FreetheLGBT Pride Month Fiesta

Day 28: On This Day

It is widely considered that June 28th, 1969, is the most important date with regards to the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement: The Stonewall Rebellion.  It commemorates the resistance of LGBTQ+ peoples to a police raid in Manhattan, New York, on a bar called Stonewall Inn at 1:20 in the morning. 

Here, in the 1960s, police raids on establishments that welcomed LGBTQ+ people were all too common heard of. Many people without identification cards or those not conforming to accepted dress norms  were arrested on the spot. But during the raid on Stonewall Inn the police found themselves against resistance. 

It is recorded that this resistance was mostly a display of refusing orders and mocking the police at first, but later became violent when police could no longer contain the gathering crowd of over 500 protesters—a whole mix of races, ages, genders, and sexualities, including heterosexuals. 

During the following week, protests erupted and tensions ran high. Within weeks, protesters and allies alike organized activist groups to establish safe places for LGBTQ+ people to be open about who they are without fear of being arrested by the authorities. 

On June 28th, 1970, demonstrators held the first-ever Pride marches in New 

York, Los Angeles and San Francisco for the one year anniversary of the riots at Stonewall Inn. In 1971, London, Boston, Paris, Dallas, Milwaukee, Stockholm, and West Berlin also held marches in commemoration. 

Following this, LBBTQ+ rights movements sprang up in every major city in the US, Canada, Western Europe and Australia. Today, Pride events are held annually in June (or July, in some places) throughout the world. Every year is a step closer to the movement's goals: equality, understanding, acceptance, respect and solidarity.