The Social Movements Assembly’s activities this year will include supporting and participating in the World Day for Sexual Diversity Rights on 28th June.

This initiative of active support and participation, coordinated by LBGT South-South Dialogue, opens a space for all movements and individuals committed to radical change in constructing another word to affirm and include the principle of sexual diversity as part of their policies, and to express their solidarity with the struggles being led by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender organisations, and all other people who defend diversity in broader terms.

With this aim, a proposal has been put forward to organise actions to discuss and highlight the issue, as well as for participants of the Social Movements Assembly to be present and actively participate in LGBT Pride events to be held around the world on 28th June.

Especially, a call is being made for ideas, testimonies and expressions of solidarity to be sent to , a space where messages from writers, leaders, public figures and other people around the world will be presented. Bringing together this multiplicity of voices is especially relevant at this time when there is growing tension between, on the one hand, democratic changes orientated towards recognising citizens’ rights without discrimination based on sexual orientation and, on the other, ultra-conservative and retrograde tendencies that attempt to stop or dismantle legal and institutional reforms that protect these rights.

The fact that the Social Movements Assembly, whose yearly calls (adopted in each World Social Forum) have recognised and included support for the LGBT movement since 2002 demonstrates the political experiences and visions, and the qualitative advances achieved within the SMA. This year’s Call from the SMA in Caracas stated that, “We affirm our respect for sexual diversity and the autonomy of individuals. We respect each person’s right to freely make decisions about their body and sexuality. We reject any form of discrimination related to personal choice and we call for support of the mobilization on June 28 for the full recognition of sexual diversity.”

LGBT organisations have intervened and participated in this space where the world’s struggles converge, bringing with them a new view of building equality at all levels: from ‘macro’ changes within social structures and institutions through to daily practices in all activities and spheres of human life. This vision of equality in a diverse world presupposes coherence in everybody’s practices, thus the challenges of inclusion require the very movements, its dynamics, cultures and internal symbols to broaden the reach of its proposals for a different world.

At this new stage when agendas, causes and ideas are being shared and mutually used, it is to be hoped that the LGBT Pride celebrations will not take place ‘in isolation’, with participation limited only to those directly affected by different forms of discrimination - from subtle prejudices to brutal hate-crimes - or taken over by commercial entities, but rather as an affirmation of the diversity that concerns all of humanity and is part of the vitality of a different world.

28th June, the day that celebrates pride and free expression of sexual orientation, has continued gaining support from different democratic actors and social sectors and has spread around the world with visibly creative actions and proposals for equality, self-determination and justice. With an ever-growing public profile, political citizens’ demands and initiatives now include the eradication of all forms of discrimination, such as racism and sexism, including a change from the neo-liberal model, which also intensifies all forms of unequal relations.