Multimedia Video: Jazzy’s 3rd Annual Pride Fair

Community member Jazzy (Kate) Mabel, hosted the 3rd annual pride fair on June 3. This year’s event had over 40 vendors that sold pride-themed items such as plants, clothing, jewelry, books, and more.
Ayana Grace, a small business owner of Uni Cosme shared, “I love the community, I’m a part of the community, and I have been going [at the festival] for the past two years, so I thought that this time I would want to do something bigger, so I thought up to become a vendor here with my products to make sure that everyone feels included with the things they do in their life.”
The festival also provided attendants with food vendors, and vegan options were provided by vendors such as GetSauced, which sold a vegan potato salad, and DoggyStyle sold plant-based vegan hotdogs.
Live performances were also performed by headlined local artists such as Manuela, who had previously been a student at BC, 4U&I, Faith Angeles, Lou Beauty, Dancing Tommy, and Big Stretch. An open mic was also provided at the festival which encouraged many attendees to come up and perform themselves.
When speaking to one of the headliners, Faith Angeles, they stated that the festival brought many opportunities to social network and connect with other people. “I didn’t really do a good job with being social in high school, so this is rad. It helped me out, I’m not alone and a lot of the stuff [music] today I made with a tight-knit group of people that I trust, which is the most important to me.”
Every year Jazzy opens up its backyard to the LGBTQ+ community, and allies, in hopes to show Bakersfield where they belong and just how big the community is. This year’s event had over 2,000 attendees, exceeding the size of the previous years.

The Rip interviewed Mabel at the festival, and this is what they shared:
BC Rip: “So you’re on year three, can you kind of talk a little bit about the biggest difference between all the years and this year?”

Mabel: “Yeah, Honestly probably size above all else. We started out with 1500 wristbands, and we sold out of them, well not sold out– We ran out of them, to give people entrance at I think 4:00 P.M. So we have been going for about four hours after that, so I would estimate that at least two thousand people have been through here today, which has doubled every year with size. Which has been a really good testament that the community here is growing, and all of the vendors are just continuing to bring more and more people out here and of course all of our lovely musicians. We had an entirely new line-up this year, all queer line-ups. I think people just really came out to support this year and as always it has been wonderful to see all the families, all the different ages, and all the different demographics.”
Mabel also stated that they will aim to continue this annual festival for as long as they can so that they could continue to create a bigger community for the LGBTQIA+ community throughout Kern County.