About Dublin LGBTQ Pride

Our History

While the term Pride didn’t become popular until the early 1980’s, the tradition, established following the Stonewall Uprising, of holding LGBTQ+ events and protests at the end of June was adopted very early by Dublin. In the early 1970’s this was often marked by a picnic in Merrion Square and on June 27th 1974 there was even a march of 10 people from the Department of Justice on Stephen’s Green to the British Embassy to protest the criminalisation of homosexuality, the law was a hangover from colonial times.

In March 1983 the first large scale LGBTQ+ protest march took place in Dublin. It was organised by the Dublin Lesbian & Gay Collective in response to the release of the murderers of a gay man called Declan Flynn. About 900 people marched from Liberty Hall to Fairview Park. That June the National LGBT Federation (NXF) organised the first Dublin Pride Parade, it went from Stephen’s Green to the GPO. While the original route went from St Stephens Green to the GPO on O’Connell Street, in the early 1990’s the starting point of The Garden of Remembrance was established.

Dublin LGBTQ Pride Today

In 2018 60,000 people marched with us and as many watched on and cheered from the sidelines. In just a generation, our annual parade and festival has grown from a handful of people to become of the biggest and most popular events in Ireland. Along the way we have helped change the the laws and constitution of Ireland as well as the hearts and minds of many of our citizens. Of course, we’re not finished yet and we still need your help to achieve the ideals and ideas that first gave birth to our movement, our fundamental human rights.