A boycott of National Student Pride, which takes place this weekend, has been dropped after the LGBTQ+ student event parted ways with Airbus, HSBC, Disney, Deutsche Bank, and Amazon as sponsors.
This weekend, National Student Pride returns to London for its annual festival of celebration, activism, panel discussions, an LGBTQ+ careers fair and community marketplace.
National Student Pride, which will this year be headlined by Joe Lycett, Russell T Davies, Tia Kofi, Suzi Ruffell, Charlie Craggs, among others, is a non-profit organisation that accepts sponsorship from companies which also exhibit at their LGBTQ+ careers fair.
Earlier this week, an active boycott was set up on social media against National Student Pride, calling on them to drop specific sponsors: Airbus, HSBC, Disney, Deutsche Bank, and Amazon. National Student Pride has since agreed to part ways with these companies as sponsors, and return all sponsorship.
RuPaul’s Drag Race UK season one’s Crystal, who recently successfully sued Laurence Fox for LGBTQ+ hate speech has returned to the line-up following these changes and community conversations. Crystal pulled out of the event on Wednesday, February 21 in support of the boycott led by Queers for Palestine, but will now appear as DJ at the Friday night Launch Party.
View this post on Instagram
On Thursday, February 22, Crystal made a statement via Instagram, “we’re seeing the power of conversations and learning in public and collective action”.
National Student Pride returns to London from 23-25 February, bringing together 2,000+ attendees for a whole weekend of parties, panels, an LGBTQ+ careers fair, and more. Free daytime tickets, £10 weekend wristbands and Sunday Drag Brunch bolt-on tickets HERE.
National Student Pride has committed to holding a full review of their sponsorship policy after the event this weekend. The 2024 sponsorship policy is available HERE.
