The Guardian81%
‘Stop pretending we don’t exist’: Seoul fills its streets with Pride colour 60%
By Raphael Rashid0%
6/12/2026, 11:54:51 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 24 faulty reasoning types, including Status Quo Bias, Hasty Generalization, and Anecdotal, with Negativity Bias as the most egregious example at 33.2% saturation with 112 hits. Analysis detected 791 faulty-reasoning hits from 337 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 55.6% and a BS Rank of 60% (8,948 of 21,887 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 59.10% of the article peer group.
Tens of thousands of people have poured into central Seoul to celebrate the city’s annual queer culture festival, filling the streets with rainbow flags and drumming troupes in one of Asia’s largest Pride gatherings.
“I only tell friends who I think can accept it,” said Lee Seo-hee, a university student from Seoul who identifies as bisexual.
“It doesn’t feel like a completely safe society.”
But little could dampen the mood on Saturday, despite LGBTQ+ people in South Korea remaining without basic legal protections, and a comprehensive anti-discrimination law blocked in parliament for nearly two decades.
On a blazing sunny day, the mood was jubilant and unguarded.
Booths lined the festival grounds in another location instead, representing civil society groups, university clubs and diplomatic missions including the British embassy.
“This is the one time of year people feel they can truly show who they are,” said Jay Park, a film-maker and frequent attender.
“Until a few years ago, many came covering themselves up, afraid of being seen.”
Days earlier a Seoul court had offered a rare step forward, ruling that a same-sex couple who had shared their lives and finances constituted a protected legal union, even as same-sex marriage is not legally recognised in South Korea.
Last month the government quietly committed to laying the groundwork for such a law, listing it among national policy tasks of President Lee Jae Myung’s administration.
“Even Korean companies that sponsor Pride abroad keep their mouths shut about LGBTQ+ rights in Korea,” said Heezy Yang, a Seoul-based queer artist and activist.
South Korean pop culture exported queerness to the world through films, music videos and dramas, he said, while the country silenced it at home.
Nearby, a crowd of counter-protesters held a rival rally, with trucks blasting hymns and banners declaring homosexuality a sin.
“Korean politicians have always treated minority issues as an afterthought, people not worth their votes,” Park said.
“Stop pretending we don’t exist.
Pass the anti-discrimination law.”
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