the limping messenger

In 2015 I published this lightly formulated protest against the unbearable sound pollution produced by the Gay pride Canal Pride (with sound systems on board of the boats that send shock waves through all the canals and neighbouring neighbourhoods where the parade passes… and worst the pre- and after-parties with street stages with many hours of sound terror. Did it have any effect? NO there is only brute force and brute commercialism in the minds of the Gay Pride organisers. They aim at tolerance and mutual respect in words but the sound terror that is part of Gay Pride has the opposite effect. Why is it that there must always be bug amplifiers and huge loud speakers, competing for who has the loudest?
Here at least in an image a show that it could all be different and nicer…

After years of Proud & Loud Gay pride Cana Parades that invade the city of Amsterdam with unbearable levels of noise pollution, finally it has dawned on a few more creative inclined fighters for the good cause of emancipation of everyone that it is time to unplug and show that gay emancipation should be considerate also to the inhabitants of the inner town that hosts them. It is not only about the ears of the public, but also their own hearing now and in the future that needs to be recognised. Too long the organisers of Gay pride Amsterdam have remained deaf to complaints about the negative side effects of what in itself is a just cause.

Pain level sound produced not only during the Canal Parade but also on the city streets with outdoor stages during three nights, are experienced as nothing but noise to those who live in the inner town. Many inhabitants are fleeing their homes – some for several days – because of an event that could be liked, but has turned into a hard core commercial enterprise with a competition who has the loudest sound system on board, who dares to turn the amplifiers up beyond any regulation. For those living around the Gay Pride is nothing less and more than three days of ‘sound pollution’.

Many living around the festival will hear from a distance only a mechanical droning base sound without any melody, with some high pitched over-modulated exalted sounds of people shouting in a microphone, this from seven in the evening until midnight during three days. If it was only one afternoon of the Canal Parade moving through the ‘grachten’ it would have been bearable. Each year the outdoor stages produce most of the time the same repertoire of disco and the like, with no renewal whatsoever. The only difference being that the amplification of that repertoire gets louder by the year.

Let’s get over with all this cheap and easily produced invasive self-centred party noise. Let’s become finally creative.

From 2016 on Gay pride Amsterdam will be UNPLUGGED and so many new inspiring opportunities lay ahead: ukelele orchestra on boats, plucking guitars, falsetto voices echoing underneath the bridges, violins, bassoons, flutes, the sound of horns from afar, the dying thunder of timpani, the high tone of a triangle bouncing over the surface of the water and choirs, many choirs of all sorts, performing in many styles…

The emancipation of all those that are treated as unequal will be married to the emancipation of the ear… than the inhabitants do not need to flee or burry their heads under the blanket, wear ear-plugs…

GAY PRIDE UNPLUGGED 2016 will become the herald of a genuine attempt of communicating joy and playfulness to the pleasure of all.