Community Not Commodity Coalition

Community Not Commodity was a HUGE success! We organized to focus the struggle for Queer and Trans liberation away from Corporatized "Pride" and toward Community! We have laid the framework for a coalition that will continue to work for justice- as decentralized groups that can come together in Solidarity for future actions! You can view videos here.



This pride, don’t let Trans folks get thrown under the float!

COMMUNITY NOT COMMODITY INVITES YOU TO JOIN US IN THE CASTRO FOR THE ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF OCCUPY WALLSTEET (09/17)

Join us for an afternoon of celebration and defiance. Bring your props, costumes, dances, and cheers as we rally and march on the banks. We have taken these street before, and we will do it again as a reminder to the big banks, real estate brokers, and politicians that WE are still here and ready to FIGHT FOR OUR NEIGHBORHOOD.

SO WHAT ARE WE PLANNING TO DO?

*2pm-3pm: We begin our afternoon by setting up at the corner of 18th and Castro. At 2:30pm, we will have a brief community speak out!

*3pm-4pm: We begin our march on the banks as a group. We will mark the end of the march by holding a brief sit-in at Harvey Milk Plaza to denounce Sit/Lie and the criminalization of homelessness.

*5pm: We will join OSF at 555 California for a debt burning ceremony, where we will symbolically get rid of debt through the burning of debt papers.

WHAT SHOULD YOU BRING?
*Signs, costumes, or any visual aid that represents a playful response to economic injustice
*Cheers, chants, song, and spirit
*Bank statements, student loan statements, and all other proofs of debt for the debt burning ceremony

WHAT ARE WE PROTESTING (AND WHY THE CASTRO)?
Many of us know the Castro as the historic home of queer activism since the 1970’s. And yet increased rents, foreclosures and evictions, and THE displacement of queer and homeless youth has taken the neighborhood further from the legacy of Harvey Milk and those who fought to make this place a home for EVERYONE. On September 17th, we invite Castro residents to join us in DEMANDING A NEIGHBORHOOD FOR ALL OF US.

WHAT ARE WE ASKING FOR?:
*Divestment from big banks like Wells Fargo, BofA, Chase, and Citibank; and investment in credit unions
*No more evictions and Foreclosures that create homelessness; especially among young members of the LGBT community.
*Stop evicting those with HIV/AIDS!

Pride at Work/HAVOQ successfully organized a direct action at the Kaiser float and OccuPride rose to support their campaign. To find out more about their ongoing campaign efforts, visit them here.

The Pride celebration has become increasingly commercialized, co-opted by corporate interests that use our struggle for liberation as a market for commodities and a way to boost profit.

These interests – the top of the 1% – parade status quo candidates and parties for our consumption, wearing a progressive mask of LGBT equality while marginalizing and criminalizing the poor and disempowered. In doing so they seek to divide our community, catering only to those of us with money to spend. But the queer and trans communities are more than the affluent; we are also the disempowered, the homeless, the sick, the victims of discrimination and violence.

So we must Occupy Pride. We honor our radical roots in our fight for full liberation for all of us – women, people of color, immigrants, the disabled, all the oppressed and marginalized. We are diverse, joined together in struggle – we are the 99%. We must tear down the barriers that divide us to build and nurture an inclusive community, celebrating our forgotten histories and those of us excluded from corporate Pride. Together we will reclaim the parade, bringing it back to its origins: a march for the liberation of all oppressed peoples! Housing, health care, living wages, protection from discrimination – human rights are queer rights! There are no spectators.

• This is about Pride, not profit.
• We are a movement, not a market.
• We are communities, not commodities!