History, harassment and triumph: Top End celebrates 40 years of Pride
Vibrancy and colour was brought to Darwin as Territorians celebrated 40 years of Pride history by looking at how far the Top End has come.
Did you know that 50 years ago, before homosexuality was decriminalised in the Northern Territory, Darwin and a bar called the Pianola Palace were recognised as an international gay tourism destination?
Or that in the summer of 1992, Parliament House was exorcised of homophobia by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence?
These are the pieces of Darwin’s rich queer history that people taking Dr Dino Hodge’s walking tours are often fascinated by.
The Australian history academic and activist arrived in the Top End in 1983 and spent 17 years in the NT.
And for 40 years, Dr Hodge has been collecting materials about queer history in the NT.
“Our culture and our achievements deserve recognition and celebration,” he said.
“It’s for this reason that I have spent the last 40 years building our archival collection so that we are in a position to publicly celebrate and share our amazing history with the wider community.”
For the past 10 years, he has hosted walking tours which focus on this lesser known side to the Territory’s history during Darwin Pride Festival – one of Darwin’s longest running festivals.
On the tour, he guides people along a route which includes visiting Darwin’s first gay bar run by entrepreneur John Spellman, and also mentions the surprising history of First Nations communities.
“I think the first thing people are surprised by is the well-established record about the range of sexual behaviours and gender identities within First Nations communities,” he said.
“We have a lot to learn from First Nations populations.
“The other thing that people love about the history walks is when I talk about the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence who set up the NT Convent of Equal Opportunity.
“On the first day of the May parliamentary sittings in 1992, they were at the parliament to bless the parliamentarians for successful sittings and to exercise homophobia from the Parliament House.”
40 years of Pride: The landmark achievements and historic ‘unrelenting harassment’
However, this year on the 40th anniversary of the Pride festival, he said they also collated a document listing all the reforms of the past 40 years in the NT.
“People are just blown away of how much has been achieved,” he said.
The NT has some of the “best laws” in Australia which Dr Hodge said was due to the tireless effort from the community in offering practical guidance to the government.
Starting at the decriminalisation of homosexuality between consenting adults in 1983, the landmark legislative and policy reforms include the establishment of the Rainbow Territory, the 2017 national postal vote in which Territorians voted in favour of legislative recognition of same-sex marriages and significant changes made in 2023 to the 1992 Anti-Discrimination Act.
Despite the many landmark achievements, the Territory was the last Australian jurisdiction to wipe historical “homosexual offences” charges from the record, clearing the records of an unknown number of people charged under the criminal act.
Thirty-five years after homosexuality was decriminalised, then-Chief Minister Michael Gunner formally apologised to the LGBTQIA+ community in 2018.
“You can expunge historical convictions, but there are some things you can never make right,” Mr Gunner said.
“All we can say is, humbly, deeply, honestly, sorry.
“I am sorry that in a beautiful, diverse and welcoming place such as the Northern Territory, a place filled with amazing people who share their lives and homes with strangers, you were forced to live secretly, closed off, underground.”
The Parliament heard stories from queer Territorians of being “brutally treated by police”, being told they were “hateful creatures”, having water bottles thrown at them during Pride marches, forceful evictions, and being fired from their jobs in what was described as “intense and unrelenting harassment”.
Pride festivals help promote acceptance and inclusion
Dr Hodge said there was one instance where police raided a home where two gay men were having sex in private – which was allowed in law at the time – and when the case was brought before the court it was thrown out because police were “intentionally and deliberately harassing” the community.
The men’s names were still published in the court records and they were forced to leave their jobs and the Territory.
“So even when we are not criminalised, we can still suffer the effect of hatred and persecution,” he added.
Unfortunately, harassment and violence is still not a thing of the past.
A recent survey of young people in the LGBTQIA+ community across Australia reported one in 10 had faced bullying, harassment or violence due to their identity and over half experienced verbal harassment in the last year.
But 79 per cent of respondents also felt a sense of “acceptance and inclusion” relating to their identity in the past year.
“This is why we have pride festivals,” Dr Hodge said.
“The Pride festival this year is celebrating 40 years of solid achievements in law and policy reforms that have been driven by the community.”
Mentioning the recent proposed changes from the CLP Government to the Anti-Discrimination Act which has drawn concerns from communtiy groups, Dr Hodge said although some people felt “anxious and confused”, it did not dampen celebrations.
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