Pride Hamilton is an annual LGBTQ Pride event, staged in Hamilton, Ontario. Unlike some Pride events, the event does not currently stage a parade, but includes a week of LGBTQ-oriented community events culminating with a community festival in the city's Gage Park.[1]
The event was launched in 1991 by Hamilton's Gay and Lesbian Alliance (GALA), but was immediately mired in controversy over mayor Bob Morrow's refusal to issue a civic proclamation.[2] Morrow cited a lack of consensus among Hamilton City Council rather than any personal animus against LGBT people,[2] although councillor Dominic Agostino tried to broker a compromise under which Morrow would write a welcome letter instead of a formal civic proclamation.[3] GALA filed a complaint with the Ontario Human Rights Commission,[4] which was heard in 1994;[3] in the hearing, Morrow's lawyers mounted the defense that Morrow's actions were not discriminatory as he had no way of knowing that the members of GALA were actually gay, a line of argument which GALA's lawyers dismissed as absurd.[5]
The commission ruled in March 1995 that Morrow's refusal to issue a proclamation was discriminatory, and ordered him to pay $5,000 in damages to GALA and to issue the proclamation in 1995.[6] Morrow issued a proclamation that year,[7] but concurrently announced that he would cease issuing any further civic proclamations for any events at all.[8]
The event was transferred from GALA to a new independent Hamilton Pride committee in 1996.[9] Bob Wade, Morrow's successor as mayor, reinstated civic proclamations, and issued a civic proclamation of the event in 2001.[10]
The 2019 event was disrupted by a violent anti-LGBTQ protest.[11] The Hamilton Police Service subsequently faced criticism, both for taking too long to respond to the immediate situation[12] and for its post-confrontation arrests, which initially targeted people who were defending the event against the violence rather than the instigators of it.[13] Later arrests did include some of the protestors.[14] The community reaction included direct pickets of mayor Fred Eisenberger's home, which Eisenberger characterized as inappropriate harassment of his family and as not representative of the city's LGBTQ community.[15] In 2021, Pride Hamilton filed a formal complaint to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal over the police delay in responding to the 2019 incident.[16]