The 7th Szczecin Equality March is approaching. "We don't want to be ashamed or hide."

"What are you waiting for?" – this is the slogan of the 7th Szczecin Equality March on Saturday (June 12th). The event is part of the Szczecin Pride Festival, which began on July 5th. Its goal, according to the organizers, is to "encourage action, engagement, and building a community equal for all – because LGBT+ people still do not have full rights."

The festival included exhibitions by Beniamin Gorgoń and Ezra Wojakowski, a bike ride, a Queer Pop-Up x Grill with Lesbians, and Speed ​​Friending. Also today (Friday) will be Queer Night, a masculinizing makeup workshop, a stand-up comedy show titled "30 Shades of the Rainbow," and a drag show. The biggest event will be the Szczecin Equality March, which will begin at 2 p.m. on Jasne Błonia, preceded by a picnic.

The Szczecin Pride Festival is organized by the Lambda Szczecin Association. They argue that despite growing public support, the LGBT community still needs to fight for its rights.

"It's quite terrifying; there's no point in counting on legislative solutions for the next five years," says Andrzej Witczak of the Lambda Szczecin Association. "We can only count on what can be resolved through decrees issued by ministers or the prime minister, because such matters need to be resolved. There are bills on the desks of ministries that can be implemented by decree. There are certain agreements that can be made, whether regarding transgender people or the prosecution of certain crimes. These are things that don't need to be changed by legislation; the president's signature is unnecessary, and yet they're not being implemented. This is a breach of the promise we were given, which encouraged us to go to the elections and vote for the coalition on October 13th."

Andrzej Witczak believes that in recent months the activities of organizations such as Lambda have been significantly limited on social media, which is a result of international politics, the election of Donald Trump as US president and Meta's decision to limit its reach.

"This year, we're facing significant challenges, both organizational and even promotional," explains Andrzej Witczak. "All the posts we try to post or sponsor are cut off by Meta's algorithms. The company doesn't allow us to promote these posts. This is all related to changes in global politics. The largest tech companies are headquartered in the US, want to curry favor with Donald Trump, and have therefore changed the policies of their social media platforms. Words like equality, queer, LGBT—the algorithm automatically perceives them as negative and applies a so-called shadowban, meaning it simply doesn't show these contents to a wider audience. We have to contend with the fact that these reach is sometimes several thousand times smaller than last year or two. Therefore, there is a significant need for broad collaboration and reaching people with this information."

The LGBT community is concerned with, among other things, marriage equality, the rights of transgender people to a dignified transition process, and the prosecution of hate crimes.

– It cannot be that after living together for 20-30 years, we do not have the right to bury our partner or visit him in the hospital at the end of our lives – says Andrzej Witczak.

"It's about ordinary, everyday life. My partner and I recently started wondering if transferring money for rent and other necessities isn't considered a gift," explains Aleksandra Vu Van, a member of Lambda Szczecin. "We're not related, and we're not married either. These are mundane things, but they can complicate life."

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This year's Equality March will be held under the slogan "What are you waiting for?". It starts on July 12th, at 2 p.m. It will be preceded by a picnic on Jasne Błonia at 11 a.m. An after-party will be held at Hala Odra at 9 p.m., and on July 13th (Sunday) there will be a city walk with Małgorzata Narożna (FiKa) in the footsteps of Felicity Vestvala, a transgender opera singer from Szczecin who gained international fame in the second half of the 19th century. ©℗

Agata JANKOWSKA

More on this topic in Friday's "Kurier Szczeciński" and eKurier of July 11, 2025.