LGBT History
By Dylan Rothbein

When we think of the history of the diversity of human sexuality there’s no community more complex and historically in some ways misunderstood, with a distinct culture and history, then the LGBT community. To understand the history of the LGBT community is to understand but every letter with an acronym in many ways tells the story of human sexuality from the perspective of the minority. The history of LGBT rights is a history that gives meaning to the notion of liberty. What’s a fierce tradition of at times defining defying gender roles and at times showing that the highest form of self-acceptance comes from being yourself and that is something that is a priceless commodity because in a society governed by Liberty and authenticity is perhaps the greatest blessing and the greatest virtue. The legacy of the LGBT community is the story of a community extract to the highest ideal of authenticity it doesn’t play the victim no matter how rough and no matter how much adversity comes our way as a community. The greatest lesson is our resilience that built our culture and the support services that we fought for that we now depend on in order to live equally in the community. It hasn’t always been easy for the LGBT community, but it is their history that serves as the glue that holds the community together.

The modern history of the LGBT community starts in one of the least obvious places on the European continent, Berlin under the Weimar Republic that flourished in between World War 1 and when the Nazis rose to power in 1933 (Haeberle, 1981). During this period in Berlin’s history it was considered one of the most progressive cities in Europe at the time with a prosperous drag scene and support services in ways that were in many ways ahead of their time. At the Institute of Sexual Research they conducted gender affirmation surgeries and prescribed hormone replacement therapy that paved the way for the transgender healthcare receive today. At this time in Berlin gay bars what considered the most hip place to be for the LGBT community which is a very common theme throughout the history of the LGBT community. The Institute of Sexual Research was also served as a hub for LGBT individuals all over Europe (Haeberle, 1981). This is where the Danish artist Lily Elbe went to have her bottom surgery where unfortunately she did not survive but because of her willingness to be one of the first trans women we should be forever in debt to her because she was willing to be the first so we can learn how to conduct male to female bottom surgery safely (Theophano, 2008). As far as I’m concerned this is her courageous legacy (Theophano, 2008). In many ways the Institute of Sexual Research is the first LGBT center in the tradition of the LGBT center to see today (Haeberle, 1981). One outspoken gay rights activist at the time was the director The Institute of Sexual Research Doctor Magnus Hirschfield (Haeberle, 1981). In 1933 when the Nazis rose to power the Institute of Sexual Research was burned down and in turn the history the science and the medical advances were all lost (Haeberle, 1981). When the Nazis rose to power in Germany the LGBT community become targeted by the Nazi secret police were at first they thought that they could simply go back into the closet and they would be safe but that that wasn’t going to work. The Nazis at the same time where they instituted policy of having Jewish people wear yellow stars had members of the LGBT community wear pink triangles (Haeberle, 1981). There was a lot of sexism within Nazi Germany which ironically enough actually spared lesbians and bisexual women. They were left alone to a degree with some preconditions they reverted back to an extremely feminine gender expression based upon the standard to femininity. Outlined by Nazi Germany. These women were not left alone for long, they ended up eventually having to go to concentration camps to and put on the pink triangle as well as some bisexual men. In the concentration camp nobody was immune to the power of the gas chamber that slaughtered gay men and lesbians, as well (Haeberle, 1981). Although this was far less common because of the sexism in German Society (Haeberle, 1981). In the concentration camps there was also experiments being done in the emerging field of conversion therapy, or gay men were sterilized against their wills (Haeberle, 1981).

After World War II America became a emerging hub for the LGBT community. Ex-military men who are involved in World War II when they came home they begin to join the emerging culture of the motorcycle games that were developing as a means of expressing their masculinity. These motorcycle games also add a population Butch women he wanted to express their masculinity and some of these women were also drag kings. One of the people to return from World War II ended up being one of the first haifeng high-profile people to come out as trans her name was Christine Jorgensen who’s one of the first high-profile trans people can enter into the American people’s popular consciousness of the existence of trans people. Another trans icon who is steath in his transition was jazz musician Billy Tipton what is a trans man and a popular musician during the post-war. During this time conversion therapy also became commonplace for gay teenagers who tried to pass as straight as much as possible, but was extremely inauthentic none the less. During the fifties there was a poet who was very unusual at the time because most people in the LGBT community were living in the closet but he was out, his name was Allen Ginsberg who wrote the classic Howl where he talked about gay sex methods in the public sphere in ways that were unheard of before (Meyer 1997). In the fifties there was another person in pop culture who is also flamboyant and clearly gay, his name was one of the four fathers of rock and roll, Little Richard (Hamilton 1998). He struggled to accept his homosexuality (Hamilton 1998).

The 60s brought with it a series of social and political changes throughout society that empowered minority remote communities doing grassroots organizing go help expand the interpretation of the American public of the promises of America based on the Constitution the Bill of Rights in the Declaration of Independence. In the late 50s the Civil Rights Movement began to pick up steam with people like Rosa Parks and people beginning to hear the name of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The Civil Rights Movement served as a model for all grassroots movements opposed to Civil Rights Movement making a my opinion historically the fact that the Civil Rights Movement is the mother of all modern-day grassroots movements especially in the. After it into the late 60s end the seventies where in many ways the grassroots movements ever developing the women’s movement and the LGBT rights movement anyways were born out of the Civil Rights Movement. The Civil Rights Movement engaged in various forms of Grassroots acts of Civil Disobedience these actions often times included things like refusing to get add off of lunch to get up at lunch counters two full Fletch marches the the 2 most famous building in Selma Alabama and the March on Washington. In the early 60s there is a riot at the Gene Compton cafeteria And that tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco which was a red light district was known to have a large population of LGBT individuals and sex workers. Because this area was known for a hotbed of illegal activity in the form of drugs and the LGBT community in a place where being gay and cross dressing in women’s clothes was considered a criminal act by law the owners when they were ready to close up shop call the cops to get everyone out. One night in 1966 the cop just so happen to be trying to subdue the wrong drag queen who hit him with hot coffee who were present for this riot where activist who had their start in the Civil Rights Movement (Blakemore 2020). 1969 became the birth of the modern gay-rights movement as we know it today with The Stonewall Riot (Blakemore 2020). In New York City’s West Village there was a Community Development of LGBT individuals made up of homeless youth and people escaping conversion therapy in this community (Gan 2007). There is also a substantial population of drag queens and drag kings (Gan 2007). In the late sixties there also chew rock and roll icons that where extremely popular at this time although it wasn’t completely known to their fan bases I that they were members of the LGBT community. Peter Townsend guitar player and songwriter of The Who is gay and Janis Joplin was bisexual. there’s this white piece of history that at Woodstock Janis Joplin went into a board party with her girlfriend and Shadow shot herointogether. In New York City at this time a lot of the bars especially in the West Village that served as hot beds for the LGBT community to congregate were right by that Italian mafia which which originally in some ways help that LGBT community because being gay was it many places considered an illegal act although New York City WesMer open things weren’t perfect and nowhere near as good as what they are now, this is why in some ways by is run by the mob. You could argue certain Mutual benefit for both the Italian mafia and the LGBT community because while now tricky Community needed a place to congregate the mob needed businesses different their criminal operations. One night in 1969 the cops came the the bus the mob who is running Stonewall at the time and an altercation broke out when a butch lesbian bouncer by the name of Summer More decided to start fighting back and started a carriage in the crowd discount fighting back (Blakemore 2020). This Riot lasted for 3 days (Blakemore 2020). A lot of people have argued that the Stonewall Riot was started by trans women drag queens if you happen to have been black but this is a math used to perpetuate Critical Race Theory in LGBT community and perpetuate misogyny in the LGBT community that seeks to disenfranchise lesbian and bisexual women to this very day all just to promote their political agenda which has nothing to do with the LGBT community and everything to do with the promoting of radical identitarianism and Critical Race Theory in the name about of LGBT Rights. In 1970 the Gay Liberation rally in Washington Square Park one of the most notable speakers at this event was Sylvia Rivera who is echoing sentiments by the trans community as a trans woman herself (Gan 2007). Like the trans community was being excluded from recognition within the world of gay rights activism which is just a glimmer into the rift that developed between individual letters under the acronym of LGBT and their relations with one another historically and even in the modern-day LGBT community (Gan 2007). In 1970 there was still, even in the gay rights movement, ignorance towards the trans community (Gan 2007). There wasn’t that much of anything for the trans community so Sylvia Rivera, a trans woman and drag queen and Marsha P Johnson, a drag queen formed “STAR House” for homeless trans youth to support them when they were rejected by their families for who they are (Gan 2007). It was in this that led to the growth of one of the most influential doctors in trans healthcare the great Dr. Peter Benjamin who is one of the first people in the United States to start performing trans surgeries and prescribing hormone replacement therapy his discoveries and methodology became the basis of the forming of the W path which it was involved in which is the world’s standards of transgender health care. It still informs transgender healthcare to this very day.

The 1970s brought with history of the LGBT community granting prominence in society in higher levels than people have seen before. By the time the 70s rolled around San Francisco became the next hotbed for gay rights activism throughout the 70s. In the sixties the San Francisco hippie movement what’s transcended San Francisco was mainly focused in Haight-Ashbury San Francisco but ultimately by the seventies the drug use became out of control there and it descended into a haven for drugs. In 1973 the a huge breakthrough for the LGBT community when a group of activists disrupted got an American Psychological Association and because of their protest if they had and their ability to disrupt order through Civil Disobedience they successfully got homosexuality out of the DSM so that way being gay was no longer considered a psychiatric impairment. So there began to be an LGBT community moving into the cashier District. One of the newcomers there what’s the New Yorker he would become arguably the most important gay rights activists of the 70s his name is Harvey Bernard Milk (Stryker, 2015). When Harvey Milk first got to San Francisco he opened up a camera supply store which became a hub of gay rights activism (Stryker, 2015). After being denied access for being gay to the local business owners organization he began to start organizing in San Francisco he started out working with small-time bars that we’re staging a boycott of craft beer because they because the Teamster’s Union was discriminating against having gay people add drivers. This was Harvey Milk’s first action and he was successful (Stryker, 2015). In the 70s San Francisco was dangerous but the gay community a lot of violence on the streets forget people so there was a cultural norm walking around with a whistle that was used to notify members of the community when somebody with getting hurt so that way the community could support that person when they’re being mugged although there was still a lot of people being murdered them to us case for being gay at the time. By the mid-70s Harvey Milk started running for office to get on the city of advisors he failed twice and then when he ran for Assemblyman he also lost but when things were redistricted he was able to win (Stryker, 2015). Every time Harvey Milk lost an election is margarine for losing weight down exponentially every time he tried (Stryker, 2015). Harvey Milk was one of the most robust activists in the LGBT community that revolutionize the way people think about fighting for LGBT rights (Stryker, 2015). He emphasized importance of people coming out and telling people who they are as a means of furthering the movement on a personal level he managed to inspire people who never told anyone who they were to come out for the good of the movement and for the good of the community as a whole. One of my greatest takeaways from him as an activist is the idea that self-advocacy starts with being yourself because it is the game when you start living authentically is the day where the actions you take to live authentically change the signal to those around you of who you really are and then the next person they meet who is like you they will be able to handle that person better be Because of the way you treated them. 1977 it was a local or a local referendum in Miami-Dade County that was to ban Overtime LGBT community from accessing employment housing and education this led to the rise of Anita Bryant who was most known for doing commercials at the time to become a spokeswoman of this movement. This referendum led to all over the country sparking protests and rallies within the LGBT community that would speak out directly against this referendum to get it to fail unfortunately this go test discrimination have a referendum passed in Miami-Dade County. One of the places that had the strongest outcry against this referendum was San Francisco under the leadership of Harvey Milk who where is the city adviser at the time on the board of City advisors at the time (Stryker, 2015). In 1978 it was a ballot initiative Proposition 6 in the same tradition as the one that passed a Miami-Dade County and in Kansas that what overturn against gay people in public life where they wouldn’t be allowed to serve the community as teachers. This was being hacked by state Senator John Briggs and the spokeswoman was singer Anita Bryant. Why do most outspoken people against this ballot initiative was Harvey Milk who actually debated state Senator John Briggs on this issue (Stryker, 2015). In 1978 there is a new LGBT organization starting that was in some ways the polar opposite of that LGBT activism that was happening at that time and some might argue that majority of it even to this day which is to say that they’re this LGBT organization The Log Cabin Republicans started as a coalition of LGBT conservatives Libertarians and Center right-wingers in 1978 against the Briggs Proposition 6 initiative (Stryker, 2015) in the LGBT rights movement. And how I that people wouldn’t have suspected conservative Ronald Reagan who was a friend of governor of California and about to launch his presidential campaign although I detest the policies of Ronald Reagan, he was right to speak out against this proposition. Proposition 6 was defeated 1978 despite the disapproval of the conservative right (Stryker, 2015). Not long after Proposition 6 was defeated tragedy struck when Harvey Milk and the mayor of San Francisco was murdered in cold blood by Harvey Milk’s former colleague Dan White (Stryker 2015),. In the 70s they were also members of the LGBT community who were who started to gain cultural prominent in the music business. out of Los Angeles California there is a a new rock and roll band I’ve all girls that started cut the right away is the rhythm guitar player Joan Jett he also has a successful solo career in her own right is a lesbian. Coming out of England was a rock and roll musician who was the original voice Reginald Dwight that we now know is Elton John who was one of the most flamboyant rock and roll musician at the time, also coming out of England out of the scene for the new wave of British metal was one of the most historically significant rock and roll musician in all of Rock and Roll history the lead singer of Judas Priest Rob Halford who is gay.

The 1980s was a bittersweet time for the LGBT community and one hand day today people start becoming more comfortable interacting with the community in their day-to-day life however and it’s also a time of great sorrow that came from I’m out to 2 places from the fact that the culture was going clear a conservative time in history dealt with a lot of judgement and sadly aware of death. In the late 70s with the various ballot initiatives that put in the crosshairs the Liberty of the LGBT community coming in the question even though the community was becoming far more vocal in far more organized than ever seen before there is still an intensive push back which led to the rise of the religious right which started in the late 70s with people like singer Anita Bryant and the various salad initiatives that she pushed against the morality of homosexuality. In the United States you had in my opinion one of the worst Presidents in American history Ronald Reagan ushered in an era of deregulation, trickle down economics, in coalition with social conservatism family values and in England you had a British version of the same conservative agenda and under the leadership of a tory government with Margaret Thatcher in the role of prime minister who had similar policies to Ronald Reagan in the United States. It’s worth noting that not all conservatives were going along with this socially conservative agenda, some conservatives like David Koch who ran in 1980 as the vice presidential candidate but the libertarian party actually supported gay marriage and gay libertarian party was ahead of their time. In London there was a gay rights activist on the scene that fundamentally changed the LGBT community dynamics in England through showing the possibility of building coalitions with groups that are culturally different from you, his name was Mark Ashton (Butcher 2014). In England like in the United States working class people were being sidelined just to enrich big business in the world part of England there is working class communities that have been done to have enough where the trickle-down economic policies that was hurting their communities show a group of coal miners that started going on strike. Mark Ashton realized what was going on and that Pride he started Chris going around buckets in the middle of pride parade help raise money to support the Striking miners. in March bookstore that served as a hub for the LGBT community in England he formed an organization “Gays and Lesbians Support The Miners (Butcher 2014). For a year straight “Gays and Lesbians Support Miners raised money and form relationships in coal mining communities that were on strike despite cultural differences based on the idea of having a common enemy of the Thatcher Administration (Butcher 2014). “Gays and Lesbians Support The Miners” was successful in their campaign to raise money for the miners and was able to financially support them through their strike for one year straight (Butcher 2014). This is why now the Coal Miner’s Union marches in London Pride (Butcher 2014). I think the greatest lesson I learned from the activism of Mark Ashton and “Gays and Lesbians Support the Miners” overall is that liberty transcends your cause and it is the pursuit of Liberty that binds people together define a coalition to achieve common goals (Butcher 2014). As an activist it showed me that working with people who are different from you call truly presents great opportunities despite the possibility of potential cultural misunderstandings. This is one of the things that I want to work on as an activist despite my disagreements with the right I wanted to start working with conservatives in the defense of Liberty despite cultural differences in the tradition of “Gays and Lesbians Support The Miners” (Butcher 2014). In 1987 Mark Ashton would turn into another casualty of the AIDS epidemic, this brave activist was 26 years old when he died (Butcher 2014). In New York City there is a new culture developing among the LGBT community that technically started in the late 70s that was commonly referred to as the ballroom scene where are balls where The LGBT community would get together to have these parties that served as competitions a fashion end dance shows where there would be a announcer and that announcer would announce a category for a given round and people would dress up as a category and a panel of judges what judge for that category. A person is why I never get go around would receive a trophy and we gain reputation for themselves as individuals and the houses that they represent. in the ballroom scene the teams were made up of houses made up of kids who wear thrown out of their homes for being members of the LGBT community and before joining these houses a lot of these kids wear sex workers and homeless that the ballroom scene provided an outlet for them to express themselves and that houses that they were a part of gave them the structure to get their lives back on track wow building their self-esteem in the process. In the late seventies a new invisible threat came to the LGBT community that didn’t get on anyone’s radar until the 80s that would come to define a generation and change that looks LGBT community forever. This Invisible Killer that defined a generation is commonly referred AIDS. At first the AIDS epidemic was seen in places where there was large LGBT communities like New York and San Francisco. One of the key constituencies for this disease is gay men who would contract the virus through gay sex align protect where anal sex. The Reagan Administration ignored the AIDS epidemic and in the court of public opinion push by the religious right the AIDS epidemic what a symbol of a punishment to the in morality of homosexuality. The LGBT community isn’t very resilient community and their resilience has carried the community through adversity end the movement despite differences between individual identities under the LGBT umbrella when push comes to shove the community has stuck together through thick and thin which is one of the reasons why I’m so proud to be a part of a community a scratch that’s fine. During the height of the AIDS epidemic there began to be a mantra being touted by the LGBT community this man trap was also the name of an organization that served as one of the main 8 activism organization at the time and the LGBT community which was the sentiment act up which was based on the idea that as a community the LGBT community was not going to be sidelined when members of the community were dying everyday which was why the mentality was to act up because when people in the community were dying during the height the AIDS epidemic the community started to mobilize the fight that epidemic on a grassroots level which I personally find truly inspiring where they word not stop screaming to the rest of society as to what was going on in the community as a means of trying to push Premier shine perfect inquiry as means of saving more lives in the form of AIDS research. This is the area where LGBT Healthcare as we know it today was born with clinics popping up like Callen Lorde in the Bronx in the West Village and aperture Community Health Center in Chinatown Manhattan. LGBT Community Trader with history started taking care of itself when they realized that society at large wasn’t interested in taking up their cause. The LGBT community began to organize around the fighting of the AIDS epidemic to independently educate the community about safe sex practices in the form of holding events Chris sex education and the practice that continues of handing out free condoms at LGBT functions and being able to pick them up at LGBT spaces like LGBT centers and LGBT community health centers. Perhaps the unsung heroes of the AIDS epidemic during the 80s voice of lesbian faction of the LGBT community who in many ways held the community together by being the backbone of a generation. Despite cultural differences that existed between the gays and the lesbians the lesbian community started becoming very active in AIDS activism where they would serve as social support visiting gay men in the hospital to give them a hand to hold food to eat, and a little bit of camaraderie and what for a lot of them turned out to be their last days, which was also appointed thing to have happened because unfortunately throughout LGBT history many of the members have experienced being shunned by their families and for a lot of these men being comforted by lesbian women what’s the closest thing grabbing their mother visit them in the hospital who couldn’t bear to look them in the eye because of who they were. Lesbians also served as blood donors when the community was in need for blood the help the individuals infected with AIDS by being 1 to the first in line to donate blood where the LGBT community held their own blood drives disappoint the mostly gay men in the community who are infected with AIDS. Blood was also in high demand at this time because there became obliged started so at the country because as it became known about AIDS being passed in the bloodstream are became a band and donating blood. The service of the lesbian community during the height of the AIDS epidemic can’t be overstated and how many ways come to define this generation of LGBT activism in the community’s darkest hour. In 1987 there was March on Washington scheduled for the LGBT community this merge included many sayings but based on the Mantra of act up there came is idea of which was true next challenge is that because if people were quiet about the AIDS epidemic more people are going to die a lot of them being gay men and trans women which led to the pink triangle used in Nazi Germany to become commonplace which became the symbol of the fight against AIDS. At this March in 1987 a grassroots action that sums up the activism and the heartbreak of this generation of a quilt that catalog everyone that community had lost from AIDS which way is the brainchild of Quail Jones who was recruited into the LGBT rights movement by Harvey Milk in San Francisco. In 1989 there is a double-edged sword of ones that AIDS epidemic hardest casualties and one of its greatest public relations opportunities in the form of someone add served as a better standard bearer for AIDS activism in the LGBT community, his name was Ryan White who was a hemophiliac that contracted AIDS through a blood transfusion at 11 years old from rural Indiana (Bailey, 2016). The story of Ryan White turned out to be just what American needed to see the urgency of the AIDS epidemic because he was more palatable for the more conservative parts in America get their head around who had religious issues with homosexuality by definition even Ronald Reagan had Ryan and his family over for dinner in 1989. The LGBT community was very receptive to Ryan White and his family always making sure that they were up to date with the latest in research and in treatment for the AIDS epidemic (Bailey, 2016). I think the most interesting part of Ryan White even though he was told he only had 6 months to live he opted to return to school which became a national news story which I think turned Ryan White in all his due to all the publicity that he was getting into a token of what we call in the disabled community “Inspiration Porn” a term coined by Stella Young on which led to him being pitied in the media (DO IT). On the other hand I also like to greater awareness and greater mobilization within the American people to become interested in the AIDS epidemic (Bailey, 2016). In 1990 the AIDS epidemic cut the wife of one of the most flamboyant rock and roll musician has name was Freddie Mercury the lead singer, songwriter and pianist queen. When Ryan White tried to go back to school originally the school wouldn’t want to have him back because of his AIDS diagnosis so the family took the school to court ultimately despite a lot of back-and-forth in a lot of losses in the court system he ended up being able to return to a different school (Bailey, 2016). His parents moved a couple miles away heading to town they were living in for him to attend school until he died at 13 years old in 1991 (Bailey, 2016). As a disability rights activist I find the terms of Ryan fight returning to school to be I’d really thought-provoking because they effectively argued in the court was that by this point for Ryan it was a disability and his right to an education with guaranteed by it what was called about the time the Education For All Handicapped Children Act which we now call the IDEA, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act what set the terms of him returning back to school and ended up serving to protect his civil rights so he could be educated equally everyone else in his community (Blanck 2019). I think judicial precedent can be used to help the trans community in the 21st century because as far as I’m concerned gender dysphoria is a disability. In 1991 things began to get better in regards to the AIDS epidemic with the drug rendezevere being at the approved to treat age and as the community adapted see this crisis by this time they became better at it and the deaths beginning to go down.

In 1990s gave birth to a new breed of politics that turned out to be a double-edged sword for the LGBT community along with many other segments of society including but not limited to, union workers in the manufacturing sector began to get sold out by trade deals like in the North American Trade Agreement that exported American jobs overseas and devalued the surplus value of the American worker that in turn the row areas across the country particularly in the South the Midwest Royal Northeast into towns that once was the background of America in the manufacturing sector and in the energy sector to be coming rural towns in the Urban Decay which ended up turning into a hotbed for the fentanyl epidemic. This new breed of politics effectively according to the mathematician Eric Weinstein the Democratic party into a second Republican Party under the leadership of President Bill Clinton and his chief strategist James Carville who came up with the strategy of triangulation where they would effectively move to the right and then set up a situation where members of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party would have to vote for them anyway even though they were to the left of Democratic party leadership this is a strategy that continues to be employed to this very day and help to turn the Democratic party into the party of corporate progressives elites who want to roast you signal a progressive day are to see various groups in the population including the LGBT community into a series of victims. LGBT history during the 90s and the 2000s can be summed up by two main issues guess you was a marriage equality and the issue of whether the LGBT community would be allowed to participate in the US Military. In 1993 presidential candidate Bill Clinton started to get pressure on the issue of whether gays and lesbians would be allowed to be involved in military operations irrespective of their sexual orientation which led to a cultural battle that ultimately lasted 17 years (Manuel 2020). Whatever you think about modern American history as pertains to the issue of gays and lesbians in the military we should understand that there’s a long history of gays and lesbians being bared in employ employment because of concerns regarding are sexual orientations having said this like any other part of society there has always been gays and lesbians involved in the institution of the US Military whether society-at-large recognized their sexual orientation or not (Manuel 2020). In the sixties Robby Krieger leave your tire player for the doors got out of the draft proclaiming to be a homosexual. By the early 90s gays and lesbians who are found out while they were employed by the US Military started to become suspect and in turn fired from their positions which became more and more common as time went on. By the mid-90s after numerous hearings on Capitol Hill in both chambers of Congress a compromise was reached with Congress in conjunction with the Clinton administration passed the policy in the form of legislation of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” which effectively made it so gays and lesbians and bisexuals we’re allowed to remain involved in military operations providing they stayed in the closet which turned out to be a very difficult cultural standard to uphold (Manuel 2020). Military leaders were opposed having gays and lesbians involved in military because they were concerned about issues of unit cohesion and combat readiness. The “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” created unfavorable press for the military at large in the 2000s when the Afghanistan War started there was unfavorable press surrounding the firing of gay translators who translated from Arabic to English. In the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks the American people became more and more skeptical of the policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”. On July 13th 2010 the Log Cabin Republicans took their grievances about “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” to the Supreme Court where the law was struck down which led to hearings in both chambers of Congress again that led to in 2012 “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” to be repealed (Manuel 2020). In 1996 in both chambers of Congress a new law was passed called the Defense of Marriage Act commonly referred to as DOMA that on the basis of federal law would define marriage as between a man and a woman effectively making it illegal four members of the LGBT community to tie the knot. During the height of the AIDS epidemic it became increasingly clear the importance of marriage rights and the importance of being able to designate a next of kin. Even know prior to that AIDS epidemic LGBT community wasn’t as inclined to fight for marriage rights because at the time they saw it as a heteronormative institution. Although there were court cases on the state level regarding gay marriage throughout the 70s and 80s, in 1999 there was a breakthrough when Hawaii and the case of Baehr v. Lewin, getting some success on a state level in Hawaii (Arkes, 1995). As the 90s and early 2000s the grass every came to be a transitional phase being tried out in the state level and experiment that was commonly referred to as a civil partnership which started out in places like Vermont, Massachusetts, New York and California. Civil Partnerships were based on the notion that although gays lesbians and bisexuals were allowed to get married they would be able to go into a legal contract where they would be able to acquire all legal next of kin rights especially pertaining to healthcare, death benefits, and taxes even though they weren’t legally considered to be married. Eventually this wasn’t good enough which led to the LGBT community starting the fight for gay marriage across the country on a state level. In California there was a ballot initiative Proposition 8 on gay marriage (UNITED STATES California Court Legalizes Lesbian and Gay Marriages. 2008). 2004 there began to be talked of a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage which led to the Log Cabin Republicans during a media campaign to put pressure on Republican politicians to strike this down they were successful in their efforts. In 2012 Supreme Court struck down proposition 8 and legalized gay marriage across the country this was particularly poignant for me because I was 18 years old and just came out as bisexual a few months before. In 2003 there was another landmark ruling that revolutionized the LGBT community in the Supreme Court decision in 2003 Lawrence V. Texas the Supreme Court effectively struck down anti-sodomy laws all over the United States of America (Naeger, 2004). In the early 2000s Paris and critical changes Cadet W pass regarding bold logistics of how people would your transmission is change the day-to-day operations of the trans community and the LGBT community as a whole with rethinking of the requirement that in order to start hormone replacement therapy you would have to go through a trial run of real-life experience that oftentimes put trans people in danger where by you would have to live as a gender of what you were transitioning to without hormones in order to prove that you are trans. The other change to the WPATH in the early 2000s was the implementation of a policy referred to as informed consent which effectively turns hormones into over the counter drugs where by anyone whether they’ve been diagnosed with gender dysphoria or not would be able to walk in get any LGBT health clinic or Planned Parenthood to sign a waiver where they would assume all the rest of this medication and be able to medically transition without any safeguards put into place to protect the individual and to make sure that they were diagnosed with gender dysphoria that wouldn’t turn determine whether medically transition was appropriate for them. In 2007 there was an interview was Private realtors that in many ways change the trajectory of the LGBT community forever. She interviewed Jazz Jennings who was the first transgender child to go public and then turn her reality show after her children’s book aired on TLC which gave the public in to a glimpse into the lives of trans children (Schlichenmeyer 2016). From my point of view this is one of the worst things that ever happened to the trans community because it turned this kid into a token, what Stella Young called “Inspiration Porn” (DO IT). 2008 was also an important year for the trans community compounded by the emerging Trans youth movement under the leadership of Jazz Jennings (Schlichenmeyer 2016) and her family with the passage of the Affordable Care Act which expanded through Medicaid trans healthcare in the Medicaid expansion provision of the Bill. I personally believe that the trans youth management is not only important to LGBT history but it’s also important to know the history of the American Eugenics movement (The Right to Self-Determination: Freedom from Involuntary Sterilization August 11 2020) because if actively when anyone takes hormones irrespective of their age it sterilizes them. This is why are vehemently opposed to medically transitioning children especially since I passionately believe that it is illegal undo that judicial processing in Buck v Bell which makes it illegal to sterilize people who can’t consent (The Right to Self-Determination: Freedom from Involuntary Sterilization August 11 2020). In the late 90s and in the 2000s there was also beginning to be a commercialization of the culture of the LGBT community with shows like Queer as Folk that told the story of working-class gay man in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania and shows like “RuPaul’s Drag Race” that commercialized drag culture and gave people a glimpse of the Ballroom scene none of that late seventies into the 80s. In 2014 there was a historic rock and roll record to come out called “Transgender Dysphoria Blues” that catalogs the transition of lead singer rhythm guitar player and songwriter Laura Jane Grace from male to female (Stewart 2014) which is important because she’s one of the first trans rock and roll musicians, who was a major influence on my transition from male to female. She showed me that I could be a proud trans woman while still strongly identifying as a rock and roll musician and as a passionate rock and roller when it comes to the attitude and gender expression that means so much to me and it’s so core to who I am has a human being. In 2016 President Donald Trump was elected which was a very historic victory for the LGBT community because under President Trump’s leadership he galvanized the Republican Party to increase supporting LGBT rights for the first time in the history of the Republican Party a major presidential candidate at the Republican National Convention actually got a standing ovation for standing for LGBT rights (Kabel 2020). In 2017 there was controversy surrounding the trans military ban which effectively made it illegal for Trans people to join the military (Manuel 2020). It was this issue and and the issue of trade that was the first two issues whereby I, 100% supported the president on this ban and the direction he was going to going with trade policy. I am in favor of the trans military ban because I’m a pacifist and even though I understand that the rhetoric regarding my community and this issue is negative and discriminatory when push comes to shove regardless of who I am as an activist my highest paid as a pacifist anytime any segment of society has the potential of being banned from the military I’m very comfortable with it although I don’t want trans people to be discriminated against especially since I’m a transsexual women. From my point of view the way I interpret this issue is that that I would be discriminating against members of my own community I also understand that as an activist I think of this situation in terms of any parent who last to say no to a teenager who wants to do something really bad late that the parent prions harmful and even though it’s upsetting to the teenager on an individual level in the moment the parent sees this as a net benefit for the long-term of the individual. This is how I reconcile being a trans woman and supporting the trans military ban because I cannot in good conscience endorse any individual to join any organization that involves the goal of ending another human beings life as a pacifist I wouldn’t be able to look myself in the mirror if I was against this policy. In 2020 The Supreme Court found that based upon the 1964 Civil Rights Act that it’s provision against discriminating on the basis of sex was applicable to gender identity and sexual orientation which effectively made it illegal to discriminate against LGBT individuals in the workplace.

I learned LGBT history to being immersed in the LGBT community. When I was seventeen I came out as bisexual and when I was 23 I came out as transsexual male to female. I have been involved in LGBT activism since I was 23 years old although even though I wasn’t out I was always a passion Allied for the community and always identified with the community from afar. When I was 23 I got diagnosed with gender dysphoria and in turn started transition, where I got involved with groups like Asexuals of New York City and I also at that point started spending a lot of time at various LGBT tanners and started going to Pride and at that point I started meeting and spending time with Stonewall veterans where I became to understand you know the that I owe to the generation that paved the way for my right to walk out of my house with a dress on that was out their sacrifice and their struggle I would not be able to live equally in the community is a bisexual trans sexual woman and for that I’m eternally grateful. I also started going to events in the LGBT community that can write the history of the LGBT community. I came to LGBT-rights from my work in the disability rights movement. I met the first trans woman I ever met in my life when I was working with the Autistic Self Advocacy Network who although being in tranced with Critical Race Theory that I’m opposed to on so many levels, they had a large LGBT component with a lot of their members being a part of the LGBT community, so I learned a lot from the time I was trained by them in disability rights activism where I also learned about the LGBT community. I also learned about the LGBT community through my attendance of the Philadelphia Transgender Health conference where I learned about the history of trans Healthcare and the culture of the LGBT community as a whole. When I was a teenager I didn’t at first want to be going to disability rights because my true passion at that time and in many ways till this day is the fight for organized labor in the form of fighting for economic justice and in defense and expansion of the social safety net all in the name of advancing Liberty. However when I was 19, I got an opportunity to get my start in the Disability Rights Movement doing public speaking on what it meant to be Asperger’s although I didn’t bring up my sexuality in my presentations or my gender identity until years later. I always wanted to expand my disability rights activism out to other issues that I was passionate about one of the strongest issues that I’m passionate about is the fight over LGBT rights particularly fighting for LGBT individuals who are also disabled, mostly in the form of Developmental disability, psychiatric disability and/or learning disability, and intellectual disability. I do this work not on the basis of their identity but on the basis of their personhood guaranteed to them and all other Americans based on the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution because as I’ve learned from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. it is not your immutable characteristic that matters, it’s your character that matters and in turn it’s the goal of any Civil Rights Movement regardless of the constituency to extend Liberty inequality and Kieran turn frown on the notion of equity because equity is not equality. As a musician I’ve written a plethora of material on the history of the LGBT community and in my film “Society’s Child” based upon my autobiography of growing up Asperger’s and a history of selective mutism in special education (Dylan Rothbein Liberty Coalition). I have a trans Rabbi in the film who I named Rabbi Lily (Dylan Rothbein Liberty Coalition) after Lili Elbe one of the first trans people to undergo bottom surgery where unfortunately she did not survive (Theophano 2008). I believe that one of the best ways to build civic engagement is through the constant community education of the community’s history this is how you build identity build self-esteem end of cultural Pride not just within the LGBT community but as Americans no matter how we are made of a characteristics because the story of the LGBT community he’s not just a story of diversity of human sexuality it’s the story of American Liberty that needs to be told for generations to come so we never forget who we lost and we can remain grateful as we plan for the future because it’s a pain in the backs of our elders where we can be free but given so much grass the live people in society although there’s so much more work to do because the work of an activist is never done.

References

“Disability in the Media: Stella Young” Disability in the Media: Stella Young DO-IT.
https://www.washington.edu/doit/disability-media-stella-young

“The Right to Self-Determination: Freedom from Involuntary Sterilization” Disability Justice. August 11 2020. https://disabilityjustice.org/right-to-self-determination-freedom-from-involuntary-sterilization/

UNITED STATES California Court Legalizes Lesbian and Gay Marriages.” 2008 Off Our Backs 38 (1): 7–8. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=34738989&site=ehost-live.

Arkes, Hadley. 1995. “Will Hawaii’s Judges Give Us Gay Marriage in 1996? (Cover Story).” American Enterprise 6 (3): 57. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=9505095551&site=ehost-live.

Bailey, Evelyn. 2016. “AIDS and American Schools.” Empty Closet, no. 503 (August): 21. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=117091732&site=ehost-live.

Blanck, Peter. 2019. “Why America Is Better off Because of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.” Touro Law Review 35 (1): 605–18. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=136464931&site=ehost-live.

BUTCHER, RYAN. 2014. “Lgsm Heroes.” Gay Times (09506101), no. 437 (September): 38–39. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=97864535&site=ehost-live.

Blakemore, Erin. “How the Stonewall uprising ignited the modern LGBTQ rights movement”. National Geographic. June 26 2020. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/stonewall-uprising-ignited-modern-lgbtq-rights-movement

Gan, Jessi. 2007. “‘Still at the Back of the Bus’: Sylvia Rivera’s Struggle.” Centro Journal 19 (1): 124–39. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ahl&AN=25930227&site=ehost-live.

Haeberle, Erwin J. 1981. “Swastika, Pink Triangle and Yellow Star — The Destruction of Sexology and the Persecution of Homosexuals in Nazi Germany.” Journal of Sex Research 17 (3): 270–87. doi:10.1080/00224498109551120.

Hamilton, Marybeth. “Sexual Politics and African-American Music; Or, Placing Little Richard in History.” History Workshop Journal, no. 46 (1998): 160–76.

Kabel, Robert. “Log Cabin Republicans chair: LGBT Americans belong in Donald Trump’s Republican Party”. August 20 2020. https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/voices/2020/08/20/donald-trump-lgbtq-lgbt-gay-rights-republican-equality-column/5605491002/

Manuel, Victoria. 2020. “Trump’s Transgender Military Ban: Policy, Law, and Litigation.” Law & Sexuality: A Review of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Legal Issues 29 (April): 75–91. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=143750037&site=ehost-live.

Meyer, Lisa. 1997. “‘The Liberation Is the Word.’” Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review 4 (3): 7–10. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=9235310&site=ehost-live.

Naeger, Jennifer. 2004. “And Then There Were None: The Repeal of Sodomy Laws After Lawrence V. Texas and Its Effect on the Custody and Visitation Rights of Gay and Lesbian Parents.” St. John’s Law Review 78 (2): 397–425. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=13514543&site=ehost-live.

Rothbein, Dylan. “Society’s Child” Dylan Rothbein Liberty Coalition. 2021. https://dylanrothbein.weebly.com/societys-child.html
SCHLICHENMEYER, TERRI. 2016. “Fans of a Transperson.” Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide 23 (5): 44–45. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=117973788&site=ehost-live.

Stryker, Susan. 2015. “Milk, Harvey (1930–1978).” GLBTQ Social Sciences, January, 1–4. https://search-ebscohost-com.library.esc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=110523295&site=ehost-live.

Stewart, Allison. “Against Me tells an intensely personal story on ‘Transgender Dysphoria Blues’”. The Washington Post. January 20, 2014. https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/music/against-me-tells-an-intensely-personal-story-on-transgender-dysphoria-blues/2014/01/20/9c1fe210-7fc9-11e3-93c1-0e888170b723_story.html
Theophano, T. (2008). “Elbe, Lili (1886–1931)”. GLBTQ Arts, 1–2. Gender Studies Database.