Pride protester in hospital after altercation

A protester who was injured during an altercation with security staff at Auckland's Pride Parade yesterday, sparking outrage online, is recovering in hospital after allegedly suffering a fractured humerus during the incident.

The woman was one of three members of a No Pride In Prisons group which protested the police and Corrections members marching in the parade on Ponsonby Rd.

This year's parade was the first at which police staff were given permission to march in uniform. Policeman Matthew Putt, 22, said being able to march in uniform was "another step forward for police in general".

Protester Tim Lamusse said the group wanted to highlight that the queer, Maori and Pasifika communities were disproportionately harassed and targeted by police.

The injured protester, a Maori trans woman, today wrote on social media that she had badly fractured her humerus as a result of the altercation.

Mr Lamusse said it was ironic that, during a protest aiming to highlight police brutality, a Maori trans woman was so brutally treated.

They were intending to lay a complaint with the Independent Police Conduct Authority, he said.

The altercation was widely criticised on social media, with initial reports leading many to believe the woman's arm was broken by police.

A Givealitte page named Funds for Emmy had raised more than $1600 by 2pm today for the injured woman.

Police said they were investigating the events which led to the woman's injuries and would be reviewing footage taken of the incident as part of their inquiry.

One person was arrested at the Pride Parade for breach of the peace, but they would not be charged and were not believed to have been part of the protest group.

Meanwhile, an anonymous group calling themselves Queers Against Injustice have taken credit for vandalising a GayTM on the eve of Auckland's Pride Parade.

The ANZ machine was covered in white paint in what many believed was a homophobic attack.

The GayTM was one of four transformed by the bank with vibrantly colours and rhinestones.

They were first by introduced by ANZ Australia last year to celebrate the Sydney Mardi Gras and were commissioned in New Zealand as part of the bank's diversity programme, with the proceeds from the use of non-ANZ customer cards being donated to OUTline, a not-for-profit counselling service that supports people dealing with gender and sexuality issues.

In a blog post, Queers Against Injustice said they targeted the GayTM to draw attention to the commercialisation of the Pride Festival.

"As queer subjects, we object to the representation of queer identity in terms of consumptive and wealthy citizens.

"Associating queer politics with personal banking within a gentrified area reduces the queer subject to a bourgeois, cis-gender, white, male subject, and in doing so reproduces many of the intersecting injustices by which queer subjects are marginalised.

"We sought to draw attention to the lack of representation of bodies that counter the racist, classist and cis-biased nature of Pride."

The group said they also sought to draw attention to the way ANZ was using the GayTMs to divert attention from the treatment of their workers.