By WARNER TODD HUSTON 29 Jun 2020 for Breitbart News

Thousands packed the streets in Chicago for an unofficial gay pride march despite Mayor Lori Lightfoot, the first openly gay mayor, canceling the official annual event because of her worries over the coronavirus.

Organizers insisted that the rally held in the city’s West Side Lakeview neighborhood was an attempt to “reclaim” the “grassroots” efforts to push gay pride, according to ABC 7.

The gay pride parade has roots in the Windy City going back to 1972 and has taken place in the Boystown area of the city until this year, when it was canceled over the coronavirus. But the cancellation did not deter avid pride marchers, who began gathering at noon on Sunday near the CTA Belmont station in the Lakeview neighborhood.

Hundreds flocked to the march flogged by social media posts until thousands were massed in close proximity for a two-mile demonstration into Uptown.

“The reason the march is so important is to highlight those lives that we lost and highlight the people whose lives may not have been lost, but have been wrecked just because they exist openly,” Ashabi Owagboriaye told ABC 7.

Organizers tried to tell marchers that masks were required in compliance with the city’s coronavirus rules.

But many photos posted to social media by pride enthusiasts showed large numbers of people without masks, in contradiction to the coronavirus response orders issued by Lightfoot.

Meanwhile, if the scourge of coronavirus appears less worrisome in the minds of the weekend’s pride marchers in the Lakeview neighborhood, the bloodletting in some of the city’s other communities continued unabated with more shot and killed this weekend than in any weekend going back years. Eighteen people were shot and killed, and an additional 48 were wounded over those 48 hours.

Check out HeyJackass.com for the incredible statistics of gun violence (just in Chicago) where strict gun-control laws are on the books.

Follow Warner Todd Huston on Facebook at: facebook.com/Warner.Todd.Huston.

Black Lives Matter Protesters Disrupt Chicago Gay Pride Parade

Chicago’s 47th annual gay pride parade was disrupted several times by the usual city disruptions — gang activity, gunshots, and drunks — but the event was also disrupted by a car driving into a group of bystanders. Then there was an even larger interruption by “black lives matter” protesters.

Just about every Chicago parade these days features gunfire in the perimeters as gangs clash with police and drunks have probably been a parade disruption since forever. But this year a man tried to drive into the parade route, ramming his car into some bystanders — but not hurting anyone seriously.

Police swarmed the vehicle, smashed in the rear window and yanked out the driver, a middle-aged white man, and arrested him. Chicago police have released no details on the man’s identity nor his motivations for ramming the barricades for the parade.

But by far the biggest disruption was from a large group of “black lives matter” protesters. The group was joined by members of the black queer community of Chicago who announced the disruption on their website.

After noting that they had “purposefully disrupted the Chicago Pride Parade,” the queer group explained their reasoning.

“We do so,” the group said, “because our people are dying at the hands of police, military and state-funded militias around the globe. We do so because we refuse to be tokenized by the same corporations that sponsor state violence, refuse a living wage and profit off our poverty. We do so because young queer people need a better outlet to celebrate themselves than a mire of consumption and sexual violence.”

The queer group was also attacked by the “black lives matter” protesters who held signs and walked as a group to push their own message.