LGBTQ history in New York
Various organizations were established for LGBT people to advocate for rights and provide human services, the impact of which was increasingly felt at state level.
Additional commemorative arts, cultural, and educational programing to mark the 50th anniversary of the rebellion at the Stonewall Inn will be taking place throughout the city and the world; it is believed that 2019 will be the largest international LGBT pride celebration held in history.
[10] This status quo of the death penalty for sodomy would remain unchanged after New Netherland was taken by the Duke of York in 1664, and "buggery" was retained as a capital offense.
[11] He is widely believed to have been bisexual or gay, and was immediately drawn to young working-class men found in certain parks, public baths, the docks, and some bars and dance halls.
[11] Dispersed in his praise of the city are moments of male admiration, such as in Calamus—"frequent and swift flash of eyes offering me robust, athletic love" or in poem Crossing Brooklyn Ferry, where he writes:[11]Was call'd by my nighest name by clear loud voices of young men as they saw me / approaching or passing, / Felt their arms on my neck as I stood, or the negligent leaning of their flesh against me as / I sat, / Saw many I loved in the street or ferry-boat or public assembly, yet never told them a / word, / Lived the same life with the rest, the same old laughing, gnawing, sleeping, / Play'd the part that still looks back on the actor or actress, / The same old role, the role that is what we make it, as great as we like, / Or as small as we like, or both great and small.Sometimes Whitman's writing verged on explicit, such as in his poem "Native Moments"—"I share the midnight orgies of young men / I pick out some low person for my dearest friend.
[11] The developing sub-community had a coded voice to draw more gay and bisexual men to New York and other growing American urban centers.
In 1895 a group of self-described androgynes in New York organized a club called the Cercle Hermaphroditos, based on their wish "to unite for defense against the world's bitter persecution".
[13] The group included Jennie June (born in 1874 as Earl Lind), who described herself as a "fairie" or "androgyne", which to her meant an individual, as she said, "with male genitals", but whose "psychical constitution" and sexual life "approach the female type".
[18] On January 5, 1919, the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice encouraged a police raid on the Everard Baths in which the manager and nine customers were arrested for lewd behavior.
His biography states: "So great was his need to be with boys, that though his home contained two pianos, he chose to practice at an instrument at the Y, and his favorite time was when the players were coming and going from their games.
It was the first post-World War II novel whose openly gay and well-adjusted protagonist is not killed off at the end of the story for defying social norms.
In 1950, New York made legal history when it became the first state in the Union to reduce sodomy to a misdemeanor, with a maximum penalty of six months in prison.
Nevertheless, anti-LGBT policies continued unabated, and residents in the gay villages of New York City began to increasingly become disenchanted with silent acceptance of police raids.
The election of Mayor John Lindsay in 1965 signaled a major shift in city politics, and a new attitude toward sexual mores began changing the social atmosphere of New York.
On April 21, 1966, Dick Leitsch, president of the New York Mattachine Society and two other members staged the Sip-in at the Julius bar on West 10th Street in Greenwich Village.
Mattachine pressed this advantage very quickly and Mayor Lindsay was confronted with the issue of police entrapment in gay bars, resulting in this practice being stopped.
The result of these changes in the law, combined with the open social- and sexual-attitudes of the late Sixties, led to the increased visibility of gay life in New York.
The Stonewall riots were a series of violent protests between gay men, drag queens, and lesbians against a police officer raid in New York City.
The first night of rioting began on Friday, June 28, 1969, at about 1:20 am, when police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar operating without a state license in Greenwich Village.
Newspaper coverage of the events was minor in the city, since, in the Sixties, huge marches and mass rioting had become commonplace and the Stonewall disturbances were relatively small.
In the late 1960s in New York, Mario Martino founded the Labyrinth Foundation Counseling Service, which was the first transgender community-based organization that specifically addressed the needs of female-to-male transsexuals.
[27] Also in 1977, Renee Richards, a transgender woman, was granted entry to the U.S. Open (in tennis) after a ruling in her favor by the New York Supreme Court.
Late in 1979, a new religious revival ushered in the conservatism that would reign in the United States during the 1980s and made life hard once again for LGBT people.
The organization's introduction into the LGBT rights scene involved acts aiming to promote queer positivity, visibility, and breaking beyond heteronormative social barriers.
Following its eventful founding year, Queer Nation expanded its reach throughout the rest of the early 1990s nationwide, including Atlanta, Portland, San Francisco, and Denver.
The preservation committee working behind the scenes to make these inclusions possible began to bring the unique styles and characteristics of certain landmarks into the public eye.
Despite this, the foundation created by these early efforts in the 1990s would allow for New York City to eventually become a leader in preserving and recognizing historic LGBT landmarks.
Still in existence today, SRLP was named after transgender activist Sylvia Rivera with the mission "to guarantee that all people are free to self-determine gender identity and expression, regardless of income or race, and without facing harassment, discrimination or violence".
With little critical examination, various media celebrities and outlets jumped on the band-wagon[35] and claimed to have "solved" the "problem of bisexuality" by declaring it to be non-existent, at least in men.
[39] LGBT activists and others celebrated in various portions of the state, including the front of the Stonewall Inn, only two days to the 42nd anniversary of the riots.
