A Toronto gay pride leader has admitted that he tricked Black Lives Matter into ending their protest of the Pride Toronto parade.
Pride Toronto’s executive director says he signed a list of demands from Black Lives Matter to end the group’s blockade of Sunday’s Pride parade, but has no plans to honour them.
Those demands — which include banning police floats from future parades, as well as extensive funding — are for Pride’s membership and the community to pass judgment on, Mathieu Chantelois told the Star.
A Black Lives Matter representative has signaled that the group is not happy with having been lied to.
“At the moment when Mathieu signed the agreement, he was smiling, he was hugging members of our community, he was celebratory,” Black Lives Matter member LeRoi Newbold said. “It would be very disappointing to find out that his engagement with this political act was disingenuous.”
Adding insult to injury, the gay pride group has welcomed all police, nemeses of Black Lives Matter, to future events. “Of course I want the police to be part of Pride in many ways,” said the Pride Toronto leader.
Social media users are already discussing ways to “retaliate” against Pride Toronto during upcoming events, according to sources.