This year, organizers added a parade at the start of the event, which comes as hundreds of anti-LGBTQIA-plus bills are proposed in state legislatures around the country. As the crowd made their way to Riverside Park down Broadway and Main Street, waving flags and cheering, onlookers joined right in, marching with them.

Adirondack North Country Gender Alliance Executive Director Kelly Metzgar, who led the parade, said this was just like the Stonewall riots, which many believe to be the birth of the modern gay liberation movement.

The Stonewall Riots started on June 28, 1969. The riots — a clash between police and members of the LGBTQIA-plus community that stretched over six days — were sparked by a police raid of the Stonewall gay bar in New York City. Police raids in gay bars were common at the time, according to the Library of Congress. It was illegal to serve alcohol to gay people in New York until 1966, and in 1969, being gay was still considered a criminal offense. As a result, many gay bars served alcohol without a liquor license, and police raids of the bars and police brutality against gay people was common. The first Pride march was held in New York City a year after the riots, on June 28, 1970.

Peru resident Sean Brace, who performs under the drag name Mhisty Knights, said Pride is still what it was more than 50 years ago at Stonewall — LGBTQIA-plus people fighting for the right to be who they want to be. That is a fight that is ongoing, Knights said, and LGBTQIA-plus rights are being challenged hard in other states around the country. Knights said they’re not going to stand by and go back into the closet.

A marcher in the Tri-Lakes Pride Festival parade on Sunday does a heel-clicking jump as they walk to Riverside Park. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

“We’re not going anywhere. We’re not changing who we are. They can pass all the legislation they want. We’re still going to be here,” Knights said. “If Stonewall happens again, go for it.”

Locally, Knights said Malone’s Small Town Pride event was challenged by locals there, including some churches, who called the mayor and chamber of commerce to try to stop the event. Knights was encouraged that that didn’t happen in Saranac Lake.

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Religious leaders attend

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Local drag queen Violet Knights performs in Riverside Park at the Tri-Lakes Pride Festival on Sunday. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

Two retired reverends from the Adirondack Presbyterian Church in Lake Clear were at Tri-Lakes Pride, as were representatives of the St. Eustace Episcopal Church in Lake Placid and Keene Valley Congregational Church.

Betsey Hall, a retired minister, is lesbian and was at Pride with her partner. She said the church fought for many years over whether people like her could be ordained. Women’s ordination had been an issue the church had already resolved and Hall was ordained before she was out of the closet, but for 20 years, there was fierce debate over whether the church should stop ordaining LGBTQIA-plus people in the future. The church ended up allowing LGBTQIA-plus reverends.

Martin Weitz, who is only semi-retired, still does services at the Lake Clear church and he said they fly the gay pride flag over the communion table.

Weitz said he grew up near Stonewall when the riots happened. He said it was a time when they all had to make some big decisions. It divided churches. He is straight, was ordained in 1975 and did his first gay wedding in 1985.

Now, he said the church is discussing transgender people.

A marcher in the Tri-Lakes Pride Festival parade on Sunday waves flags as they walk to Riverside Park. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

“What are we doing picking on trans people?” Hall asked. “All God’s children have a place in the choir!”

Weitz said that looking around the park on Sunday, he saw the “face of God” everywhere in the people gathered there.

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Seeking safety

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Plattsburgh-based drag queen Mhisty Knights performs in Riverside Park at the Tri-Lakes Pride Festival. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

Feeling safe was a big part of Pride this year for many in attendance.

The Human Rights Campaign, or HRC, declared its first-ever state of emergency for LGBTQIA-plus Americans on June 6 — the first declaration of its kind in the organization’s more than 40-year history. According to the HRC, 77 anti-LGBTQIA-plus bills were signed into law from Jan. 1 to June 8, 2023. That’s more than double the number of anti-LGBTQIA-plus bills signed into law in all of 2022, which previously held the record for the most anti-LGBTQIA-plus bills passed, according to the HRC. Many of these laws — some of which have been struck down in courts for being unconstitutional — target transgender people. They seek to restrict transgender health care, regulate what bathrooms people can use, attempt to ban trans students from playing on sports teams that align with their gender identity, and limit drag shows.

Meanwhile, violence and intimidation from anti-LGBTQIA-plus hate groups flourish at events and in individual confrontations.

“The fact that it is political at all is ridiculous,” Saphire Ahlers said.

On Sunday morning, Ahlers had seen a map compiled by the transgender independent journalist Erin Reed, showing which states transgender people are at the highest risk in. Florida was labeled as “do not travel.”

Tiffany Rea-Fisher, right, the director of the Adirondack North Country Association’s Adirondack Diversity Initiative walks in the Tri-Lakes Pride Festival parade on Sunday. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

This distinction for Florida comes because of a law legislators and the governor passed there last month, making it a crime for a transgender person to use a public bathroom marked with the gender they identify as. Punishments for this crime include up to a year of jail time, which will likely not be in a jail that aligns with their gender, Reed posits.

Ahlers described feeling unsafe at times in day to day life. They’re always assessing if people are safe to talk openly to. Having this visibility is important to them.

“It’s just really cool to actually be able to visually perceive of so many people who you know are chill with who you are,” Ahlers said.

Gabrielle Elijah Shippee, who also goes by Cuno, said he had been to Plattsburgh Pride in the past as the secretary of Paul Smith’s College’s Pride club, but it is so much nicer to walk down the road and enjoy pride in his own town.

He felt afraid seeing anti-trans legislation proposed and passed around the country. He said he had to take a break from social media and disconnect because it was so disheartening.

Mitchell Jensen, from Tupper Lake, said seeing dozens of people like himself makes him feel comfortable. Jensen met Metzgar when he came out as trans about 10 years ago. He said seeing another trans person who was a bit older than him, and who he could look up to, was encouraging. He had not met many trans people older than him.

“It gave me hope for the future that maybe I’ll live that long,” Jensen said.

He said when he first came out he did not even know the word transgender. Jensen said he had Googled “I feel like a boy” and learned of other people feeling that way, too.

“It wasn’t like I was indoctrinated by anyone,” Jensen said. “I was so insecure in my own being.”

He said it was something that came internally.

Ahlers said they found out they were nonbinary in college. Before then, they didn’t have vocabulary to describe how they were feeling. They thought they were just an ally.

This was a common theme for the many young LGBTQIA-plus people at the event. They said their feelings of being a different gender than the one they were born as, being attracted to the same gender or feeling genderless, come from inside and that they’re looking for the world to accept and recognize them that way.

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What Pride means

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A group of kids from the Saranac Lake Youth Center put on a fashion show with Main Street Exchange.

Each of the kids wrote bios about what pride means to them. They said pride is about not being afraid of who they are, or fear of others judging them.

Elle M., an eighth grader, said they want to feel comfortable being in their own skin, and in doing that, they want to feel comfortable in the world.

“Pride means I lived another year to celebrate being me and to remember those who died so I could have pride now,” Bingo V., a ninth grader, wrote.

“Pride to me means being authentically yourself and not listening to anyone trying to bring you down,” wrote Aaron G., a Saranac Lake eighth grader who performed in drag at Pride under the name Violet Knights.

“What Pride means to me is showing others you’re not afraid to be who you are,” Jamie H., an 11th grader in Tupper Lake, wrote.

One of the kids, Wilbur H., joined the Youth Center in 2021. They said they were shy and didn’t know themselves well. Wilbur credited SLYC Director Aleacia Landon with helping them find who they wanted to be.

“I always knew I liked girls, I just hadn’t known how to put it into words,” Wilbur said.

Wilbur said they are all sad to see Landon retiring, but know incoming director Jennifer Keller, “Jen,” will do a good job of keeping a loving, supportive and welcoming space at the Youth Center.

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Speeches

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In addition to the fashion show and drag performances, a few people delivered speeches at Pride.

Owen Gilbo, an equal opportunity specialist from the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation and a trans man from Ticonderoga, said with so much hate toward people like him in America, he was encouraged to see the celebration in Saranac Lake. Driving into town, he was held up in traffic because of the parade. He said it was impressive to see such support in a small community.

“It brought tears to my eyes,” Gilbo said.

He read a proclamation stating that the state of New York is horrified by attacks on LGBTQIA-plus people around the country, in violence and in legislation, and declared that New York is a safe haven for LGBTQIA-plus individuals. On Sunday, Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a “Safe Haven” act for transgender youths in New York state. It was passed by the state Assembly and Senate earlier and state Assemblyman Billy Jones, D-Chataugay Lake, voted to support the bill and walked in the parade on Sunday.

“People should be able to express themselves and live their lives the way they want,” he told the Enterprise on Monday. “That’s all what any of us are trying to do.”

Saranac Lake village Trustee Rich Shapiro, Franklin County Legislator Lindy Ellis, Harrietstown Supervisor Jordanna Mallach and the Adirondack North Country Association’s Adirondack Diversity Initiative director Tiffany Rea-Fisher also spoke at the event.

Local drag queen Jaxxsinn performs in Riverside Park at the Tri-Lakes Pride Festival on Sunday. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

Around 200 people turned out for the Tri-Lakes Pride Festival. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)