Category: human rights Page 1 of 5

When Pride Stopped Protesting

On June 21, 2026

A split-scene illustration contrasts an early LGBTQ+ protest march filled with activists carrying liberation signs and demanding equal rights against a modern Pride parade featuring rainbow flags, corporate sponsorships, and celebratory crowds, highlighting the movement’s evolution from political resistance to mainstream cultural celebration while emphasizing the continuing struggle for transgender equality. (Image generated by ChatGPT using DALL·E, 2026.)

Every June, millions of people gather for Pride celebrations across the United States. Streets are filled with rainbow flags, corporate logos, political candidates, and festival-like atmospheres. For many participants, Pride is a joyful affirmation of LGBTQ+ identity and a celebration of the progress that has been achieved over the past half century.

Yet Pride was not created as a celebration.

Pride was born from protest.

The first Pride marches emerged in the aftermath of the Stonewall uprising of 1969, when LGBTQ+ people fought back against routine police harassment and discrimination. Early Pride events were acts of political resistance. Participants marched because they faced criminalization, employment discrimination, housing discrimination, family rejection, and social exclusion. Pride was a demand for change, not a celebration of acceptance (TIME, 2020).

Over time, however, Pride changed.

By the late 1990s and early 2000s, LGBTQ+ organizations were increasingly integrated into mainstream political and corporate institutions. Large corporations began sponsoring Pride events. Politicians who once avoided association with LGBTQ+ causes now sought visibility in Pride parades. Pride organizations became larger, more professionalized, and increasingly dependent upon corporate sponsorship and institutional partnerships.

This transformation brought benefits. Greater visibility helped normalize LGBTQ+ identities, and corporate sponsorships provided resources that allowed Pride events to grow dramatically. Yet there was also a cost.

As Pride became more institutionalized, its activist character began to fade. Events that once centered political demands increasingly emphasized entertainment, marketing, and celebration. What had begun as a protest movement gradually evolved into a cultural festival. Many activists have argued that the commercialization of Pride diluted its political message and encouraged the public to believe that the struggle for LGBTQ+ equality had largely been won (Cornell University, 2022).

That perception grew even stronger after marriage equality became law nationwide. For many Americans, the legalization of same-sex marriage represented the culmination of the modern LGBTQ+ civil rights movement. The dominant narrative became one of victory rather than continued struggle.

But for many transgender people, the struggle was far from over.

The tensions between mainstream LGBTQ+ organizations and transgender activists became particularly visible during the debate surrounding the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, transgender activists fought for legislation that would prohibit workplace discrimination based on both sexual orientation and gender identity. However, many political leaders and advocacy organizations believed that including gender identity protections would make the legislation more difficult to pass.

In 2007, a version of ENDA was advanced that prohibited discrimination based on sexual orientation but excluded gender identity protections. Supporters of the strategy argued that political realities required compromise. They believed Congress was not prepared to pass a fully inclusive bill and that securing protections for gay, lesbian, and bisexual workers was better than securing no protections at all (Washington Blade, 2017; HRC, 2007).

For many transgender activists, however, this was not a strategic compromise. It was a betrayal.

The message they received was that transgender equality could be postponed because it was politically inconvenient. As a result, transgender activists increasingly relied upon their own organizations and advocacy networks rather than established LGBTQ+ institutions. These groups spent years educating the public, documenting discrimination, challenging exclusionary policies, and building a movement focused specifically on transgender rights.

Over the following decade, public awareness of transgender people increased dramatically. Media coverage expanded. Public opinion shifted. Gender identity became a more visible topic in American political discourse. As transgender rights gained national attention, major LGBTQ+ organizations—including the Human Rights Campaign—became increasingly active advocates for transgender equality.

Many welcomed this support. Additional resources and national visibility strengthened the fight against discrimination. Yet for some transgender activists, the shift was difficult to forget.

From their perspective, transgender organizations had spent years fighting battles that larger LGBTQ+ organizations had either ignored or treated as secondary concerns. Only after transgender rights became more politically visible and socially recognized did many of those larger organizations fully embrace transgender advocacy. The criticism was not that these organizations eventually supported transgender rights. The criticism was that they had not shown the same commitment when doing so carried greater political risk.

This history reflects a broader problem within modern Pride and LGBTQ+ politics. As movements become institutionalized, they often shift from challenging power to managing relationships with power. Organizations become concerned with political access, public relations, donor relationships, and legislative strategy. The result can be a form of respectability politics that prioritizes achievable victories while leaving more controversial or vulnerable communities behind.

Today, transgender people remain the primary targets of legislative attacks on LGBTQ+ rights in the United States. Hundreds of bills have been introduced in recent years targeting transgender healthcare, participation in public life, and legal recognition (Human Rights Campaign, 2026). Yet many Pride events continue to project an image of completed victory rather than ongoing struggle.

Celebration has an important place. LGBTQ+ people deserve joy. They deserve visibility. They deserve to recognize how far the movement has come.

But Pride should never forget why it exists.

Pride was created because LGBTQ+ people were denied equal rights. It was created because marginalized communities demanded justice from institutions that refused to recognize their humanity. If Pride becomes only a celebration, it risks forgetting the very activism that made those celebrations possible.

The history of transgender activism during the ENDA era serves as a reminder that progress is rarely as complete as it appears. Rights can be delayed. Communities can be sidelined. Movements can become comfortable.

The challenge for Pride today is not whether it should celebrate victories.

The challenge is whether it still remembers how to fight.

References

Cornell University. (2022, June 15). Is Pride too commercialized? https://lgbt.cornell.edu/news/pride-too-commercialized-0

Human Rights Campaign. (2007, November 7). U.S. House takes historic step by passing the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. https://www.hrc.org/press-releases/u-s-house-takes-historic-step-by-passing-the-employment-non-discrimination

Human Rights Campaign. (2026). Fighting anti-trans politics. https://www.hrc.org/our-work/stories/fighting-anti-trans-politics

TIME. (2020, June 18). What’s changed—and what hasn’t—in 50 years of Pride parades. https://time.com/5858086/pride-parades-history/

Washington Blade. (2017, November 6). 10 years later, firestorm over gay-only ENDA vote still remembered. https://www.washingtonblade.com/2017/11/06/10-years-later-firestorm-over-gay-only-enda-vote-still-remembered/

The Filipinoization of Stonewall

By Katherine Walter

On May 14, 2026

In LGBTQ+ rights

Father Richard Mickley, founder of MCC Manila and a pioneering figure in LGBTQ+ Christian ministry and Pride activism in the Philippines. Photo courtesy of the LGBTQ Religious Archives Network.

In the summer of 1999, I conducted anthropological fieldwork in Metropolitan Manila for my Master’s thesis at Northern Illinois University. My research focused on how Filipino understandings of homosexuality and gender identity were interacting with emerging Western LGBTQ+ political identities during the era of globalization (Walter, 1999). Looking back more than two decades later, I now realize that I was witnessing a foundational transitional period in Philippine LGBTQ+ history.

My thesis, The Gender Behaviors of Filipino Male Homosexuals in Metropolitan Manila Within the Era of Cultural Globalization, examined the relationship between bakla identity, masculine homosexual identity, class, and globalization within Metro Manila (Walter, 1999). During this period, post-Stonewall LGBTQ+ political discourse from the United States was increasingly circulating through media, activism, universities, and transnational social networks. However, these ideas were not simply imported intact into the Philippines. They were reshaped through Filipino cultural understandings of gender, sexuality, religion, family, and class.

During my fieldwork, I stayed in a house in Santa Mesa associated with the Filipino LGBTQ+ newspaper Manila Out. The editor-in-chief of the paper was Father Richard Mickley, an American minister affiliated with the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC). At the time, I understood him primarily as an older American clergyman deeply involved in local LGBTQ+ ministry and activism. Only later did I fully appreciate his historical importance within Philippine queer history.

Richard Mickley was one of the pioneering figures of openly LGBTQ+-affirming Christian ministry in the Philippines. After relocating to the country in 1991, he founded MCC Manila and became involved with LGBTQ+ advocacy and community organizing (Mickley, n.d.). He later worked alongside organizations such as Pro-Gay Philippines and activists including Oscar Atadero in helping organize the 1994 Pride March in Manila, now recognized as the first Pride march in both the Philippines and Asia (UNDP & USAID, 2014).

One of the most striking aspects of LGBTQ+ activism in Manila during 1999 was how interconnected the movement remained. Activists, students, clergy, journalists, researchers, and organizers frequently occupied the same social and physical spaces. Political organizing occurred not only through formal institutions, but also through apartments, cafés, churches, universities, newspapers, and shared community houses.

Through organizations such as Pro-Gay, Babaylan at the University of the Philippines, Manila MCC, and Manila Out, I conducted participant observation and interviews among Filipino gay men in Metro Manila. During this period, I also marched in the 1999 Manila Pride Parade, experiencing firsthand the growing visibility and political energy of the Philippine LGBTQ+ movement at the turn of the millennium. At the time, the Pride movement in Manila was still relatively small compared to large Western Pride celebrations, but it carried an intense sense of community, activism, and historical importance.

These experiences led me to conceptualize what I described in my thesis as “The Filipinoization of the Legacy of Stonewall” (Walter, 1999). By this, I meant that Filipino LGBTQ+ communities were adapting global queer political frameworks into distinctly Filipino cultural contexts rather than simply reproducing Western identity categories.

This distinction is anthropologically important. Western LGBTQ+ political discourse has often emphasized sexuality through identity categories such as “gay,” “lesbian,” or “bisexual.” In contrast, Filipino concepts such as bakla historically encompassed more fluid intersections of gender expression, sexuality, social role, performance, and class (Garcia, 2008). The globalization of queer politics in the Philippines therefore produced hybrid identities shaped simultaneously by local traditions and transnational political discourse.

Religion also played a major role in these tensions. I attended Catholic Mass with Richard Mickley during my stay in Manila, and although he retained appreciation for Catholic ritual and spirituality, he was sharply critical of institutional Catholic teachings regarding sexuality and LGBTQ+ exclusion. His later writings reflected strong opposition to what he described as “sex-negative theology,” particularly regarding LGBTQ+ marginalization and the Catholic Church’s role during the AIDS crisis (Mickley, n.d.).

Looking back now, I recognize that I was present during a major historical transition in Southeast Asian LGBTQ+ history:

the expansion of organized Pride activism,
the growth of LGBTQ+ political organizations,
the emergence of queer Filipino media,
and the globalization of queer political identity at the end of the twentieth century.

At the time, however, these developments did not feel historic. They felt immediate and deeply human. People were organizing marches, publishing newspapers, building communities, debating identity, and creating spaces where LGBTQ+ Filipinos could exist openly within a rapidly changing society.

Richard Mickley passed away on February 14, 2023. Reflecting on my experiences now, I realize that I had the privilege not only to conduct research during a pivotal moment in Philippine LGBTQ+ history, but also to personally participate in that history while encountering one of the individuals who helped shape it.

Perhaps the most important lesson I took from that fieldwork is that global political movements are never simply exported unchanged into new societies. They become translated, localized, and transformed through existing cultural systems. Stonewall did not simply arrive in the Philippines unchanged. It became Filipino.

References

Garcia, J. N. C. (2008). Philippine gay culture: Binabae to bakla, silahis to MSM. University of the Philippines Press.

Mickley, R. (n.d.). Biography and ministry history. Metropolitan Community Church historical materials.

United Nations Development Programme [UNDP], & United States Agency for International Development [USAID]. (2014). Being LGBT in Asia: The Philippines country report.

Walter, K. (1999). The gender behaviors of Filipino male homosexuals in Metropolitan Manila within the era of cultural globalization (Master’s thesis, Northern Illinois University).

ICE Is Getting Away With Murder

By Katherine Walter

On January 28, 2026

In civil rights, United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)

Los Angeles, CA – January 24: A sign is raised in support of Renee Good and Alex Pretti at a candle light vigil during a peaceful protest in support of a 37-year-old man shot and killed by immigration officers in Minneapolis was under way Saturday evening along Olvera Street in Los Angeles. Demonstrators gathered at the historic Placita Olvera marketplace on Saturday, Jan. 24, 2026 in Los Angeles, CA. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

The fatal shootings of Renee Nicole Macklin Good on January 7, 2026 and Alex Jeffrey Pretti on January 24, 2026 by federal immigration enforcement officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota are not isolated tragedies; they are stark indicators of an enforcement paradigm that is failing to protect public safety, eroding civil liberties, and operating with alarming impunity. Good, a 37-year-old mother, was killed by an ICE agent during an immigration enforcement operation earlier this month, prompting widespread protests and demands for accountability (CBS News, 2026). Weeks later, Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse and U.S. citizen, was fatally shot by federal agents while documenting and intervening in the enforcement activity; his death significantly intensified local and national outrage (ABC News, 2026).

These killings have unfolded amid “Operation Metro Surge,” a large-scale federal immigration enforcement initiative deploying ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents to Minneapolis and surrounding communities. The presence of thousands of armed federal agents in contexts far from the U.S. border has coincided with at least two fatal shootings of civilians in the span of weeks, incidents that have drawn protest, political backlash, and legal scrutiny (CBS News, 2026; ABC News, 2026). In the case of Pretti, footage and official preliminary reports indicate that two federal agents discharged their firearms during an encounter with Pretti, even as eyewitness accounts and bystander video challenge the notion that he posed an imminent threat (Star Tribune, 2026; ABC News, 2026).

The responses to these shootings reveal deep tension between federal agencies and local communities. Good’s family publicly denounced Pretti’s killing as “terrifying, deeply disturbing, and heartbreaking,” and called for a cessation of ICE activities, asserting that official accounts mischaracterized the circumstances of his death (People, 2026). Meanwhile, protests in Minneapolis and other cities have grown in size and intensity, with demonstrators expressing outrage not only over the deaths themselves but over the broader militarized approach federal immigration enforcement has adopted (El País, 2026; ABC News, 2026).

Federal officials have at times defended the actions of agents, framing them as lawful enforcement measures. Yet political pushback has emerged across the spectrum: senior legislators are seeking Justice Department records on both Pretti’s and Good’s killings, while even some Republican lawmakers have called for independent investigations and questioned the federal narrative (CBS News, 2026; Washington Post, 2026). These developments underscore that the core issues extend beyond partisan disagreement to fundamental questions about the role and accountability of ICE, CBP, and related agencies.

The argument for withdrawing ICE from Minneapolis and similar urban environments is compelling when one considers the lethal outcomes that have accompanied its operations, the erosion of public trust, and the disruption of civic life. Deploying armed federal agents into densely populated cities has resulted in confrontations with residents, journalists, and peaceful observers — encounters that should never escalate to loss of life in contexts unrelated to border security. The deaths of Good and Pretti, both U.S. citizens killed in broad daylight, demonstrate the high cost of maintaining such a deployment without robust accountability, transparent oversight, and clear limits on the use of force.

Moreover, these killings raise broader questions about the continued existence of ICE as an enforcement agency. When an agency tasked with upholding immigration laws repeatedly engages in operations that endanger the lives of citizens and long-term residents, it is reasonable to question whether reformation within the current institutional framework is sufficient. Critics and activists increasingly argue that ICE’s mandate — and the violence inherent in its domestic deployment — cannot be reconciled with the values of safety, justice, and civil liberties. For many, this leads to the conclusion that ICE should be abolished, and its functions reassigned to civilian agencies with clear lines of accountability and strong protections for human rights.

The tragic deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti are more than isolated headlines; they are a test of democratic norms and the limits of federal power. Their loss compels us to confront the consequences of allowing an immigration enforcement apparatus to operate in U.S. cities with insufficient oversight, minimal transparency, and a penchant for militarized tactics. For the safety of communities and the integrity of constitutional rights, wise leaders should support an immediate withdrawal of ICE from Minneapolis and initiate a broader conversation about dismantling an agency whose operations have culminated in the deaths of innocent Americans.

References

ABC News. (2026, January 27). Minneapolis live updates: Stephen Miller says CBP may not have followed protocol. https://abcnews.go.com/US/live-updates/minneapolis-ice-shooting-live-updates-doj-investigating-apparent?id=129340693

CBS News. (2026, January 27). Key legislators seek Justice Department records on Alex Pretti and Renee Good killings by next week. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/key-legislators-seek-doj-records-on-alex-pretti-and-renee-good-killings-by-next-week/

El País. (2026, January 26). Minneapolis clama contra la “impunidad” de la policía migratoria que mató a Alex Pretti. https://elpais.com/us/migracion/2026-01-26/minneapolis-clama-contra-la-impunidad-de-la-policia-migratoria-que-mato-a-alex-pretti.html

People. (2026, January 26). Renee Good’s family reacts to Alex Pretti’s “deeply disturbing” death: “We urge all Americans to trust their own eyes”. https://people.com/renee-good-family-reacts-to-alex-pretti-death-11892182

Star Tribune. (2026, January 28). Minneapolis Border Patrol shooting: What to know about investigations, protests and immigration operations. https://www.startribune.com/ice-raids-minnesota/601546426

Washington Post. (2026, January 27). GOP backlash on Minnesota signals a tougher landscape for Trump. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2026/01/27/pretti-shooting-trump-minneapolis-republicans/

Regime Change Is Not Lawful—It’s Plunder

By Katherine Walter

On January 3, 2026

In international law

KRAKOW, POLAND JANUARY 3:
A woman watches ABC News Live as U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine explains details of a U.S. special military operation in Venezuela, with President Donald Trump present, in Krakow, Poland, January 3, 2026. (Photo by Artur Widak/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

What is being reported today—that the United States military removed Nicolás Maduro, the sitting president of Venezuela, under the direction of Donald Trump—should be treated as a constitutional, legal, and moral emergency rather than a triumph. Even setting aside one’s opinion of Maduro or the failures of his government, the use of unilateral military force to depose a head of state is plainly illegal under international law. This is not a gray area. It is precisely the sort of conduct the modern international legal system was created to prohibit.

The cornerstone of international law since 1945 is the prohibition on the use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of another state. Article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter bars such actions outright, allowing only two narrow exceptions: self-defense against an armed attack or action authorized by the UN Security Council (United Nations, 1945). No credible public evidence suggests that Venezuela launched an armed attack against the United States, nor has there been any Security Council authorization permitting regime removal. Absent either condition, military intervention for the purpose of removing a government constitutes unlawful aggression under international law (Brownlie, 1963; United Nations, 1970).

Attempts to justify such an action by invoking “self-defense,” “counter-narcotics,” or “restoring democracy” do not survive serious legal scrutiny. International law does not permit a state to overthrow another government because it is authoritarian, corrupt, or hostile to foreign economic interests. The UN General Assembly has repeatedly affirmed that no state has the right to intervene, directly or indirectly, in the internal affairs of another, regardless of motive (United Nations General Assembly, 1970). This principle exists precisely because powerful states have historically cloaked invasions in moral language while pursuing strategic and economic gains.

Seen through that lens, this intervention reads less like a defense of democracy and more like a textbook exercise in plutocratic power. Venezuela possesses some of the largest proven oil reserves in the world, and U.S. policy toward the country for decades has revolved around control, access, and leverage over those resources (Mommer, 2002). When military force is paired with rhetoric about “stabilizing” oil production, reopening markets, or placing foreign companies in a position to manage extraction, the intent becomes difficult to deny. This is not about liberating Venezuelans; it is about aligning state violence with corporate interests, particularly those of multinational energy companies that stand to benefit from regime change.

International law directly rejects this logic. The principle of permanent sovereignty over natural resources affirms that a people’s land, minerals, and energy reserves belong to them alone and must be used for their national development, not appropriated through coercion or foreign occupation (United Nations General Assembly, 1962). That right does not evaporate because a foreign power disapproves of how a country governs itself or wishes to restructure its economy. To claim otherwise is to revive colonial doctrines that the postwar legal order explicitly sought to bury.

What makes this moment especially dangerous is the precedent it sets. If the United States can openly remove a foreign leader by force and then claim legal justification after the fact, the entire prohibition on aggressive war becomes performative rather than binding. Other powers will follow the same script, citing security concerns, economic stability, or humanitarian necessity as cover. The result is not a safer world, but a return to a system where might makes right and international law exists only to discipline the weak.

The Venezuelan people have the exclusive right to determine their political future and to decide how their resources are used. That process may be flawed, painful, and slow, but it cannot be replaced by foreign troops and oil contracts without shredding the legal norms that protect all states, large and small. If international law means anything at all, it means that regime change by force—especially when tied to resource extraction—is illegal, illegitimate, and profoundly destabilizing.

References

Brownlie, I. (1963). International law and the use of force by states. Oxford University Press.

Mommer, B. (2002). Global oil and the nation state. Oxford University Press.

United Nations. (1945). Charter of the United Nations. https://www.un.org/en/about-us/un-charter

United Nations General Assembly. (1962). Permanent sovereignty over natural resources (Resolution 1803 (XVII)).

United Nations General Assembly. (1970). Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States (Resolution 2625 (XXV)).