Pride 2021: Celebration & Solidarity

Last year, just as COVID-19 turned Pride virtual, the pandemic also required Equitas Health to convert many of our in-person services to Telehealth. After supporting the LGBTQ+ community’s fight against the AIDS epidemic for over thirty years, we were uniquely prepared and motivated to take COVID-19 as seriously as possible in order to deliver our services as safely as possible. The successful integration of telehealth made, and will continue to make, the LGBTQ+ community’s gateway to good health that much wider.

Care for All also means social justice for all. While unable to celebrate Pride on a float, or in a parade lined with thousands of people, the LGBTQ+ community demonstrated its Pride in 2020 by responding to the U.S. Census and voting in local, state, & national elections. You also showed your pride by joining marches for racial justice, echoing Pride’s activist origins in communities of color.

We all stand on the shoulders of the Transgender community when we celebrate Pride. Fifty-five years after the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District, state-sanctioned attacks on Trans lives persist. This year, state legislatures across the country, including Ohio’s, have introduced a record 82 anti-transgender bills with Arkansas passing the first law banning gender-affirming care for transgender youth.  These shameful milestones prove that social justice for some of us equals social justice for none of us.

Pride is a reminder of the LGBTQ+ community’s strength that comes from being loud, visible, and showing up for each other all year. The road to social justice and LGBTQ+ equity has been long. It will be longer still. For every victory, a new challenge awaits. I am confident our unity and visibility will make it possible to overcome any challenge—and the celebrations of our victories that much sweeter.

In solidarity and in celebration,

Bill Hardy
President & CEO
He/Him

We look forward to seeing you at this in-person and virtual celebrations!

JUNE 3 – 30 | Cincinnati Black Pride
JUNE 3 – 30 | Stonewall Columbus Pride Events
JUNE 4 | 2021 Ohio LGBTQ+ Unity Summit
JUNE 4-6 | Dayton Pride
JUNE 4-6 | Findlay Pride
JUNE 5 | Hamilton Ohio Pride
JUNE 6 | Northern Kentucky Pride
JUNE 8 | Sinclair Community College (Dayton)
JUNE 12 | Art for Franklinton (Columbus)
JUNE 14 | Pride Tea Dance (Columbus)
JUNE 19 | Stonewall Columbus Virtual Pride March
JUNE 26 | Unity March on Columbus for Black Lives
JUNE 26 | Franklinton Pride (Columbus)
JUNE 26 | Springfield Pride
JUNE 26 | RockHard Pride Events (Cincinnati)
JUNE 26 | Sandusky Pride
JUNE 26 | Big Gay Dance Party (Columbus)
JUNE 27 | Pride Market at the Park (Cincinnati)
JULY 10 | Freemont Pride
JULY 31 | Pride in the Valley (Warren)
AUG 14 – SEPT 19 | Akron Black Family Pride Events (Akron AIDS Collaborative)
AUG 21 | First Capital Pride
AUG 28 | Akron Pride
OCT 2 | Newark Pride