Marriage celebration kicks off gay pride parade

NEW YORK (AP) — Three dozen gay couples celebrated their same-sex partnerships Sunday to kick off New York City's 32nd annual gay pride parade, a celebration of flamboyant costumes and floats.

"We'd like to be recognized as a couple," said Sheneen Ellis, wearing a white veil and mini-dress decorated with tiny red rhinestones, as she stood with her partner, Alona Hartnett, dressed in white slacks and jacket.

They were surrounded by their five children as two ministers and a rabbi blessed them in a ceremony at the entrance to Central Park just before the Heritage of Pride parade.

"Two mothers are better than having only one," read a sign carried by one of the children, 10-year-old Calhea Johnson. "I love mommy and mommy."

The parade included lesbians on motorcycles, a rainbow arch of balloons and a top-down convertible carrying veterans of the 1969 Stonewall riots, in which patrons of a gay bar in Greenwich Village fought back against a police raid.

The parade to mark the event has grown over the years to a colorful pageant drawing hundreds of thousands of participants and spectators, and has been replicated in cities around the world.

In Europe, Paris and Berlin celebrated gay pride on Saturday with rollicking parades. At the center of the festivities were the cities' mayors, both openly gay.

About 1 million people dressed in everything from feathered boas to skintight leather gathered in San Francisco for that city's 31st Annual Pride Parade and Celebration, the state's largest public event.

"This is a great opportunity to raise the visibility of the gay community," said city Supervisor Mark Leno, who is gay and served as one the parade's five marshals.

But the drag queens in sequined dresses and feathers and young men in tight shorts were a bit much for some tourists.

"It's enlightening," said Sally Christenson, 48. "I was naive. I never thought people would expose themselves to this extent. You don't see this in Minnesota."

In Chicago, organizers expected approximately 350,000 to attend what has become one of the largest parades in the city.

"It's once a year that we can get out and be happy," said Greg Trent, 32, of Joliet, a community southwest of the city. "We can step out into the street and stand up for our rights. Everyone supports us. I love it."

But Yvonne Ricciotti, 29, said the event is becoming too commercial.

"I think people are forgetting what it's about. It's about Stonewall. It's about standing up for our rights. People are turning it into a big party and the politicians are here just to get our vote."

In Atlanta, thousands of people, including several mayoral candidates, participated in the city's 31st Gay Pride celebration, which wrapped up Sunday with a parade along the city's main artery, Peachtree Street.

"Events like this help increase our visibility and help to let people know that gay people do exist, that we're not deviants," Benson Cohen said. "We don't just exist in the shadows."

Organizer Calvin Johnson agreed: "We contribute a lot to the city. We're not here to force anything on them, we just want to be a part of the society and be accepted for who we are."

The New York marriage ceremonies were not legally binding but served as a rallying point for activists who would like to see same-sex couples accorded the same legal rights as heterosexual couples.

"Women who want to marry and men who want to marry should have the same rights that Deni and I have enjoyed," city Public Advocate Mark Green, who is running for mayor, told the couples as he stood with his wife of 24 years, Deni Frand.

New York City's domestic partnership law gives public employees who are same-sex couples the same health benefits as married couples, along with privileges such as visiting rights in city institutions like hospitals and jails.

Vermont is the only state that offers gay couples the option of civil unions, which give them the same rights as married couples. Legislation to legalize homosexual unions has been introduced in New York state but has never passed.