Don’t Believe the Hype! is a silent looping video projection intended for screening on public surfaces in gay neighbourhoods across Canada. It beckons viewers with sensuous displays of queer public affection paired with scrolling text that both provokes and informs. This site-specific work claims public space for queer intimacy and political imagining at a time when Canadians are being encouraged by both the federal government and LGBT civil society organizations to celebrate the so-called 50^th anniversary of the decriminalization of homosexuality.

Critical of the state mythologies and top down benevolence, this piece demands a more critical interpretation of Pierre Elliott Trudeau's 1969 Criminal Code reform that failed to stop the regular brutality, disregard, police violence, arrests, harassment, firings, and bar and bathhouse raids that continue in the wake of the supposed decriminalization of homosexuality. Whose legacy are we celebrating? Whose lives are disappeared by convenient origin myths? What’s the cost of misremembering? And why have so many gays and lesbians been so eager to embrace a demonstrably false anniversary?

About Don’t Believe the ‘69 Hype! [panel discussion]

Join us for an artist talk and panel on the mythologies and realities of the 1969 Criminal Code reform and its impact on the lives of queers, sex workers, and those seeking abortions. The event will begin with a brief talk from artist/activist Ryan Conrad whose commissioned video projection Don't Believe The Hype! will be on display in the gay village throughout Pride week as part of Knot Projections 2019: Imagining Publics, an extended public projection series involving five local artists. Ryan’s talk will be followed by context-setting commentary from Tom Hooper (Historian; Faculty Member @ York University), Ummni Khan (Associate Professor, Law and Legal Studies @ Carleton University) and Darrah Teitel (Playwright; Campaign Officer, Action Canada).