Pride: a turbulent history of bisexual erasure and marginalisation

In 1969, a Jewish, polyamarous, bisexual woman called Brenda Howard organised the Christopher Street Liberation Day Parade to commemorate the riots at the Stonewall Inn. While Howard was not at Stonewall that night, several of her friends, many of whom were sexual workers and kinksters, were present. A year later, she helped organise another march and, thankfully for us, the tradition continues yearly around the world.

“She used to call us when she was bored waiting for paid phone sex calls to come in, and make the waiting time a productive organising opportunity and personal energy recharge instead,” wrote activists Lani Ka’ahumanu and Lorraine Hutchins about the Pride organiser in her memorial.

“The next time someone asks you why LGBT Pride marches exist or why LGBT Pride Month is June tell them ‘A bisexual woman named Brenda Howard thought it should be.”

So how did an event, and word, popularised by Howard and another iconic bisexual activist, Donny the Punk, come to erase and even exclude bisexuality on so many occasions?

Long struggle.

In 1993, Brenda, who was a founding chairperson of the Gay Activists Alliance, was involved in organising the March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation…