‘Chaos campaign’: how an Armenian enclave became the center of an anti-LGBTQ+ battle

Erik Adamian, leader of Galas, in Glendale. Photograph: Jessica Pons/The Guardian

On a gray afternoon last June, the school board in Glendale, California, was preparing to make what was once a routine vote to honor June as LGBTQ+ pride month.

School board meetings used to be pretty placid affairs. This year, however, cops in riot gear surrounded the building and helicopters hovered overhead. As Erik Adamian, an alum of the school district, waited in line to get inside the meeting, he heard demonstrators shout: “You are all a bunch of pedophiles!” “Stop grooming our kids!”