Tomorrow marks the 43rd Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots of 1969. These riots, which are widely believed to have started the gay rights movement, were a response to police violence against the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender community in New York. Bar raids by police were common at this time. LGBT people could be arrested and subjected to violence just because they went out to a bar on a night an establishment was willing to welcome them. They would arrive at a bar, be let in and drink and dance until the cops showed up. At this point, bright lights would be turned on and people would either flee the bar or stay and try to avoid arrest.
I wasn't there during Stonewall - in fact, I wasn't even born yet. However, the course of my life has been altered by the individuals present on this night in 1969, who decided they had had enough.
I struggle to understand the way the world worked for members of my community 40 years ago. In college, when I was first coming out, I read books that described the early days of the gay rights movement. At the time, it felt like we'd come so far. I went out on the weekends with friends, openly identified as a Lesbian and walked hand in hand with my first girlfriend down the main street of my college town.
Now, I'm in my 30s and I see how far we still have to go. In some states, we have written discrimination against same-sex relationships into the constitution. In others, LGBT people can still be fired from a job, denied a place to live or asked to leave a restaurant. Here in Maine, we have protections under the Human Rights Act, can legally adopt children and feel relatively welcome in most communities. However, as I get more involved in the campaign for same-sex marriage, I meet people who are afraid to come out at work, kids who are relentlessly bullied at school and couples who's family members won't welcome them home for the holidays. The bottom line of this campaign is to allow same-sex couples to obtain marriage licenses, but it feels much bigger than that to me.
I don't know what the people who were present at the Stonewall Inn on this night more than 40 years ago were thinking about when they decided to fight back and resist arrest. I like to think some of them might have been thinking about me. Today, my life is a little easier because of their efforts. On difficult days during this campaign, I think about my kids who aren't even born yet and what I want the world to look like for them.
Tomorrow, we will meet in Augusta to mark the one year anniversary of taking out papers to put marriage on the ballot. I think it's fitting that we'll peacefully assemble in our state capital, at the State House in the Welcome Center on the anniversary of Stonewall. Join us there at 12:30 p.m. to remember how far we've come and how far we still have to go.
