Queer History

“Thank God, and thank the lesbians.” 

Georgia has a long and sordid history of violating LGBTQ+ rights. It took an attack on the press for us to finally pay attention.

There’s no sadness that a gay bar can’t cure.

“Masculine? Feminine? It depends on the situation. Neuter is the only gender that always suits me.”

Here are 100 lesbian, bi, queer, and just plain human moments that had extra special meaning for our entire community.

I say “yes” to Dionysus and the joy of being in both the lightness and the darkness.

“Josephine Baker,” said President Macron in Tuesday’s ceremony, “you enter the Pantheon because while you were born American … deep down there was no one more French than you.”

Set in the mid aughts, “Girls on Jane,” explores the characters’ personal crises and sexual escapades as they navigate life and the lesbian dating scene. It’s a world away from Covid, a throwback to the time when meeting people required more than simply swiping right. 

I am grateful for the safety of this space, for the community it contains, for those late night conversations with strangers that make you feel aware, awake and part of something.

There were joyful tears throughout the dive bar. The whole night felt like a free mom hug.

When I look at her self-portrait, I connect with the bohemian Paris of her day, to the lesbian artist who lived and loved. I am reminded that my present is what it is because of those who came before, and that I too am a small link to our queer, and hopefully freer, future.

Queers always create beauty.

Queers are magic, even in the middle of an RV park.

As important as they are, bars tell only part of the story.

The thought of driving through the South on purpose, as a butch dyke, was a vision of my gay hell.  But for the first stop of our tiny Pride tour, Country Roads, Take Me Homo, a small town is exactly where we ended up.

The older I become, the more that Pride becomes a period of remembrance.

I became Emily Alexa Freeman, my third alias, with a fairy tale for a backstory. I had one overriding rule: tell no one.

Country Roads, Take Me Homo is an ongoing series chronicling Ty Yule’s experience at small town Pride events across America. 

A tall drag queen with mascara running in a jagged line down her cheek sang in a rich baritone. I knew the song well, the same one I sang with a maverick group of angels, as we surrounded a pyre of burning draft files in 1969, gripping our fear, as the police sirens approached. We shall overcome. We shall overcome someday.

“We acknowledge the limitations and barriers but we know it’s going to get better, that is what fuels our fight.”

Equal Ground is Sri Lanka’s oldest non profit LGBTQ+ advocacy group, raising awareness of rights and visibility in a country that officially offers no protections for queer and gender non-conforming people.

“We want to make sure that this next stage of Madeline’s life is as free from fear and full of love as our whole lives have been because of her.”

Modern lovers pining for the one who got away, take heart: Even Hollywood’s greatest lesbian romantic was dealt an unrequited hand.

The middle school kids knew what it was like to avoid looking corny, but they also knew a lot about bravery.

Cue “You Should See Me In A Crown” by Billie Eilish.

Here’s to women fighting the good fight!

We must never forget how far we’ve come, how much these women have risked, and how far we still have to go. 

“Every time I tell my story, the trauma comes back and destabilizes me. That’s why I continue to fight, so this doesn’t happen to other people.”

“I was more afraid when I went out to clubs, dressed in drag, than I was when I was befriending a drug dealer or up in some apartment buying for the NYPD, with no gun or shield. I would’ve rather been found dead, in some dumpster, because a dealer found out I was a cop than been busted in drag.”

Thankfully, life for queer people in the south is changing along with our reputation and food.

“I want them to learn that redemption is possible. I’ve evolved emotionally and psychologically, and I’m proud of how far I have come.”

According to a 2019 Social Perception Survey on LGBT+ Rights in Nigeria by TIERS, 60% of Nigerians will not accept a family member who is LGBT.

“The most important thing is to hold on and resist.”

Sandie Crisp, better known as Goddess Bunny, was a transgender woman with polio, grew to become somewhat of a patron saint to gay mall punks, weird queer kids, and underground artists.

On this day, we remember all of the nameless queer people, and all people, lost during the years of the Holocaust.

Being Asian, queer, and a woman meant there was a myriad of ways I could vanish, and I saw it each time I watched a movie.