Pride Guide 1999 GAY PEC

ONICLE

Pink Paradigm sponsors 1999 Queen City Pride rally

Cincinnati-The city's new club for gay visibility and education, Pink Paradigm, has been up to more than raising money for billboards.

Since their early meetings in February, the new "queer social network for cultural change" has raised about $2,500 towards the first installment of their billboard campaign to promote gay visibility in the Queen City.

The group's educational bent has also directed it's members to address such things as the city's bid for the 2012 Olympic Games, which they tackled with a leafleting of an Olympics fundraiser on May 22, and with direct exchanges between Olympics organizer Nick Vehr and Pink Paradigm spokesman Michael Blankenship at the University of Cincinnati on April 15, and on radio station WNKU the following week.

Pink Paradigm says they want Vehr to "speak out against discrimination and stand up for fairness. It's more than fun and games."

When it became apparent that no rally was being planned as part of Cincinnati's Pride events for 1999, Pink Paradigm stepped forward to sponsor this year's Pride rally, in a demonstration of community involvement.

"It seemed logical that if we (the Paradigm) are about visibility and education, we should sponsor the Pride rally, otherwise it wasn't being scheduled,” said Blankenship.

The group scrambled to pull together speakers and entertainers for the event, which was held Sunday, June 6, in front of Cincinnati City Hall.

Cincinnati's Pride Committee picked "Unity in Our Community" as the theme for this year's Pride events, and Pink Paradigm members hope that the rally served as a community forum, with all points of view within the GLBT community expressed.

"Unity has to be built upon a foundation of communication and cooperation,” said Blankenship. "We all have something to say, and we all need to listen as well."

Pink Paradigm hopes to do most of its talking through its billboard campaign. The

group had mockups of some of their best billboard designs on display at the Pride rally. The billboards are not tied to any specific political intention, but designed to get the public used to thinking of gay people as familiar faces in the common experience.

Instead of making statements, the billboards ask simple questions. The ads are built around themes of love, family, fairness, privacy, and economy. The group hopes to "put a face on our community," and thinks the best way to do that is to relate to the public personally, and let them answer the questions posed. Pink Paradigm needs to raise at least $6,000 for each different design in the planned series of ads.

More information about the group and its future activities can be found at the Rainbow Cincinnati web site, http://

www.GayCincinnati.com.

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A group of Pink Paradigm members, calling themselves the "Magnificent Eight" pause from leafleting on Olympics fundraiser May 22 to pose for a photo in their bright pink T-shirts.

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