The History of Pride. Though many events of fighting for LGBTQ+ equality, in the twenty first century more so the 2010’s stand out today. But many people forget those who fought time and time again for LGBTQ+ rights before us. And many of us don’t realise that Trans Women of colour and Black Lesbians are the reason that we have Pride today. Without them, Pride may not exist.

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During the mid to end of the twentieth century the face of Pride was led by Transgender Women and mostly Transgender Women of colour. Because of Transphobia and anti-Blackness, the Women that fought for Pride were often shoved out of Pride and they faced the most discrimination within the community.

The four Women I will mention in this post are known as pioneers and key leaders in the advocation of LGBTQ+ rights. The bravery and lifelong commitment of these Women is what sparked a movement that led to the rights of LGBTQ+ people today.

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Pride Month is celebrated in June – because of Stonewall and the Stonewall riots. If you do not know what Stonewall is or what the riots are, I’m going to tell you. In the early hours of the 28th of June in 1969 the Stonewall Inn, in Greenwich village in New York, was raided. The Stonewall Inn was a bar, owned by the New York Mafia – the Genovese crime family. The Stonewall Inn was a place where queer people of the sixties went to drink. The place was originally a straight bar and due to the laws in New York taverns were not allowed to serve LGBT individuals. The Mafia saw how opening a gay bar would profit them as gay people would flock there because they weren’t allowed in any other places.

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The Mafia had a deal with the Stonewall Inn. Because LGBT individuals weren’t allowed to drink, the bar legally wasn’t allowed to serve alcohol. Therefore, it would often get raided. The Mafia had this deal that they would inform the Stonewall Inn before a raid would take place. This allowed the Inn to prepare themselves by hiding the alcohol and removing LGBT individuals.

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However, on this particular day in June, the bar was raided but they were not informed beforehand.

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The first to be arrested and to throw the first punch was Butch Lesbian Stormé DeLarverie. Stormé was a Lesbian and activist born in Louisiana in 1920. Her mother was Black, and her father was White, her mother was her father’s servant. She moved to Chicago when she was eighteen and this is where she came out as a Lesbian. She co-founded the Jewl Box Revue, which was North America’s first integrated Drag touring company, this is where she worked for fourteen years. She sang in the shows as the only Drag King.

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When police raided the Stonewall Inn and officer shoved Stormé and she punched him in the face she was attacked and handcuffed. When an officer hit her over the head with his baton, that is when the riots began.

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Her activism continued for the next thirty plus years as she worked as a bouncer at Lesbian bars. She made sure to protect Lesbians and Lesbian spaces all through up until her eighties. In 2014 she passed away at the age of ninety-three. She is one of the fifty LGBTQ+ leaders recognised on the ‘National LGBTQ Wall of Honour’ at the site of the Stonewall Inn.

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Another face you should recognise is Marsha P Johnson. Marsha “Pay It No Mind” Johnson was a Black Trans Woman who was the face of the LGBTQ+ movements in New York. She was a Drag performer and sex worker who advocated for Trans and Homelessness youth in New York. She helped other sex workers and helped people who were living with AIDS and/or HIV. At the age of twenty-three she was one of the leaders of the Stonewall riots.

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One year after the Stonewall riots in 1970 she co-founded an organisation called STAR which means: Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries. She worked alongside Sylvia Rivera, who I will talk about next.

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STAR was a shelter for homeless transgender youth that both Women founded. They both paid for this organisation through sex work. Many people described Marsha as a fun, happy and positive person – she was always seen with a smile on her face, and she was known for her exotic hats and jewellery. Marsha was an eccentric woman. She always filled everyone with positivity. She didn’t have a permanent home and lived on the streets of New York. This was a normal struggle for Transgender individuals during the twentieth century.

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Unfortunately, Marsha’s life was lost in 1992 at the age of forty-six. Her body was found in the Hudson River. Her death was ruled down as a suicide, but anyone who knew Marsha knew that she wouldn’t commit suicide – her life revolved around fighting for Transgender rights. As even in Pride parades, Trans people were cut out and shoved aside.

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The circumstances surrounding her death were strange, but police never went into an investigation. Many activists believe that she was murdered. But even today, police will not investigate her death – in a 2017 documentary called ‘The Life and Death of Marsha P Johnson’ activists tried to find answers – but police wouldn’t cooperate.

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A quote by Marsha: “I was no one, nobody, from Nowheresville until I became a Drag Queen. That’s what made me in New York, that’s what made me in New Jersey, that’s what made me in the world.”

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Sylvia Rivera was another face of Pride. Sylvia was a Latina Trans Woman who was a lifelong Trans Rights activist within New York City. She was raised by her grandmother who beat her for her feminine expression. At age eleven, she ran away from home and became a sex worker near Times Square.

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While in New York she was taken in by a group of Drag Queens and she then began to identify as a Drag Queen. Sylvia was age seventeen when she helped lead the Stonewall riots. She claims to have thrown the second Molotov cocktail in protest of the police raiding the Inn.

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A few weeks later she co-founded the Gay Liberation Front which was a collection of gay liberation groups that aimed to fight against homophobia, capitalism, militarism, racism and sexism. A year later she co-founded STAR with Marsha P Johnson.

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Sylvia disliked the fact that the Gay Liberation was created and revolved around white, middle-class gay and lesbian people so she advocated for the movement to be more inclusive. More inclusive within race and gender identity.

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She is best known for her appearance on stage at a Pride rally in 1973. She proudly forced herself onto the stage and expressed her desire for including Trans and other marginalised people within the LGBTQ+ community. This moment became known as her ‘Y’all Better Quiet Down’ speech. Her message was so important, but she faced a lot of backlashes as many people in the audience booed her as she spoke.

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Sylvia was tired. She was drained from being repeatedly pushed out, so she took time away from activism for twenty years. She lived homeless for many years and police always found a way to tare her home that she made on the streets down.

In 2002 she died from liver cancer at the age of fifty-one. Her ashes were spread at the Hudson River where Marsha P Johnson’s body was found. People said that now they can both live together forever.

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Sylvia and Marsha’s legacy lives on.

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Miss Major Griffin-Gracy was a Black Trans Woman; she grew up in the South Side of Chicago in the 1940’s and 50’s but shew moved to New York City in the early 1960’s after reviving many threats of violence because of her Transgender identity.

Miss Major was homeless, like many Trans people, she used sex work and theft to survive and make money for herself. Like Marsha, Stormé and Sylvia, she was a frequent customer at the Stonewall Inn, and she took part in the riots when they began.

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On the first night of riots, she was punched in the jaw and was nocked out and taken into custody unconscious. After being in prison for five years in the late 1970’s she moved to California. There she continued her work as an activist. She worked with the AIDS epidemic without any profit for herself. She also advocated for prison abolition. During 2005 she began working for the Transgender, Gender Variant and Intersex Justice Project and she became the Executive Director. She advocated for Trans Women.

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In 2015 she moved to Arkansas where she continued to advocate for her community. While there she sponsored the House of GG, which is a retreat house for the Trans community.

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These four women shaped the world as we know it today. Without their constant fights, we wouldn’t have Pride. They worked for a better world. They worked for equality. And they worked for diversity in a world built for straight, middle-class and top-class, white citizens (mostly male dominated).  

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