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June 28, 1969 is a date in American homosexual history revered as a watershed moment. On that date, riots broke out at the Stonewall Inn in New York City in the early morning hours. Those riots are often pointed to as the first instance in American history where gay and lesbian resistance to government-supported persecution took place. It is held to be the start of the gay rights movement in the United States. The following year, June 28, 1970, Gay Pride marches took place in New York and Los Angeles--and are currently held annually throughout the world to mark the Stonewall event.
Suppression of Gays In the 1950s, strong suppressive movements existed with the purpose of controlling and eliminating subversive security risks. The McCarthy hearings led to a somewhat paranoid search for communists and anarchists. The State Department added homosexuals to the list, saying they were enotionally unstable, and thus were subject to blackmai (as security risks). From 1947 to 1950, 1700 federal job applications were denied, 4380 persons were discharged from the armed forces and 420 were fired from their government jobs for being suspected homosexuals.
In the fifties and sixties:
- the FBI kept lists of known homosexuals and their friends
- the US Postal Service kept track of addresses where homosexual material was mailed
- state and local governments shut down gay bars, arrested customers and exposed them in newspapers
- the wearing of "opposite gender" clothing was outlawed in some cities
- professors suspected of being gay were fired by universities
- thousands of gays and lesbians were jailed, fired or institutionalized in mental hospitals
The above material was gleaned from an article in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots , reviewed 6-17-09.
Is there any wonder why gays would tend to stay "in the closet" and live in fear of having their sexual orientation disclosed? A homosexual young person, in their twenties or thirties shows great courage in openly declairing their sexual orientation. Even to their parents, who for the most part were culturally conditioned by the "anti-homosexual" culture of the last half of the twentieth century.
I worked as a professional counselor at a mental health facility in the 1970s. I became known as the "gay counselor" because I was one of a very small number of counselors who were willing to counsel with gays. In ten years of counseling I found no homosexual persons who experienced the sexual orientation as a choice. The only person who said it was a c hoice turned out to be a bi-sexual person, not a homosexual person.
Think about it: why would anyone freely choose a sexual life that would bring such hatred and social ostracism? It is not a choice. Think about it. If you are heterosexual, do you remember making that choice regarding your sexual orientation? Think about it. Most heterosexuals are usually repulsed, or at least have an aversion, to same-sex intercourse. Most homosexuals express the same repulsion, aversion to opposite-sex intercourse. Think about it.
SR Snips:
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Hate crimes occur when a perpetrator targets a victim because of his or her perceived membership in a certain social group, usually defined by racial group, religion, sexual orientation, disability, ethnicity, nationality, age, gender, gender identity or political affiliation.
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US Defense The United States has spent $903 billion in Afghanistan and Iraq since hostilities began.
Time, 6-22-09, p. 15
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Gay RightsThe Defense of Marriage Act (1996) says that no state needs to treat a relationship between persons of the same sex as a marriage, even if the relationship is considered a marriage in another state. The federal government defines marriage as a legal union exclusively between one man and one woman.
S/R Report 01: HATE is available at this same site. Scroll down.
