President Obama made history when he established Stonewall National Monument, the first National Park unit commemorating the history of the struggle for equal rights in the LGBTQ community; Stonewall National Monument. His announcement came a week after the deadliest mass shooting in American history in which a single gunman killed 49 people at a gay night club in Orlando Florida.
Photo: charlotteobserver.com
On June 28, 1969, police attempted to raid the Stonewall Inn, a gay club in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. At that time, it was illegal to serve alcohol to homosexuals. The Inn was owned by the Mafia, who had purchased it and turned it into the night club and would often bribe the police to prevent raids.
Photo: latimes.com
The club had protocols for when it was thought that the police would be coming, but that night, the Inn was not forewarned. Some patrons attempted to flee out the windows but the police barred them from leaving. The police attempted to complete their raid using standard policy: line all patrons up and have them present identification to leave the club, while anyone dressed as a woman was escorted into the bathroom by female police officers where their sex would be verified. However, those dressed as women refused to be subjected to sex verification and the male patrons refused to present their IDs. Some of the patrons were released but instead of dispersing, they gathered outside the club, which attracted an ever larger crowd.
A woman in handcuffs was escorted to a police vehicle but she repeatedly attempted to escape and complained about her restraints until an officer hit her on the head with a baton and dragged her to the vehicle. At this point, the crowd became a mob and fought against the police. The riots that broke out were not planned. Instead, it was all of the pent up frustration of oppressed people that finally reached the breaking point and the LGBT community fought for itself.
After 45 minutes of violence, the Tactical Police Force showed up to rescue the officers already on the scene. Both the police and the rioters were angry: the rioters because of constant humiliation and being forced to hide their true selves and the police because they had been resisted. As the tactical police attempted to disperse the crowd, the mob retaliated with song and dance, taunting the police. By 4:00am, the streets were cleared; 13 people had been arrested and many were taken to the hospital for injuries.
During the day of June 28th, pro-gay slogans were painted on the Stonewall Inn. That night, the Stonewall was open again and thousands of people showed up, clogging the streets. The police showed up and again the crowd became a mob, taunting the police with kick lines and leading them on chases down Christopher Street until the Tactical Force arrived again.
The riots at the Stonewall Inn and on Christopher Street marked a shift in the movement to gain equal rights for the LGBT community. Newspapers were created that were called Come Out! and Gay Power, groups were established with the word gay in their title for the first time. The Stonewall Riots did not mean that police raids ended or that things changed quickly, but the riots did mark the major shift to more public activism in the fight for LGBT rights.
Photo: cbsnews.com
On the anniversary of the riots, June 28, 1970, the first gay pride parades took place, on Christopher Street in New York, and in Los Angeles and Chicago. In the subsequent years, pride parades quickly spread to more cities and gay rights groups were formed in every major city. Eventually, June was named as Pride Month to commemorate the Stonewall Riots.
Today, gay marriage is the law of the land, employers cannot discriminate based on sexual orientation and it is not illegal to serve alcohol to homosexuals. The US has made great strides since 1969 but as the mass shooting in Orlando shows, the struggle for civil rights is never-ending, and love is the best way to combat hatred, discrimination and fear.
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