Miami and Miami Beach Is the Gay Getaway You Need Right Now! - HomoCulture

Contents:

• THE TEN MOST MEMORABLE MOMENTS MIAMI'S GAY HISTORY
• MIAMI THEN AND NOW ALWAYS GAY FRIENDLY
• LGBTQ FLORIDA: GAY & LBIAN WALKG TOUR MIAMI BEACH
• MB GAY HISTORY 101
• MIAMI AND MIAMI BEACH IS THE GAY GETAWAY YOU NEED RIGHT NOW!
• YOUR GUI TO EXPLORG GAY MIAMI
• MIAMI GAY BEACH
• THE TEN MOST MEMORABLE MOMENTS MIAMI'S GAY HISTORY

THE TEN MOST MEMORABLE MOMENTS MIAMI'S GAY HISTORY

At the 1972 Democratic Natnal Conventn, a woman named Male Davis lled for somethg new: The party, she said, should clu gay rights s platform.

Davis, the first out lbian legate at a major party nventn, clared that gay people were "here to put an end to our fears. A few months before Davis' speech, the cy played host to what some believe to be the first anized gay pri week, which began as a prott agast the cy's anti-cross-drsg law.

Once aga, gay rights activists were a major prence, holdg protts outsi. But om s earlit days as an untamed, fantastil playground for the rich to s emergence as an ever-changg global mec, the cy has been the settg for moments of both triumph and feat the slow march toward gay equaly — moments that had profound implitns beyond the cy's borrs.

MIAMI THEN AND NOW ALWAYS GAY FRIENDLY

From the cy's earlit days, long before the begng of the gay liberatn movement, queer people had rved out plac for themselv Miami — much to the chagr of the nservative lg class. In later years, the passage of antidiscrimatn legislatn Da County sparked what would bee a natnal movement agast gay rights, as well as an unprecented mobilizatn of the gay muny. Ku Klux Klan Raid on La Paloma Gay Bar, 1937.

Bryant — a 36-year-old former Miss Ameri nnep, sger, and Florida orange juice spokperson — took the stand that outlawg workplace and hog discrimatn agast gay people would "discrimate agast [her] children's right to grow up a healthy, cent muny. It was one of the first major mpaigns agast the gay rights movement sparked by Manhattan's Stonewall Rts, which followed a police raid of a club that weled gays 1969. At the same time, Bryant's csa — which brand gay people as perverts and lked homosexualy to pedophilia — uned and activated the gay muny a way that had never been seen before.

LGBTQ FLORIDA: GAY & LBIAN WALKG TOUR MIAMI BEACH

"The Ana Bryant mpaign, to me, is one of the most, if not the most, pivotal or semal moments policizg gay people the Uned Stat, " Capó says.

But so, too, me the gay muny's galvanizg to fight back. But Cuba, they ran the risk of beg thrown to a forced labor mp if their relatnship was disvered by the dictatorship, which nsired homosexualy to be antirevolutnary.

MB GAY HISTORY 101

Beyond swellg the cy's gay populatn wh queer exil such as Rodriguez and Gonzalez, who were eager to pe opprsn Cuba, the mass emigratn forced a kd of reckong over a homophobic immigratn policy.

MIAMI AND MIAMI BEACH IS THE GAY GETAWAY YOU NEED RIGHT NOW!

Shor, Capó says, the untry barred homosexual foreigners om entry.

YOUR GUI TO EXPLORG GAY MIAMI

Among the nearly 125, 000 people fleeg Cuba were thoands of self-intified homosexuals the Castro regime had emed unsirable. "In this way, the Uned Stat' long-standg antimunist rhetoric tmped s long-standg anti-gay immigratn policy.

" Rather than screeng for homosexualy, immigratn workers would ny gay people only if they disclosed their sexual orientatn unsoliced — a policy change that ultimately would lead to immigrants beg granted asylum on the basis of their sexualy.

MIAMI GAY BEACH

Meanwhile, Ameri beme a permanent home to somewhere around a thoand gay Marielos, cludg Rodriguez and Gonzalez, who, after more than 50 years together, are married and livg Miami.

The longtime uple was anx to fd out whether Miami-Da Circu Judge Sarah Zabel would lift a stay on her lg that the state's gay marriage ban was unnstutnal. Over the next week, gay upl said "I do" across the Sunshe State, the 36th to legalize same-sex marriage before beme the law of the land later that year. That the first same-sex marriage took place Miami-Da County — where Ana Bryant began her natnal csa agast gay rights and where so many other pivotal moments played out — was ftg.

THE TEN MOST MEMORABLE MOMENTS MIAMI'S GAY HISTORY

Miami has had a gay nightlife scene as early as the 1930s.

From then on, would be a rolleraster of ups and downs, filled wh progrs, failure, celebratns, and heartbreak Miami LGBT history, leadg to our current stat as a gay mec that attracts more than 1 ln LGBT visors a year. A place wh s own chamber of merce dited to the queer muny sce 1997, and where Art Smh hosted and officiated a mass gay weddg for more than two dozen upl this past Febary. Of urse, didn’t happen right away, and the early gay nightlife scene of the 1930s was not long-lived.

This silent film shows a police raid on a Miami gay bar 1957. In 1964, a Florida legislative mtee led by Senator Charley Johns published Homosexualy and Cizenship Florida, also known as the Purple Pamphlet, as part of a wch hunt to seek out gays and bisexuals workg schools, universi, and ernment jobs, who they believed were termed to “subvert the Amerin way of life by ntrollg amic stutns and by rptg the natn’s moral fiber, ” acrdg to Carry’ on the Lbian and Gay South.

Acrdg to The Encyclopedia of Lbian and Gay Histori and Cultur, “The first anized gay pri week was celebrated Miami Beach early 1972 wh a march on Lln Road prottg a cy law banng cross-drsg.

In Augt of that year, hundreds of gays and lbians joed thoands of prottors at the 1972 Republin Natnal Conventn Miami Beach.