impressive and moving

my copy counts 794 pages
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Gay-Revolution/Lillian-Faderman/97814... book page
https://youtu.be/LnA064FnTqY?list=TLGG5NKVeDqgLxYyNjA4MjAyMQ 3:12'' Faderman 'history in 5'

https://youtu.be/Q1D65SxzojI 5:41" A Living History of the LGBT Movement Since The 1800s
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https://aarp.org https://aarp.org/pride
https://www.aarpinternational.org/

I picked this title up to read for a book group, and liked it a lot more than I expected to. Faderman pulls together many, many threads and weaves them it into a narrative, mixing the familiar with stories of unknown people who represent many thousands of others--people whose lives were shredded in the dark, mid-century days and those who lived to experience triumphant outcomes in the Obama years. For 630 pages, the narrative is gripping and compelling: a real achievement in narrative non-fiction. There are many works of popular gay history, but it's hard to think of one that covers this much ground so well. Highly recommended. ( )

This book provides a historical overview of the gay rights movement in the United States from the post-World War II era to the present. This sprawling account covers numerous groups, individuals, movements, protests, and legal cases that changed the status for LGBTQ people. If one thing is clear, there is no one "great person" who lead the struggle, but it was a multi-generational effort of groups of people who stood up for equality.

The book starts in the 1950s when gays & lesbians were not only in danger of arrests, beatings, robbery, and sexual assault at the hands of the local police "Morals Squad," but a "Lavender Scare" saw the exposure and firing of numerous gay & lesbian people working for the US government. This occurred at the same time as the more famous "Red Scare," but may have had an even more widespread and devastating effect. In 1950, the Mattachine Society organized in Los Angeles as the first activist group to advocate for the rights of gay American citizens, with chapters in other cities established soon afterward. The Daughters of Bilitis, a lesbian civil rights group, was founded in San Francisco in 1956. Early activism focused on court cases to defend gay people from losing employment, with some success.

The Stonewall Uprising of 1969 was a turning point, where the patrons of the Greenwich Village gay bar - inspired by the Civil Rights and anti-war movements - decided to stand their ground against a police raid. The multi-day riots kicked off a decade of mass movement protests and pride parades. The 1970s also saw gay activists take on the American Psychiatric Association to stop having homosexuality classified as a mental disorder. Communities began to include gays and lesbians in their antidiscrimination codes, which prompted a backlash from conservative Christians. Most famously, entertainer Anita Bryant lead an anti-gay movement in Florida. Faderman credits Bryant as an accidental advocate for gay civil rights by bringing attention to their discrimination.

The 1980s is defined by the AIDS crisis and the deaths that devastated a generation of gay people. Faderman notes that AIDS had the effect of strengthening gay rights activism, with the shadow of death making previous infighting seem irrelevant, and prompting people to be greater radicalism. ACT UP, founded in New York in 1987, staged direct action events at government buildings, the New York Stock Exchanged, and churches to bring attention to the lack of action to treat people with AIDS and seek a cure. (Oddly enough, I had a run in with an angry conservative woman in the early 90s who said that gay men spit out communion at St. Patrick's Cathedral, which I'd always thought to be bigoted hyperbole, but it turns out it actually happened, although it makes more sense in the context of the protest).

I found the final chapters of the book that cover the 1990s and 2000s less interesting than the rest of the book, perhaps because it covered events that I remember living through. The focus here shifts from activist people and groups, to government action and becomes more a litany of court cases and presidential campaigns that affected gay civil rights, than the work of the people behind it. Still, this book is overall a good resource to get the big picture of struggle for LGBTQ equality. ( )

A fantastic completion of the stories of ordinary and extraordinary activists that transformed our society. Wonderfully composed into brief chapters and sections that draw you into the period and move you along into the next step of the revolution. ( )

An essential book about the movement to include gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people in U.S. society from the 1950s to the present.

Lillian Faderman has long been a leading figure researching and writing about lesbian history. In the early 1980s, she began publishing books that introduced us all to lesbians from the past giving a historical validation to the lesbians who were suddenly speaking out around us. Since then she continued her careful scholarship and has won numerous awards for her books. Now, in The Gay Revolution, she tells a comprehensive story of the movement for lesbians, gay men and other sexual outsiders to be fully accepted in U.S. society.

Read more: http://wp.me/p24OK2-1pF ( )