Experience

Open letter and gathering speak up for Palestine on Tuesday 5 August, the eve of Antwerp Pride 2025

Posted by Timothy on

The 18th edition (since 2008) of Antwerp Pride takes place from Wednesday 6 to Sunday 10 August 2025 in Antwerp. This year’s theme is “Do not just march! Listen. Understand. Commit”. Prides are a mix of celebration – parties – and activism and advocacy. For the 2025 edition, the organising committee focuses on belonging. Belonging to the society at large – the ‘outside world’ – but also belonging within the rainbow realm. 

On the occasion of the start of the 2025 Antwerp Pride week, activists are calling attention to the grave human rights violations in Gaza. There is an open letter, which you can sign, and there’s a gathering on Tuesday 5 August at 8 PM at Suikerrui, near Antwerp City Hall. 

“What does one have to do with the other?”, the open letter and petition opens. “Human rights are not a pick-and-choose menu. It’s everyone or no one. So no Pride without speaking up for Palestine.”

“That is why we are gathering for a symbolic action.”

Authors Saskia De Coster and Angelo Tijssens wrote the open letter below.

“We Know”

Know that there will be dancing and drinking during this Pride too, that timeless anthems will ring out as one, not always in tune, songs about freedom and respect, about becoming who you’ve always been, and we’ll see all hands in the air and all the colours of the rainbow, and we will dance.

But we know that partying does not exist in a vacuum, and we do not want to be used as props in an entertainment parade. We do not believe it is possible to simply join the fun and march through the streets of Antwerp for the sake of it.

We know the first Pride was a protest—by people who were forced to live in the shadows and stood up to power not out of desire, but because they had no choice. Because it was a matter of survival, of simply being allowed to exist, and to walk freely and visibly through the streets.

We know how much can change and shift, in all directions, and that public space is safer for some than for others. Some can afford to ignore this, but others must move heaven and earth to have their right to exist recognised—and we’re not just talking about ourselves, the privileged ones we are.

We know that queer rights are human rights, and we must not be selective—must not only stand up for those marching beside us during Antwerp Pride. Solidarity goes beyond the partygoers. Often, it’s the invisible ones—those unable to attend—who need the most attention. The flag has always been multicoloured.

Know that we dance to show we are here, despite those who never wanted to acknowledge our existence, to honour the struggle for our rights, and to remember those vilified heroes and defiant champions who dared to shout that we are all equal—truly, what else?

We know there is a Pride route—with security and water taps, with elected officials and delegations that help fund illegal settlements, pension funds that are filled with profits made from the shattered bodies of an entire people, corporations that continue to cash in on our selective blindness.

We know that when it comes to true safety and rights, we cannot count on the big capital of corporations who fear for their profit margins and sway with the wind.

But know that it is far too easy to misuse the flag as a marketing gimmick—from sandwiches to city branding. If that’s what the flag stands for, then it’s a fig leaf.

We know that politicians who will soon dance with us, with “equality for all” plastered on their floats, love to present themselves as open-minded. But this Pride has nothing to do with trendiness. It is about humanity.

We are well aware that those same politicians are doing far too little to stop a livestreamed genocide. That by their inaction, they are signalling that some lives matter more than others. Their colourful boas are feathered peace doves.

We know this, and so we cannot pretend it’s business as usual, while people are being violently driven from their own streets, stripped of every right to exist, reduced to subhumans, to less-than-humans—so they are easier to wipe off the map.

We know that people are being deliberately starved and murdered—indiscriminately—and that a genocide is underway.

We know that there is no Pride without protest, no dancing without life, no human rights without humans.

We know it. History knows it—and will remember.

But know this: We know who you are.Know that our flag does not cover your shame.

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