Pups show pride alongside humans at NC Pride

Natalie, a portly white pit bull, waddled over the grass of Duke University’s verdant East Campus Saturday in a pair of purple satin pixie wings. Her head was as wide as a shovel and her mouth could swallow your hand whole, but for such a powerful beast she glanced around with an almost childlike exuberance, her thick pink tongue unfurled, her amber eyes giddy and ecstatic at all the attention and head pats she was receiving.

Natalie is a mother of puppies, all of whom have been adopted. She alone remains without a home or a family, so her caretakers at Carolina Adopt-A-Bulls Rescue have taken her out this year to N.C. Pride 2016 with the hope of socializing her, but to also spread awareness of the misconceptions that surround the breed.

Adopt-A-Bulls, a nonprofit rescue organization based in Durham that advocates to end pit bull bans and raise awareness about the breed, was just one of many dog rescue and advocacy groups in attendance at the festival.

Canines were in abundance at this year’s 32nd annual N.C. PrideFest, a celebration that brings together LGBT communities from Georgia to Maryland, celebrating the progress these communities have made as well as remembering the hardships they’ve endured. The event took place this year on the lawns of Duke University’s East Campus, beginning at 10 a.m. and ending at 5 p.m. with speeches at noon and the parade kicking off at 1 p.m. on Campus Drive. The event was free and open to everybody, including their four-legged best friends.

“Natalie loves to play, she loves cats, she loves to play with other dogs and she likes to sing,” Tiffany Bair, the Adopt-A-Bulls volunteer who was walking Natalie, said. “She loves show tunes.”

Other rescues in attendance included the Hope Animal Rescue, another rescue group based in Durham, and the N.C. Greyhound Adoption Promotion, a nonprofit that raises awareness about retired racing greyhounds as suitable future family members and gets interested families in touch with adoption agencies.

“Greyhounds are known as the 40-mile-an-hour couch potato,” Joanna Wolfe, a volunteer for the N.C. Greyhound Adoption Promotion, said. “They sleep 18 to 20 hours a day and are excellent pets for people who work full time.”

“Most people have never seen a retired racing greyhound so it gives them an opportunity to come and interact with the dogs. We call them our floor models because they’re not going home with anyone, but they’re here for people to interact with,” she said.

Detric Robinson, an employee of Elon University who attended Pride, brought his pup Kai to support LGBT pride.

“Kai is out here to lend some support,” Robinson said of three-year-old Kai, a suspected corgi-hound mix. “He’s an old soul, but he acts like a child sometimes.”

Natalie, the pit bull in her purple wings, was also brought to support Pride.

“She is proud to support Pride here,” Bair said. “There’s nothing but love in these dogs so we figure they’d fit in well here.”

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