Scottish band mistaken for Californian parade with same-sex marriage by senders of homophobic messages

A band from the Scottish town Ayr has received a slew of homophobic messages because it shares its name with a New Year’s Day event in the US state of California which hosted its first same-sex wedding last week.

In an historic move for the 125-year-old Rose Parade in Pasadena, California, a gay couple said their vows and became the first to marry as part of the event.

The couple, Danny Leclair and Aubrey Loots, married atop the AIDS Healthcare Foundation float, which was shaped as a giant cake.

Rose Parade, a folk/indie/pop band from Scotland consisting of members Ari Pournaras, Ed Mackay, Paul Wilson and Oscar Wilson, began receiving messages of complaint leading up to the parade, amid calls to boycott it.

As they received more messages, however, the band said they became increasingly homophobic.

Some directly complained as if they were messaging the organisers of the parade in Pasadena.

While others just sent messages containing homophobic slurs.

Speaking to PinkNews, the band said: “Initially we received a few messages and just thought it was bizarre, it doesn’t take a lot of brain cells to realise that we are a band from Scotland and not the actual tournament of roses. We posted a screenshot of the messages and started receiving a lot of homophobic abuse, horrible messages. Our fans and friends stepped in and did a great job replying to all the abusive messages in an anti-homophobic way. We never thought a small indie band from Scotland could be so controversial!

They continued: “We should all have equal rights including the right to marry and make a statement of love and commitment to each other, love has no gender…”

The wedding was the first in the historic parade, which has been running for 125 years, and went off without any glitches. It took place at the latter part of the two-hour parade.

The couple, who said their vows live on TV in front of millions this afternoon, have been together for twelve years.

Despite a campaign to boycott the parade because of the wedding, organisers of the parade were happy for it to go ahead,

Advocates of same-sex marriage had said they hoped the calls for boycott only created more of a dialogue in favour of equal marriage.

Mr Leclair said: “Our stance is love is love and love will save lives.”

After the two were happily married, however, many complained that major TV networks had missed out that segment of the parade by going to ad breaks or otherwise.

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