Tv,ext on American History the u. S. Commission on civil rights hosts a talk titled, stonewall at 50 the movement for lgbt civil rights by historian and author david carter. Stonewall was a sixday gay rights uprising that began during a police raid on june 28, 1969 in new york citys Greenwich Village. We will now turn to our next iteration of the commission speaker series, this one titled stonewall at 50 the movement for lgbt civil rights. Thank you for the topic. June has come to be known as pride month. Street demonstrations began at the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village in new york city. Many view these demonstrations as a critical moment in the struggle for lgbt civil rights. 2016, in recognition of that history, president barack obama, the clares on monument declared a monument at the Stonewall Inn. We will hear more about how this was a catalyst for the lgbt Rights Movement. Discrimination on the basis of Sexual Orientation and gender identity is, unfortunately, still prevalent in this country. I just read in the news yesterday the new York Police Commissioner apologized for the actions of the new York Police Department during the stonewall uprising, declaring the actions and the laws were discriminatory and oppressive. Interactions between Police Officers and the Lgbt Community concerns on the police use of force. Several surveys found ofproportionately high rates contract between lawenforcement and lgbtq individuals, including Police Harassment and abuse. The commission took in thesential evidence of interactions. As much as we regret and call for the end of ongoing discrimination, i am grateful for this opportunity to mark the progress we have made since 1969. To that end, we now welcome historian david carter, who served as no advisor on the campaign to make the stonewall site a national monument. He has been working on the lgbtq Civil Rights Movement for a quarter century. Stonewall mr. Carter, we look forward to hearing from you. Your microphone is not on. If you will hit the talk button, we will hear you much better. Prof. Carter thank you. I want to thank the chairwoman and other members of the commission for according me the honor of appearing before you. Speak on myasked to work on the history of the stonewall uprising, which is the most famous single event in this movement, which began as the result of a police raid june 20, a gay the Stonewall Inn club in Greenwich Village. The facts are wellestablished, as his General Information about the Stonewall Club and how it operated. However, to understand the meaning of the event requires information that goes beyond these facts, including information that has not yet become integrated into documentary accounts and museum exhibitions. Aware of the to be context beyond the events of the uprising to interpret the uprisings meaning and his historical implications accurately. I will not spend much time today on the uprising itself, but on this larger context. Homosexual acts had been illegal since the nations founding, but the increase of the intolerance of homosexuality seems to have taken root in this country around the great depression, with theld war ii, advent of the cold war and the red scare, exemplified by virulent anticommunism and the demand conformity that characterize the 1950s. Laws and that homosexuals became so harsh, at times they werent oconee and. The Defense Department hardened his policy of discharging homosexual men and women, tripling the discharge rate and gave less than honorable blue discharges. Dischargesive deprived veterans of benefits promised them in the g. I. Bill of rights. That 1950 Senate Testimony 5000 homosexuals worked in the government a fabricated figure the senate authorized an investigation into the matter by a subcommittee. Statedcommittee report that those who engage in overt acceptance version over ask off perversion, having included one homosexual can pollute an entire office. They suggested that a purge of individuals be the model for Civil Service agencies. There was intense effort to witht out homosexuals, lists of Government Employees checking fingerprints of job applicants against fingerprint files. After Dwight Eisenhower became president he signed an executive 19 53, whichl added sexual perversion as grounds for government investigation and dismissal. The government shared police and military records with private employers, resulting in the dismissal of hundreds. Encouragedthyism theregainst homosexuals, was a furor over child molestation. Homosexuals were believed to be the main culprits. As the right wing demonization proceeded up right a pace, the negative qualities attributed to homosexuals overlap until it became a common assumption that any man or woman who was homosexual was so beyond the pale that she or he must also partake of the most forbidden ideological root of all, communism. As homosexuals became handy scapegoats for these postwar preoccupations, antihomosexual. Aws were made more severe 29 states enacted new sexual psychopath laws or revised existing ones and homosexuals commonly the laws primary targets. In almost all states professional licenses could be revoked or denied because of homosexualsy so could lose their livelihoods. In 1971, 20 states had sex permitting them to be detained as homosexuals. In california, sex offenders could be locked in a Mental Institution for life and in seven states, they could be castrated. Men convicted of consensual sodomy were given electrical and pharmacological shock there up therapy,ed castrated, and had lobotomies performed as authorized i 1941 law. It has been pointed out that no specific statute outlawed being homosexual and only homosexual acts were legal. While this is technically true, the effect of the entire body of police to theies conduct to make being gay a crime to factor. Harshness of the laws they tended to hand out light fines or place those convicted on probation, but the random or selective use of far harsher penalties and the potential threat of their use combined with other sanctions and harassments, major and minor, official and unofficial, were more than sufficient to keep the vast majority of homosexual men and women well within the lines society had drawn for them. Having created all manner of sanctions to make it difficult for homosexuals to me to their own kind some of the police aggressively patrolled the few places where homosexuals could mingle bars, bathhouses, outdoor cruising places such as streets, parks, and beaches. Some jurisdictions planted microphones on park benches and used peepholes and to a mirrors to people on restrooms. Well they used while they to medicalized homosexuality into an illness, gays and lesbians found almost universal moral condemnation from religion, whether mainstream or obscure. Criminals,emned as mentally ill, and sinners, homosexuals feast these social reality in postworld war ii faced a social reality imposed world war ii america that was bleak, if not grim. To shift the perspective to a single state, namely new york, one place people sought refuge was Greenwich Village. The bohemian reputation attracted gay people to the area around the turn of the 20th sensed a placey known for what tolerance might even accept a sexual nonconformist. As word got out that there were large numbers of gay people in Greenwich Village, more and more gave men and lesbians were drawn there. Eventually, new york of the largest gay population in the United States and the village served as a center for the growing homosexual subculture. But new york was also the city that most aggressively and systematically targeted damon as criminals. Newce vice squads, which york city was the first to create, attempted to use decoys and raid gay bars. New york created the state Liquor Authority and gave it back to goal total leeway in enforcing and administering these laws. They interpreted laws so even the presence of homosexuals, categorizes people who are lewd and dissolute, in a bar made that place disorderly and subject to closure. The result in new york city was the most vigorous investigation of homosexuals before world war ii, responding before world war ii. Responding to rightwing pressure after the war, new york modernized its operations and continued to holland thousands of homosexuals, sometimes just for socializing at a private party. Commonly, Police Arrested them at bars and cruising areas. In 1966, over 100 men were arrested each week for homosexual solicitation in new york city as a result of Police Entrapment, making it impossible servers to legally homosexuals, creating a leadtion that could only to criminal stepping in. The mafia set up gay bars, which set up a situation for police explication of the bar customers. These last were not likely to complain because they had nowhere else to go and they feared the mob. The corruption of the police, as they were paid off by the mafia, the lawyers charge the exorbitantclients fees, part of which was used to bribe judges. The First Organization to begin organized, ongoing political resistance to the oppression of the societyas founded in 1951. But because of the intense rightward shift of the 1950s, the early radical spirit of that organization was lost. The approach changed to relying to say thatists homosexuals were not criminals, but mentally ill persons in need of therapy. Homophilef file incurs the public to be more tolerant. This was a strategy that came to be known as the education and Research Approach of the homp ophile movement. ,rank caminiti was caught up summarily fired when the government discovered he was homosexual. After failing to get his job back, in spite of doing all he could as an individual, he changed to an organizational approach. His last gambit was sent to the Supreme Court to hear his case. Inspired by basic principles of american democracy, the black Civil Rights Movement, and , the assertion that homosexuals are a valid minority, he argued the government should not only hurt not persecute homosexuals, but should work to end the discrimination against them. He used the analysis from the Supreme Court petition when he started an organization in washington, d. C. To argue the Homophile Movement is a Civil Rights Movement that must settle for nothing less but total social and legal equality and no one had enunciated that before. It was beyond radical at that time. He was the first lonely voice, but he soon one of few activists few activists over to his side. In 1964, he was invited to give a speech and articulated publicly the arguments he had crafted in the Supreme Court petition. Also urged the new york city activists to accomplish two gay bars andalize and Police Entrapment. Thenext year they threw out old education and Research Approach and elected a slate of thetants to pursue strategy. And the president of the Mattachine Society in new york made legal progress toward legalizing gay bars. Club openedl in time of progress for the legalization of day bars. It became popular because it was the only club were dancing was allowed regularly, but more particularly where slow dancing was allowed. Andas the Largest Gay Club it was at the intersection of christopher street and, with avenue. A became well known among crosssection of the community. At the same time, it was a mafia bar run only to exploit a community right or exportation exorbitant prices for drinks. Irty withso d questionable mafia alcohol. One of the managers of the criminal,was a career ed murphy, a gay man, who was arrested in the mid1960s for running operation blackmailing homosexuals murphy found the a prostitution ring. He used an office above the late 1960s toe run a prostitution ring. These stonewalls leaders also customers,nformation especially those with more lucrative careers. When the new York Police Department received a query them , from interpol, and they investigated and determined that it was stolen by a wall street employee who was blackmailed because of his homosexuality. Further investigation showed stonewall as the likely origin of the blackmailing operation. At a time of extensive investigation into Police Corruption in new york city, seymour pine, who had a wastation to be honest, transferred against his objections to be the head of the public morals squad. He was summoned by his captain and order to put the stonewall out of business because of its connection with the mafia operation. After routine raids on the a raidll, pine organized , 1969,morning of june 28 book to the real reason for the raid was not made public. Local sixth precinct informed the club, so for this larger raid, he did not inform the sixth precinct, which was supposed to assist when it was under way. When it began, almost everything went wrong from the beginning from the police perspective. Pine, who was used to rating early when there were few occupants, this time ran into an unusual degree of resistance. Also, the sixth precinct did not respond to calls for help when the crowd got out of control. The crowd that gathered in the street outside the stonewall was made up of Club Customers and passersby. Initially the reaction of the crowd went back and forth between expressions of anger and humor. As the crowd witnessed police be rough with patrons, they became more angry. The culmination came when a lesbian being carried out of the club was treated brutally by the police. After she escaped twice from a patrol car, she was thrown inside the vehicle. The lesbians harsh treatment was a Tipping Point that cause the crowd to become furious. Pine, sensing the danger to his officers after the patrol of patrol wagon left, thought it too dangerous to remain on the sidewalk. He retreated into the club where the remaining prisoners were being held for the next patrol what can. One reason for the anger was the believe the gate persons inside the club were being beaten by the police. A loose parking meter was uprooted and used as a parking need used as a battering ram. They tried to set the club on fire. An finally managed to get Undercover Police woman out through a back window. She went to a fire station and called for help for the Tactical Police force or right police. Soon, fire trucks arrived as the as riot police and sixth precinct. The Police Inside stonewall were rescued and the prisoners taken away. The riot police were brutal and clearing the streets of protesters, but the crowd was not cowed by the large numbers of Helmeted Police ran dishing the times. When the police formed a phalanx and clear christopher street, the street the Stonewall Club was on, they used to be highly irregular village street layout to come back behind the police. This scenario was repeated many times. The next day the crowds were much larger and the violence was greater. On sunday, the third day, the police were less confrontational, the crowds smaller and there are no reports of violence. Were only sporadic skirmishes between police and small numbers of civilians on monday and tuesday. The following day, however, the Village Voice appeared, uprising and using derogatory terms like andet and dike faggot dyke. The result was the six night was much like the first two nights with much violence. It sensedwitnessed that nothing would be the same with the movement. There was much discussion about what should be done. I handful of people realized it was urgent that something be made of this event before the unleashed energy dissipated. Form aision was made to new organization, the Gay Liberation front or g a laugh. The jia left was modeled on new left groups of the 1960s. The Gay Liberation front or glf. Lf was modeled on new left groups of the 1960s. They wanted to take on all forms of oppression simultaneously. Meetings would break down over theoretical discussions and the of democratic process. Some of the early founders quit. They formed a new organization, the Gay Activist Alliance or gaa. Aa decided to work only on the issue of rights for gay people, to a hereto democratic principles and meetings, and to the use ofchew violence. They also used creative demonstrations and guerrilla theater. When harpers magazine published a vicious essay attacking gay people and refused to publish a occupy their offices. They brought coffee and doughnuts, approaching members of staff and saying im a homosexual. Would you like a doughnut . Aa ascended in the national media, growing rapidly and starting new chapters nationwide. F, and new gay, gl liberation organizations that sprang up such as radical lesbians, there was soon a Mass Movement for the civil rights of lesbians and gay men. Having a Mass Movement made possible the passage of new legislation to decriminalize byesex behavior and changes nongovernmental organizations to the scrum night discriminatory practices. These stonewall uprising is his story for one reason. It inspired the creation of a new phase of the movement for the rights of gays and lesbians and later the bisexual and transgender. They created a Mass Movement, making most of the gains over five decades possible. Stonewall and the Gay Liberation movement also inspired similar organizations around the world so that globally, lgbt people have more civil rights than they did 50 years ago. This is why i often say to study the uprising without learning about the day liberation phase of the lgbt Civil Rights Movement is like studying the fall of the bastille without knowing anything about the french revolution. Like toi would underscore that while they were many factors that came together to create the stonewall uprising, the most important of these causes is the progress omophile phasee h of the movement, particularly locally in new york city. This is a conclusion reached by craig rothwell, a man whose perspective is of primary importance in understanding the historic record or historical commentary because he was the chief critic of the sun will club before the uprising. He was the main propagandist of the stonewall uprising and he had the idea to celebrate the uprising annually with a march commemorating the revolt. If it had not been for the work to legalize gay bars, following up on earlier suggestions, the explosion at stonewall in all likelihood would not have occurred. A seriess because of of reflections i had after i finished the first draft of my history of stonewall, because the narrative did not make sense to me. Explosion occur after all the progress made under the Lindsay Administration . In other words, it was under the john Lindsay Administration they ended Police Entrapment and made the progress of legalizing gay . Ars revolutions tend to occur after periods of liberalization, or to put it another way, well it took many factors coming together to , the more iwall have listened to history, the more i have come to feel the most important cause in a long list of causes that created the matrix that created the uprising, the most fundamental was the work done as a result of the civil rights approach, the progress made toward legalizing gay bars. Yes, most people out there on the night who were produced baiting in the uprising, they had not read frank hamm and he may not have known the word mattachine. The people who stormed the best deal may not have red ball readr, may not have voltaire, but it doesnt mean they were not influenced by them. Makes small in their eyes what was formerly great or makes great what was formally small. It has nothing to do with all this. We are here concerned only with the attitude of the onlookers as it reveals itself in public with all of the drama of great political change taking place. In other words, the french revolution had the impact it did on those who per dissipated in. T participated and it it was the same with stonewall. The event derived its power from the emotional shock it created in those who heard about it. Goes to explain the symbolism of stonewall, but what does that power into war. I believe the what does that power endure. Importants and movements have moments that have a power that exceeds what can be expressed by mere rational analysis of their historic affect. This is because these moments are symbolic. Because they express the deepest truths experienced by the human heart. They become implemented of the best in us. They symbolize our hopes and dreams, our feelings and. Earnings, our potential the vision of a world as it should be or could be or as it needs to be or as it needs to be. Thus when we learn about American History, certain stories, events, people, and moments are emphasized. All School Children learn the story of how Francis Scott key watched through the night to see if or mchenry would fall under the british bombardment. When he saw the flag still flying in the morning, he knew that an important battle had not been lost and expressed this moment of hope and triumph of faith in words that became our national anthem. These stories or images of the reverend Martin Luther king jr. Giving his i have a dream speech or of the American Flag being raised over iwo jima or rosa parks refusing to move to a seat at the back of the bus are all moments and images that help define who we are, moments that exemplify our best and highest values and thus are potent symbols. The narrative of the stonewall uprising is a very powerful story for a number of reasons. It seemed to come out of nowhere and was totally unexpected. It was spontaneous, totally undirected, and happened in a cd club run by the mafia. The groups that first turned against the police were primarily effeminate boys who lived on the streets, sissies rejected by their families and society, prostitutes, a butch lesbian, and trans people. That such a group could not only lead an effective revolt against the police but also terrify them seemed too good to be true, yet this is what happened. The police were astonished and terrified at the anger they witnessed. Pine, who led the rate, have written the manual for handtohand combat in world war ii and been seriously injured in the battle of the bulge, yet he said he was never more afraid than when he was inside that bar surrounded by hundreds of homosexuals. Stonewall symbolizes both gay people standing up for themselves en masse in the first time spontaneously and winning, and this is the kind of stuff of which legends have always been made. All who witnessed the stone while uprising were transfixed by it. That is the reason that less than half a year after the uprising, a homophile conference voted to celebrate the event annually. Spawned byements stonewall continues to surge around the nation and the world. There was Little International movement for lgbt rights before stonewall, but the Liberation Movement inspired by the stone while uprising at the Gay Liberation movement has known no boundaries and has continued to overturn discrimination and unjust policies in europe, asia, africa, and every part of the world. The stonewall uprising is the most celebrated and symbolic event both nationally and internationally in the history of the lgbt movement for civil rights and equality, from its earliest beginnings in germany in the 19th century down through the present day. Given the preeminence of stonewall and the history of the lgbt Civil Rights Movement, the event has been widely celebrated within the movement, but until very recently, the history of this movement has generally been ignored or given limited recognition outside of the movement. This has begun to change, especially since the ruling establishing the right to marriage for samesex couples was made by the Supreme Court, which seemed to say to many people that this is a legitimate moral movement. The two major speeches in which president obama linked the lgbt movement with that of the black Civil Rights Movement and the movement for womens rights help the public to recognize the movement as legitimate in american and civil rights history. As for official recognition of the uprising by the United States government, this began with the uprising site being listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999, being declared a National Historic landmark in 2000, and more recently being made a national monument. I think the commission for its time and will be happy to respond to any questions you have. Thank you very much, mr. Carter. I will open to questions from my colleagues. While people are ruminating, i will start with mine. I was struck by your saying that stonewall derived its power from the emotional response to its images that people who witnessed it saw. Ninthgrade daughter studying the Civil Rights Movement in her history class and she was writing last night about what it meant for the Civil Rights Movement for people to see how black people were treated in a way that had not been visible before. I am wondering now that that is our history, if you think that we are beyond shocked today or if there are still moments, for movements of this type, for lgbt people or other civil rights issues, we still are perceptible of shock that will prompt that kind of change, or if we now need a different tool for ensuring the equality gains that you describe. Mr. Carter i think there are positive and negative shocks, for example. Think the Supreme Court ruling establishing the right to marriage was a positive shock which helped to wake people up. Processhat the normal of trying to bring about social positive social change should be nonviolent and through normal forth,s, lobbying and so these kinds of meetings, for example. At times, i do think direct action is called for. Anita bryant almost set the movement back. Supportersand our began to stop drinking orange juice, for example. There were the protests against the movie cruising and boycotts of that. Certainly it was important, the things that were done to act up to finally bring the federal government to respond to the aids crisis, which response had been, as we know, sorely lacking. So yes, there is a ways to go yet and i expect there will be more moments that will create a shock, probably the positive and negative. I think we are getting close to the end, as far as the major goals. One of the great landmarks was actually, one of the greatest landmarks, brought about by endedcaminiti, which discrimination pretty much by the Civil Service commission, happened july 1, 1969. That was the greatest accomplishment of the movement to date, but it got lost in the news because it happened in the middle of stonewall. The most significant moment after that was definitely the declassification of homosexuality as a mental illness, which took place in 1973. Was the landmark after that striking down all the sodomy laws by the United States. I think that was 2003. Then the establishment of Marriage Equality via a Supreme Court ruling. What surprises me is that most people i talked to, lgbt or not, opposed or supported, most people believe there is federal law today which protects lgbt people from discrimination. When i tell them there is no such law, they are shocked. Certainly this is the most important goal. One could argue the greatest achievement was the Marriage Equality ruling, or when this law will pass, because you could argue the marriage ruling would be the most important because, after all, this is a movement about sexuality. The greatest recognition our society gives to sex and romance is marriage, so that has been achieved. On the other hand, like heterosexual people, all lgbt people dont get married, and you dont have to be married, as much as one might desire to be. But one does need a job, does need access to housing. One could also argue that whenever this bill finally gets past, that would be the greatest achievement of the movement. Two, that goal that has been reached, the goal that has not yet been reached, those are both extraordinarily important landmarks. Does that answer your question . It does, thank you. Thank you very much for your presentation. I am curious how the movement interweavedt with the Civil Rights Movement, the womens movement, the rights for racial equality. I worked on trying to add lgbt status to the hate crime law and it took us i think 13 or more years to do that, because we were broadening coverage from race and religion to both gender and lgbtq status. I was shocked it took us that long, because i thought at least basically we could agree that people should not be beaten up because of who they love. I am just wondering how you see those movements intertwined. Did they help each other, did they not help each other . Mr. Carter i think the most important lessons i have learned through my Research Since stonewall, because i have been working since that time almost on a biography of Frank Caminiti , has become more and more apparent to me that really this movement modeled itself so closely on the black Civil Rights Movement. I think this is not my observation, it was made by a professor at harvard he said the reason the lgbt movement has been able to move so rapidly is because the success of the black Civil Rights Movement before it. That paved the way. Once you have those key civil 1965, act of 1964 and pretty much everyone realized, ok, it applies for this group, it has got to apply for all other groups. Women, religion, whatever, no one should be discriminated against for an irrational reason , which is what discrimination is. Kind of tautological there. The main connection modelically is that we our movement on that movement. Difficult to bring other people who were different races into the movement. I think the reason for that going on my own experience, an activist in wisconsin for 10 years, we had very few members who were black and latino. We talked about this and the best analysis we could come up with was because these people who were gay and black or gay and latino, they felt torn between the two groups because they felt if they came out in the wrong community, they would be rejected by if they came out as gay or bisexual in their community, they would be rejected by their community, so they felt they had to choose. For most of those groups, the racial or ethnic identity was more primary than Sexual Orientation. Too, is another issue, which is the idea of just focusing on one thing. That was essentially the approach that frank kameny took and also what the Gay Activist Alliance took after, that we have to focus just on this issue because this is what we are about, just like the naacp folks were about rights for black americans. The more you try to bring in, the more division because it becomes more complicated, trying to file one because on top of another. As the lgbtption is movement has gained more power successful, it feels it can risk more. When you take care of these major goals you cant be fired for being gay, for example you feel like you can work on other issues, like racism within your own group or trying to help ethnic minority members within your own group. Thats my perception. Thinkhink and i also that as time has gone on, there has been a feeling that it is more possible to have how can i say . Working together in otherion with different, civil Rights Groups to achieve common goals. Does that answer your question . Madam vice chair . Thank you very much, madam chair. I add my thanks, mr. Carter, to the others words. I thank you for coming. I was struck by your statement that revolution comes after liberalization, and so i was wondering if you would say a few words further in explanation of that. I think that was somewhere along your discussion of the lessons of stonewall. Example,ent to, for the changes that allowed black slaves or newly freed black slaves to serve as soldiers in the civil war, and my mind went back to the fact that during world war ii, having black soldiers serving abroad, and as and there wass some liberalization of our society. I just wanted you to explain further, please, what you meant by revolution comes after liberalization. Of carter well, that was course not my observation. But when i think of that, there have been many examples. For example, the American Revolution. There was a period of liberalization before the American Revolution. I think that the colonists got used to having certain rights, so than when all of a sudden the king was imposing extra taxes, unreasonable taxes, taxing everything, and we were not represented. I think what that kind of liberalization does is it gives people more selfconfidence and lets them feel their humanity more. So i think thats what is happening in the case where black people were allowed to serve as soldiers and trained as soldiers. They gave them more selfconfidence. They could see themselves as fuller human beings. Revolutionhe russian came after a time of increased liberalization by the czar. This happened also with the french revolution. They were excited in part, also because they were excited about what they heard about happening in the United States with our revolution, ideas of equality and freedom and democracy and representative government. So relate that back to stonewall for me, then, and the gay movement . You hader before where 100 people being arrested a week in new york city in 1966, this ended all of a sudden, like that. It took one order from john lindsay and it stopped. Bars, some of the pressure was taken off of bars. The stonewall was a different kind of club, and it formed in part because of the slight relaxation of the severe clampdown on gay bars, so i think they felt really because i dont know, it is a bit speculation but lets say all of a sudden youre bars are not being rated as often, so we have got to offer more, so we are going to have dancing, going to put extra security upfront, make it harder to get in. You feel secure, a big dance floor, the biggest jukebox in town. People began to feel more human because they could express their romantic feelings. I feel like the most important crowdin the stonewall that made it happen were these street youths. They never get recognition in the media or anything. There is only one surviving member of the street youths, and he has been the most articulate person ever i have heard talk about stonewall. Explainedid, when he to me was, lets say you are a teenager and you are gay, living in the middle of the United States and you hear a love song on the radio, so you fantasize itt in homosexual terms was written in heterosexual terms, but you imagine the same feelings, a teenage boy falls in love with another teenage boy, you would like to dance, hold hands, et cetera, but feels he cannot do that in the mid1960s. In most bars in new york city, you could not do it. They would not allow touch dancing or slow dancing. In the stonewall, you could not only do it, you could do it all the time, so you begin to feel more human, more validated. Of course, there are many other things that factor into it. This was a time of sexual revolution, advanced for freedom in general, so forth and so on. That is also part of what was happening. Called the time of the sexual revolution, the impact of the pill and all that. Certainly heterosexuals in the late 1960s were letting it all hang out, so homosexuals might have thought, what about us . Can we have a little freedom . They got a taste of freedom at the stonewall, and they can go down the streets and not be entrapped by the police, go to a gay bar and not be entrapped by the police. I think that had a profound whent on the psyche and they felt they were being subjected to a clampdown, they thought, we can express our resentment. Thats what i am trying to say. Thank you. Thank you for your presentation. I have been thinking about this notion about when change happens quickly and when it happens more slowly. I am wondering, after hearing your presentation, if the narrative we hear often about how quickly changes coming in the gay Rights Movement is actually true. You spoke about some markers and different types of entrenched niscrimination, otherizatio that has a very long history in this country and perhaps around the world. While it is true there are lots of things happening now, i take it there are other markers of the distance that remains to be traveled. In particular, as a commissioner from new york, i am thinking about the extent to which Youth Homelessness has a correspondence with gay youth very often being rejected by their families and having to become homeless and like the street kids, in essence, that you described generations ago. So i am wondering if there is a dominant narrative about structural changes happening that are very important and send important signals, but if under the surface there are still certain tensions that the nation and individuals are working through that lead to very real impact on peoples lives. That when we think talk about change in a social and political setting, it is always a very complex phenomenon. Reality in onee block in a city might be different than a block away. What is happening in the country, a rural area, might be different 20 miles away in a medium town. It could be different from family to family based on attitudes and beliefs. With homosexuality, it is extremely complex because the triple condemnation i mentioned earlier i think still exists for a lot of people. , some people may have religious objections, some people may think it is unnatural. Re could be all kinds of even philosophical objections or issues that some people have. It is a very complex phenomenon i think itanced, so can be very paradoxical where you feel like you made all this progress, and then you hear of areas where it is not progress or you hear of examples, like the pulse nightclub, the massacre that happened all of a sudden. I think thats the way it always is with social movements. I referred to the major accomplishments of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and 1965, but still there is a lot of racism. Racism is still a very real and still a virulent force in society and there is a real problem with the lack of Economic Justice for black people and other minorities, not to mention other not to mention native americans. There is a lot of work to be done, but considering where we 625, where in 19 homosexuality was outlawed in anyy state, you didnt have lgbt people represented positively in the media everywhere. If there was ever a gay character in a film, they had to be killed off or kill themselves. Considering where we were 50, 55 years ago, where we have come today is phenomenal. I think that is because we could ,se the arguments and examples the great achievements of the africanamerican movement for civil rights area thats why so much has been done. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. One could also say the price of equality is eternal vigilance, too. Yes, it is very sad that gay sometimesl have to choose between their families and integrity, being true to themselves, and pay a price for it. Thank you. I think the admission to be eternally vigilant is a good note to end on. I thank you for that and plan to stand in solidarity on the vigilance. Thank you for joining us today, and with that i will adjourn our meeting at 2 26. Mr. Carter thank you so much. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] announcer you are watching American History tv, all weekend , every weekend on cspan3. Announcer monday night on the communicators, we talk about the future of journalism in the age with david andms matthew. Facebook, google, apple may employ exactly zero journalists. The amount of journalism they are doing is zero. They are not going to city hall, not going to school board meetings, not covering the president. They rely on delivering our content and monetizing around that content. If you dont do that anymore, we dont have local journalism. The question is not whether we want a vibrant journalism industry, the question is how to get there and should we do it with an antitrust exemption. We did it in the 1970s when newspapers were last threatened by new media, the broadcast era. It didnt work. Announcer watch the communicators monday night at 8 00 eastern on cspan2. Announcer this weekend on American History tv, heath lee,. Thor of the league of wives she is joined by two vietnam war p. O. W. Wives. Here is a preview. We were married four years before he left on the cruise and we had 2 and published it. So that was wonderful because then i knew he was alive, or at least alive at that point. Andid not write any letters i found out after the guys came back why. Years,was just the four then i did not find out until 1973 that he had died in captivity. Debbie, do you remember the day you found out your husband was unaccounted for . Could you tell us a little about what you remember . The night i was notified . I was having dinner about a block away with a friend of mine and it was about 8 00 at night. She got a phone call, apparently from one of my neighbors, and said, debbie, you need to go home, somebody wants to buy your used car. So i go home thinking, who wants to buy a car in the dark . We went in the house, i did not see any car outside. As soon as we got in, there was a knock on the door. As soon i saw the shoulder bars, i knew. 1966. As october 4, announcer watch the entire sunday at 8 35 p. M. Eastern. You are watching American History tv, only on cspan3. Announcer next on lectures in history, William Woods University Professor greg smith teaches a class about the American Revolution and the Continental Army. He describes how the force differed from the British Military in demographics and the officer selection process. He also talks about the significance of military operations in the northern colonies. Alright, well welcome everyone to an exciting lesson in war. Happy 40th birthday, cspan. We will focus on the continental thise situating very much in the broad history of war and the military and the Continental Army is different than other armies that preceded it, largely because its one thats very much based on ideals and certain concepts and
comparemela.com © 2020. All Rights Reserved.