Guardian: 'It's 100% segregated': does Georgia's LGBT haven have a race problem?
Tom Dempsey
'It's 100% segregated': does Georgia's LGBT haven have a race problem?
Atlanta has one of the largest gay populations in the country and scored full marks in an LGBTQ rights index, but things are far from perfectAn enormous cheer went up: “Stacey! Stacey! Stacey!” Standing on a white jeep, waving a rainbow flag, Stacey Abrams was making history as the first major-party nominee for governor to march in the Atlantic Pride parade, the biggest LGBTQ parade in Southeast America.
If Abrams, a Democratic candidate, wins in November she’ll make history again, by becoming America’s first black female Governor – and the crowd thronging Atlanta’s midtown streets to watch the parade on 14 October were enthusiastically behind her.
Atlanta has one of the largest gay populations in the country – and arguably one of the most politically involved.
“It’s the south,” says Rigel Cable, a web design consultant who lives in Atlanta with his husband, “so you really have to defend the progressive nature of the city. I think people are vigilant to make sure the city stays the way it is. A lot of the congress members in Georgia are conservative, so we’re always fighting at a city level to maintain the progress we have here.”
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