Life

Taiwan wins bid to host World Pride festival in 2025

By Jordan Robledo

15th November 2021

© Carrie Kellenberger via Flickr

Taiwan has made history as the first East Asian country to host the renowned World Pride celebration in 2025.

The LGBTQ+ event is set to take place after Sydney World Pride 2023 in the municipality territory of Kaohsiung.

In a statement on Saturday (13 November), the InterPride committee congratulated Taiwan and expressed their excitement regarding the landmark win.

“From Rome to Jerusalem to London to Toronto to Madrid to New York City to Copenhagen, World Pride has been a worldwide event since 1997,” the statement said.

“Bringing WorldPride to this region for the first time will create a significant impact to the much-needed visibility and awareness of human rights for the LGBTQIA+ community there while providing the ability for millions more to participate from surrounding countries and territories, including China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Indonesia,” he said.

Darien Chen, who is a spokesperson for Kaohsuing Pride, echoed similar sentiments and thanked the committee for the opportunity.

“The WorldPride Taiwan Team 2025 would like to thank all before us who lit the way, to thank InterPride who built this wonderful organization and platform and thank our supporters who have bestowed this amazing opportunity for Taiwan and Asia,” Darien said.

“This is the beginning of a four-year journey that we plan to ignite change in Asia, to promote InterPride’s mission, and to advance human rights in the world.”

Before deciding on Taiwan, around “300 member organisations” debated between the event being held on the island nation or in Washington DC.

The Captial Pride Alliance, which hosts the yearly Pride events in the DC area, submitted its bid in an effort to highlight its 50th-anniversary festival and to bring in tourism revenue.

But even though they lost out on their chance to host, organisers for Capital Pride congratulated Kaohsiung Pride for their win in a statement.

“The Capital Pride Alliance congratulates Kaohsiung Pride on being awarded the opportunity to produce WorldPride 2025,” they said. “We extend them our heartfelt best wishes for a successful event.”

The committee also gave DC residents an inside look into their upcoming festival plans for 2022.

“After nearly two years of navigating through this difficult time, we share our communities eagerness to bring back our annual large-scale events and traditions,” they said. “CPA plans on unveiling its plans for 2022 and beyond in the coming months.”

The monumental World Pride is one of two major LGBTQ+ events set to be held in Asia over the next few years.

Back in 2017, it was announced that Hong Kong would host the long-running Gay Games in 2022.

A record 17 cities put forward a bid to host the event, with Los Angeles and Washington DC in the US, Tel Aviv in Israel, and Guadalajara in Mexico all ultimately missing out on this occasion.

But due to the ongoing pandemic, officials have pushed back the highly-anticipated event to November 2023.