These not-so-subtle headlines appeared in the New York Daily News reporting the events of June 28, 1969. Stonewall Riots, precipitating from a police raid in the Stonewall Inn, at 57 Christopher St., Greenich Village, NYC, served as the opening salvo in the modern Gay Rights Movement.
She sat there with her legs crossed, the lashes of her mascara-coated eyes beating like the wings of a hummingbird. She was angry. She was so upset she hadn't bothered to shave. A day old stubble was beginning to push through the pancake makeup. She was a he. A queen of Christopher Street.
Last weekend the queens had turned commandos and stood bra strap to bra strap against an invasion of the helmeted Tactical Patrol Force. The elite police squad had shut down one of their private gay clubs, the Stonewall Inn at 57 Christopher St., in the heart of a three-block homosexual community in Greenwich Village. Queen Power reared its bleached blonde head in revolt. New York City experienced its first homosexual riot. "We may have lost the battle, sweets, but the war is far from over," lisped an unofficial lady-in-waiting from the court of the Queens.
More below the fold-
June 28, 1969-
It was 1:20 A.M. when eight cops stomped into the Stonewall Inn, a dive in Manhattan's Greenwich Village district that had no liquor license but served watery drinks to a mix of drag queens, street kids, gay professionals and closeted and straight mafiosi (who ran the place). Within two hours, the Village was bleeding and burning as hundreds rioted.
Please note that those described as the leaders in this rebellion were not the clean cut, wholesome Will and Grace, Ellen Degeneres GLBT types, but "drag queens" and "bull dykes" and others from what are considered the "dregs" of our society. These fringe elements, who frequently take heat for being non-conformists and an embarrassment to our cause, were on the front line in this historic confrontation.
Welcome to the first edition of WGLB TV "Leers and Sneers Friday", a weekly news and video magazine presented here at Daily Kos expressly for the GLBT community, and it's family, friends and allies. Our goal is to provide the Daily Kos readership broader exposure to GLBT news, history, events, personalities and perspectives in a light-hearted and snarky environment that will hopefully make all visitors feel welcome and comfortable gabbing about anything and everything gay.
The Rainbow Flag was popularized as a symbol of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) pride and diversity by San Francisco artist Gilbert Baker in 1978. The different colours symbolize diversity in the gay community, and the flag is used predominantly at gay pride events and in gay villages worldwide. For the 25th Anniversary of the Stonewall riots held in 1996 in New York City a mile-long rainbow flag was created and post-parade cut up in sections that have since been used around the world.
June is "Gay Pride" month with events and parades scheduled in major cities throughout the US and the world to commemorate the anniversary of this landmark event in gay history.
Vrrroooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom!
Wide world of GLBT sports-
In keeping with the time honored tradition of Pride Parades throughout the land, at the front of our parade this morning are the ladies with this week's sports report. We present a "Where Are They Now?" segment on 'out' golfing legend Patty Sheehan. ("Dykes in Spikes"???)
Ms. Sheehan became only the second LPGA player to publicly announce that she was a lesbian back in 1998 when the five-time majors champion and Hall-of-Famer confirmed a suspicion that lesbian fans had had for a long time: In an article in Golf World, Sheehan let it be known that she and her partner and manager of 12 years, Rebecca Gaston, were adopting a child. Sheehan & Gaston, who now reside in Orlando, FL, have since adopted a second child. After her retirement from golf, Sheehen ran for and was elected to the Orlando, FL City Council in 2000.
In 2003, Councilwoman Patty Sheehan and other gay activists were incensed over an official Orlando city proclamation honoring "Exodus". The proclamation stirred more than a little controversy among Orlando's gay rights organizations with Sheehan, calling it "offensive and embarrassing."
In January of this year, when her lone opponent dropped out of the race, Commissioner Sheehan was left sitting on a pile of campaign cash with no campaign to spend it on. Since the law allows candidates to distribute their unused contributions to charities of their choice, Sheehan presented a check for $25,000, most of her funds, to the Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Community Center of Central Florida. Good on you Councilwoman Sheehan!
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From the DJ Booth-
Every Pride parade in every good sized city throughout the land has a minimum of 2 or 3 dance club floats with Go-Go Boys or Girls showing off their ripped bodies and their dance moves. Dance clubs like The Saint in NYC and The Trocadero in SF were magnets for the beautiful people in the 70's and early 80's, where they could find brothers and sisters with the same appreciation of good music and physical intimacy to dance the nights away. These settings were the forerunners to the Studio 54's and later day raves that were cheap knockoffs and poor imitations of the originals. Since those early days, dance clubs have remained an important focal point for both the gay and lesbian communities.
This week's Circuit Segment finds Mr. Fast Love himself touring the U.S. for the first time in 20 years. Let's hope there is a little less "Wham-bam, thank you Sir" this visit!
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From the Rainbow Cafe-
GLBT Sandwich with DKosy Goodness:
Nuclear Rainbow Cocktail- (as prepared at drinksmixer.com)
1/2 oz grenadine syrup
1/2 oz Rumple Minze® peppermint liqueur
1/2 oz Jagermeister® herbal liqueur
1/2 oz Midori® melon liqueur
1/2 oz Crown Royal® Canadian whisky
1/2 oz Bacardi® 151 rum
1/2 oz amaretto almond liqueur
Carefully layer, in order, into a glass.
Serve in Champagne Flute
Alcohol content: 35%
The Gay Gardener-
Where each week we present some aspect of horticultural interest to the GLBT community.
This weeks featured specimens are the "meat eaters"!!!
One species of meat eating plant found in Australia is commonly known as the "Rainbow Plant".
from Britannica online-
Many sticky glands cover the long, linear yellow-green leaves, giving the leaf a glistening appearance that shimmers as the glands split the sunlight into all the colours of the spectrum.
Don't Taste the Rainbow! So did today's gardening piece, with meat eating, sticky glands, get the horticulturalists in you all excited?
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Biggest Dick on the Planet Award-
Given weekly to the worst person in the world in regards to the GLBT community. In this weeks voting we had a tie. So without further ado we present our two big dicks.
Our first "winner" has waged a violent campaign against homosexuals, arguing that prior to colonisation Zimbabweans did not engage in homosexual acts. His first major public condemnation of homosexuality came during the Zimbabwe International Book Fair in August 1995. He told the audience that homosexuality:"...Degrades human dignity. It's unnatural and there is no question ever of allowing these people to behave worse than dogs and pigs. If dogs and pigs do not do it, why must human beings? We have our own culture, and we must re-dedicate ourselves to our traditional values that make us human beings... What we are being persuaded to accept is sub-animal behaviour and we will never allow it here. If you see people parading themselves as lesbians and gays, arrest them and hand them over to the police!" In September 1995, Zimbabwe's parliament introduced legislation banning homosexual acts.
Tied with the big dick from Zimbabwe is another big dick from that part of the world who recently pronounced that he will "cut off the head" of any homosexual caught in his country. He also ordered any hotel or motel housing homosexuals to close down, adding that owners of such facilities would also be in trouble. He said the Gambia was a country of believers, indicating that no sinful and immoral act as homosexual would be tolerated in the country. He warned all homosexuals in the country to leave, noting that a legislation "stricter than those in Iran" concerning the vice would be introduced soon.
This genius has also recently announced he had discovered a cure for the disease that has wreaked havoc across Africa. He made that announcement in front of a group of foreign diplomats, telling them the treatment was revealed to him by his ancestors in a dream. His concoction has stirred controversy and anger among health officials who say the president's claims will bring false hope to the nation's more than 20,000 HIV/AIDS patients. They are also afraid that it could cause patients to stop taking the anti-retroviral drugs that have been proven to prolong life and improve quality of living.
These two award-winning, big dicks, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Yahya Jemmeh of Gambia, could use some lessons in leadership from this African Statesman and World Leader. And Annie, you've been aces in my book for 25 years now, Good on you!
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Sandra. Sandra! SANDRA!! That's all well and good, but we were talking "dicks", not "lips"!!! ...And BTW, I always thought you of the Cock-a-doodle-don't persuasion!?!
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Read of the month-
Goats by Mark Jude Poirier.
Poirier brings us an oddly compelling story of two men, one a teenager, the other about 40, both committed adolescents. Fourteen-year-old Ellis lives with his mom in suburban Tucson, Arizona. Goat Man is, for lack of a better definition, their pool man. He takes care of the pool and the garden, and "in exchange, Ellis's languid mother Wendy gave him food, the pool house, and a meager salary. She also provided him with a place to keep his goats." When he's not caring for his herd, Goat Man spends his off hours growing pot and getting high. And every so often, he heads into the desert for a trek with the goats, walking at night in the cool dark. In many of these pursuits--especially the getting high part--he is joined by the confident, easygoing Ellis. This apprenticeship is interrupted only when Ellis heads off to Gates Academy, the Pennsylvania prep school attended by his absentee father. The novel then follows him as he journeys from his unconventional home into the real world.
Editorial Review from Esquire:
One of the most kinetic, most original young fiction writers we've read in a long time.
The very talented Mr. Poirier, who has graciously agreed to contribute literary reviews here from time to time, informs me that the filming of Goats is tentatively scheduled to begin in the fall with Thomas Haden Church as Goat man. Mark's first film, "Smart People", will be available on DVD August 11.
And now for something completely different-
"Fractured Fairy Tails"-
This weeks contribution comes from far away Bulgaria and is titled "золотойilocks and the Three Bears". -And btw, those issues with "too cold" and "too soft" are the problem at the moment. Quite the contrary as a matter of fact...
And for the ladies in the house, Joss Stone and magnificent Melissa 'Rampion' Etheridge pay tribute to one of the greatest, self-acknowledged bisexual vocalists of all time.
BTW- Did you happen to notice Janis's sister and brother in the audience in that last scene?
Weekly Rants from Under the Rainbow-
Gay Marriage-.
A constitutional amendment banning gay marriage is to be reintroduced in Congress by U.S. Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga.). U.S. Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.) originally introduced the Federal Marriage Amendment, which later became the Marriage Protection Amendment, in the House in May 2003.
U.S. Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga.) introduced an amendment to the U.S. Constitution on May 22 to ban same-sex marriage, a result of the backlash by lawmakers upset with the California Supreme Court’s recent ruling legalizing gay marriage. <snip> Other co-sponsors of the bill, all Republicans, are: Reps. Tom Feeney of Florida; Joe Pitts of Pennsylvania; John Shimkus of Illinois; Tim Walberg, Peter Hoekstra and Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan; Brian Bilbray and Duncan Hunter of California; Dan Burton of Indiana; Trent Franks of Arizona; Barbara Cubin of Wyoming; Todd Akin of Missouri; John Peterson of Pennsylvania; Ralph Hall of Texas; Scott Garrett of New Jersey; Henry Brown of South Carolina; Virgil Goode of Virginia; Virginia Foxx and Robin Hayes of North Carolina; Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland; Mark Souder of Indiana; Robert Anderholt of Alabama, Jeff Miller of Florida, Steve King of Iowa; and Mary Fallin of Oklahoma.
A new poll shows for the first time a majority of California residents back gay marriage!
More California voters now support allowing same-sex marriage than oppose it, according to a new poll released Wednesday. The results mark the first time in over three decades of polling that more California voters have approved of extending marriage to gay couples than have disapproved, said Field Poll director Mark DiCamillo. The survey of 1,052 registered voters was conducted over the phone.
Quite threatening wasn't it? Thanks to MTV and Real World S.F. producers Jonathan Murray and Mary-Ellis Bunim for presenting gay marriage and the gay "agenda" in such a sympathetic light all those years ago (1994). You had a very powerful impact in showing the face of the GLBT community as positive role models on a whole generation of young Americans. That impact, and Pedro Zamora's courageous struggle with HIV/AIDS, cannot be overstated. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!
You should know that Pedro Zamora died at 4:40 a.m. EST on November 11, 1994 from AIDS related complications, the day after the final episode of The Real World: San Francisco aired on MTV. He was buried on November 13 at Vista Memorial Gardens in Miami Lakes, Florida.
Where would we be today as a community if so many wonderful lives, with so much potential, hadn't been allowed to simply fade away back in those early days of HIV? The housemates of Pedro's (with one notable exception) also deserve a huge thank you for teaching the nation and the world about living with persons infected with HIV. I hope you've all moved on to happy, healthy, productive, post-R.W. lives. But more about that in upcoming editions of WGLB TV NEWS.
TrueMajority.org is sending an open letter to our nation's Governors in support of marriage equality and opposing any effort to write hatred and discrimination into the Constitution. Please sign their open letter in support of marriage equality.
In Overseas News-
A memorial to the thousands of gay men who died in Nazi concentration camps was officially dedicated in Berlin on May 27, 2008.
Between 5,000 and 15,000 gay men were held in concentration camps by the Nazis as members of an "anti-social group. "Historians estimate that 60% of them died while incarcerated. After the war, gay men were not recognised as victims of the Holocaust and many were re-imprisoned by the authorities because of their sexuality.
May your next dedicated ray of sunlight be sent to the Vatican to illuminate the difference between homophiles and pedophiles for his holiness the Bishop of Rome, who despite his highly touted infallibility remains in the dark on many issues related human sexuality.
Berlin - Following years of controversy, German dignitaries on Tuesday will dedicate a memorial to the tens of thousands of gays and lesbians who were persecuted and killed in Nazi Germany.
This month marks the 75th anniversary of the series of raids and public book burnings in May 1933 with which the regime of Adolf Hitler began its crusade against homosexuality.
Photos of Nazi stormtroopers hurling books onto bonfires stem largely from the book-burning rally which occurred outside the offices of gay-rights pioneer Magnus Hirschfeld's Institute for Sexual Science, which was ransacked in May 1933.
This year's Boston Pride Parade had a special marcher or three. Our brilliant Governor Deval Patrick, a personal hero of mine for all he has done and continues to do for our community, became the state's first sitting governor to march in a Gay Pride Parade in 2007. This year, after his daughter Katherine came out to the family, the Patricks had even more reason to march proudly with us.
And now a statement from our nominee Senator Obama-
"I am proud to join with our lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered brothers and sisters in celebrating the accomplishments, the lives and the families of all LGBT people during this Pride season. Too often, the issue of LGBT rights is exploited by those seeking to divide us. But at its core this issue is about who we are as Americans." "It's time to live up to our founding promise of equality by treating all our citizens with dignity and respect. Let's enact federal civil rights legislation to outlaw hate crimes and protect workers against discrimination based upon sexual orientation and gender identity or expression. Let's repeal 'don't ask, don't tell' and demonstrate that the most effective and professional military in the world is open to all Americans who are ready and willing to serve our country. Let's treat the relationships and the families of LGBT Americans with full equality under the law.
"We are ready to accomplish these goals because of the courage and persistence of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people who are working every day to achieve equal rights -- the gay couple who demands equal treatment in our family laws as they raise their children, the lesbian soldier who wants nothing more than to serve her country openly and honestly, the transgendered workers who ask for the simple dignity of being judged by the quality of their work.
"Generations of LGBT Americans, at once ordinary and extraordinary, have made possible this moment in our history. With leadership and hard work we can fulfill the promise of equality for all."
Thank you President Obama, err I mean Senator Obama. However, we will discuss Brown v. Board of Education at your earliest convenience from the Oval Office in January of next year.
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*Please note that in place of Blog roll listed along the right hand of the diary we have placed links to various GLBT organizations and resources for your convenience. Please feel free to contact us with additional links that you feel are appropriate for our reference list.
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A little "morning music" to play us out this AM and a little redhead for TBC's birthday... I dearly miss morning music, but redhead, not so much. BiPM will be back with C&J later this evening, and as always, bright and early monday AM. See y'all there. Cheers and thanks for stopping by!
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Acknowledgments: AndyS In Colorado was an original co-conspirator in this endeavor and his vision greatly helped with the final format you see above. Andy has recently stepped away from DailyKos but will hopefully come back to us when time permits. Also homoaffectional fed us numerous links to news items and diaries of interest to the GLBT community. I hope my running ahead with establishing a format and putting these first few editions together, hasn't scared the rest of our crew off for good. Making executive decisions seemed the easiest way to get the concept underway. I'll be more than happy with others stepping in and cobbling together their own editions down the road. As you can see in that first video, the GLBT community is comprised of a number of different factions that frequently have their own perspectives and agendas. So don't assume we all speak with a single voice to any of the issues raised here. I in no way am comfortable speaking first-hand for the lesbian, trans-gendered or bisexual communities. So editions dedicated to their issues, by other team members, would certainly expand our outreach and credibility on/to those issues. Even within the gay male community there are numerous sub-factions whose issues can sometimes be unique to their perspective. So again, let me thank those who played a hand in getting this endeavor started and encourage them to contribute their own special perspectives in future editions to broaden our scope. -tnichlsn
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