Nonprofit arm of Black Pride marks anniversary since breaking away from Dallas Southern Pride, which holds festivities on same weekend
A performer entertains during the Ms. Dallas Southern Pride Pageant last year. While Dallas Southern Pride is a circuit party, DFW Pride Movement stages an educational summit. (Patrick Hoffman/Dallas Voice)
DFW Pride Movement, the nonprofit organization that began hosting its own Black Pride events five years ago, will mark its anniversary this fall with special guests and first-ever events.
Derrick Spillman, executive director of DFW Pride Movement, said new events at this year’s “The Movement” Dallas Black Pride Community Summit will include a black LGBT authors event with readings and discussions and a black LGBT film series. The film series will be hosted by Noah’s Arc star Rodney Chester and will feature the creators of the
YouTube web shows Free Fall, Momma’z Boi, Street Behavior, No Shade, among others.
Singer and reality TV star of R&B Divas Monifah Carter will headline the organization’s major concert on Oct. 4 to kick-off the special anniversary celebration. And Texas native and drag performer Sophia McIntosh will co-host the Margaritas & Music Day Party event.
Angela Amos, left, and Teedee Davis, founders of Dallas Her Pride, plan a full weekend of events geared toward women this year.
Spillman said this is Carter’s first Dallas visit and McIntosh’s first appearance at Black Pride in more than a decade.
“It’s a star-studded event and we have way more than we’ve ever had,” Spillman said about the event lineup. “It’s our fifth year. This is a milestone and we wanted to celebrate it.”
Dallas Black Pride’s other branch is Dallas Southern Pride, which started in the late ‘90s. But DFW Pride Movement founder Venton Jones broke away from the DSP board five years ago to create a separate Pride celebration geared more toward community and education instead of partying.
“We’re the cultural side of Pride,” Spillman explained, adding that events include a job fair and art shows. “Our message is similar [to DSP’s message]. Their focus is totally different.”
Kirk Myers, business adviser to Dallas Southern Pride, said his leadership has helped redefine DSP as a circuit party. This year’s theme is “Candy Land 2013” and events will include a pool party, the Lipstick Ball and Ms. Dallas Southern Pride Pageant.
The group will also host the second annual Southern Regional Ball/House and Pageant (B/HAP) Communities’ Leadership and Health Disparities Conference during the weekend. Abounding Prosperity, of which Myers is founder and CEO, is organizing the conference with the theme “Building Bridges and Forming Alliances!” with the goal of reducing health disparities among sexual minorities across the South.
Myers said his nonprofit Abounding Prosperity focuses on education and outreach the rest of the year, so he wanted DSP to offer a weekend of events that would bring the community together in order to have an audience to offer educational events.
“We do the social work 365 days a year,” he said. “Quite frankly, people are not booking tickets to come to a roundtable discussion. We had to grow the event before adding these events.”
Myers said there’s been some confusion about the two entities that put on Dallas Black Pride, but the important thing is that the two groups offer choices for attendees.
“It’s better to have two entities,” he said. “We’re in capitalist America so I think that choice is good.”
And while the larger LGBT community has embraced Dallas Black Pride events, Myers said the traditional Dallas Pride celebration is becoming more inclusive. This year
Abounding Prosperity will have a float in the Dallas Pride parade. Two weeks later, the Dallas Black Pride festivities begin.
“It’s more about unity this year with mainstream and fridge groups working together,” he said.
Dallas Her Pride, a group launched last year by Teedee Davis and Angela Amos, started in response to there being little offered to women during Black Pride. Both Davis and
Amos have been planning events geared toward women for Pride for several years, but Davis said the team wanted to add more throughout the whole weekend last year.
“The women have always felt left out,” Davis said. “The women’s events are more inclusive than a big boy circuit party.”
This year’s Her Dallas Pride events include dance parties, a burlesque troupe, relationship workshop, music night at Sue Ellen’s and a partnership with DSP for its pool party.
Davis said last year DHP brought in 2,500 women. While she likes having the women-focused events, she said she wishes the two entities that plan Black Pride would join forces.
“I will always support the guys’ initiatives,” Davis said. “I would love to see [Myers] and DFW Pride Movement work together cohesively for the overall unification of the group.”
But Myers said the two groups, while separate, have existed in harmony over the years. And he said the main goal is to have Dallas Black Pride become the Southern Pride destination, putting Dallas on the map for its events, despite which group’s venues attract people.
“At the end of the day, my future goal with DSP is to make Dallas a destination city,” Myers said. “It benefits all of us if it drives the economic engine in Dallas when they come, no matter where they go.”
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Dallas Black Pride weekend
Dallas Black Pride takes place Oct. 3-7. For more information about events and venues, visit DfwPrideMovement.org, DallasSouthernPride.com and DallasHerPride.com.
This article appeared in the Dallas Voice print edition September 13, 2013.