Greek Stonewall, the brief history of Athens Pride since 1992

Every Thursday at the SPICES CLUB, there were parties for men only, and soldiers with machine guns, police, and a prosecutor would come in. They arrested about 10 people and charged them with very serious charges, resulting in one man hanging himself out of shame in his cell in Gada.

Television had played a catalytic role in the disgrace of those arrested, all of whom were released in the following days, and in the following years all the serious charges collapsed.

The attack on Club Spices and the suicide of one of those arrested was the reason for the Greek Stonewall to begin and for us to take to the streets to demand our freedom. I must note that Grigoris Valianatos once again excelled on Greek television when the channels went wild about Spices.

The Spices Club led the start of the first ATHENSPRIDE 2005 parade

The first Athens Pride in the form of mass parties on Strefi Hill was organized by Paola in 1992 and for several subsequent years.

Then followed in 1996, in closed spaces, pride events, but huge ones, which I organized alone or with Grigoris Valianatos or with Fotis Sergoulopoulos and Yiannis Tsirogiannis.

A Pride event with speeches, in the halls of the Municipality of Athens, with panels and events (there was no parade) was organized in 2000, if I remember correctly, by Paul Sofianos himself. From a panel at this event, in which I participated as a speaker and Irene Petropoulou, the creation of the Lesbian Group of Athens sprang.

Since all of us had been fighting for so many years to one day create a proud Athens Pride, we were preparing the ground, in 2005 a committee was formed and held the first parade in the streets, which we all supported and continue to support.