The Gay Liberation movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s arose amidst cries for civil rights, gender equality, and an end to American participation in the Vietnam War. Gay Liberation marked a revolutionary acknowledgement of gay rights in the United States; historians and activists argue that the Stonewall Riots of 1969 prompted this development. The Greenwich Village uprising was the first instance of gay resistance to win widespread media attention, albeit mixed. The Stonewall Riots acted as a catalyst for the Gay Liberation movement, as did the event’s presence in local and national newspapers, regardless of the shifting degrees of support the media coverage lent to the rioters.
Subcultural movements defined the 1960s. Because of the prodigious “baby boom” in the United States after World War II, an unprecedented number of young people were alive in the 1960s to ignite liberal protest movements and express their characteristic discontent with the status quo. As they experimented with recreational drugs and nonconformist lifestyles, they pushed issues of race, gender, and the United States’ participation in the Vietnam War to the forefront of the American consciousness. Among these causes was the gay rights movement. Despite the radical climate of the 1960s, early gay rights groups were led by the conservative, homophile Mattachine Society, founded in Los Angeles in 1950. The organization responded to negative stereotypes and emphasized the gay community’s presence in conventional society; they adopted this approach in 1953 after facing early opposition to more radical strategies. Of the society, David Carter writes, “The founders of the Mattachine Society used the word homophile because they believed that this new term, w...
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...ment and put gay rights on the front pages of newspapers across the United States, and it is still remembered well into the twenty-first century. President Barack Obama mentioned Stonewall in his 2013 Inaugural Address, the first inaugural address to reference gay rights. He asserted, “We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths -- that all of us are created equal -- is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall...Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law.” Despite immediate negative media coverage, the Stonewall Riots increased awareness and encouraged the United States to recognize an emerging call for equal rights. Because, to quote Oscar Wilde, “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”
In Vicki L. Eaklor’s Queer America, the experiences of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, and transgender people in the years since the 1970s gay liberation movement are described as a time of transformation and growth. The antigay movement, threatened, now more than ever, created numerous challenges and obstacles that are still prevalent today. Many of the important changes made associated with the movement were introduced through queer and queer allied individuals and groups involved in politics. Small victories such as the revision of the anti discrimination statement to include “sexual orientation”, new propositions regarding the Equal Rights Amendment and legalized abortion, were met in turn with growing animosity and resistance from individuals and groups opposed to liberal and
During the sixties and seventies there was an influx of social change movements, from civil rights, gay rights, student’s rights and feminism. In the early sixties the US was experiencing
Historian David Carter, provides an intriguing in-depth look into the historical impact of the Stonewall Riots in Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution. This engaging book adds to the genre of sexual orientation discrimination. Carter extensively analyzes the various factors that played a role in igniting the Stonewall riots and the historical impact that the riots had on the Gay Revolution and movement for gay equality. Through the use of interviews, newspapers, and maps, Carter argues that the riots were a product of many geographical, social, political, and cultural factors. Carter further argues that the riots ultimately led to the forming of the Gay Revolution and caused sexual orientation to be a protected category in the growing movement for civil rights. Carter’s book provides a well-structured argument, supported mainly by primary evidence, into the different factors that contributed to the riots as well as a detailed account of the events that transpired during the riots and the political attitudes towards homosexuality in America during this time.
...e social changes brought about this period. He cites the growing sensationalism of sex covered in the media as a prime driver behind the sexual orthodoxy in American culture (Chauncey 1994, 359). During this witch hunt, he draws a silver lining. Using the scholarship of others such as John D’Emilio, he cites that this period brought a greater bond to the gay community by forging brotherhood of adversity which would then come back into play in the 1960’s as an experiential touchstone for the Civil Rights era (Chauncey 1994, 360). Chauncey nestles his own narrative of the gay community in New York within the larger narrative of gay life in America filling in the gaps of secondary sources through his own primary work.
The media considers the1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City the spark of the modern gay rights movement. This occurred after the police raided the Stonewall bar, a popular gay bar in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. Allyn argues that the new energy and militancy generated by the riot played a crucial role in creating the gay liberation movement. Arguably, the Stonewall Riots have come to resemble the pivotal moment in gay rights history largely because it provided ways for the gay community to resist the social norms. In fact, the riots increased public awareness of gay rights activism (Allyn 157). Gay life after the Stonewall riots, however, was just as varied and complex as it was before. In the following era, ho...
“Jesus never said a word about homosexuality. In all of his teachings about multiple things--he never said that gay people should be condemned. I personally think it is very fine for gay people to be married in civil ceremonies” (Carter). Jimmy Carter took a religious route to support the Gay Rights Movement. The Gay Rights Movement started in the 1950s and is still a heated topic that is debated over. The Gay Rights Movement is believed to be started by the Stonewall riots. The Gay Rights Movement had no real leaders and its followers were homosexuals and people who sought for oppression towards gays to end. The purpose of the Gay Rights Movement is to end discrimination towards the homosexual community. “The Women’s Liberation and Gay Liberation Movements” is a speech written and spoken by Huey Newton, cofounder of the Black Panther Party. The speech was given on August 15, 1970 and the theme of the speech is for people to fight for their own liberation. In Huey Newton’s “The Women’s Liberation and Gay Liberation Movements” speech, he motivates his intended audience during the Gay Rights Movement by using the rhetorical strategies pathos and punctuation.
Prior to the 1970’s, members of the LGBTQ community, and especially those who also identified as people of color, were forced to stay silent despite constant discrimination because of their minority statuses. They did not have a voice or means to speak out against the oppression. During the 1960’s, the few safe spaces established for QPOC in urban communities had disappeared, since this particular era was being overshadowed by the Civ...
Kuhn, Betsy. Gay Power!: The Stonewall Riots and the Gay Rights Movement, 1969. Minneapolis, MN: Twenty-First Century, 2011. Print.
. Gianoulis, Tina. "Gay Liberation Movement." In St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture., edited by Thomas Riggs, 438-43. 2nd ed. Vol. 2. Detroit: St. James, 2013. Gale Virtual Reference Library (GALE|CX2735801056).
· Influences: civil rights movement, Black Power movement, white student movement, antiwar movement, and feminism.
especially young gay people, had risen throughout the sixties, the events at the Stonewall Inn
The Stonewall Riots marked the start of the gay rights movement, and inspired members of the gay community to fight for their rights instead of being condemned for their sexuality. Even today, gay people in the US use the incident at Stonewall to educate younger members of the gay community. "The younger generation should know about Stonewall so that they will realize it is possible to make change. It is possible to overcome entrenched, institutionalized prejudice, discrimination, and bigotry. And that they can live full equal lives." (Frank Kameny, aarp.org) This is the message that many members of the gay community continue to spread after the incident at the Stonewall Inn.
The history of the gay rights movement goes as far back as the late 19th century. More accurately, the quest by gays to search out others like themselves and foster a feeling of identity has been around since then. It is an innovative movement that seeks to change existing norms and gain acceptance within our culture. By 1915, one gay person said that the gay world was a "community, distinctly organized" (Milestones 1991), but kept mostly out of view because of social hostility. According to the Milestones article, after World War II, around 1940, many cities saw their first gay bars open as many homosexuals began to start a networking system. However, their newfound visibility only backfired on them, as in the 1950's president Eisenhower banned gays from holding federal jobs and many state institutions did the same. The lead taken by the federal government encouraged local police forces to harass gay citizens. "Vice officers regularly raided gay bars, sometimes arresting dozens of men and women on a single night" (Milestones). In spite of the adversity, out of the 1950s also came the first organized groups of gays, including leaders. The movement was small at first, but grew exponentially in short periods of time. Spurred on by the civil rights movement in the 1960s, the "homophile" (Milestones) movement took on more visibility, picketing government agencies and discriminatory policies. By 1969, around 50 gay organizations existed in the United States. The most crucial moment in blowing the gay rights movement wide open was on the evening of July 27, 1969, when a group of police raided a gay bar in New York City. This act prompted three days of rioting in the area called the Stonewall Rio...
...not covered by the media, and the Stonewall Riots were the first large-scale movement for LGBT rights. Despite this, it still took some time for the movement to gain proper attention. An example of this is The New York Times newspaper, which did not allow its journalists to use the word “gay” until after 1987, almost twenty years after the riots, and it only covered the riots in an article consisting of three short paragraphs.
Have you ever thought how much progress the LGBT community has made and how it affects other people? The gay rights movement was and is currently a movement that “strives to end all discrimination towards the LGBT community” (Redlingshafer). As early as 1924, the Society for Human Rights in Chicago becomes United States’ earliest known gay rights organization (“Milestones in the American Gay Rights Movement”). However, most people recognize the Stonewall riot in 1969 as being the beginning of the gay rights movement. Almost ninety years later, society and the government have progressed over time and are still growing. Harvey Milk, author of “The Hope Speech”, was a politician who led a portion of the gay rights movement. Also, a more recent and well known leader of the movement is Dan Savage, the creator of the “It Gets Better Project”. The followers of the gay rights movement are not just homosexual. There are followers and supporters of every gender, race, and sexual orientation. The gay rights movement and its issues are represented in “The Hope Speech” by Harvey Milk.