When Copenhagen 2021 kicks off on 12 August, it will be the culmination of several years of work. In 2015, the team behind the annual Copenhagen Pride Parade began an ambitious plan to bring the largest LGBTI + event in the world – WorldPride – to Copenhagen.
Meanwhile, the sports association Pan Idræt had a similar offer to bring EuroGames to Copenhagen – an LGBTI + sporting event open to everyone, regardless of gender, age, sexual identity or physical ability.
Both bids were successful in 2017.
WorldPride and EuroGames were combined under the umbrella of Copenhagen 2021, Malmö was brought in as a partner and the largest LGBTI + event in Scandinavian history – with free concerts, 22 sporting activities, digital events, a human rights conference and over a thousand events – was born.
A degree of seriousness
“We really want to place Copenhagen as the LGBTI + capital of Northern Europe,” said Steve Taylor, Communications Director for Copenhagen 2021, about the organizers’ ambitions for the mega-event. But rights issues are just as important for Copenhagen 2021 as the more colorful aspects.
“You can have fun in Copenhagen 2021, but we do it while we take on serious business. We wanted to use Copenhagen’s status to have an international conversation and create an event that people talk about in the global history of LGBTI + policy and advocacy. ”
While the organizers behind Copenhagen 2021 are proud of Denmark’s LGBTI + history, they claim that there are still challenges to be solved.
“Just as we are in favor of LGBTI + equality in Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, we are also in favor of the Danish government continuing with the last remaining LGBTI + issues that they still have to deal with,” Steve Taylor explained.
Some work needs to be done
Among the key issues, Copenhagen 2021 points to the rights of trans- and intersex people as well as the fact that conversion therapy is legal in Denmark. This allows an institution to encourage LGBTI + people to ‘pray the gays away’ – a practice that has been likened to torture by the United Nations.
“No Nordic nation has yet banned conversion therapy, which is shocking.”
Every year a Rainbow Europe Index is published, which ranks European countries according to LGBTI + equality. In 2021, Denmark ranked number nine with 64 points out of a possible 100 – a position that the 2021 team in Copenhagen would like to see improved.
“It is difficult, we accept that. But other countries have managed this. We can all look at Malta, which is the best in Europe on the Rainbow Europe Index. Malta has already addressed most of these issues. ”
The Øresund Declaration
As part of the human rights conference in Copenhagen 2021, politicians and global leaders will sign the Øresund Declaration, which has 15 demands from the decriminalization of homosexuality, marriage and consent. The goal is that countries that sign up can be measured against the declaration for the next nine years and live up to their promise.
“It is the long-term ambition of the global human rights agenda that will emerge from the event. We hope that it will help to place Denmark as one of, if not the leading nation in the world for LGBTI + equality.
Source: The Nordic Page