UK BLACK PRIDE
Europe’s largest celebration for African, Asian, Middle Eastern, Latin American and Caribbean-heritage LGBTQI+ people.
Building on the success of our 15th birthday digital celebration in August 2020, which attracted 30,000 viewers, UK Black Pride’s 2021 event will extend to three days, recorded live at an as-yet-unannounced venue in east London.
We are acutely aware that our communities will be looking forward to an in-person event this year, but we can’t yet say with confidence that we could put on a physical celebration and keep our communities safe. The safety of our communities is our responsibility – and one we take very seriously – and so we have taken the decision to err on the side of utmost caution.
To honour what has been a tremendously difficult year for so many in our communities, UK Black Pride’s 2021 theme is “Love and Rage”.
We’ve seen firsthand over the past year our communities’ persistent commitment to each other; the ways we show up, in big and small ways, is nothing short of inspiring. We continue to show what it means to love, to love hard and to love against the odds.
We are also raging, disappointed and tired. Our communities continue to be overlooked and undervalued, tokenised and discarded. From constant gaslighting to this country’s steadfast refusal to address and redress structural and institutional racism, we have a lot to be mad about.
Our anger is righteous. Our love is righteous.
Our 2021 theme claps back against the many ways we are told who we are allowed to be, and how to grieve, love and rage. We will not be quiet, we will not be meek. We will be heard, and we will be loud.
UK Black Pride is the space where each of you can show up as all of who you are, with your rage and disappointment, with your unyielding love and capacity for joy. We can’t wait to celebrate and rage with you. Let us show what is possible when we show up in our fury, committed to loving each other and changing the world.
Lady Phyll and the UK Black Pride team
The team has been working hard to find a new home for UK Black Pride and have taken into consideration accessibility, public transport links, diversity of the local area and the borough’s historical significance.
Phyll Opoku-Gyimah, co-founder and executive director of UK Black Pride:
“We’ve had a really good run in Lambeth and are grateful to the local council, public services like police, TfL, ambulance services and of course the residents who helped make our annual celebrations so successful. We’re excited to work with Hackney Council, the Mayor of Hackney and local residents and businesses to bring UK Black Pride to east London this summer. We are so energised by Hackney’s diversity, historical significance as a welcoming place for people from such a broad range of diasporas and the wonderfully enthusiastic response from local government.”
With the deadline fast approaching for UK Black Pride’s inaugural survey of LGBTQI+ Black people and people of colour, we spoke to some of the incredible activists, organisers and creatives taking part to find our why it’s so important to be heard.
Moonlight Experiences is an organisation dedicated to the celebration of queer culture through tourism, whilst uplifting those vulnerable and marginalised voices in our community. By supporting local queer venues and creating an international network of queer culture, Moonlight Experiences is reshaping the way we navigate travel and community as LGBTQ+ individuals.
Lady Phyll writes a letter to Black womxn, as part of Queer Britain’s campaign to capture thousands of untold LGBTQ+ experiences across the UK.
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Who we are
Find out more about UK Black Pride and why it was founded by Phyll Gyimah-Opoku back in 2005.
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