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85-582: Gay Liberation Front ( GLF ) was the name of several gay liberation groups, the first of which was formed in New York City in 1969, immediately after the Stonewall riots . Similar organizations also formed in the UK, Australia and Canada. The GLF provided a voice for the newly-out and newly radicalized gay community, and a meeting place for a number of activists who would go on to form other groups, such as

170-407: A barrel of printers' ink on the crowd from the roof of the newspaper building", according to glbtq.com . Some reports state that it was a barrel of ink poured from the roof of the building. The protesters "used the ink to scrawl slogans on the building walls" and slap purple hand prints "throughout downtown [San Francisco]" resulting in "one of the most visible demonstrations of gay power" according to

255-411: A battering ram. As the patrol force advanced, the crowd did not disperse, but instead doubled back and re-formed behind the riot police, throwing rocks, shouting "Gay Power!", dancing, and taunting their opposition. For the next several nights, the crowd would return in ever increasing numbers, handing out leaflets and rallying themselves. Soon the word "Stonewall" came to represent fighting for equality in

340-589: A crowd estimated at 500,000 people. The show featured Sir Elton John , Patti LaBelle , Bryan Adams , and Rufus Wainwright . On a recent anniversary of PGN, an editorial in The Philadelphia Inquirer stated: "Segal and PGN continue to step up admirably to the challenge set for newspapers by H.L. Mencken : to afflict the comfortable and to comfort the afflicted." By the summer of 1970, groups in at least eight American cities were sufficiently organized to schedule simultaneous events commemorating

425-677: A half million people. His determination to gain acceptance and respect for the gay press can be summed up by his 15-year battle to gain membership in the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association one of the nation's oldest and most respected organizations for daily and weekly newspapers. The battle ended after The Philadelphia Inquirer , Philadelphia Daily News and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette joined forces and called for PGN's membership. In 2005, he produced Philadelphia's official July 4 concert for

510-659: A left-leaning newspaper, and opened a drop-in centre and published a newsletter. The group struggled to maintain a core group of members, and competition from other local groups, such as the Canadian Gay Activists Alliance (CGAA) and the Gay Alliance Toward Equality (GATE), soon led to its demise. Bøssernes Befrielsesfront  [ da ] (BBF; lit. The Gays' Liberation Front ) was founded in Copenhagen in 1971,

595-399: A more civil demonstration of over 200 attendees several days later protesting the raids. The protest was met by squadrons of armed policemen. It was from this event that the publication The Advocate and organization Metropolitan Community Church (led by Pastor Troy Perry ) were born. Few areas in the U.S. saw a more diverse mix of subcultures than Greenwich Village, which was host to

680-593: A number of groups including Organization for Lesbian and Gay Alliance (OLGA), the Lesbian Avengers , Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence , Dykes And Faggots Together (DAFT), Queer Nation , Stonewall (which focused on lobbying tactics) and OutRage! co-existed. These groups were very influential following the HIV/AIDS pandemic of the 1980s and 1990s and the violence against lesbians and gay men that followed. The first gay liberation groups identifying with

765-455: A one-man operation on the part of Craig Rodwell , was already espousing the slogans "Gay Power" and "Gay is Good" in its publication HYMNAL . The 1960s was a time of social upheaval in the West, and the sexual revolution and counterculture influenced changes in the homosexual subculture , which in the U.S. included bookshops, publicly sold newspapers and magazines, and a community center. It

850-1003: A permit to use a campground in the Sequoia National Forest . Once it was learned that the group was sponsored by the GLF, the Sequoia National Forest supervisor cancelled the permit, and the campground was closed for the period. ... if we are to succeed in transforming our society we must persuade others of the merits of our ideas, and there is no way we can achieve this if we cannot even persuade those most affected by our oppression to join us in fighting for justice. We do not intend to ask for anything. We intend to stand firm and assert our basic rights. If this involves violence, it will not be we who initiate this, but those who attempt to stand in our way to freedom. — GLF Manifesto , 1971 The UK Gay Liberation Front existed between 1970 and 1973. Its first meeting

935-661: A priest, led Vanguard for ten months and taught gay rights, then led Vanguard members in early demonstrations for equal rights. After he resigned in May 1966, J. P. Marat joined Vanguard and led it in six months of protests. Glide Church began to sponsor it in June 1966 assisting Vanguard to apply to become a non-profit and apply for the EOC grant. The organization dissolved due to internal clashes in late 1966 and early 1967. Former members reorganized as The Gay and Lesbian Center and Glide re-directed

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1020-565: A protest at the Women's House of Detention in Greenwich Village and would go on to hold weekly protests there. One of GLF's early acts included organizing a march protesting coverage of gay people by The Village Voice , which took place on September 12, 1969. Long before the word "intersectionality" came into use, the GLF had a broad political platform, denouncing racism and declaring support for various Third World struggles and

1105-463: A quasi-apologetic “homophile group.” “Liberation” implied its broad and radical agenda, a word used at that time by the Women’s, Vietnamese, Black and other freedom movements. “Front” denoted an umbrella coalition uniting a diverse group of lesbian and gay people despite their differences in class, age, gender, race and ethnicity. The meeting then authorized Lois Hart, Michael Brown and Ron Ballard to compose

1190-410: A routine practice at the time, with regular payoffs to dirty cops and organized crime figures an expected part of staying in business. The Stonewall Inn was made up of two former horse stables which had been renovated into one building in 1930. Like all gay bars of the era, it was subject to countless police raids, as LGBTQ activities and fraternization were still largely illegal. But this time, when

1275-406: A statement of purpose that appeared in the next issue of “Rat,” a prominent New York radical movement newspaper at that time. From the beginning, GLF stated its goals as confronting all forms of sexism and male supremacy which it held to be the source of LGBT oppression and to form coalitions with other radical groups working to create a world-wide social revolution. On August 2, 1969, the group held

1360-515: Is even used synonymously or interchangeably with the gay rights movement . The Christopher Street Liberation Day Committee was formed in New York City to commemorate the first anniversary of the June 1969 Stonewall riots , the beginning of the international tradition of a late-June event to celebrate gay pride. The annual gay pride festivals in Berlin , Cologne , and other German cities are known as Christopher Street Days or "CSD"s. Although

1445-489: The Bay Area Reporter . According to Larry LittleJohn, then president of Society for Individual Rights , "At that point, the tactical squad arrived – not to get the employees who dumped the ink, but to arrest the demonstrators. Somebody could have been hurt if that ink had gotten into their eyes, but the police were knocking people to the ground." The accounts of police brutality include women being thrown to

1530-721: The Berkley Barb , next to the headline "HOMOS, DON'T HIDE IT!", the revolutionary article by Leo Laurence. The same month Carl Wittman , a member of CHF began writing Refugees from Amerika: A Gay Manifesto , which would later be described as "the bible of Gay Liberation". It was first published in the San Francisco Free Press and distributed nationwide, all the way to New York City, as was the Berkeley Barb with Laurence's stories on CHF's gay guerrilla militant initiatives and Mother Boats' photographs. CHF

1615-658: The Black Panther Party . They took an anti-capitalist stance and attacked the nuclear family and traditional gender roles . Continuing its protest on how the media portrayed LGBT people and the movement, GLF picketed the offices of Time Magazine following their publication of a cover story entitled “The Homosexual in America.” Come Out! , the first periodical published by the GLF, came out it November 1969. In 1970, several GLF women, such as Martha Shelley, Lois Hart, Karla Jay, and Michela Griffo went on to form

1700-600: The Gay Activists Alliance , Gay Youth New York, and Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR) in the US. In the UK and Canada, activists also developed a platform for gay liberation and demonstrated for gay rights . Activists from both the US and UK groups would later go on to found or be active in groups including ACT UP , the Lesbian Avengers , Queer Nation , Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence , and Stonewall . The United States Gay Liberation Front (GLF)

1785-611: The Gay Activists' Alliance . The GLF virtually disappeared from the New York City political scene after the first Stonewall commemoration parade in 1970. Mark Segal , a member of GLF from 1969 to 1971, continued to push gay rights in various venues. As a pioneer of the local gay press movement, he was one of the founders and former president of both the National Gay Press Association and

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1870-531: The National Gay Newspaper Guild . He also is the founder and publisher of the award-winning Philadelphia Gay News which recently celebrated its 30th anniversary. In 1973 Segal disrupted the CBS evening news with Walter Cronkite , an event covered in newspapers across the country and viewed by 60% of American households, many seeing or hearing about homosexuality for the first time. Before

1955-548: The Radicalesbians , a lesbian activist organization. Their first protest was at the National Organization of Women’s Second Congress to Unite Women. The group protested NOW's exclusion of lesbians and lack of support for lesbian issues. In 1970, members of GLF New York led by Mark Segal and Nova, formed the group Gay Youth New York, for people under 21 years of age. In 1970, the drag queen caucus of

2040-717: The Society for the Promotion of Community Standards , and pickets . Supporting the wellbeing of gays and helping them to come out was an early concern of the movement, leading to the formation of counselling services such as Gay-Aid in Wellington and Gays-An in Christchurch. A "Gay Week" was held from 29 May to 3 June 1972, featuring guerrilla theatre, a forum, dance, and teach-in. Gay Liberation organizations were not always successful in these aims; sexism and transphobia in

2125-644: The Vietnamese National Liberation Front ." On July 31, 1969 the core group of radical activists met again at Alternate U, a leftist meeting hall and lecture center on 6th Ave. at 14th Street. The meeting was attended by over 40 people including Martha Shelley , Marty Robinson , Bill Katzenberg, Lois Hart, Suzanne BeVier, Ron Ballard, Bob Kohler , Marty Stefan, Mark Giles, Charles Pitts, Pete Wilson, Michael Brown, John O’Brien, Earl Galvin, Dan Smith, Jim Fouratt, Billy Weaver, Jerry Hoose, Leo Martello and others. Space usage at Alternate U

2210-417: The nuclear family , regardless of whether they had anything to do with the actual principles of gay rights. For some offsets of movement, the politics were radical, anti-racist , and anti-capitalist . In order to achieve such goals, consciousness raising and direct action were employed. While HIV/AIDS activism and awareness (in groups such as ACT UP ) radicalized a new wave of lesbians and gay men in

2295-610: The "Radical Feminists", a group of gender non-conforming males in drag , who invaded and spontaneously kissed each other; others released mice, sounded horns, and unveiled banners, and a contingent dressed as workmen obtained access to the basement and shut off the lights. Easter 1972 saw the Gay Lib annual conference held in the Guild of Students building at the University of Birmingham . By 1974, internal disagreements had led to

2380-429: The 1980s, and radical groups have continued to exist ever since, by the early 1990s the radicalism of gay liberation was eclipsed in the mainstream by newly-out, pro- assimilationist gay men and women who stressed civil rights and mainstream politics. The term gay liberation sometimes refers to the broader movement to end social and legal oppression against LGBT people. Sometimes the term gay liberation movement

2465-651: The American Psychiatric Association's classification of homosexuality as a mental disorder. In 2019, in recognition of GLF New York's historic role in the post-Stonewall LGBTQ movement, and its central role in establishing the annual Pride March, NYC Pride announced that GLF would be one of the Grand Marshal's for the march commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising. On October 31, 1969, sixty members of

2550-771: The EOC funds intended for Vanguard to form a service agency and new non-profit The Hospitality House. On March 28, 1969, in San Francisco, Leo Laurence (the editor of Vector , magazine of the United States' largest homophile organization, the Society for Individual Rights) called for "the Homosexual Revolution of 1969", exhorting gay men and lesbians to join the Black Panthers and other left-wing groups and to "come out" en masse . Laurence

2635-459: The GLF, including Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera , formed the group Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR), during a GLF action, the occupation of Weinstein Hall in a protest against NYU policies. STAR focused on providing support for gay prisoners, housing for homeless gay youth and street people, especially other young "street queens". In 1970, several Black and Latinx members of

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2720-435: The GLF, including Peter Tatchell , continued campaigning beyond the 1970s under the organisation of OutRage! , which was founded in 1990 and dissolved in 2011, using similar tactics to the GLF (such as " zaps " and performance protest) to attract a significant level of media interest and controversy. It was at this point that a divide emerged within the gay activist movement, mainly due to a difference in ideologies, after which

2805-523: The GLF, including graphic artist Juan Carlos Vidal and poet Néstor Latrónico, formed Third World Gay Revolution (T.W.G.R.), which attempted to vocalize and combat the triple oppression of heterosexism, racism, and classism experienced by queer people of color. Another chapter of T.W.G.R. opened in Chicago shortly after the original group formed in New York. In 1970, the GLF, led by Gary Alinder, protested

2890-754: The GLF, the Committee for Homosexual Freedom (CHF), and the Gay Guerilla Theatre group staged a protest outside the offices of the San Francisco Examiner in response to a series of news articles disparaging people in San Francisco's gay bars and clubs. The peaceful protest against the Examiner turned tumultuous and was later called "Friday of the Purple Hand" and "Bloody Friday of the Purple Hand". Examiner employees "dumped

2975-672: The Gay Liberation Front movement in Canada were in Montreal , Quebec . The Front de Libération Homosexual (FLH) was formed in November 1970, in response to a call for organised activist groups in the city by the publication Mainmise . Another factor in the group's formation was the response from police against gay establishments in the city after the suspension of civil liberties by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau in

3060-714: The Inmates and Life in the New York House of Detention for Women , published in 1967 by Sara Harris, recounts her time as a social worker in the prison, and the shocking scenes she witnessed. Jerry Herman's Off-Broadway musical, Parade , opened in 1960 and featured a song called "Save the Village", originally entitled “Don’t Tear Down the House of Detention.” Melvin Van Peebles ' musical, Ain't Supposed to Die

3145-775: The SLA eventually prevented the agency from revoking licenses on the basis of homosexual solicitation in 1967. At the beginning of gay rights protest, news on Cuban prison work camps for homosexuals inspired the Mattachine Society to organize protests at the United Nations and the White House , in 1965. In the years before 1969, the organization also was effective in getting New York City to change its policy of police entrapment of gay men, and to rescind its hiring practices designed to screen out gay people. However,

3230-613: The Stonewall riots for the last Sunday in June. The events varied from a highly political march of three to five thousand in New York and thousands more at parades in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Chicago. While groups using the Gay Liberation Front name appeared around the U.S., in New York that organization was replaced totally by the Gay Activist Alliance. Groups with a "Gay Lib" approach began to spring up around

3315-548: The Stonewall riots of 1969 in New York City are popularly remembered as the spark that produced a new movement, the origins predate these iconic events. Resistance to police bar-raids was nothing new: as early as 1725, customers fought off a police raid at a London homosexual molly house . Organized movements, particularly in Western Europe, have been active since the 19th century, producing publications, forming social groups and campaigning for social and legal reform. In

3400-550: The design of the prison, labeling it "a new era in penology ". Her mission was to effect the moral and social rehabilitation of the women in her charge, giving them a chance for "restoration as well as for punishment". She commissioned a number of art works as part of her mission to uplift the women and treat them all as individuals. Among the Women's House of Detention's most famous inmates were: In its later years, allegations of racial discrimination , abuse and mistreatment dogged

3485-599: The dominant culture of the time. While the movement always included all LGBT people, in those days the unifying term was "gay", and later, "lesbian and gay", much as in the late eighties and early nineties, " queer " was reclaimed as a one-word alternative to the ever-lengthening string of initials, especially when used by radical political groups. Specifically, the word 'gay' was preferred to previous designations, such as homosexual or homophile , that were still in use by mainstream news outlets, when they would carry news about gay people at all. The New York Times refused to use

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3570-611: The early 1890s, the trial of Oscar Wilde was widely reported in Germany and spurred discussion of homosexuality, leading to the homosexual emancipation movement in Germany , the first modern gay rights movement . The movements of the period immediately preceding gay liberation, from the end of World War II to the late 1960s, are known collectively as the homophile movement . The homophile movement has been described as "politically conservative", although its calls for social acceptance of same-sex love were seen as radical fringe views by

3655-575: The early 1960s, Dick Leitsch , the president of the New York Mattachine Society , advocated direct action, and the group staged the first public homosexual demonstrations and picket lines in the 1960s. Kameny, founder of Mattachine Washington in 1961, had advocated militant action reminiscent of the black civil rights campaign, while also arguing for the morality of homosexuality. The New York State Liquor Authority (SLA) did not allow homosexuals to be served in licensed bars in

3740-596: The eighties (in smaller communities) did the marches begin to be called " gay pride parades ". The movement involved the lesbian and gay communities in North America, South America, Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Gay liberation is also known for its links to the counterculture of the time (e.g. groups like the Radical Faeries ) and for some gay liberationists' intent to transform or abolish fundamental institutions of society such as gender and

3825-624: The emerging gay liberation movement in the U.S. saw themselves as connected with the New Left rather than the established homophile groups of the time. The words "gay liberation" echoed "women's liberation"; the Gay Liberation Front consciously took its name from the National Liberation Fronts of Vietnam and Algeria ; and the slogan "Gay Power", as a defiant answer to the rights-oriented homophile movement,

3910-497: The fall of 1970. This group was short-lived; they were disbanded after over forty members were charged for failure to procure a liquor license at one of the group's events in 1972. A Vancouver , British Columbia group calling itself the Vancouver Gay Liberation Front emerged in 1971, mostly out of meetings from a local commune, called Pink Cheeks. The group gained support from The Georgia Straight ,

3995-514: The fall of the Berlin Wall. He and Bob Ross, former publisher of San Francisco's Bay Area Reporter represented the gay press and lectured in Moscow and St. Petersburg at Russia's first openly gay conference, referred to as Russia's Stonewall. He recently coordinated a network of local gay publications nationally to celebrate October as gay history month, with a combined print run reaching over

4080-777: The foundation of the Auckland Gay Liberation Front in March 1972, alongside fellow University of Auckland students Nigel Baumber, Ray Waru, and others. In the following months Gay Liberation Fronts established in Wellington , Christchurch and Hamilton , with further groups founded in Rotorua , Nelson , Taranaki , and other places between 1973 and 1977. Gay Liberation groups carried out numerous direct action protests, including guerilla theatre performances, zaps , disrupting meetings of anti-gay groups like

4165-503: The gay community. And in commemoration, Gay Pride marches are held every year on the anniversary of the riots. In early July 1969, due in large part to the Stonewall riots in June of that year, discussions in the gay community led to the formation of the Gay Liberation Front. According to scholar Henry Abelove , it was named GLF "in a provocative allusion to the Algerian National Liberation Front and

4250-437: The gay street youth. A group of young, effeminate runaways, shunned by their families, society, and the gay community, they reflected the countercultural movement more than any other homosexual group. Refusing to hide their homosexuality, they were brutalized, rebellious tearaways who took drugs, fought, shoplifted and hustled older gay men in order to survive. Their age, behavior, feminine attire and conduct left them isolated from

4335-550: The ground and protesters' teeth being knocked out. Inspired by Black Hand extortion methods of Camorra gangsters and the Mafia , some gay and lesbian activists attempted to institute "purple hand" as a warning to stop anti-gay attacks, but with little success. In Turkey, the LGBT rights organization MorEl Eskişehir LGBTT Oluşumu (Purple Hand Eskişehir LGBT Formation), also bears the name of this symbol. In 1970 "The U.S. Mission" had

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4420-587: The heterocops!" The protesters stormed the stage, one young woman taking hold of the priest's head and pounding it repeatedly against the table. The control room quickly cut off the microphones and switched to recorded music. Later on the 15th of May the first specifically Gay Power march takes place in Europe in Örebro , Sweden, led by a group known as Gay Power Club  [ sv ] . In 1971, Dennis Altman published Homosexual: Oppression and Liberation , considered an important intellectual contribution to

4505-471: The homosexuals and women as oppressed groups), we should try to unite with them in a revolutionary fashion. ... Some people say that [homosexuality] is the decadence of capitalism. I don't know if that is the case; I rather doubt it. But whatever the case is, we know that homosexuality is a fact that exists, and we must understand it in its purest form: that is, a person should have the freedom to use his body in whatever way he wants. This statement by Newton

4590-601: The ideas that shaped gay liberation movements in the English-speaking world. Among his ideas were "the polymorphous whole" and his posing of the notion of "the end of the homosexual", in which the potential for both heterosexual and homosexual behaviour becomes a widespread cultural and psychological phenomenon. Similarly, Allen Young's 1972 manifesto "Out of the Closet, into the Streets" envisions gay liberation as

4675-461: The modern gay liberation movement in France occurred on 10 March 1971, when a group of lesbians from the Front homosexuel d'action révolutionnaire (FHAR) disrupted a live radio broadcast entitled: "Homosexuality, This Painful Problem". The expert guests, including Ira C. Kleinberg, Herman Kleinstein, a Catholic priest, and a dwarf, were suddenly interrupted by a group of lesbians from the audience, yelling, "It's not true, we're not suffering! Down with

4760-454: The movement also led to the establishment of separate lesbian-feminist and trans organizations, such as SHE - Sisters for Homophile Equality - founded in Christchurch in September 1973. Gay Liberation chapters also worked alongside groups such as Hedesthia, a social and political organization for transvestites and transsexuals. Gay liberation The Stonewall Inn in the gay village of Greenwich Village , Manhattan , New York City ,

4845-476: The movement's splintering. Organizations that spun off from the movement included the London Lesbian and Gay Switchboard , Gay News , and Icebreakers . The GLF Information Service continued for a few further years providing gay related resources. GLF branches had been set up in some provincial British towns (e.g., Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Leeds, and Leicester) and some survived for a few years longer. The Leicester Gay Liberation Front founded by Jeff Martin

4930-536: The name inspired by the American Gay Liberation Front. BBF was opposed to the already-established gay rights group " Forbundet af 1948 " for being too formal. BBF's activities included going to schools to educate about how it was like being gay, and civil disobedience against the law that prohibited men from publicly dancing together, which was eventually repealed in 1973. The group regularly met at "Bøssehuset" (lit. The gay house ) in Christiania . Women's Liberation and Māori activist Ngahuia Te Awekotuku initiated

5015-453: The networks agreed to put a stop to censorship and bias in the news division, Segal went on to disrupt The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson, and Barbara Walters on the Today show. The trade newspaper Variety claimed that Segal had cost the industry $ 750,000 in production, tape delays, and lost advertising revenue. Aside from publishing, Segal has also reported on gay life from far reaching places as Lebanon, Cuba, and East Berlin during

5100-410: The police began arresting patrons, the customers began pelting them with coins, and later, bottles and rocks. The lesbian and gay crowd also freed staff members who had been put into police vans, and the outnumbered officers retreated inside the bar. Soon, the Tactical Patrol Force (TPF), originally trained to deal with war protests, were called in to control the mob, which was now using a parking meter as

5185-406: The press that three members of Mattachine New York would turn up at a restaurant on the Lower East Side, announce their homosexuality and, upon the refusal of service, make a complaint to the SLA. This came to be known as the "Sip-In" and only succeeded at the third attempt at Julius in Greenwich Village. The "Sip-In", though, did gain extensive media attention and the resultant legal action against

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5270-471: The prison called The Women's House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison . He writes, "It was one of the Village's most famous landmarks: a meeting place for locals and a must-see site for adventurous tourists. And for tens of thousands of arrested women and transmasculine people from every corner of the city, the House of D was a nexus, drawing the threads of their lives together in its dark and fearsome cells." Hellhole: The Shocking Story of

5355-408: The prison. Angela Davis has been outspoken about the treatment she witnessed. Andrea Dworkin 's testimony of her assault by two of the prison's doctors led to its eventual closing. Audre Lorde described the House of Detention as, "a defiant pocket of female resistance, ever-present as a reminder of possibility, as well as punishment." In 2022, the historian Hugh Ryan published a history of

5440-408: The recognition of humanity's innate bisexuality and androgyny within relationships that are free, expressive, and equal. Young portrays lesbians and gay men as the vanguard of sexual and human liberation. Sociologist Steven Seidman interprets these intellectual productions as precursors to queer theory . New York Women%27s House of Detention The New York Women's House of Detention

5525-407: The rest of the gay scene, but living close to the streets, they made the perfect warriors for the imminent Stonewall Riots. These emerging social possibilities, combined with the new social movements such as Black Power , women's liberation , and the student insurrection of May 1968 in France, heralded a new era of radicalism. After the Stonewall riots in New York City in late June 1969, many within

5610-429: The same year, Huey Newton , the leader of the Black Panthers, publicly expressed his support for gay liberation in his letter titled "A Letter from Huey to the Revolutionary Brothers and Sisters About the Women's Liberation and Gay Liberation Movements" stating that: Whatever your personal opinions and your insecurities about homosexuality and the various liberation movements among homosexuals and women (and I speak of

5695-455: The significance of the new John Lindsay administration and the use of the media by Mattachine New York should not be underestimated in ending police entrapment. Lindsay would later gain a reputation for placing much focus on quelling social troubles in the city and his mayorship coinciding with the end of entrapment should be seen as significant. By late 1967, a New York group called the Homophile Youth Movement in Neighborhoods (HYMN), essentially

5780-410: The society. Maybe they might be the most oppressed people in the society. Furthermore, Newton called for the removal of derogatory terms in the Black Panther's vocabulary. This helped advance the Gay Liberation Movement and legitimized it even further. Although a short-lived group, the Comite Pederastique de la Sorbonne , had meetings during the student uprising of May 1968, the real public debut of

5865-467: The state under penalty of revocation of the bar's license to operate. This denial of public accommodation had been confirmed by a court decision in the early 1940s. A legal study on the city's alcoholic beverage law commissioned by Mattachine New York concluded there was no law per se prohibiting homosexuals gathering in bars; however, laws did prohibit disorderly conduct — which the SLA had been interpreting as homosexual behavior — in bars. Leitsch informed

5950-467: The time of our earliest memories, have been in revolt against the sex-role structure and nuclear family structure." In December 1969 the Gay Liberation Front made a cash donation to the Black Panthers, some of whose leaders had expressed homophobic sentiments. Prominent GLF members were also strong supporters of Fidel Castro 's regime. These actions cost GLF, a numerically small group, popular support in New York City, and some of its members left to form

6035-420: The women inmates an opportunity to try to communicate with people walking by. After the prison was officially closed on June 13, 1971, Mayor Lindsay began the demolition of the prison in 1973, and it was completed the following year. The Jefferson Market Garden, now on the site, has a historical marker recognizing the site's history. Ruth E. Collins was the first superintendent at the prison. She embraced

6120-669: The word 'gay' until 1987, up to that time insisting on 'homosexual'. Early 1960s New York City, under the Wagner mayoral administration , was beset with harassment against the gay community, particularly by the New York City Police Department . Homosexuals were among the targets of a drive to rid the city of undesirables. Consequently, only the Mafia had the power and financial resources to run gay bars and clubs. By 1965, influenced by Frank Kameny 's addresses in

6205-529: The world, such as Campaign Against Moral Persecution (CAMP, Inc.), and Gay Liberation Front groups in Australia, Canada, the US and the UK. The lesbian group Lavender Menace was also formed in the U.S. in response to both the male domination of other Gay Liberation groups and the anti-lesbian sentiment in the Women's Movement. Lesbianism was advocated as a feminist choice for women, and the first currents of lesbian separatism began to emerge. In August of

6290-880: Was a women's prison in Manhattan , New York City from 1932 to 1974. Built on the site of the Jefferson Market Prison that had succeeded the Jefferson Market in Manhattan's Greenwich Village , the New York Women's House of Detention is believed to have been the world's only Art Deco prison. It was designed by Sloan & Robertson in 1931 at a cost of $ 2,000,000 and opened to the public by Richard C. Patterson, Jr. on March 29, 1932. It did not receive its first inmates until some time later. Its location at 10 Greenwich Avenue gave

6375-405: Was arranged with AU staffer, Susan Silverman, who also attended the meeting. Here, the decision was made to break away from existing gay and lesbian organizations and form the new group to be called the Gay Liberation Front, the name that Martha Shelley “officially” introduced at the meeting. All three words had powerful meanings. “Gay” implied the new radical, out-of-the-closet generation—no longer

6460-502: Was during this time that Los Angeles saw its first big gay movement. In 1967, the night of New Years, several plainclothes police officers infiltrated the Black Cat Tavern . After arresting several patrons for kissing to celebrate the occasion, the officers began beating several patrons and ultimately arrested 16 more bar attendees including three bartenders. This created a riot in the immediate area, ultimately bringing about

6545-400: Was expelled from the organization in May for characterizing members as "timid" and "middle-class, uptight, bitchy old queens". Laurence then co-founded a militant group the Committee for Homosexual Freedom with Gale Whittington, Mother Boats, Morris Kight and others. Whittington had been fired from States Steamship Company for being openly gay, after a photo of him by Mother Boats appeared in

6630-567: Was formed in the aftermath of the Stonewall Riots . The riots are considered by many to be the prime catalyst for the gay liberation movement and the modern fight for LGBTQ rights in the United States. On June 28, 1969, in Greenwich Village , New York , the New York City police raided the Stonewall Inn , a well known gay bar , located on Christopher Street . Police raids of the Stonewall, and other lesbian and gay bars, were

6715-586: Was held in the basement of the London School of Economics on 13 October 1970. Bob Mellors and Aubrey Walter had seen the effect of the GLF in the United States and created a parallel movement based on revolutionary politics. Come Together , the organisation's newspaper, came out of its Media Workshop the same year. By 1971, the UK GLF was recognized as a political movement in the national press, holding weekly meetings of 200 to 300 people. The GLF Manifesto

6800-508: Was inspired by Black Power, which was a response to the civil rights movement . Vanguard was a gay rights youth organization active from 1965 into 1967 in San Francisco. It was founded by Adrian Ravarour and Billy Garrison, and Vanguard magazine was founded by Jean-Paul Marat and Keith St.Clare. Ravarour had been asked by Joel Williams to help the Tenderloin LGBT youth who suffered discrimination. Seeing their conditions, Ravarour,

6885-639: Was noted for its involvement in the setting up of the local "Gayline", which is still active today and has received funding from the National Lottery . They also carried out a high-profile campaign against the local paper, the Leicester Mercury , which refused to advertise Gayline's services at the time. The papers of the GLF are among the Hall-Carpenter Archives at the London School of Economics . Several members of

6970-563: Was published, and a series of high-profile direct actions, were carried out, such as the disruption of the launch of the Church-based morality campaign, Festival of Light. The disruption of the opening of the 1971 Festival of Light was one of the most well-organised GLF actions . The first meeting of the Festival of Light was organised by Mary Whitehouse at Methodist Central Hall . Amongst GLF members taking part in this protest were

7055-527: Was revolutionary. There has been another black civil rights organization that saw gay and lesbians as another oppressed group in the United States during this decade. Newton recognized the same challenges that both oppressed groups face. He writes in his letter: We haven't said much about the homo- sexual at all but we must relate to the homosexual movement because it's a real thing. I know through reading, and through my life experience, my observations, that homosexuals are not given freedom and liberty by anyone in

7140-641: Was soon renamed the Gay Liberation Front (GLF); the Gay Liberation Front was a loose network of organizations throughout the US and abroad that determined their own political goals and modes of organization. One GLF statement of purpose explained their revolutionary ambitions: We are a revolutionary group of men and women formed with the realization that complete sexual liberation for all people cannot come about unless existing social institutions are abolished. We reject society's attempt to impose sexual roles and definitions of our nature. Gay Liberation Front activist Martha Shelley wrote, "We are women and men who, from

7225-442: Was the site of the June 1969 Stonewall riots , and became the cradle of the modern LGBT rights movement , and the subsequent gay liberation movement. Early in the seventies, annual political marches through major cities, (usually held in June, originally to commemorate the yearly anniversary of the events at Stonewall) were still known as "Gay Liberation" marches. Not until later in the seventies (in urban gay centers) and well into

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