Jaclyn Friedman on the legacy of Stonewall after 40 years, and why waiting isn’t working for gay rights:
Forty years ago, a raucous group of transvestites, queens, dykes, hustlers, and homeless queer kids gathered at their local bar in Greenwich Village: The Stonewall Inn. This wasn’t a political meeting — and contrary to the common historical narrative, they weren’t leaders in the nascent gay-rights movement. (Those leaders were far too concerned with convincing the powers that were that gay Americans were “just like everyone else” to set foot inside the Stonewall.) No, this was just an average Saturday night in 1969, and the Stonewall’s patrons had gathered for the same reasons that most people gather at a bar — to dance, drink, hang out with friends, and maybe get lucky.
Then something extraordinary happened.
It wasn’t the police raid. Raids were pretty average then, too, as cops made a habit of targeting gay hangouts. What was extraordinary was that, for whatever reason, on that night everyone at the bar began to fight back.
