Story: Parades and protest marches

Hero parade

Hero parade

The Hero parade along Auckland’s Ponsonby Road formed part of the annual Hero festival. It began in the early 1990s to promote gay and lesbian pride. The parades were highly sexualised, with scantily-clad ‘marching boys’ and voluptuous drag queens. Moralists condemned the parade on these grounds, while other critics said it promoted a narrow view of homosexuality. But most of the tens of thousands who turned out for the spectacle loved it.

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New Zealand Herald
Reference: 23 February 1998

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How to cite this page:

Ben Schrader, 'Parades and protest marches - Royalty, sport, commerce', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/photograph/21099/hero-parade (accessed 20 April 2024)

Story by Ben Schrader, published 11 Mar 2010