While safety and security were given as reasons for the cancelation of the Cleveland gay pride events, a small business on the city's west side is taking a stand against violence while spreading love.
"Pride has gone on all over the country in the face of this kind of hatred for decades," said Gilbert Kudrin.
Kudrin has proudly taken the risk - marching in some of Cleveland's earliest pride parades.
"It's always been scary," said Kudrin. "It was scary at Stonewall when people stood up and said we need to be treated as humans."
Kudrin operates Nighsweats and T-Cells t-shirt printing in the Detroit Shoreway neighborhood. The company has been well known on Broadway for the last 25-years.
"We work with the cast of Wicked, Book of Mormon," said Kudrin.
Recently, Kudrin got a message from Tony Award winner Lin Miranda to print asking them to print a t-shirt.
"It was in response to the mass killings in the Orlando gay bar," said Kudrin.
The shirt spreads the message from Miranda's moving speech at the Tony's. In honor of the Orlando nightclub victims he said "Love, is love, is love, is love, is love, is love, is love, is love -- and it cannot be killed or swept aside."
"We had a part in making something better. Those shirts were sold to raise money for the families of the victims of Orlando," said Kudrin.
More than 10,000 of them have been sold so far. Many of them have also been sent to gay pride events in cities across the country, even as Cleveland's event got canned this year.
"I don't want to hide at home. If anything, it's more reason for us to march in the streets and to demand safety," said Kudrin.
Kudrin says his biggest concern with Cleveland pride being canceled is what will happen to those teens struggling with their sexuality.
"Who come to Pride for their very first time and decide not to go home and end their life because they found a community -- they found love," said Kudrin.
Kudrin said they shipped a bunch of the t-shirts out to San Diego, a city which still had its pride events, despite recent threats.
