At the Hong Kong Pride Parade in 2009 (Photo: 陳驚 via Flickr)
The Economist, that weekly newspaper read by your friends who are smarter than you (but who, let’s be honest, probably read Coconuts HK in secret), has announced the inaugural “Pride and Prejudice”, a 24-hour LGBTQ event that will start in Hong Kong, continue in New York and end in London next year.
Now, before you get your tiny neon banana hammocks and Mardi Gras beads out, don’t forget this is still the Economist, so as progressive as it may be, the event will be more like a corporate conference than your average pride parade.
Participants in Pride and Prejudice, which will happen on March 3, 2016, will take part in “globally-oriented discussions on the future of the LGBT movement and its impact on business and the economy,” with the core question being: what is the cost of LGBTQ discrimination?
“The Economist has long supported equal rights for LGBT individuals,” said Daniel Franklin, the executive editor of the Economist.
“Nearly twenty years ago in our cover story, ‘Let them wed’, we argued in favour of same-sex marriage,” he continued.
“Progress since then has been huge but uneven—hence the need for a global conversation on the costs of LGBT discrimination.”
We definitely look forward to it, since as we all know, the only way to make the Hong Kong government care about an issue is to put a dollar value on it.
