckland Pride Parade become OurMarch, a grassroots march focusing on current political issues within the extended Rainbow Community. At the 2020 AGM, Auckland Pride Festival voted that they will not engage in a working group with NZ Police or have a relationship with the NZ Police until the Police are able to demonstrate that they are practising anti-racist behaviours. The membership also voted to leave

InterPride InterPride is the international organization that brings together Pride organizers from across the World to network, share knowledge, and maximize impact. To this end, Pride organizers design InterPride’s structure, programs, and initiatives, to ...

Protests

2014 saw protesters demonstrating against the Israeli Embassy's presence at the parade. In 2018

TERF TERF () is an acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist. First recorded in 2008, the term was originally used to distinguish trans-inclusive feminists from a group of radical feminists who reject the assertion that trans women are wom ...

activists disrupted the parade by holding a sign that read “stop giving kids sex hormones, protect lesbian youth.” After a short while, they were asked to move by parade staff.

Major events delivered by Auckland Pride

Tuwheratanga

The Auckland Pride Festival officially starts at its Dawn Ceremony where a

karakia Karakia are Māori incantations and prayers, used to invoke spiritual guidance and protection. With the nineteenth-century introduction of Christianity to New Zealand, Māori adopted (or wrote new) karakia to acknowledge the new faith. Moder ...

and the call of the kaikaranga and

pūtātara The pūtātara is a type of trumpet used by the Māori people of New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South ...

is performed. It was held at Western Park on

Ponsonby Road Ponsonby is an inner-city suburb of Auckland located 2 km west of the Auckland CBD. The suburb is oriented along a ridge running north–south, which is followed by the main street of the suburb, Ponsonby Road. A predominantly upper-middl ...

in 2017 & 2018, it then transitioned into Te Takaranga Āniwaniwa for the 2020 Festival and was held in Aotea Square. The name was changed to Tuwheratanga for the 2021 festival and was held on top of

Maungawhau / Mount Eden Maungawhau / Mount Eden is a scoria cone and Tūpuna Maunga (ancestral mountain) in the Mount Eden suburb of Auckland, New Zealand. Geography The cone is a dormant volcano and its summit, at above sea level, is the highest natural point on the ...

. This was previously known as the Auckland Pride Dawn Ceremony and Te Takaranga Āniwaniwa.

Pride March

The original Auckland Pride Parade, much like the

Hero Parade The Hero Parade was an (almost) annual gay and lesbian Parade through the streets of Auckland, New Zealand, in the 1990s. The last Parade was in 2001. It was the showpiece of the Hero Festival in Auckland which runs to the present day. The Hero Par ...

was situated on

until 2019 when Auckland Pride Festival shifted their focus to calls to action that benefit the intersectionality of the rainbow community. The 2019 and 2020 Parades became OurMarch, which now starts from

Albert Park, Auckland Albert Park is a public park in central Auckland, bounded by Wellesley Street East, Princes Street, Bowen Avenue and Kitchener Street. From the entrance at the corner of Bowen Ave and Kitchener St, sealed footpaths climb steeply through native tre ...

and concludes in Aotea Square. The march continues on this route but is now just called the Auckland Pride March. This was previously known as Auckland Pride Parade and OurMarch.

Pride Party

Pride Party (previously known as PROUD 2013-2019 and OurParty 2019-2020) is the closing party for the Auckland Pride Festival and is held after the Pride March. Notable performs include Courtney Act and

Le1f Khalif Diouf, known by his stage name Le1f (), is an American rapper and producer. He also founded the record label Camp & Street, with Boody, DonChristian, and Chaz Requina. As a gay rapper he's garnered attention for his musical and performa ...

Governance

Auckland Pride is governed by an elected board, and recently, has co-opted members on for advisory purposes. The 2021 board and advisers is listed below,

Board members and advisors

Previous board members of note include:

Lexie Matheson Alexandra Mary Raine Matheson (born 1944/1945) is a New Zealand transgender activist, entertainer, and educator. Early life Lexie was born in Christchurch in 1945 to Anne Charlotte Euphemia (nee Rule) and John Walker Matheson. She had two s ...

and

Phylesha Brown-Acton Phylesha Brown-Acton (born February 1976) is a Niuean fakafifine LGBTQ+ rights activist. In 2019 she was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit in recognition of her work with LGBTQ+ communities from Pacific countries. Biograp ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Auckland Pride Festival LGBT events in New Zealand Pride parades Parades in New Zealand Recurring events established in 2013 2013 establishments in New Zealand Summer events in New Zealand Festivals in Auckland