Commissioner Bratton claims he wants to repair trust between the NYPD and New Yorkers. But he's sending cops to march in a huge, notorious anti-LGBTQ parade -- the NYC St. Patrick's Day parade. Bratton will march up front alongside the organizers. He has approved huge contingents of uniformed officers to march, too. He's claiming a free speech right for NYPD officers join this display of bigotry. (Imagine if thousands of uniformed cops marched in an antigay parade in Russia!)

The parade organizers invoke "religious freedom" in order to turn this huge public event into a discriminatory one. From NYC to Arizona, LGBTQ communities are confronting hate shrouded in the language of "freedom." The NYPD *cannot* join in endorsing discrimination justified by religion. 

LGBTQ groups, public officials, and civil rights attorneys have called on the NYPD to stay out of the parade. The Mayor and the City Council are boycotting it, too. But Bratton hasn't bothered to respond to the community at all. 

The homophobic culture of the NYPD is part of a larger problem of bias and unresponsiveness to many New York communities. Let's make our voices loud for an accountable NYPD that's fair to all of us.

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For more information on the parade's history of exclusion (of LGBTQ people, people of color, women, people in wheelchairs....) visit http://irishqueers.blogspot.com/p/know-your-history.html.