Remembering the Stonewall Riots

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As the fortieth anniversary of the Stonewall Riots approaches, The Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide honors those momentous six days of rebellion. 

The violent response to the police raid of a gay bar in Greenwich Village was an iconic turning point for the modern gay rights movement, and marches around the world are commemorating the riots, even in countries where homosexuality is condemned.  David Carter, who is the author of Stonewall: The Riots That Sparked the Gay Revolution, writes about the significance of these marches:

Marchers are sometimes attacked by skinheads and the like, often with the complicity of the government, and forced to fight back.  Thus the militancy and sometimes even the violence of Stonewall continue to be recapitulated in such places, where rights are far from won–which is to say that Stonewall continues to serve as a symbol of gay rebellion and liberation.

Another piece lists the Top 10 Historic Gay Places in the U.S.  In addition to the Stonewall Inn, the site of the famed Walt Whitman’s tomb is included, along with Castro Street, San Francisco, Laramie, Wyoming, and Hart, Michigan, home to the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival, founded in 1976. And of course there is Cambridge City Hall in Massachusetts, the site of the first same-sex marriages in the history of the U.S. 

Source:The Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide (article not yet available online)

Image by MShade, licensed under Creative Commons.

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