Latest Updates:

06/06/08 - Our Website Has Been Updated With More Information Etc.

05/05/08 - Click Here To Download - Pride 2008 “Many Cultures, One Community” Parade & Festival Booth/ Registration Form.

Welcome To Mid-South Pride Newly Designed Website!

Pride 2008 “Many Cultures, One Community”:

Welcome to Mid-South Pride's all re-designed, revamped website.We encourage you to look around and learn more about us, and this years pride event, we are so excited to give our mid-south community a bigger, better then ever pride with fun filled events and some big named VIP's for pride 2008. We have lots of surprises in store.

A Note From Sean Alexander, Co-Chair Of Mid-South Pride:

Too many times we underestimate ourselves and what we can accomplish with our lives and our struggles. As Mid-South Pride mourns the loss of its former President and co-founder, Gary Wilkerson, the remaining members of the organization have to carry on with the vision and mission. We have to set our minds on the duties at hand. It was a group effort in the beginning, and it will continue to be a group effort for years to come.

Mid-South Pride was established to be a lasting opportunity for future leaders of our community to rise to service. In the past, Pride in the Memphis LGBT community has been celebrated, but the governing body has changed periodically. MSP was established so that the central organization would remain the same. The vision and mission were established so that those who wanted to see Pride continue in the Mid South would join MSP. We have stood our ground, and the community has rallied behind us. MSP was formed in 2004 just weeks before Pride was scheduled to take place.  We played host to some 500 participants and spectators. As of 2007, we grew to nearly 2500. We are firmly established.

Because of where Memphis is located geographically, MSP so named itself and is working toward a Regional Pride celebration status. We are trying to reach out to the more rural cities and townships for a dual support role. In adopting our moniker, it has been catching. The rest of the Memphis LGBT community organizations are attaching the Mid South recognition to their mission statements. This was part of our vision, to emphasize the need to reach beyond the borders of our city, county, and even outside our state. Memphis is in the southwest corner of Tennessee, and borders northwest Mississippi and northeast Arkansas. We adopted the weather map of our local television stations, and even made it part of our logo. These are the areas that we are working to serve.

This past year, our success was celebrated as we were recognized for our achievements on a national level. We were given the first ever “Voice of PRIDE Award” for 2007 from QBliss, This is a landmark achievement in the southeast region of the US, considering the religious opposition to homosexuality that we face. That opposition is more prevalent here in the southeast more so than anywhere else in the country. We have an uphill fight every time we raise our voices to be heard.

We still have issues we must address, even here at home. Though we have been recognized on a national level, we are still questioned about our values as an all inclusive community. We are often asked “what about the African-American LGBT community?”. You could easily replace African with Asian, Latino, Indian, or even Native. We are even looking to the transgender portion of our community. MSP is working toward inclusion of ALL these minorities, hence the choice for our theme for 2008:

“Many Cultures, One Community”

As we work to make our world a more accepting and loving place to live for ALL people, we will miss those who came before us and have set the principles that we work for in our path. We will miss the leaders who had the vision, and the power to face the struggle head on. We will continue to fight for acceptance in diversity. We will rise to the challenges set before us, and we will achieve the goals set by those pioneers. Those roots run deep throughout the LGBT community in this nation, and they can not be moved. As MSP gains momentum and moves forward in its role in our community, we will miss the passion and fire of our co-founder and Community Leader, Gary Wilkerson.

~Sean Alexander, Co-Chair Mid-South Pride, Inc.