The Night the Queers Fought Back—Stonewall and the Birth of a Movement

The Stonewall was a dive bar operated by the Mob in New York's Greenwich Village.  It's patrons were outcasts and the most flamboyant of a rough streets scene--young hustlers, drag queens, butch lesbians.  It was also an inter-racial scene that attracted police attention.  Wealthier and more respectable Gays gathered and partied more discretely in posh clubs that authorities usually ignored.

Fifty years ago on the night of June 27, 1969 something snapped when New York City Police made one of their regular raids on a Gay bar.  Instead of meekly submitting to arrest, the denizens  of the Stonewall Inn, a Greenwich Village bar operated by the Mafia and patronized by the most marginalized of folks—homeless street kid hustlers, drag queens, butch dikes, and others resisted when police started to arrest them. 

The raid was conducted by a small team of detectives, uniformed officers including women led by Deputy Inspector Seymour Pine of the Public Morals Squad. 

For some reason patrons refused to follow the familiar procedure of such raids—allowing restroom inspections of individuals in women’s clothing to determine if they were men and providing identification upon request.  Dumfounded by resistance, police called for backup and patrol wagons.  There was some scuffling inside.  

The Stonewall Inn in 1969 looked just as seedy as it was.

Meanwhile some patrons who had been released were joined by passersby outside the bar.  The crowd quickly swelled.  Taunts and jeers were exchanged between the police and crowd.  The crowd began to interfere as drag queens were led to the wagons.  When a lesbian made several unsuccessful attempts to escape, she was beaten and cried out to the crowd, “Why don’t you guys do something?” 

That ignited the crowd which began pelting police with beer cans, coins, and rubble from a nearby construction site.  They attacked the wagons, freeing some of those arrested.  Police retreated into the bar and barricaded themselves.  They grabbed some members of the crowd as they went, including folk singer Dave Van Ronk who had been playing at a nearby club and came out to investigate the ruckus, and Howard Smith, a writer for the Village Voice. 

When a lesbian named Betty repeatedly tried to break away from custody and was roughly handled by several cops she famously pleaded, "Why don't you guys do something?"  It became the Remember he Alamo battle cry of a movement.

Observers reported that the most aggressive members of the crowd were the young street kids.  They used an uprooted parking meter as a ram to try and break down the doors of the bar and crashed through the plywood covered windows.  When they got in police drew their pistols and threatened to shoot while rioters used lighter fluid to start a fire. 

The Fire Department responded as the crowd outside grew to hundreds.  The Tactical Police Force (TPF) arrived in riot gear to rescue the besieged officers in the saloon.  They formed a phalanx and moved up the street being blocked and taunted by an impromptu kick line of drag queens and “sissies.”  

Drag queens played a leading role in the resistance after the police raid in the the nights that followed.

Rioters and police played a brand of violent tag around the narrow streets of the Village until after 4 AM.  

Later that morning the riots were front page news. 

And they were not over.  The next night even larger crowds gathered in front of the building and fighting continued.  Despite heavy rain there were sporadic eruptions the next two nights. 

Meanwhile the Gay community, which had been largely unorganized except for the small Mattachine Society which advocated a campaign to educate the public that Homosexuals were “normal,” began to meet and debate tactics.  Thousands of fliers were printed for a Wednesday march. 

The original rebellion, which had been entirely spontaneous, was already laying the groundwork for a new, open and defiant Gay movement.  Taking cues from the Civil Rights Movement and the Peace Movement, which were also confronting authorities with a new militancy, and taking advantage of the traditional anti-establishment radicalism of the Village, the beginning of a new movement was taking place. 

On Wednesday the Village Voice—the most liberal paper in New York, carried a harshly critical piece on the riots describing participants as “forces of faggotry.”  Angry demonstrators descended on the Voice offices that night and threatened to burn them down.  Other violent confrontations erupted in the neighborhood as police tried to stop marchers, this time for the first time carrying signs and “making demands.” 

That was the last night of disturbances, but things changed quickly over the next year.  Two new militant Gay organizations emerged in New York, the Gay Liberation Front, which allied itself with the broader radical movement, and the Gay Activists Alliance which advocated a focused campaign demanding an end to police harassment and for broader rights for Gays. 

Similar or allied groups sprang up in major cities and college towns across the country.  New Yorkers founded three new newspapers, Gay, Come Out!, and Gay Power which soon had press runs to 2000 to 2500.  Again, similar publications were founded across the country.  

The Christopher Street March on the first anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion is considered the founding event of the Gay Pride marches now held internationally.

On June 28, 1970 the anniversary of what was now being called the Stonewall Rebellion was marked by Christopher Street Liberation Day and a 51 block march from the Village to Central Park with thousands of marchers filling the streets.  Marches were also held in Chicago and Los Angeles. 

These became the Gay Pride Marches and annual events across the country.  There was a huge march is scheduled this Sunday in Chicago.  An indication of how accepted and mainstream Gay rights have become, at least in big cities, is that there are official floats sponsored by the city’s sports teams. Politicians galore and all of the major media turn out to court the potent Gay vote and consumer demographic.  But there were still loads drag queens and all of the high camp fun that the carnival-like parades have become known for.

This year New York City will have competing Pride Parades on June 30.  The Heritage of Pride (HOP) Parade  has faced criticism in past years for over commercialization, dominant corporate  presence in  floats and units. campaigning politicians, the presence of uniformed police officers, and restrictive rules. The Reclaim Pride Coalition (RPC) will sponsor an alternative back to basic march “Eschewing the corporate-saturated, highly policed nature of recent parades, the March is a truly grassroots action that mobilizes the community to address the many social and political battles that continue to be fought locally, nationally, and globally.”  Local TV will lavishly cover the older, more respectable event.

But this year Gay Pride Parades  also reflect a community increasingly under siege by a well-oiled and funded backlash led by religious zealots and abetted by the radicalized Republican Party eager to pander to a big part of its base.  With Republicans in complete control of many governorships and State houses rafts of anti-Gay legislation have been enacted or proposed. 

And now the Cheeto-in-Charge, who in an earlier incarnation had proclaimed himself a “friend of the Gays,” has lent his full blather and bluster to stoking the fires of repression.  He let Gay Pride Month pass without even the most tepid acknowledgement and order U.S embassies abroad not to fly the Pride Flag—an order that was flouted at many of them.  Trump has worked to strip protections against discrimination in agency after agency. The Supreme Court recently smiled on so-called religious liberty grounds for refusing service to Gays, lesbians, and transgender folk.

So it was not a surprise that in the midst of the usual party, floats and marching units speak out.  Or that in several cities outright protests have broken  out around or in the parades.  50 years after the fact Pride Month has returned to its roots—Resistance!

Stonewall—The Night the Queers Fought Back

The Stonewall was a dive bar operated by the Mob in New York's Greenwich Village.  It's patrons were outcasts and the most flamboyant of a rough streets scene--young hustlers, drag queens, butch lesbians.  It was also an inter-racial scene all of it attracted police attention.  Wealthier and more respectable Gays gathered and partied more discretely in posh clubs that authorities usually ignored.

On the night of June 27, 1969 something snapped when New York City Police made one of their regular raids on a Gay bar.  Instead of meekly submitting to arrest, the denizens  of the Stonewall Inn, a Greenwich Village bar operated by the Mafia and patronized by the most marginalized of folks—homeless street kid hustlers, drag queens, butch dikes, and others resisted when police started to arrest them. 

The raid was conducted by a small team of detectives, uniformed officers including women led by Deputy Inspector Seymour Pine of the Public Morals Squad. 

For some reason patrons refused to follow the familiar procedure of such raids—allowing restroom inspections of individuals in women’s clothing to determine if they were men and providing identification upon request.  Dumfounded by resistance, police called for backup and patrol wagons.  There was some scuffling inside.  

The Stonewall in looked just as seedy as it was.

Meanwhile some patrons who had been released were joined by passersby outside the bar.  The crowd quickly swelled.  Taunts and jeers were exchanged between the police and crowd.  The crowd began to interfere as drag queens were led to the wagons.  When a lesbian made several unsuccessful attempts to escape, she was beaten and cried out to the crowd, “Why don’t you guys do something?” 

That ignited the crowd which began pelting police with beer cans, coins, and rubble from a nearby construction sight.  They attacked the wagons, freeing some of those arrested.  Police retreated into the bar and barricaded themselves.  They grabbed some members of the crowd as they went, including folk singer Dave Van Ronk who had been playing at a nearby club and came out to investigate the ruckus, and Howard Smith, a writer for the Village Voice. 

When a lesbian named Betty repeatedly tried to break away from custody and was roughly handled by several cop she famously pled, "Why don't you guys do something?"  It became the Remember he Alamo battle cry of a movement.

Observers reported that the most aggressive members of the crowd were the young street kids.  They used an uprooted parking meter as a ram to try and break down the doors of the bar and crashed through the plywood covered windows.  When they got in police drew their pistols and threatened to shoot while rioters used lighter fluid to start a fire. 

The Fire Department responded as the crowd outside grew to hundreds.  The Tactical Police Force (TPF) arrived in riot gear to rescue the besieged officers in the saloon.  They formed a phalanx and moved up the street being blocked and taunted by an impromptu kick line of drag queens and “sissies.”  

Drag queens played a leading role in the resistance after the police raid in the the nights that followed.

Rioters and police played a brand of violent tag around the narrow streets of the Village until after 4 AM. 

Later that morning the riots were front page news. 

And they were not over.  The next night even larger crowds gathered in front of the building and fighting continued.  Despite heavy rain there were sporadic eruptions the next two nights. 

Meanwhile the Gay community, which had been largely unorganized except for the small Mattachine Society which advocated a campaign to educate the public that Homosexuals were “normal,” began to meet and debate tactics.  Thousands of fliers were printed for a Wednesday march. 

The original rebellion, which had been entirely spontaneous, was already laying the groundwork for a new, open and defiant Gay movement.  Taking cues from the Civil Rights Movement and the Peace Movement, which were also confronting authorities with a new militancy, and taking advantage of the traditional anti-establishment radicalism of the Village, the beginning of a new movement was taking place. 

On Wednesday the Village Voice—the most liberal paper in New York, carried a harshly critical piece on the riots describing participants as “forces of faggotry.”  Angry demonstrators descended on the Voice offices that night and threatened to burn them down.  Other violent confrontations erupted in the neighborhood as police tried to stop marchers, this time for the first time carrying signs and “making demands.”  

That was the last night of disturbances, but things changed quickly over the next year.  Two new militant Gay organizations emerged in New York, the Gay Liberation Front, which allied itself with the broader radical movement, and the Gay Activists Alliance which advocated a focused campaign demanding an end to police harassment and for broader rights for Gays. 

Similar or allied groups sprang up in major cities and college towns across the country.  New Yorkers founded three new newspapers, Gay, Come Out!, and Gay Power which soon had press runs to 20-2500.  Again, similar publications were founded across the country.  

The Christopher Street March on the first anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion is considered the founding event of the Gay Pride marches now held internationally.

On June 28, 1970 the anniversary of what was now being called the Stonewall Rebellion was marked by Christopher Street Liberation Day and a 51 block march from the Village to Central Park with thousands of marchers filling the streets.  Marches were also held in Chicago and Los Angeles. 

These became the Gay Pride Marches that have become annual events across the country.  There was a huge march this Sunday in Chicago.  An indication of how accepted and mainstream Gay rights have become, at least in big cities, is that there were official floats sponsored by the city’s sports teams. Politicians galore and all of the major media turn out to court the potent Gay vote and consumer demographic.  But there were still loads drag queens and all of the high camp fun that the carnival-like parades have become known for.

Resistance was a theme at many Gay Pride marches this year like this one in Los Angeles.

But this year Gay Pride Parades  also reflected a community increasingly under siege by a well-oiled and funded backlash led by religious zealots and abetted by the radicalized Republican Party eager to pander to a big part of its base.  With Republicans in complete control of many governorships and State houses rafts of anti-Gay legislation have been enacted or proposed. 

And now the Cheeto-in-Charge, who in an earlier incarnation had proclaimed himself a “friend of the Gays,” has lent his full blather and bluster to stoking the fires of repression.  He let Gay Pride Month pass without even the most tepid acknowledgement but pointedly spoke to a meeting of an ardently anti-Gay religious group.  He also signed an Executive Order supposedly in support of religious liberty that gives free reign to churches, charities, businesses, and individual professionals and crafts people to discriminate against Gays in almost every way.  Hell, it virtually invites them to do so.  Internationally Trump had refused to protest and seemed to endorse his pal Vladimir Putin’s increasingly violent suppression of Gays in Russia and practically endorsed the even more extreme repression by Turkey which is rapidly turning into a right wing Islamic dictatorship.  His proposed budget stripped funding from HIV/AIDS research and he supports the Senate Republican health care bill that will strip coverage to many.

So it was not a surprise that in the midst of the usual party, floats and marching units spoke out.  Or that in several cities outright protests broke out around or in the parades.  48 years after the fact Pride Month has returned to its roots—Resistance!

International Holocaust Remembrance Day Calls Us Anew

Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day.  It will be observed—celebrated is certainly the wrong word here—in ways big and small, significant and trivial in many places across the world.  The commemoration comes on the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps in Poland by the advancing Red Army on January 27, 1945.  American, British, Canadian, and other Allied Forces liberated other camps, but Auschwitz was the pinnacle of efficiency for the Nazi industrialization of mass murder.

On the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation the United Nations General Assembly held a special commemorative session.  The following November the General Assembly created the commemoration day, which was first observed in 2006.

In November of 1944 as the Red Army advanced from the East and the Allies pressed on the Western Front, SS Chief Heinrich Himmler ordered the beginning to the elimination of evidence of death camps in Poland.   Gassing operations were suspended and crematoria at Auschwitz were ordered destroyed or, in one case, converted into a bomb shelter.  As things got worse, Himmler ordered the evacuation of the camps in early January directing that “not a single prisoner from the concentration camps falls alive into the hands of the enemy.”

On January 17, 58,000 Auschwitz detainees were set on death march on west towards Wodzisław Śląski. Approximately 20,000 Auschwitz prisoners made it to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany, where they were liberated by the British in April 1945.

Auschwitz survivors with Red Army officers.

But that left over 8,000 of the weakest and sickest abandoned behind with scant supplies.  The Red Army 322nd Rifle Division arrived 10 days later to find 7,500 barely alive and 600 corpses lying where ever they finally collapsed.  They also found much evidence of the greater crimes Himmler had hoped to hide—370,000 men’s suits, 837,000 women’s garments, and 7.7 tons of human hair.

Coming in the midst of the Yalta Conference and other war news, the liberation received scant attention at the time.  And the Soviets, who were at best ambivalent at the highest levels about what to do with the liberated Jews, did little to publicly celebrate their role in the liberation, at least at first.

It was only after survivors reached the West and eventually Israel as refugees, that Auschwitz emerged as a special, horrific symbol of the whole Holocaust.

Seventy Seven years after those camp liberation things are getting worse—much worse—at an alarming rate.  Traditional anti-Semitism is on the rise across both Western Europe and in the old Soviet Empire, fed by resurgent right-wing nationalism on one hand and the Machiavellian dream of re-establishing Russian dominance of the East by Vladimir Putin on the other.  

Children and staff of a day care facility in an Albany, New York Jewish Community Center (JCC) after it was targeted in a wave of bomb threats.

Meanwhile Donald Trump has catapulted to power in the United States with a big boost from the so-called Alt-Right—the old Neo-Nazi/Skin Head/Klan/Patriot Militia wolves in sheep’s clothing.  Trump has brought one of their most prominent spokesmen, Former Breitbart chief Steve Bannon, an open and notorious anti-Semite into the White House as his top aide.  This cozy relationship has empowered a new wave of hate speech, threats, intimidation, and graffiti attacks on Jews and Jewish institutions.  A planned Neo-Nazi anti-Jewish march in Whitefish, Montana; a wave of bomb threats phoned into Jewish Community Centers; swastikas and other hate messages painted on synagogues, businesses, and home; organized social media harassment of Jewish celebrities, writers, ordinary citizens, and those who speak up for them; and escalating violence against protestors that led to the shooting of an unarmed anti-fascist, and IWW member by a Neo-Nazi on the University of Washington campus.  All of these incidents have gone down without a murmur from the new lords of the White House who seem reluctant to hurt the feelings of their pet bully boys.

Meanwhile Israel, the state established with so much hope as a refuge and haven for Holocaust survivors and Jews from anywhere who no longer felt safe, has fallen under the sway of their own brand of right wing xenophobes.  The election of Trump was greeted with jubilation by Bibi Netanyahu who believes he now has a carte blanch from the American administration to launch widespread construction of settlements on the West Bank and in Arab neighborhoods Jerusalem which will displace, make homeless, and pauperize thousands of Muslims and even Christian Arabs.  He will also have a free hand to crush demonstrations and opposition with virtually unlimited force and expand already wide-spread “preventative detention.” Despite the protests of many Israelis, growing opposition in the American Jewish community, and world-wide condemnation, Netanyahu maintains the Muslims have no rights that he is bound to respect if he blandly declares them to be enemies of Israel and terrorists.

In America the most ardent supporters of Israel right or wrong, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and its politically influential and deep pocket members and allies, have been more than willing to turn a blind eye to the cancer of anti-Semitism at the heart of Trumpism in exchange for a blank check to Netanyahu and perhaps even a long dreamed of attack on Iran.  It is an extension of the deal with the devil they have long been party to with extreme right wing Evangelicals who support Israel only because it fulfills the necessary prophesy leading to Armageddon, the End of Time, and the Rapture.

Donald Trump shows off his anti-immigrant and Muslim executive order handiwork.

Trump, for his part, has not made Jews the obvious objects of his wrath.  Instead, within days of his election, he moved rapidly against the demons of his imagination—immigrants and Muslims—all Muslims, just as he had promised his core of nativist supporters on the campaign trail.  The speed and scope of his action stunned even those of us who expected the worst.  In a series of sweeping executive orders and administrative actions he has moved to:

• Build the infamous border wall against Mexico at a cost of $15-25 billion Dollars and proposed to pay for it with a 20% tariff on Mexican imports that would pick the pocket of all Americans who consume fruits and vegetables, beer and tequila, the auto parts essential to all “American made” cars, many appliances and tools, house wares, apparel and hats, etc.
• Step-up immigration arrests nationally and expedites deportations.
• Order the building of large new detention facilities to hold huge number of expected detainees.  Many believe these will be virtual concentration camps.
• Fill those camps by ending so called catch and release which allows many arrested on immigration offenses to be released pending hearings.
• Punish Sanctuary Cities and Universities who are uncooperative with immigrations sweeps and won’t automatically turn over to Federal authorities every immigrant picked up for a minor crime or traffic infraction or who in some other way comes to the attention of local governments.  That would jeopardize billions of Federal dollars to public schools, health program, housing, and vital public services including police and fire.  It would also disrupt transportation and infrastructure improvement projects.  In short it would be a devastating monkey wrench in the American economy.
• Create a weekly report of “all crimes committed by immigrants” to stir up public fear.

Of course even this is just the tip of the iceberg of outrages.  Refugees and Muslims come in for special attention.

• Suspended the issuance of visas to citizens of seven Muslim counties—Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen—for at least 30 days with the likelihood that the ban would be extended indefinitely.  All are countries that have come under American military action, bombing, and drone attacks in recent years.  Not included is Saudi Arabia which had 15 citizens involved in the 9/11 attacks and was the original base of al Quida and its principle funding source.
• Stop all refugee resettlement immediately and suspend all claims of political asylum.
• Order the military to reviews restrictions on enhance interrogation—torture with the intent of reinstating its use and authorized the use of so-called Black Ops secret detention facilities.
• Instructed Homeland Security and domestic law enforcement agencies to step up surveillance and monitoring of the Islamic community and its institutions.

Although this round of orders did not include a Muslim registry that Trump touted on the campaign trail, officials hinted that something along those lines may be in the pipeline. White House spokesman Sean Spicer hinted that there were more actions under consideration to “Keep Americans safe.”

Young American Jews like these from the Jewish Voice for Peace are helping to lead resistance to dangerous anti-Muslim Trump administration orders.

The sweeping nature of these actions drew a sharp response not just from the usual Civil Liberties suspects but from a broad range of people.  Led by New York Mayor Bill de Blasio municipal leaders from around the country defiantly pledged not to buckle under to threats to defund Sanctuary Cities.  A broad spectrum of religious leaders including the Catholic National Council of Bishops, mainstream Protestants, and even many moderate Evangelicals joined in public condemnation.  Many Jewish leaders spoke out, often arm and arm with Muslim leaders.  On Wednesday alone 2000 Conservative Rabbis issued a strong statement.  Several Holocaust survivors have spoken out.  Former Secretary of State Madelyn Albright who discovered a few years ago that she was a Jew whose family escaped from Czechoslovakia while she was a toddler and raised her as Christian, said that she would register as a Muslim if a registry was established.  She was joined by celebrities including Mayim Bialik of the Big Bang Theory.

Over 10,000 have signed a MoveOn.org pledge to register and there are other pledges out there.  I signed.  So should you.  It is effective Resistance like the Danes who sewed yellow Stars of David on their own clothes to protect their Jewish neighbors from the Nazis.  You can sign here:  http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/i-pledge-to-register .

At least it’s a start.  Don’t be a good German and stand by while we slide deeper into evil.

I am not saying that Trump is Hitler.  I am saying he is a fascist and must be stopped.

Resist!