Cuba: Gay kiss-in marks Pride in Havana

Protest also celebrates new labour-code protections

Approximately 20 people staged a public kiss-in in Havana, Cuba, on June 28 to mark the anniversary of the Stonewall riots and to help normalize same-sex affection, which is still seen as taboo, organizers say.

“Kissing in public should be everyone’s right but many view it as a public scandal, if it happens between other individuals besides heterosexuals,” Pink News quotes event organizers as saying.

“When we as men and women kiss, for love or fraternity, we exercise our equality as citizens and we display the double standards that spark homophobia, sexism, the discriminatory attitudes that mark the root of our culture and which we must change,” they add.

The event was also held to celebrate new labour-code provisions against discrimination based on sexual orientation, but the report notes that the protections do not cover gender identity.

Natasha Barsotti is originally from Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. She had high aspirations of representing her country in Olympic Games sprint events, but after a while the firing of the starting gun proved too much for her nerves. So she went off to university instead. Her first professional love has always been journalism. After pursuing a Master of Journalism at UBC , she began freelancing at Xtra West — now Xtra Vancouver — in 2006, becoming a full-time reporter there in 2008.

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