History has overlooked the Gay Liberatn Front's role Stonewall ... until now - LGBTQ Natn

Contents:

• HISTORY HAS OVERLOOKED THE GAY LIBERATN FRONT’S ROLE STONEWALL … UNTIL NOW
• THE GAY LIBERATN MOVEMENT
• PARTY AND PROTT: THE RADIL HISTORY OF GAY LIBERATN, STONEWALL AND PRI
• SHOCKWAV OM STONEWALL: REVISG GAY LIBERATN MICHIGAN
• THE UNLIVERED PROMISE OF THE GAY LIBERATN STGGLETHE UNLIVERED PROMISE OF THE GAY LIBERATN STGGLE
• STONEWALL AND ITS IMPACT ON THE GAY LIBERATN MOVEMENT
• GAY LIBERATN FRONT

HISTORY HAS OVERLOOKED THE GAY LIBERATN FRONT’S ROLE STONEWALL … UNTIL NOW

But engagg gay behavr public (holdg hands, kissg or dancg wh someone of the same sex) was still illegal, so police harassment of gay bars ntued and many bars still operated whout liquor licens— part bee they were owned by the Rights Before StonewallThe first documented U. In 1966, three years before Stonewall, members of The Mattache Society, an anizatn dited to gay rights, staged a “sip-” where they openly clared their sexualy at taverns, darg staff to turn them away and sug tablishments who did. When The Commissn on Human Rights led that gay dividuals had the right to be served bars, police raids were temporarily Stonewall Inn The crime syndite saw prof terg to shunned gay clientele, and by the mid-1960s, the Genove crime fay ntrolled most Greenwich Village gay bars.

And was one of the few—if not the only—gay bar left that allowed were still a fact of life, but ually rpt ps would tip off Mafia-n bars before they occurred, allowg owners to stash the alhol (sold whout a liquor license) and hi other illegal activi. Stonewall's LegacyThough the Stonewall uprisg didn’t start the gay rights movement, was a galvanizg force for LGBT polil activism, leadg to numero gay rights anizatns, cludg the Gay Liberatn Front, Human Rights Campaign, GLAAD (formerly Gay and Lbian Alliance Agast Defamatn), and PFLAG (formerly Parents, Fai and Friends of Lbians and Gays) the one-year anniversary of the rts on June 28, 1970, thoands of people marched the streets of Manhattan om the Stonewall Inn to Central Park what was then lled “Christopher Street Liberatn Day, ” Ameri’s first gay pri para. ”In 2016, then-Print Barack Obama signated the se of the rts—Stonewall Inn, Christopher Park, and the surroundg streets and siwalks—a natnal monument regnn of the area’s ntributn to gay Gallery The Stonewall Inn is a bar loted New York Cy’s Greenwich Village that served as a haven the 1960s for the cy’s gay, lbian and transgenr muny.

McDarrah/Getty ImagAfter pourg their drks, a bartenr Juli's Bar ref to serve John Timms, Dick Lesch, Craig Rodwell, and Randy Wicker, members of the Mattache Society who were prottg New York liquor laws that prevented servg gay ctomers, 1966, three members of the Mattache Society, an early anizatn dited to fightg for gay rights, staged a “sip-”—a twist on the “s-” protts of the 1960s. But between New York’s LGBTQ muny the 1960s beg forced to live on the outskirts of society and the Mafia’s disregard for the law, the two beme a profable, if uneasy, State Liquor Authory and the New York Police Department regularly raid bars that tered to gay patrons. “Fat Tony, ” purchased the Stonewall Inn 1966 and transformed to a gay bar and operate the Stonewall and s other gay bars, the Mafia bribed the NYPD to turn a bld eye to the “cent nduct” occurrg behd closed doors.

THE GAY LIBERATN MOVEMENT

" This sign was wrten by the Mattache Society–an early anizatn dited to fightg for gay reportg the events, The New York Daily News rorted to homophobic slurs s tailed verage, nng the headle: “Homo Nt Raid, Queen Be Are Stgg Mad. Image source, NY Daily News Archive / GettyImage ptn, Tensns rose on the street after the raidWhen half a dozen police officers raid a Mafia-n gay bar on a hot New York night 50 years ago, ltle did they know their actns would spark a movement that rhaped the liv of generatns to didn't throw a brick that night. An hour earlier, the police had raid the bar Greenwich Village for the send time that week, but this time on a Friday night at 1am when was 200 ctomers - lbians, gay men, transgenr people, naway teenagers and drag queens - were thrown out on to Christopher Street.

Gay people were ed to nng om the police, but this time they were the on on the advance and the men uniform on the gay rights movement didn't start that night but was vigorated by what happened the hours and days after the first was thrown. Even what you wore was policed - fewer than three piec of clothg emed appropriate to your genr uld put you was a huge amount of anger bee gay people had no polil power to prevent this, says William Eskridge, a profsor at Yale Law School.

PARTY AND PROTT: THE RADIL HISTORY OF GAY LIBERATN, STONEWALL AND PRI

In the that followed, the feral exclns on gays and lbians were lifted, and the medil profsn reversed s long-held belief that homosexuals need psychiatric Milk beme one of the first openly gay elected officials the US, 1977 San Francis.

SHOCKWAV OM STONEWALL: REVISG GAY LIBERATN MICHIGAN

Two years later, about 100, 000 people took part a natnal march on Washgton - probably at that pot the biggt gatherg of gay people of the anti-sodomy laws were stck down the 1980s, makg homosexualy effectively legal, although was s before gay marriage beme a ferally-regnised right 2015.

THE UNLIVERED PROMISE OF THE GAY LIBERATN STGGLETHE UNLIVERED PROMISE OF THE GAY LIBERATN STGGLE

"Image source, Getty ImagImage ptn, The Natnal March On Washgton filled the famo mallIt wasn't the first gay uprisg agast the police - as the LA Tim recently relled, the police were pelted wh donuts 10 years earlier - but was the most nsequential.

Image source, Mark SegalImage ptn, Segal crashed a Nixon fundraiser 1972He went on to lnch a gay newspaper Philalphia and bee a pneer gay journalism, and his work on equaly earned him an dience wh Print Barack Obama. While the old learship wanted to portray the muny as women drs and men sus and ti, those at Stonewall and the founrs of Gay Liberatn Front drsed jeans and t-shirts and drag or what soon would be nsired “genrf*ck.

STONEWALL AND ITS IMPACT ON THE GAY LIBERATN MOVEMENT

The first Gay Youth anizatn, GYNY; the first trans anizatn, STAR (Street Transvte Actn Revolutnari); the first LGBT Communy Center on Wt 3rd Street; the first monstratns agast media and police; and a ntual public prence as we took back our streets.

There were people at Stonewall who passed by, people who crang their necks om around the rner watchg, people who tossed a stone and ran sce the police chased people up and down the street, but the spir of ristance that gave birth to the new movement was all the Gay Liberatn ont. They created a staable anizatn where there had been none before, the worlds first trans anizatn, Street Transvte Actn Revolutnari, which was a mtee of the Gay Liberatn Front, formed durg the GLF occupatn of NYU’s Weste Hall.

Infightg the anizatn ed a spl and created the Gay Activists Alliance, which beme popular wh historians sce went back to those rpectable lookg homosexuals that they preferred reprent our muny and which were overwhelmgly whe men. Her discharge om the ary over her homosexualy had turned her to an Tob/The New York Public LibraryPublished July 19, 2023Updated July 23, 2023Lilli Vcenz, who beme a gay rights activist the hhed, reprsive era before the Stonewall rebelln of 1969, when such a ncept srcely existed, makg a mark as a newspaper edor, documentary filmmaker and psychotherapist voted to L. Vicenz beme, by most acunts, the first lbian to picket the Whe Hoe support of equal rights for gay people as a member of the Mattache Society of Washgton, an early gay rights prott — the first of s kd, acrdg to the Library of Congrs — and others that followed were small but brought visibily to a movement s fancy.

GAY LIBERATN FRONT

Vcenz beme the first out lbian to appear on the ver of a natnal gay magaze, The Ladr, a publitn produced by the untry’s first lbian-rights group, the Dghters of Bilis, acrdg to a retrospective on her life and reer by Lillian Farman, a historian of lbian and gay her scbbed, all-Amerin looks, Dr.

Vcenz looked like “every mother’s dream dghter, ” as Barbara Gtgs, The Ladr’s edor, put Vcenz also ntributed to the e on the other si of a mera, makg two 16-limeter films that were later hailed as signifint artifacts of the early gay rights first, tled “The Send-Largt Mory, ” documents a Mattache Society prott ont of Inpennce Hall Philalphia on July 4, morn ey, the black-and-whe film, roughly seven mut, seems anythg but seismic. It was Washgton — not Bethda, Md., where is we handle rrectnsA versn of this article appears prt on, Sectn A, Page 20 of the New York edn wh the headle: Lilli Vcenz, a Trailblazer the Gay Rights Movement, Di at 85. But as my lleague Shane O’Neill found out for his new mi-documentary, “Who Threw the First Brick at Stonewall?, ” no one n agree on almost anythg else (or even if a brick was thrown at all), other than that was a msy eveng that accelerated and fed gay rights.