The Stonewall Inn in Manhattan, New York was an LGBTQ+ nightclub and safer
space for the community in the 1960s, and still is today. The Stonewall
Riots occurred when members of the queer community came together to fight
against ongoing police harassment and arrests, namely of customers who
were breaking a criminal statute that allowed police to apprehend anyone
wearing less than three "gender-appropriate" items of clothing. Thus,
police officers would commonly arrest trans women, cross-dressers, and
drag performers under the pretense of "female impersonation." On June 28,
1969, patrons, primarily trans women of color, fought back for their
rights during a regular police raid, and there erupted the infamous
Stonewall Riots. This activism inspired the beginning of what we now know
as the LGBTQ+ movement, including the tradition of LGBTQ+ Pride marches.
Image By Rhododendrites - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=49720743
Marsha "Pay It No Mind" Johnson
Marsha P. Johnson was a Black trans woman who was a force behind the
Stonewall Riots and surrounding activism that sparked a new phase of the
LGBTQ+ movement in 1969. Along with Sylvia Rivera, she established the
Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR) in 1970--a group
committed to supporting transgender youth experiencing homelessness in New
York City. Marsha P. Johnson was tragically murdered on July 6, 1992 at
the age of forty-six. Her case was originally closed by the NYPD as an
alleged suicide, but transgender activist Mariah Lopez fought for it to be
reopened for investigation in 2012. Marsha P. Johnson is now one of the
most venerated icons in LGBTQ+ history, has been celebrated in a series of
books, documentaries, and films. Her actions and words continue to inspire
trans activism and resistance, and will continue to do so well into the
future.
Image By Dramamonster (Gary LeGault) - CC BY-SA 4.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=76458102
Sally Ride
Sally Ride was a lesbian engineer, physicist, and astronaut. She completed
a double major in Physics and English at Stanford University and then
joined NASA in 1978. There, she became both the youngest American
astronaut and first American woman to travel to space aboard the space
shuttle Challenger. After leaving NASA, Ride became the Director of the
California Space Institute at the University of California, San Diego,
eventually starting her own company to create educational resources and
programs known as Sally Ride Science for students, especially girls, to
pursue careers in STEM.
Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin was a Civil Rights organizer and activist, best known for
his work as adviser to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the primary
organizer of the March on Washington in 1963. Throughout his life, Rustin
was engaged in several pacifist groups and early civil rights protests,
with a particular passion for non-violent resistance. Due to his
high-level status as an organizing figure, he was arrested several times
for civil disobedience, as well as for being a gay man. Despite this, he
never stopped fighting for equality for Black and LGBTQ+ people. He also
sought to bring both the worlds of queer resistance and racial justice
together, being the first person to bring the AIDS crisis to the attention
of the NAACP in 1987. That same year, Bayard Rustin passed away, just four
days prior to the 24th anniversary of the March on Washington.
Edie Windsor
A lesbian and pioneering woman in the STEM field, Edie Windsor is
celebrated for challenging unequal marriage rights and winning the
landmark 2013 case, United States v. Windsor. By challenging the
constitutionality of the “Defense of Marriage Act” (DOMA), Edie paved the
way for the 2015 Supreme Court decision that would recognize same-sex
couples in all fifty states. She initially sued the United States for
denying her the federal estate tax exemption for surviving spouses after
her wife, Thea Spyer, passed away in 2009. The couple married in Canada in
2007 and moved to New York in 2008 where their marriage was formally
recognized by the state. Even so, Windsor would have had to pay $363,053
in estate taxes because the definition of “surviving spouses” at the time
did not apply to “same-sex spouses.” Windsor sued the United States and,
after a long fight, eventually won a victory for same-sex couples and the
wider LGBTQ+ movement.
Pidgeon Pagonis
Pidgeon Pagonis is a non-binary intersex activist, educator, and filmmaker
at the forefront of the intersex movement fight for bodily autonomy and
justice. Their goal is to deconstruct the dangerous myths that lead to
violations of intersex people's human rights, including common,
irreversible medical procedures performed without consent to make bodies
conform to binary sex stereotypes. Their writing has been featured in
Everyday Feminism and scholarly journals such as Narrative Inquiry in
Bioethics and the Griffith Journal of Law & Human Dignity. They were
recognized as an Obama Champion of Change in 2015. They continue to raise
intersex awareness in Buzzfeed, Teen Vogue, CNN, AP, NBC, Washington Post,
AL Jazeera, and Huffpost. They are the co-creator of the Intersex Justice
Project, an organization dedicated to fighting for intersex people,
especially intersex people of color.
By Pidgeon Pagonis - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=56560421
Alok Vaid-Menon
Alok Vaid-Menon is one of the most renowned young gender non-conforming
performance artists, writers, and educators across the world today. Their
eclectic sense of style and poetic challenge to the gender binary have
been internationally renowned. Alok was recently the youngest recipient of
the prestigious Live Works Performance Act Award granted to ten
performance artists across the world. They were also featured in the 2016
documentary, The Trans List. They have been featured on HBO, MTV, The
Guardian, National Geographic, The New York Times, and The New Yorker and
have presented their creative and political work, specifically spoken
word, at over 400 venues in across 40 countries.
