Three little boys have made a stand for gay rights – literally.
Sam Bernstein, 4, Finn Madden, 4, and three-year-old Dean Haines set up a “Pride of the Village” stall at New York’s Pride Parade, selling lemonade and cookies.
At $1 a pop, the youngsters managed to raise $250 for victims of the recent Orlando massacre at Pulse nightclub.
They had a lot of help from their parents as they set up the stand, but proud mum Stephanie Bernstein says they were excited to be making a difference.
“The boys loved being responsible for the ‘store’ and took greater pride in knowing they were doing something to help others,” she told Babble.
“Being surrounded by rainbows and cookies didn’t hurt, either.”
Mum Michelle Madden told the New York Times the boys felt like selling lemonade and loved the idea of “living the life that you want, the way you want to live it”.
After telling her young son about the Pride parade, Finn said that people should be able to marry whoever they wanted to.
“We live in Greenwich Village, where we are incredibly fortunate to have so many diverse people and lifestyles celebrated all around us,” Michelle said.
“Prejudice is learned — it is not innate. If every four-year-old today was taught tolerance, think of the world we could look forward to!”
Stephanie told Buzzfeed that her son Sam had grown up never even questioning gay rights.
“For us, gay rights are such a big thing, but when I was explaining it to my four-year-old he just said, ‘Of course you should marry whoever you want.’
“I love that our children are living in a time when gay rights are just normal.”
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