Brighton's Trans Pride march becomes the biggest yet - a kilometre of trans joy through the city

More than 40,000 people marched through the streets of Brighton at the weekend for Trans Pride, the largest turnout the city has ever seen for the event, as Brighton & Hove's TNBI community and thousands of allies came together in what was an extraordinary display of trans joy.

The march, now in its fourteenth year, has grown from a small grassroots gathering into one of Europe's largest annual protests for trans liberation. At one point Scene Magazine was at the bottom of West Street, was at the very front of the march, while the back of it had still not left Victoria Gardens, a route stretching well over a kilometre and a jump on last year's numbers.

It was a striking testament to the volunteer team behind Trans Pride, who year on year manage to deliver a joyful, safe and powerful protest march that lets tens of thousands of people walk together in solidarity under the trans and TNBI flags.

This year's event carried a clear focus on supporting trans youth, with banners and speeches at the start of the march, centring the wellbeing, safety and futures of young trans people in the UK. There was also a current of frustration and real anger running with the protestors, much of it a response to recent guidance from the ECHR that many in the community feel will inflict real harm and add layers of difficulty to already precarious lives.

But that frustration never took over the day. It sat alongside the joy rather than against it, a reminder that for this community celebration and resistance have always walked side by side. Marching loudly and proudly through your own city, surrounded by people who love and support you, is itself a form of protest, whatever else is happening in the wider world.

What struck so many people, marchers and onlookers alike, was the sheer scale of solidarity on display. This was Brighton's own large and long established TNBI community, joined by people who had travelled from right across the UK and further afield to be part of it. Alongside them marched thousands of allies from Brighton & Hove's LGBTQ+ groups, trade unions, charties, local businesses and faith groups, all turning out in person to show their support.

The city's LGBTQ chorus sang the marchers by from New Road, leading rousing chants of solidarity that carried down the street long after the singers themselves were out of sight, a small but powerful reminder of how many corners of Brighton, Hove and Sussex showed up for the community.

Even the day's one attempt at dissent was met with the same spirit of care and good humour. A small counter protest of just four people gathered at the clock tower, and was swiftly and cleverly screened off from view by another choir holding a huge 20-metre long trans flag, turning what little opposition there was into little more than a footnote against the scale of joy surrounding it.

Perhaps the most moving sight of the day was along the pavements themselves, where families of TNBI people lined the route to declare their support out loud, alongside parents, grandparents and siblings marching for the young trans people in their lives. Organisers and longtime attendees noted a clear increase on last year, with noticeably more families than ever turning out together to stand behind their trans loved ones, in public and with pride.

There were many placards, loud samba bands, chants, banners in every shade of blue, pink and white, flags representing the diversity of TNBI, queer and LGBTQ+ communities, and there was a warmth to the crowd that stretched the full length of that kilometre-long route. Friends walked arm in arm. Strangers cheered each other on.

The march brought the city to a standstill in glorious July sunshine, drivers in the static traffic along West St and the seafront honking their support. For a community so often talked about in the abstract, in headlines and in policy documents, this year's Trans Pride was a day to simply be present, together, in the sunshine, taking up space in a city that opened its streets to them.

For all the very real challenges the trans community continues to face, the march was, above everything, a protest and a celebration. A celebration of trans lives, of diversity, of chosen and birth family, of resilience and above all of joy and a loud vocal protest against the continued erosion of basic human rights that trans people are facing in the UK.

That golden thread of protest and joy ran through the entire day, from the first gathering points through to the final steps of the route. Brighton's Trans Pride has always understood that visibility and celebration is its own kind of strength, and this year's event proved that on the biggest scale the city has yet seen.