Members of the local LGBTQ community say they refuse to submit to fear following a weekend massacre at a gay nightclub in Orlando.
“I think this is going to make us even stronger,” said Donna Nagy, chairwoman of Thunder Pride, during Monday morning’s Pride Awareness Breakfast at the Prince Arthur Hotel.
“There’s going to be so much support. We have people from all over, even at this breakfast.”
Monday’s event was organized to take place before Saturday’s shooting began to make headlines. A single man is responsible for killing 49 and injuring more than 50 after he opened fire in the nightclub.
While there are safety concerns following the tragic events, Nagy said being part of the LGBTQ community means always needing to be careful.
She added this is a fear that the LGBTQ community has had to live with their entire lives.
“My first reaction was anger,” Nagy said. “It immediately brought me back to the late 60s and early 70s gay bashing. That was my immediate reaction and then total sadness that this is still happening in 2016.”
Nagy said the incident didn’t catch her off guard “for some reason people feel that they have the right to make other people think the way they think and if they don’t they can kill them.”
Diane Olsen, mother of an openly gay daughter, said during a time like this the LGBTQ community needs to stand together.
“It actually hit me as I was driving here,” Olsen said. “How horrifying that is to have happened and to be targeted because of your sexual orientation.”
Olsen said her heart breaks for the families and the people that were killed and injured Sunday morning.
“It kind of is a little scary. It makes you wonder if it can happen anywhere, if it can happen in our own city and that is a bit worrisome.”
The weekend shooting took place during Pride Week. Locally Thunder Pride has a number of activities planned to celebrate the week.
Another one of those celebrations took place at the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre. There hospital staff and volunteers helped raise a pride flag.
Human Resources Intern Sarah Schoales said the community needs to stand together as a whole.
“We need to make sure that we are standing up for people and keeping them safe,” Schoales said.
