Colorado Avalanche Celebrate Pride Weekend 2020

The Colorado Avalanche showed support for the LBGTQ+ by taking part in the virtual Pride parade and Pridefest this weekend.

The Colorado Avalanche did their best to celebrate the LBGTQ+ community on what’s historically Pride weekend. Typically in Denver, Pride weekend includes a Pridefest at the park and a parade. Of course, both of those events feature large groups of people, so they can’t happen in the COVID-19 era.

Last season, the Avalanche were full participants in the Pride parade. Read more here:

Naturally, this year they couldn’t engage in the same activities. So, they took part in the virtual festivities.

Denver Pride hosted a virtual Pridefest and parade, both of which incorporated video units to commemorate the weekend.

The team started off by having Rex Fuller from The Center on Colfax on the Sports Social show. The Center is a community center for Colorado’s LGBTQ+ community.

The team social media started off the weekend itself by changing the logos on their social media to the rainbow logo for Pride weekend.

As you can see, they also hashtag Hockey Is For Everyone, which is the NHL’s initiative to be inclusive of all hockey fans. Now, I know no readers here will do so, but you don’t have to go too far down these kinds of tweets or Facebook posts to find someone who asks, “What about a straight pride day?”

Hockey is a sport played by cis-het, predominantly white males. Every day is straight pride day in the NHL. Moving on.

The Colorado Avalanche also published a placard that you could print and display to who you, too, support the rights of the LGBTQ+.

https://twitter.com/Avalanche/status/1274374975428820994

I wish my printer worked. I would have put this up at my work today.

Now, the Avalanche’s mascot, Bernie, is always a liaison to the community. He was front and center for last year’s Pride parade:

This year, it looks like he went to the Pepsi Center and took a new picture:

A couple actually:

And a little video:

https://twitter.com/Avalanche/status/1274809316361584641

While the NHL has been on pause, Bernie has been making videos from home. Each one shows him engaged in some weekend activity. This weekend was all about Pride:

I love that Bernie has little dolls of other NHL mascots and that he put them in his Pride parade.

Anyway, the Colorado Avalanche have done a good job of being supportive to all communities. They may occasionally falter, but they take great pains to be inclusive. And that’s what it’s all about.