If LGBTQ nonprofit organizations disappeared for even a single day, hundreds of thousands of LGBTQ people — especially the most vulnerable — would be cut off from health care, shelter, food, safety, and community. Today, in the midst of COVID-19 and economic collapse, our community’s nonprofits are truly and profoundly more important than ever before.
These organizations need our help. This Pride Month, we can all step up and support these organizations for Give OUT Day, the only national day of giving for the LGBTQ community. This year, over 475 LGBTQ nonprofits are participating, spanning nearly every state, D.C. and Puerto Rico, and working in every facet of queer life, from advocacy groups to community centers to performance troupes.
In the face of an unprecedented public health and economic crisis, we see these organizations working relentlessly to keep LGBTQ people healthy, delivering food to at-risk seniors and retooling their mental health services — in a matter of days — for our new world of physical distancing. We see them providing critical services, granting stipends to those who’ve suddenly lost income and finding housing for youth who are sheltered in place in abusive homes.
As the pandemic forces many of us physically apart, these organizations are offering — virtually — a sense of community, holding online spaces for healing, performance, and connection, more important now than ever.
And as protests over police brutality and systemic racism continue to grow, we see these organizations elevating Black LGBTQ voices, taking to the streets in allyship, and loudly joining calls for racial justice.
We also see how much these organizations need your help. In fact, in a survey of nonprofits by Charity Navigator and Reuters News, 83% of respondents reported that they are suffering financially due to the pandemic.
That’s where Give OUT Day comes in — and just when it’s needed most.During all of Pride Month, until 11:59 p.m. EDT on Give OUT Day (June 30), all donations to participating nonprofits on giveoutday.org help these organizations do this critical work. But Give OUT Day donations go even further: The organizations that earn the most individual donors win additional prize grants that boost their impact.
Participating in Give OUT Day is a simple way to show your pride and make a difference. Here’s how you can take part:
Right now, visit giveoutday.org/search to select which organizations you want to support. Click “donate,” and use the shopping cart to support multiple nonprofits in a single transaction.
Go a step further and click “fundraise.” Launch a fundraiser for a favorite organization by using this toolkit, and maximize your impact by reaching out to your network.
Whether or not you have the ability to donate, share giveoutday.org on social media to encourage your friends to give, especially on Give OUT Day, June 30.
Remember, though it looks different this year, Pride isn’t canceled. Show your pride by making a gift, starting a fundraiser, and sharing about Give OUT Day. You’ll support the LGBTQ community at a time of profound need — and unprecedented action.
Roger Doughty is the President of Horizons Foundation, the organizer of Give OUT Day. Celebrating its 40th anniversary, Horizons is the world’s first community foundation of, by, and for LGBTQ people.
On her wedding day, Nicole Castillo knew that she was making a mistake. She was 20 years old, and both she and her husband knew that she was not straight.
“But at the time, it didn’t feel like it was an option to not be married, and to come out,” she said. “I was concerned about harming my family, and I stayed in that marriage for some time.”
It took Castillo, now 36, until her mid-20s to understand her sexual orientation. “I was from a generation with almost no LGBT visibility. I didn’t know of any gay or queer women.”
As Pride Month winds down, Latinx LGBTQ people report a mixture of optimism and concern for their communities, on issues ranging from the Black Lives Matter movement to violence against transgender people.
Latinx LGBTQ people say that they see significant progress in the struggle for equality, yet stress that the fight for their rights is far from over.
Castillo, from Colorado, said she doesn’t mind that in-person Pride celebrations have been canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. “The Pride events are great, but they have become very mainstream, and it sometimes seems like the important issues can get lost.”
In contrast, she noted, “the Black Lives Matter protests are the most immediate, the most raw. That feels in a way more authentic that what Pride has become.”
From Stonewall to increased visibility
The Latino LGBTQ community has a rich heritage of activism. The first openly gay candidate for public office in the U.S. was Jose Julio Sarria, who ran for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1961. In New York, one of the people credited with starting the 1969 Stonewall Riots — which helped inspire the beginning of the LGBT rights movement — was Sylvia Rivera, a transgender Puerto Rican woman.
In Los Angeles, Robbie Rodriguez, 38, program director for Equality California, said that the last several years have been challenging for Latinx LGBTQ people.
“We have dealt with the very hostile Trump/Pence administration, which has not made me feel great as a Latinx gay man,” Rodriguez said. “Almost every day, the president incites fear and emboldens bigots to be open with racism, homophobia and transphobia.”
But Rodriguez is feeling optimistic because of two recent Supreme Court rulings, one that makes it illegal for employers to discriminate against people on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, and the other temporarily preserving DACA, the program that has granted deportation relief to young immigrants. “And we should look at the sense of solidarity that has developed in the community as a result of police brutality against African Americans,” he said. “I’ve been pleasantly surprised at the LGBTQ+ community showing up and showing allyship to the Black community, and lifting up their experiences.”
The visibility of Latinx LGBTQ characters in the media is heartening to Rodriguez, who recalled watching “The Real World” on MTV when he was a kid. “I watched the show with my family, and I remember seeing Pedro Zamora, who was out and HIV-positive. That meant a lot to me.”
In recent years, there has been increased Latinx LGBTQ representation on television, on shows like “Pose,” “One Day at a Time,” and “Love, Victor.” A 2019 GLAAD report found that the percentage of Latinx LGBTQ characters had increased on broadcast and cable, though the percentages on streaming dropped.
Vico Ortiz, a performer in Los Angeles who has appeared on shows like “Vida” and “American Horror Story,” has seen a shift in the public views of LGBTQ people—and believes that the entertainment industry plays a major role. “Having shows with queer characters is important. People who might not know any queer people see these shows, and hopefully that opens up conversations from a place of empathy and compassion.”
Ortiz, a millennial who identifies as nonbinary, describes the last few weeks as a whirlwind. “The anti-discrimination ruling at the Supreme Court was amazing, but literally two days before that, the Trump administration announced that it was taking away health care for transgender people. It’s like whiplash on your heart; we make fantastic strides, and then other stuff happens. It is frustrating; I want future queer youth not to have to deal with any of these issues.”
Ortiz noted the absence of in-person Pride events this year, but said that the Black Lives Matter movement was, for now, more important. “We might be missing some glitter parties, but we wouldn’t have Pride without riots and protests.”
Ortiz felt a heaviness on June 12, the fourth anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida, that left 49 people dead. “I was also thinking of the queer people who may be isolating or quarantined with nonsupportive people.”
‘Fight harder, stronger and fiercer’
Like other Americans, Latinx LGBTQ people are facing the ongoing threat of the coronavirus. The pandemic has disproportionately affected Latinos, putting their health and economic well-being at risk.
For Dr. Rafael Campo, 55, the pandemic carries echoes of a previous health crisis that struck the Latinx LGBTQ community. Campo, who teaches and practices medicine at Harvard Medical School, graduated before drug treatments for HIV/AIDS had been developed.
“There is a sad resonance in the way that HIV/AIDS originally impacted the Latinx LGBTQ population, and what is happening with coronavirus now,” he said, pointing out parallels in the lack of government response, the lack of access to care, the stigma of infection and the health disparities. “How these two very different viruses impact communities of color is part of the symmetry.”
At times, Campo has felt beleaguered by the trials that the Latinx LGBTQ community seems to be facing. Some of his patients who survived the AIDS epidemic feel a sense of renewed trauma, because they are now at risk for COVID-19. “But there are reasons to be hopeful. The demonstrations and activism around racial justice show the strength of our communities. Adverse circumstances can really bring us together and help our communities to become stronger and better.“
“We carry pride within ourselves—and no one can take that away.”
In Puerto Rico, the human rights activist Pedro Julio Serrano, 45, is concerned with the ongoing violence against transgender people, which in his view is not getting the media attention it deserves. “All over the U.S., members of the transgender community are being killed, and this doesn’t occur in a vacuum. Trump’s bigotry and divisive language has contributed to this cycle of violence. “
Puerto Rico’s new civil code, which defines myriad aspects of everyday life, is another issue that is deeply troubling to Serrano. The update coded has been controversial because it potentially could be used to take away LGBTQ rights. “It makes us invisible,” Serrano said. “It no longer includes discrimination protections. Many legal experts say it is inconsistent and poorly written, a judicial mess.”
The Latino LGBTQ community remains committed to the struggle for full equality, Serrano said. “We are going to come back and fight harder, stronger and fiercer.”
Likewise, Serrano said that losing the in-person Pride events was just a temporary setback. “For sure, when you are with other people you feel empowered and you feel solidarity. But you cannot cancel true pride. It is the product of many victories and struggles. We carry pride within ourselves — and no one can take that away.”
After warnings that it might shut its doors for good, people have raised $250,000 to secure the future of the Stonewall Inn.
The bar is considered the birthplace of the modern gay rights movement, and was designated a US National Monument by Barack Obama in 2016 in recognition of the 1969 Stonewall riots – which were sparked by a police raid on the venue.
But despite its central role in LGBT+ history, the owners of the still-functioning bar warned ahead of the 51st anniversary of the riots last week that a prolonged period of closure due to COVID-19 has left its future in doubt.
People donate thousands to rescue Stonewall Inn.
The business warned: “Our doors have been closed for over three months to ensure the health, safety, and well-being of patrons, staff and the community.
“Even in the best of times it can be difficult to survive as a small business and we now face an uncertain future. Even once we reopen, it will likely be under greatly restricted conditions limiting our business activities.”
Within just days, a crowdfunding campaign has already raised $256,900 to help secure the future of the bar – with more than 6,400 donors contributing an average of $40 each.
A further $39,500 has been raised online for a support fund set up for Stonewall Inn staff who are out of work during the Coronavirus pandemic.
‘We must preserve the legacy.’
Meanwhile, the pro-LGBT+ Gill Foundation, set up by software engineer Tim Gill, has pledged to match $250,000 in donations to rescue the historic venue.
In a release, co-chairs Scott Miller and Tim Gill said: “Queer people of colour – including trans women of colour like Marsha P Johnson, Sylvia Rivera, and Miss Major – led the uprisings against police brutality at Stonewall and in doing so helped spark the movement for LGBT+ equality.
“We must preserve that history and the legacy of the activists who led the charge.”
Stacy Lentz and Kurt Kelly, co-owners of the Stonewall Inn, added: “As the first and only LGBT+ National Monument, Stonewall is home not only to the history of our community, but also the history of our city and country.
“We are beyond grateful for this generous pledge that will help us keep the history alive.”
The Gill Foundation also announced it has committed $50,000 to trans groups including Trans Lifeline, the TransLatin@ Coalition, Brave Space Alliance and The Ally Coalition.
Five decades ago, thousands of gay and transgender activists marched from New York City’s Stonewall Inn to Central Park on the last Sunday of June. The 3-mile journey, honoring the first anniversary of the iconic 1969 Stonewall uprising, established a tradition of LGBTQ pride marches that would continue uninterrupted for 50 years and spread around the world.
And in many ways, social attitudes are ahead of the law. Five decades after people first paraded in the streets to shout out that they were proud to be gay, majorities of even doctrinally conservative religious groups support nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ people, and many say they know someone who is gay, although fewer say they know someone who is transgender.
Laws and visibility, however, have gone only so far. LGBTQ people are the victims of a quarter of hate crimes, and violence continues to plague Black and brown transgender people in particular. The number of anti-LGBTQ hate groups is rising. The Trump administration has embarkedonasystematicrollback of Obama-era pro-LGBTQ policies — including health care policies and religious exemptions — and has appointed a long list of judges with anti-LGBTQ track records.
Heritage of Pride, the nonprofit that produces the official NYC Pride march, and other pride organizations around the world will host star-studded livestreaming events, including a rally, performances and a virtual march.
In a 2011 oral history project by SAGE, an advocacy group for older LGBTQ people, Jerry Hoose — a founding member of the radical queer rights group Gay Liberation Front who participated in the Stonewall uprising and the first Pride march — said the inaugural march, then called Christopher Street Liberation Day, was about coming out of the shadows after Stonewall and finding “pride in ourselves.”
“We marched in the sunlight up to Central Park into the Sheep Meadow, proudly, in your face, and it was just a remarkable year,” said Hoose, who died in 2015. “It was the year that changed our future and our history.”
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Hoose attributed LGBTQ advances to work in that crucial first year after Stonewall. “Right after the riot,” he said, the “militant” activism that helped bring together the first Pride march was the most meaningful period of activism for the gay cause.
Some LGBTQ historians and leaders say the renewed focus on police brutality on the anniversary of the first Pride march shows that LGBTQ activism, and the event of Pride itself, is becoming more like it was 50 years ago.
“I don’t think it will ever come back in the same forms,” Lillian Faderman, author of “The Gay Revolution,” said of past pride events. “It’s just its natural evolution, and the present generation wants to do it differently from the way it’s been done for the past 50 years.”
Jon Boyd Carter, a Reclaim Pride organizer, downplayed the historic division between his group and the mainstream Pride parade, saying, “We are in a moment bigger than the differences held between queer organizations.
“We are in a moment where every American is being called upon to incorporate a new way of thinking about social justice into their everyday lives, and every person and organization that finds a way to authentically do that should be applauded and supported in that attempt,” Carter said.
Ellen Broidy, a co-founder of the first Pride march and a former member of the Gay Liberation Front, applauded Pride Month’s renewed intersectional focus.
“I’m thrilled to see all the young people, the diversity of the people, the intersectionality, people marching for a range of issues but keeping Black Lives Matter in the forefront,” Broidy said, adding that the “gay liberation movement” of the ’60s and the ’70s that she and her contemporaries advocated for was intersectional before the word existed in this context.
“We always believed strongly in what we now call intersectionality, in that statement that none of us are free until all of us are free,” Broidy said. “Also, the whole revolutionary idea was that none of us wanted a piece of the pie — we literally wanted to blow up the whole bakery.”
In an interview last year for NBC News’ “Stonewall 50: The Revolution” series, Broidy said, “The revolution did not happen.” One year later, however, she has updated her view.
“We are in a whole new era now,” she said. “Regrettably, it took death to bring it about, but there seems to be an energy in the streets.
“If people can keep this going, the revolution that failed to materialize in 1970 — in spite of the Black power movement, the anti-war movement, the LGBT movement, the women’s movement — might just come into being now,” she added. “I feel more optimistic than I have in a long time.”
More than a dozen New York City Department of Correction officers will be disciplined for their conduct surrounding the death of Layleen Xtravaganza Cubilette-Polanco, 27, a transgender woman who died last year while in solitary confinement at Rikers Island jail.
Three officers and one captain will be suspended without pay immediately, the department said in a statement Friday. It was not immediately clear what disciplinary actions the remaining 13 officers would face.
The announcement comes several weeks after Bronx District Attorney Darcel D. Clark declined to file charges following a six-month investigation into the circumstances of Cubilette-Polanco’s death.
“We are committed to ensuring that all of our facilities are safe and humane,” Department of Correction Commissioner Cynthia Brann said in a statement. “Even one death in our custody is one too many and this swift and fair determination on internal discipline makes clear that the safety and well-being of people in our custody remains our top priority.”
Cubilette-Polanco died in June 2019 after being placed in solitary confinement despite the objections of at least one doctor due to her history of seizures.
In declining to file criminal charges, Clark said in a statement that “the purview of this office is not to determine whether it was a wrong decision” to put Cubilette-Polanco in solitary confinement. Instead, it was the district attorney’s role to “determine whether that decision rose to the level of criminal behavior.”
After an “in-depth investigation,” Clark’s office determined that it would unable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that officers committed a crime that caused Cubilette-Polanco’s death.
Several weeks before she died, Cubilette-Polanco had been hospitalized at the Elmhurst Hospital Prison Ward for psychiatric care after “showing radical changes in behavior” including shouting, crying, rolling around on the floor, talking to herself, expressing suicidal thoughts and charging at a jail guard, according to a Board of Correction report.
After returning to Rikers Island, jail staff tried to get her sent to restrictive housing, or solitary confinement, as a punishment for charging at the guard, according to the report. However, a psychiatrist “verbally stated that due to [her] medical history as it pertains to seizure disorder, that he would not be able to authorized [sic] a cell housing placement” in a restrictive housing unit.
Cubilette-Polanco died after suffering an epileptic seizure, according to the medical examiner’s report.
“The death of Layleen Polanco was an incredibly painful moment for our city,” New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a statement Friday. “What happened to Layleen was absolutely unacceptable and it is critical that there is accountability.”
Councilman Ritchie Torres broke out to an early lead Tuesday night in the hotly contested battle for an open Bronx congressional seat, as the openly gay city lawmaker appeared to turn away a challenge from one of New York’s most high-profile conservative politicians.
Torres led the crowded field to replace retiring Rep. Jose Serrano (D-Bronx) with 30 percent of the votes cast during early voting and Primary Day, according to returns from 61 percent of precincts. Assemblyman Michael Blake (D-The Bronx) was in second place with 18 percent.
Councilman Ruben Diaz Sr., a conservative firebrand and minister best known for making homophobic statements, trailed in third place with just 15 percent of the vote.
The final result won’t be official for another week as most people voted by absentee ballot. Still, this is very encouraging. As you can see in the clip below, Diaz was in rather a foul mood last night. Bronx United, a coalition formed to oppose Diaz, has already declared him the loser, snarkily using Diaz’s standard “you should know” opening to all of his press releases.
The four justices appointed by Democratic presidents were joined by Justice Anthony Kennedy, a Republican appointee. Within two years, more than 150,000 same-sex couples got married. According to U.S. Census estimates, there are more than 500,000 married same-sex couples in the country.
The impact of those unions has been more than cultural. Same-sex weddings have generated more than $3 billion over the past five years, the Williams Institute study estimates, which also said the weddings have generated some $244 million in state and local taxes and created nearly 50,000 jobs.
The 5-4 Supreme Court ruling has been pelted by countless other minor challenges, but so far, none has seriously threatened it. In fact, earlier this month the high court ruled in Bostick v. Clayton County that employers couldn’t fire workers simply for being gay or transgendered.
In 1996, only 27 percent of Americans supported the freedom to marry for same-sex couples. By 2015, decades of activism, visibility, and engagement had grown that to a 63 percent majority.
Gallup confirmed this month that support has continued to grow and broaden. Today at least two-thirds of all Americans are in favor of marriage equality, including 83 percent of Democrats, 71 percent of independents, and even a 49 percent plurality of Republicans.
As recently as 1996, at the time of the world’s first-ever freedom to marry victory in Hawaii, there were zero states, zero countries in the world, where loving and committed same-sex couples could marry. As of last month’s win in Costa Rica, there are now 29 freedom to marry countries, representing more than 1.1 billion people.
In July 2013, Jim Obergefell married his longtime partner in love, John Arthur, who was gravely ill with Lou Gehrig’s disease. Because Ohio at the time didn’t allow same-sex unions, the couple flew to Maryland to exchange vows.
Arthur died of the disease three months later, and Obergefell sued to be listed on the death certificate as Arthur’s husband. That case was one of six argued together before the high court. Obergefell was the lead plaintiff, meaning the case bore his name, though he was joined by dozens of other plaintiffs.
The whirlwind of that suit meant Obergefell was never alone with his thoughts. But as the focus has shifted to other minority groups, he’s had time to learn that, contrary to the self-help books, grief does not come in clean stages. “That implies it’s the same for every person, and it isn’t,” he said. “I’m still grieving, I’m still processing.”
Five years ago in June, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to strike down all same-sex marriage bans. Of the four cases, [Michigan Attorney General Dana] Nessel asserts, DeBoer was most significant, which is why it rankles her that the landmark is known as Obergefell v. Hodgesbecause of a quirk in the order in which the appeals were filed. “To my dying day, this will make me bitter,” she says.
“We were the only case that was truly just about the right to marry your same-sex partner. We were the only ones who tried the case. We put in more in terms of blood, sweat, and tears than anybody else. April and Jayne should have been synonymous with that case. If you read the opinion, the justices mostly talk about April and Jayne’s case. Ultimately, from an historical perspective, honestly, April and Jayne got robbed.”
The US Marine Corps has released a statement celebrating Pride month and a decade since the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, and one officer is on a mission to shut down homophobes who disagree.
The Marine Corps released a statement in support of its LGBT+ members at the beginning of Pride month, which said: “During [Pride] month, we take the opportunity to recognise our LGBT service members and reflect upon the past.
“We celebrate their successes and recognise the contributions they have brought to our Corps.
“This year we celebrate the ten year anniversary of the repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ .”
It added: “Commanders and leaders are encouraged to take time to recognise the 2020 LGBT Pride Month, and promote participation in observance events throughout their local communities.”
However, the statement went largely unnoticed until it was posted on Facebook by the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in Parris Island, South Carolina.
The post quickly amassed more than 2,000 comments, and while a lot were supportive, many others were severely offended by the celebration of LGBT+ marines.
This year we celebrate the ten year anniversary of the repeal of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”. The Marine Corps takes pride in…
One man wrote: “Never thought I’d see this BS…I’m all for doing your own thing, but for it to be celebrated… wtf, over!”
Luckily, Chief Warrant Officer (CWO) Bobby Yarbrough, who conducts communication, strategy and operations for the Marine Corps, was there to shut down the homophobes.
In a response, Yarbrough wrote: “We also celebrate Black History Month, Asian Pacific Heritage Month, Month of the Military Child, etc. Should we stop celebrating those too?”
Another anti-LGBT+ commenter wrote: “What in the heck is this about? Is this what the Corps is coming to? A social experiment?”
Yarbrough swooped in again, responding: “Nope. We still fight wars. Some of our warfighters are LGBT. We like them to know we support them.”
When another commented that “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell worked just fine”, the CWO hit back: “I would imagine all the LGBT [people] that was kicked out of service would disagree. No heterosexuals were kicked out due to sexuality.
“The policy was terrible and needed to go away.”
A more positive commenter told Yarbrough: “Sir, may I please have your command photo so I may turn it into a candle and place next to my Joe Exotic one?
What’s so bad about a rainbow burrito? If you’ve been following the rift in the L.G.B.T.Q. movement over the corporate embrace of Pride, the question may have crossed your mind. Last June, the West Village was a labyrinth of rainbows, with every bank branch and Shake Shack festooned with messaging for Pride Month. Chipotle sold limited-edition Pride merch, including tank tops with a rainbow burrito and the slogan “¿Homo Estas?” The hoopla—always big, but this time bigger—marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Stonewall uprising and culminated in the annual NYC Pride March, which drew some five million revellers and boasted sponsors including MasterCard, Macy’s, Uber, and Diet Coke.
Amid the festivities, a group of activists staged an alternative: the inaugural Queer Liberation March—a smaller, rawer, more radical cousin to the established parade. In spirit it was closer to the roots of the Pride March, which was originally called the Christopher Street Liberation Day March, and began, in 1970, to mark the one-year anniversary of the Stonewall riots. The new march even re-created the original route, from Greenwich Village up to Central Park. There were no branded floats, no police contingent, no corporate funding. “One of our mottoes was ‘We’re here for queer liberation, not rainbow capitalism,’ ” one of the organizers, Natalie James, said recently. The group is now planning a second annual march, which will take place Sunday, while the main Pride March has been cancelled because of the coronavirus pandemic—meaning that, by happenstance, the upstart march has usurped the Goliath in the space of a year, just in time to draw on a renewed spirit of spontaneous protest.
The critique that Pride marches have become corporatized and depoliticized has been building for years, part of a perennial tension in the L.G.B.T.Q. movement between assimilation and radicalism. “A lot of longtime activists had just stopped going to Pride,” another organizer, Jay W. Walker, said. “They were kind of sickened by it.” He brought up the concept of pinkwashing, in which “corporate bad actors” use a show of acceptance to buy good will while distracting from less savory practices. For instance, Walker mentioned Wells Fargo, which has had floats in Pride marches for years while maintaining (until recently) financial ties with the National Rifle Association, which opposed gun-control measures after the Pulse night-club shooting, in 2016. “A big part of our issue with the corporations is they’re not consistent in their support for us throughout the year,” Francesca Barjon, the group’s twenty-four-year-old social-media organizer, said. “It’s about being able to profit off of us in June.”
Cathy Renna, a NYC Pride spokesperson, countered, “We’re so far past that with these corporations. They know they gotta do better than that. This is not about waving a rainbow flag in June in your window.” The Chipotle merch, for example, benefitted the Trevor Project, which provides services to queer youth. “It’s really easy for Pride to be a target, because Pride is something that everybody has some sense of ownership in,” Renna said, adding, of the breakout march, “If we’re going to continue to make the kind of progress that we want to make, I think it’s important that we not—I’m trying to think of a way to say this that’s family-friendly—crap on each other, because some people like to do things differently.”
The Queer Liberation March had its roots in the 2017 Pride March, which featured the disruptive début of the Resistance Contingent, a consortium of activist groups that formed in response to the Trump Administration. It included groups such as Gays Against Guns, which staged a die-in, and Hoods4Justice, which formed a blockade to prevent the N.Y.P.D. marching band from joining the parade, with banners reading “There are no queer friendly cops” and “Decolonize pride.” A dozen people were arrested. During the planning for the Pride March in 2018, Heritage of Pride, the organization that produces New York’s Pride events, tried “dissolving” the Resistance Contingent, James said. It was eventually reinstated, but the activists were disillusioned with what the march had become. “We realized we all were very dissatisfied with the event itself, the degree of corporate floats, the corporatization, the bank sponsorship, as well as having a fully uniformed police contingent given a place of honor right at the front of the march,” James said. The N.Y.P.D. presence struck the activists as particularly ironic, since the Stonewall riots had been provoked by a police raid. After delivering a set of demands to H.O.P., the mayor, and the police commissioner and getting brushed off, the group, calling itself the Reclaim Pride Coalition, took on the “colossal task” of organizing its own march.
James, who is an organizer for the queer caucus of the Democratic Socialists of America, helped arrange the first meetings at the caucus’s space at the L.G.B.T. Center, in the West Village. One point of contention was whether to allow the Gay Officers Action League, or goal, to participate. “Eventually we came out on the side of the fact that the N.Y.P.D. as an institution, as a whole, is a racist one, and therefore having any representation of it wasn’t proper,” James said, though police officers were welcome to march as individuals, out of uniform. (Renna defended the presence of goal at the main march, saying, “It’s a free-speech march. If you’re going to let the Communists march, you’re going to let the police who are queer.”) “We wanted to get rid of the barricades, and we wanted certain police-free zones within the area,” James said. A subgroup negotiated with the N.Y.P.D. “We didn’t get a formal permit,” she said. “But we did get an assurance that they would not interfere with our march.”
The start time was set for 9:30 a.m. That morning, things did not start off promisingly. “We were there at the intersection, and there was just us,” Jon Carter, one of the marshals, recalled. “We looked around and we could see empty streets, and there was a real question about what the day would look like.” Then, after thirty-five minutes, there was an “If you build it, they will come” moment, as marchers materialized. (The group estimates that forty-five thousand people attended.) “We were very intentional about having trans people in the front,” Barjon said. It ended with a rally on the Great Lawn, with speakers who included the act up veteran Larry Kramer. Walker recalled, “Larry did his normal thing that he always does, which is to scream at queer people and go, ‘You’re not doing enough!’ ”
The group was busy planning a 2020 edition of the march when covid-19 struck. After New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, temporarily banned large gatherings, the Pride March and its rambunctious challenger both cancelled. The Reclaim Pride Coalition decided to hold a virtual event, called Livestream for Queer Liberation. (The group also protested the controversial field hospital that was set up in Central Park by Franklin Graham’s organization Samaritan’s Purse, which asked volunteers to sign a statement opposing same-sex marriage.) But the calculation changed in early June, after the killings of George Floyd and other black Americans by the police sparked a wave of mass protests. “There was unanimity that we needed to have a march,” Walker said. “And we needed to have it centered on the movement for black lives.”
With only weeks to plan, the march’s scrappy, D.I.Y. quality worked in its favor. “The simplicity of our approach to organizing marches and actions makes things very fluid and flexible, and we’re able to pivot in a way that a more complex plan wouldn’t allow us to,” Carter said. The main Pride March, which Carter called a “polished spectacle,” is still not happening this year. It’s as if the covid-19 meteor killed off a twelve-million-dollar dinosaur, and a smaller, more resourceful organism survived to fill the parade-size void. Nevertheless, the group has adapted to the new circumstances: it’s gathering masks and hand sanitizer and will still put material online for people who can’t take the health risk of attending in person. It isn’t seeking any type of police blessing, advertising only the starting point (Foley Square). Also, James said, “We have voted on a start time, 1 p.m., so for the queers that utterly took umbrage at our 9:30 start time last year, I’m sure they’ll be relieved.”
The group’s timing is apt. Outside Stonewall, there’s now a sign reading “pride is a riot!”
An incredible 90 per cent of people in the United States agree with the Supreme Court ruling banning workplace discrimination for LGBT+ people, according to a new poll.
Last week, the US Supreme Court ruled that LGBT+ people are entitled to protection from discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in the workplace.
The surprise ruling extends sex-based employment discrimination protections to LGBT+ people in all 50 states.
And a new nationally representative poll of 1,001 adults in America has found that the vast majority of the public support the ruling.
The poll, which was conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), found that 9 in 10 adults (90 per cent) agreed that it should be illegal to fire people because of their sexual or gender identity.
The poll also found that 7 in 10 Republicans agree that discrimination against LGBT+ people in the workplace should be illegal.
However, Republicans are also less likely to believe that LGBT+ people, as well as Black and Hispanic people, face discrimination.
Elsewhere, pollsters found that 69 per cent of adults support laws that ban discrimination against lesbian, gay and bisexual people, while 68 per cent believe trans people should be legally protected from discrimination.
That figure is similar to the percentage of people who support laws banning discrimination based on race (71 per cent) and disability (76 per cent).
Meanwhile, 79 per cent of those surveyed believe trans people face at least some discrimination in the United States, while 74 per cent thought the same was true for lesbian, gay and bisexual people.
The public is shifting more quickly on these issues than the political and legal landscapes are.
The poll revealed that 49 per cent of Americans believe society has “not gone far enough in accepting people who are transgender”, up 10 percentage points from a 2017 poll.
Conversely, just 15 per cent said society has “gone too far” in accepting trans people, while 32 per cent said it “has been about right”.
The poll was conducted between June 16-21 through telephone interviews in English and Spanish.
“Most Americans – including most Republicans – oppose discrimination against people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender,” said KFF president Drew Altman.
“The public is shifting more quickly on these issues than the political and legal landscapes are.”
The ruling found that an employer who fires an LGBT+ employee because of their identity ‘defies the law’.
The poll comes just over a week after the Supreme Court delivered its surprise ruling.
In the court’s 6-3 ruling, conservative justice Neil Gorusch said: “It is impossible to discriminate against a person for being homosexual or transgender without discriminating against that individual based on sex.
“We do not hesitate to recognise today a necessary consequence of that legislative choice: An employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender defies the law,” he said.
Trump’s Department of Justice had sought to assert that the Title VII provisions should only apply based on the “ordinary meaning of sex” as male or female, not covering sexual orientation or gender identity.