Cincinnati Pride Cuts Ties With Several Corporate Sponsors

metroweekly.com:

Cincinnati Pride announced it will cut ties with several corporate sponsors, sacrificing tens of thousands of dollars, in response to the companies’ decisions to eliminate diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies and initiatives.The organization acknowledged that it would be a struggle to replace the funding for its annual Pride parade.

But it has also said it is essential to stand by its values, which include respect for the history and diverse culture of the LGBTQ community.Cincinnati Pride says it doesn’t want to work with corporate sponsors that are viewed as hostile to those values and would rather work with companies that have demonstrated a genuine, ongoing commitment to LGBTQ causes throughout the calendar year, according to Cincinnati NBC affiliate WLWT.“Organizations that, I would say, walk the walk as much as they talk the talk,” Jake Hitch, a board member with Cincinnati Pride, said of the types of sponsors with whom it would like to partner. “One of the things that we’re looking at is: are you an advocate for the LGBTQ community only in June or are you January to December?”Hitch told local ABC affiliate WCPO that Cincinnati Pride won’t publicly name the corporations with whom it’s severing ties.“We’re not looking to, you know, throw anyone under the bus or really even make the conversation around organizations we’ve…said no to.

It’s about trying to bring the community in together,” Hitch told the news station.Cincinnati Pride’s re-evaluation of its relationship with certain sponsors comes at a time when there is a larger conservative backlash, politically and societally, against LGBTQ visibility more broadly and expressions of gender nonconformity, whether in the form of drag or transgender.