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Happy #LGBTQhistory Month! When schools have an #LGBTQ inclusive curriculum, LGBTQ students feel safer at school and hear homophobic and transphobic remarks less frequently. Our timeline, coloring book, and #LGBTQhistory resources are great for this month and all year round. ➡️ glsen.org/lgbtqhistory

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Sylvia Rivera Discusses the Stonewall Riots in a Never-Heard-Before Interview

H/T: Out

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Miss Major Is A Trans Elder And Stonewall Icon…And She’s Changing The World

It’s been almost fifty years since the historic night at the Stonewall Inn that many people cite as the beginning of the mainstream fight for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights. Decades later, one trans activist who was present the night of the riots is still fighting for the rights and survival of transgender and gender-nonconforming people.

Miss Major is a community leader ― an organizer, activist, prison abolitionist, former sex worker, formerly incarcerated person, transgender elder and mother to countless transgender and GNC youth. She’s built a legacy recognized globally, particularly with her work with incarcerated transgender individuals. Her tireless efforts as an activist and respected elder in the community have not only saved countless lives but paved the way for modern day trans and GNC people operating in the public spotlight and fighting for queer people on a national level. Her legacy has even inspired an award-winning documentary called MAJOR!, currently making its rounds at film festivals.

In this interview with The Huffington Post, Miss Major reflects on her work over the decades, the history of the Stonewall Riots and how we can move away from a system of mass incarceration towards one of harm reduction.

H/T: HuffPo

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LGBTQ History Is American History

Nearly 50 years later, in the very same vicinity, the events of June 27, 2016 will go down in history as the day when the President of the United States, the Department of the Interior, the National Park Service, the National Park Foundation, and individuals and organizations inside and outside the LGBTQ community together declared loudly and clearly that LGBTQ history is American history - and that at this place this story will be told.

H/T: HuffPo

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This LGBT Pride Month, we are ‪#‎GLSENproud‬ to see LGBT history celebrated with the naming of the Stonewall National Monument as the first national monument dedicated to the LGBT equality movement.

‪#‎ShowYourPride‬ and celebrate LGBT Pride Month when you visitwww.glsen.org/showyourpride.

[GLSEN]

Meet the Trans Women of Color Who Helped Put Stonewall on the Map

Know your LGBT history!

Back in the 1960s, the Stonewall Inn was the one of the few bars in Manhattan where people of the same sex could dance with each other without police harassment, which was only protected through alleged Mafia ties. On June 28, 1969, the bar’s patrons clashed with police officers, in a raid that would have otherwise resulted in arrests and public shaming. However, this time the patrons fought back, setting off what we now know as the modern LGBT movement, including the tradition of LGBT Pride marches. Two often-forgotten people who made an impact that night were transgender women of color: Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera.

H/T: Mic

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12 LGBT Activists Say What Stonewall Means To Them

Activists and allies, politicians and representatives from the National Parks Department gathered Monday night in Greenwich Village, New York – the historic epicenter of the LGBT rights movement – to discuss the possibility of a Stonewall Inn National Park.

H/T: BuzzFeed

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Obama to Name Stonewall Inn First-Ever National Monument for Gay Rights

Recognizing and celebrating LGBT history is important!

The Stonewall Inn, the Greenwich Village bar that played a crucial role in the gay-rights movement, was given landmark status by New York City last year, but the Associated Press reports the Obama administration will do even more to distinguish the site. According to “two individuals familiar with the administration’s plans,” the president will name the bar the first national monument for gay rights — he’s reportedly considering proposals that would involve cordoning off Christopher Park, a small sliver of land near Stonewall Inn, and surrounding areas. 

H/T: NY Mag

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Queer Cinema Before Stonewall

When did queer cinema begin? What did it look like before the German New Wave breakthroughs of Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Ulrike Ottinger, before the flashpoint of William Friedkin’s Cruising, before its efflorescence in the ’90s? The popular understanding of gay and lesbian film prior to Stonewall—that pivotal moment in 1969—is often one of censorship and subtext, of sad young men and Dietrich in a tuxedo. This survey aims to revise that conception dramatically and from a number of different perspectives, considering homophile auteurs in classical Hollywood, visionary grindhouse offerings, home movies, sapphic vampire pictures, underground camp stylings, and physique films alongside radical formal experiments and lavender touchstones like Leontine Sagan’s Mädchen in Uniform. Charting a course from the late 19th century to the cusp of liberation, the Film Society’s pre-Stonewall program reveals the terrain of early queer cinema as far vaster and more varied than received histories might suggest.

[GLSEN]

advocate.com

Sylvia Rivera Gets a Place in the National Portrait Gallery

The pioneering activist is the first transgender American to be featured in the gallery, located at the Smithsonian Institution.

[glsen]

“At the National Portrait Gallery, we look to include portraits of people who have made a significant impact on American culture,” gallery director Kim Sajet told MSNBC. “In the aftermath of the Stonewall riots, Sylvia Rivera expanded the gay liberation movement and fought for equal rights for people who embraced different gender identities.”