Chicago Pride Month is in full swing, with events planned throughout June to recognize LGBTQ+ history and the 55th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots in New York City, which spearheaded an international gay rights movement in 1969.
Six decades later, Chicago’s Latino lesbian, gay, bisexual and queer communities are embracing the city’s progress toward equality, while recognizing there’s still work to be done. Particularly when it comes to providing safe and welcoming environments for today’s LGBTQ+ youth.
In 1989, ALMA Chicago was launched as the Association of Latino Men for Action, but its name was later changed in 2012 to the Association of Latinos/as/xs Motivating Action. ALMA is the oldest Latinx organization of its kind in the Midwest and has expanded its mission to be more inclusive of all age groups, sexual orientations and gender identities.
“During that time, at the height of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, we saw primarily gay men, right?” ALMA Executive Director Manuel Hernández explained. “So an organization that was founded as an organization for Latino gay men is now an organization that encompasses everyone within the Latina LGBT community. Especially focusing on youth engagement and encouraging them to take on the leadership to advocate for their communities and their homes that they're coming from. And so now we have programming that's geared towards connecting arts with advocacy.”
The Center on Halsted dates back to the 1973, when it was called Gay Horizons. And through the years, the center has also had to adjust its programming.
“It has evolved since then, and now we have youth housing, we have culinary workforce training, we provide mental health services and we ensure that it's everyone,” said Center on Halsted Board Chair Victor Ravago. “It's a fantastic place for folks to come find community in supporting themselves through, either coming out, or dealing with their family support and how they're being embraced. And it's folks of all generations. They find a place, and we find groups and social programming that supports them.”
Finding safe spaces was a challenge in the early 1990s for longtime LGBTQ+ activist and Chicago LGBT Hall of Fame inductee Alicia T. Vega when she came out and discovered her advocacy. A founding member of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance at Loyola University Chicago, Vega later launched a youth ministry group called QYES: Queer Youth Exploring Sexuality and served as a board member for Amigas Latinas and as a mentor for Amiguitas Youth Group.
“Amigas was like, yeah, I got to bring every single part of who I was,” Vega said. “People would open their homes, it was intimate. We would meet over meals and we would just have topics and just come together and just talk and, and connect and see people like ourselves in safe spaces.”
Upcoming Pride Month events Include Chicago Pride Fest on June 23 and 24, and the Chicago Pride Parade the following weekend on June 30. The parade steps off at 11 a.m. at West Sheridan Road and North Broadway Street, with this year’s theme of “Pride is Power.”
