Rainbow colors  filled Appian Way as Keene State College students dressed in bright colors for the first KSC Pride Parade.

Lucy Briggs, the Public Relations Representative of KSC Pride, said, “Today we’re doing a couple of things — first of all — just the message of equality that we always try to advocate for. We also have some petitions that are going for name change policies, because the school and their name change policy for any of our tran [transvestite or transgender] students, or anybody who wants to change their name, even if we legally change them, they haven’t been changed in any of the class registries and it automatically outs all of our students.”

Briggs said addressing personal pronouns is a long conversation students have to have with professors and students that can be very uncomfortable. She said students should be asked when they come to KSC what gender pronouns they prefer so they don’t need to have that future conversation with a class.

Sam Lewis / Equinox Staff:
The KSC Pride parade held colorful signs with sayings such as “Love knows no gender,” and “straight for equality.”

Kal Rasku, who also said his birth name is Julia and is listed in the directory as Julia Rasku, is the president of KSC Pride. He said he has a friend who started attending KSC with his name assigned at birth. His friend  legally changed his name, but couldn’t get the name changed in the school system.

Rasku said he believes students should have the, “Freedom to be able to have the name you want — to have it available on Blackboard and for your email because your name will out you. If you email someone and say, ‘Hey, you know, this-that-and-the other,’ and it says blatantly in the email, ‘This is from Susan something,’ and then you sign it Kyle whatever, that outs you right there.”

For that reason he said the school needs to change the IT systems so people can have their preferred name in the system.

Another one of the petitions promoted the addition of more unisex (gender-neutral) bathrooms.

“That’s a big problem for our tran [transvestite or transgender] students, the lack of ability to have bathrooms that they can go out and use. We’ve heard stories of people having to plan their day around bathrooms that they know they can use,” Briggs said.

KSC student America Rojas attended the parade and signed both positions. She said she supports what KSC Pride is doing.

“Students can’t use bathrooms and they have to work their way around showering. Showering’s supposed to be a common thing, not something that should be a problem in your life. We [non transgenders] have the convenience of it; it shouldn’t be a problem for them. They should focus on school, not worrying about where to go to the bathroom,” Rojas said.

Aspen Everhardt, the vice president of KSC Pride, held up a sign that said, “All families matter.” Everhardt said she hopes to find more opportunities for gender nonconforming students, such as having more gender-neutral bathrooms on campus.

“Especially freshmen halls — there aren’t any individual showers for people and you can experience a lot of harassment…just using the bathroom,” Everhardt said.

Bobbie Barry, an alumni of KSC, is a volunteer worker for Parents, Friends, and Families of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG). Promoters for PFLAG were at the KSC Pride Parade.

Barry said, “PFLAG is a national organization. We have three-hundred-and-sixty chapters around the United States. We have active chapters in New Hampshire. We have one here in Keene that meets on the first Tuesday of each month at St. James Episcopal Church and everyone is welcome, ally, parents, family members, brothers, sisters, grandparents— you name it — everyone’s welcome.”

She said the Episcopal Church invented PFLAG to meet in the building when they started a group since 1988. They have been meeting in a free room in St. James since 1988.

Barry said, “We have participated in marriage equality in new Hampshire, so we do have marriage equality now. And we had to go back again and fight for it because they passed it, and then the next legislature tried to take it away [and] tried to repeal the whole thing.”

Sam Lewis / Equinox Staff:
Participants of the KSC Pride parade were dressed in bright colors as they marched down Appian Way and Main Street.

Barry continued, “We had to go to battle again and really talk about why we need marriage equality in this state. Well as you know, other states have followed soon and the Supreme Court finally followed…and said marriage is a constitutional right for gay and lesbian people.”

Barry said PFLAG has worked on other things, such as the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. She said many gay, lesbian or transgender people can be fired for their sexuality.

“Our country is coming along…PFLAG started forty-two years ago when this one mom in New York City [at the] first gay pride parade carried a sign…that said we love our gay son,” Barry said. Barry said PFLAG is all volunteer based and non-profit organization.

Keene resident Ashley Engelbrecht is a sex consultant who brought some information to the parade.

Engelbrecht, who works in the Keene area said, “Simply stated, it’s [her company] a sex toy party [business], but we offer a lot more than toys. We have products that pamper, provoke and please.”

Engelbrecht said she attended the parade for people to be able to book a party or enter a raffle.

Rasku said KSC Pride wants to set a foundation with the hope that the parade will become an annual event.

He said, “We wanted to bring the community together here and we figured that a great way to do that would be with the parade, and we hope that you know we can open up more opportunities and bring more people here next year.”

Jacob Knehr, the events coordinator for KSC Pride, said,  “We have free giveaways, we have posters, we have some vendors here who’s going to be advertising products, along with PFLAG advocating for the LGBT community and we have a DJ so it’s going to be a lot of fun.”

Students were dressed in rainbows expressing their LGBT support.

“We’re just promoting support for the LGBT and GSRN community, and just spreading awareness that we support,” Knehr said.

KSC Pride also hosted a rainbow rave later that night in the Mabel Brown room in the L.P Young Student Center.

Bethany Ricciardi can be contacted at bricciardi@keene-equinox.com