HOLLAND (WHTC) — Mary and Dean DeRidder, members of P-FLAG Holland/Lakeshore, a support group for parents, friends and family of gay, lesbian, transgendered people spoke to WHTC Sunday evening about the Orlando murders.
The DeRidder’s 42-year-old daughter, who lives in California, is a lesbian. She called her parents Sunday in tears, Dean DeRidder said.
“It makes her realize she can be, she and her friends can be, out in public,” he said. The DeRidders said their daughter came to terms with being a lesbian during her time as a Hope College student. The DeRidders credited Hope College counselors with helping their daughter.
Mary DeRidder is also the coordinator for Holland’s PRIDEfest’s film festival this year. Now in it’s 12th year, PRIDEfest is a time for LGBTQ people to celebrate their identities and community. For three years, Holland’s PRIDEfest was held at Centennial Park, but several organizers moved out of town, Mary DeRidder said, so this year’s festival is scaled back.
June is Pride month, which grew out of the infamous Stonwall riots. The riots happened after police raided a gay bar in New York in 1969.
Holland PRIDEfest this year is a two-day film festival intended to raise money to create a Holland LGBT resource center. The group currently has about $24,000, said Mary DeRidder, but needs $75,000 to open with a part-time staffer.
She said the resource center will provide education and space for support groups to meet, with counselors available periodically.
“We see a very big need for this right now in our community,” she said, adding that Orlando resource centers opened Sunday in the wake of the shootings. “If we had a resource center here, that’s something we could have done.”
The DeRidders said what people can help those suffering in Orlando is support a fundraising drive to benefit victims and their families, set up at GoFundMe.
