Stonewall Uprising: A Look at Transgender Activists Who Led the Movement

Newsweek

17 hours ago

Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
The Stonewall Uprising, a pivotal moment in the LGBTQ+ rights fight, occurred 56 years ago and sparked a movement led in part by two transgender activists: Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera.
The Context
The Stonewall uprising began after police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York City, sparking protests and pushback from the local LGBTQ+ community. Johnson and Rivera emerged as two community leaders from the movement, though there is debate about their exact involvement during the protests.
Earlier this year, the Trump administration sparked backlash after removing references to transgender people from the Stonewall National Monument website. Meanwhile, the Pride Month display at the Stonewall National Monument excluded transgender pride flags this year, according to ABC News. LGBTQ+ activists have raised concerns about attempts to erase the history of transgender activists this year.
What To Know
The exact history of Stonewall is complicated, and accounts from participants have varied over the years. Who exactly threw the first brick at Stonewall, for instance, has been debated, and there remains no clear consensus on the question. Still, Johnson and Rivera emerged from Stonewall as two of the most prominent leaders in New York's LGBTQ+ community who would shape the movement for decades to come.
The uprising began early on June 28, 1969, when patrons at the bar fought back against police harassment during a raid. The riots continued for about six days and drew national attention to the LGBTQ+ rights cause.
Photo-illustration by Newsweek/Getty
Johnson had said she was not at Stonewall when the uprising began and showed up a bit later. But she was among the most prominent participants in the days-long riots, resisting police after they raided the bar. In one well-reported account of the riots, Johnson climbed up a lamppost to drop a heavy object onto a police car.
Rivera, who was 17 years old at the time of the riots, had also said that she was in attendance, although some historians have questioned whether she was present at Stonewall on the first night of the riot. Historian David Carter wrote in 2019 for The Gay City News that activist Bob Kohler, who was present at the riots, told him Rivera was not at Stonewall.
But the debate about who was at Stonewall when is "pointless and silly," Michael Bronski, author of A Queer History of the United States, told Newsweek. He said it's important to look at the activists' work after Stonewall, such as the founding of Street Transvestite Activists Revolutionaries (STAR) and the first halfway house for young gender non-conforming individuals.
STAR was an organization founded in 1970 by Johnson and Rivera to support transgender people. It was an early activist group for trans rights that went on to inspire others in the movement.
At the time, notably, the term "transgender" was not in use, so the term "drag queen" was used to describe Johnson and Rivera, though they are considered to be transgender. They had also used the term "transvestite," which is now considered outdated or offensive by many, despite its historical use.
Héctor Carrillo, a professor of sociology and sexuality & gender studies, told Newsweek it is "not automatic" that all drag queens at Stonewall would think of themselves as transgender, as the trans movement "didn't crystallize until the 1990s."
While activists like Johnson and Rivera are now recognized as pioneers of the LGBTQ+ rights movement, at the time, the transgender community was not "idolized" by many gay and lesbian people, Bronski said.
"Back then, often the queer community, the more mainstream queer community, was not particularly open to trans people, and for some reasons—if trans people went into a bar, police might be likely to raid the bar. Trans people were more hassled on the streets by police," he said.
Vincent Stephens, an associate dean of diversity and inclusion at Boston University's College of Arts & Sciences, told Newsweek activists like Johnson and Rivera were "integral to really being at the forefront of liberation."
After Stonewall, groups like the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) were founded to advance the acceptance of the LGBTQ+ community, he said. But those groups had many "internal fissures" that caused women and people of color to break off. This led to the creation of STAR.
"In many ways, they were integral to articulate the needs and concerns of gender nonconforming people," Stephens said. "They also exposed in many ways a tension within the queer community, which is that some people who were very focused on concerns of gay men and the concerns of lesbians but weren't necessary addressing concerns of gender-nonconforming people. STAR is an early example of gender non-conforming people organizing and saying, 'We are integral to this.'"
The two continued working on causes including AIDS and homelessness throughout their lives, as well as remaining active in the battle for LGBTQ+ rights.
Stonewall Anniversary Comes as Many View New Attacks on LGBTQ+ Community
This year's anniversary of the riots comes as many in the LGBTQ+ community see setbacks in a legal sense, as well as a shift in public opinion against gay and trans rights. The Trump administration's removal of mentions of the transgender community from the Stonewall National Monument website is among those concerns.
Bronski said the erasure of the transgender community cannot be viewed "in isolation." Those who oppose gay rights have realized they cannot push for the eradication of the gay community from public life, but could still "focus on the most vulnerable of those people, which is trans community," he said.
"I think it's really telling that they didn't get rid of all of LGBT, but just the T. I think they knew that getting rid of LGB would cause complete outrage, but you can get away with getting rid of the T because there's enough ambivalence and lack of understanding about transgender people," he said.
A key part of the legacy of Stonewall is remembering that 1969 wasn't all that long ago, Stephens said.
"Many of the fights that LGBTQ+ people have been fighting are relatively recent fights, and the fight is not over," he said. "We have to think about the long-term vision for how we want to exist as human beings and as contributors to society. Stonewall reminds us that we have to sometimes get up, take risks and advocate for ourselves."
Every movement "needs a moment," and Stonewall is that for the LGBTQ+ rights movement, Bronski said. While LGBTQ+ Pride Month has become "very commercialized," it's still important to remember the deeper meaning behind the role of power in society and how that can harm people.
"There is a great lesson to be learned that what happens to the most vulnerable people can happen to anyone," he said.
What People Are Saying
Héctor Carrillo, a professor of sociology and sexuality & gender studies, told Newsweek: "The Stonewall Uprising acquired enormous cultural symbolism. It came to be seen as marking the beginning of the LGBTQ movement, even when there had been other instances of gay and lesbian protest before. Those include the Mattachine Society's picketing and the Compton Cafeteria riot in San Francisco in 1966.
GLAAD criticized the Trump administration's move to remove references to the trans community from the Stonewall National Monument website in February: "The Stonewall Uprising – a monumental moment in the fight for LGBTQ rights – would not have happened without the leadership of transgender and gender non-conforming people. The tireless work of Marsha P. Johnson, Sylvia Rivera, and countless other trans women of color paved the way and continue to inspire us. You can try to erase our history, but we will never forget those who came before us and we will continue to fight for all those who will come after us."