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Remembering Stonewall · Stuff You Should Know

0:00
Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, it's us Josh and Chuck, and we want
0:03
Speaker 1: you to know we are coming somewhere near you. We're
0:06
Speaker 1: sure if you live in North America this year, that's right,
0:10
Speaker 1: We're going on tour, and uh, why don't we just
0:12
Speaker 1: rattle through these dates? Okay? Uh? Toronto August eight at
0:16
Speaker 1: the Day and Fourth Music Hall, Chicago August nine, the
0:19
Speaker 1: next day at Harris Theater. Then we are taking some
0:22
Speaker 1: time off to recover after that two day grind. We're
0:25
Speaker 1: eating Vancouver the Vogue Theater September twenty six, followed by Minneapolis.
0:30
Speaker 1: We're gonna be at the Pantageous Theater again on September
0:34
Speaker 1: that is correct, yep. And then Austin Chuck on October
0:37
Speaker 1: tenth of the Paramount Theater, Yes, and very special show
0:42
Speaker 1: and Lawrence Kansas at Liberty Hall on October eleventh, yep.
0:45
Speaker 1: And then we're gonna do a three night stand October
0:48
Speaker 1: two at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn, New York. And then Chuck,
0:53
Speaker 1: take it home. Uh, well take it home literally, because
0:56
Speaker 1: we are finishing up November four right here in Atlanta
0:59
Speaker 1: at the Bucket Theater and this is a very special
1:02
Speaker 1: benefit show. Uh, and all the proceeds will be going
1:05
Speaker 1: to Lifeline Animal Project of Atlanta in the National Down
1:09
Speaker 1: Syndrome Society YEP and for more information into buy tickets,
1:13
Speaker 1: just go to s y s K live dot com.
1:17
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know. It's from House Stuff
1:20
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
1:29
Speaker 1: Josh Clark's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry and
1:35
Speaker 1: this is Stuff you Should Know, Stuff you Should Know. Hi, Hi,
1:41
Speaker 1: I was talking to everyone else. I was looking at you, though. Sure,
1:45
Speaker 1: it just made it weird. I know, it's a little disarming.
1:50
Speaker 1: Uh So this episode on the Stonewall Riots or did
1:55
Speaker 1: you watch that documentary stone Wall Uprising? By chance? Yes?
1:58
Speaker 1: I did? Yeah, I think know one of the the
2:01
Speaker 1: people interviewed and there said they preferred, or at least
2:04
Speaker 1: he preferred to be called an uprising and not a
2:06
Speaker 1: riot or something like that. Yeah. I agree, because lends
2:10
Speaker 1: it definitely a much more like credible tone. Yeah, for sure.
2:14
Speaker 1: A riots just like we're going crazy, we're gonna steal stuff,
2:16
Speaker 1: we're gonna brust stuff, um and uprising is like we're
2:20
Speaker 1: we've had enough and we're going to throw off this oppression. Yeah,
2:25
Speaker 1: so the uh this this is being released, I believe
2:27
Speaker 1: if my math is correct, uh, forty eight years and
2:32
Speaker 1: a day. It depends on when you count the beginnings
2:34
Speaker 1: of the Stone Wall uprising, because we'll get to it,
2:37
Speaker 1: but it start at one am. So technically, uh. You
2:41
Speaker 1: know some people, you know, when you go from night
2:43
Speaker 1: and today still count that as the previous night. You
2:46
Speaker 1: know what I mean? Those are people who are on drugs,
2:51
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I was about to say
2:52
Speaker 1: I used to do that, but then you said that,
2:54
Speaker 1: So no. But anyway, forty eight year anniversary. I thought
3:01
Speaker 1: about maybe holding off till the fiftieth because I wanted
3:03
Speaker 1: to do this one for a long time. But and
3:05
Speaker 1: I thought, you know what, who knows what's going to
3:07
Speaker 1: happen exactly. We could get hit by a bus. Yeah,
3:10
Speaker 1: and then we never would have done this podcast. Right,
3:13
Speaker 1: there's no time like the President Charles Yes, especially since
3:16
Speaker 1: we finally got a great article from the Grabster on this. Yeah. Man,
3:22
Speaker 1: that guy is so good. I read this article that
3:24
Speaker 1: he wrote, Um, how the Stonewall riots worked. He called
3:27
Speaker 1: it the riots. Um it's I I sent him an
3:32
Speaker 1: email just to say, like, dude, it is so nice
3:35
Speaker 1: to have you back. I felt the same way. In fact,
3:38
Speaker 1: I need to get his email so I can echo
3:39
Speaker 1: that because, uh, you know you read it in this
3:42
Speaker 1: just like the old days, good quality stuff. Yeah you
3:45
Speaker 1: want to talk about Stonewall, Yeah, let's do it. Have
3:47
Speaker 1: you ever been there? No, I haven't. I even stayed
3:50
Speaker 1: at Washington Park in Washington Square in UM, which is
3:55
Speaker 1: nice UM. And I had no idea Stonewall was right
3:58
Speaker 1: around the corner. I didn't didn't know very much about it.
4:01
Speaker 1: I mainly just um, I knew it as like I
4:06
Speaker 1: had a rough idea. But I think I knew about
4:09
Speaker 1: the same as I know about, say Attica, So I
4:14
Speaker 1: know sometimes people chant Stonewall, sometimes people chanted Attica. So
4:19
Speaker 1: there you go. That was about as much as I
4:21
Speaker 1: knew you would. And had to drink at Attica though,
4:22
Speaker 1: so right some some radiator hoot. Uh you know I
4:28
Speaker 1: had time to go there and grab a drink at
4:29
Speaker 1: the stone All and I highly recommend it. Oh yeah,
4:32
Speaker 1: I definitely intend to, for sure, because I love that
4:34
Speaker 1: part of New York, to the village. So I had
4:38
Speaker 1: to go and look this up, right, because I was like, wait,
4:41
Speaker 1: I'm starting to see people say West Village they're also
4:44
Speaker 1: saying Greenwich Village. It's the west part of Greenwich Village.
4:47
Speaker 1: It is okay, so um, it's both. It's Greenwich Village
4:50
Speaker 1: and West Village, but technically it is in the West
4:53
Speaker 1: Village of Greenwich Village, which is between Houston and and Broadway.
5:01
Speaker 1: Houston and I've been in New York enough times. My
5:06
Speaker 1: friend made a mistake. Just don't ever say Avenue of
5:09
Speaker 1: the America's I have plenty of times. Oh yeah, and
5:13
Speaker 1: I've gotten yelled at. Yeah, and then I think the
5:16
Speaker 1: Hudson is the other side of the village. It's just
5:19
Speaker 1: my favorite part of town, is it. Yeah, the the
5:22
Speaker 1: village in the West Village is just it's the best.
5:24
Speaker 1: You know, that's where it just feels a little bit
5:28
Speaker 1: more like old New York. It's quaint, it's still kind
5:30
Speaker 1: of quiet. All those tiny little tree line streets that
5:33
Speaker 1: aren't just on a perfect grid. Uh, you can get
5:37
Speaker 1: lost down there. You can find yourself down there. You
5:40
Speaker 1: can you can pay a million dollars a square feet
5:43
Speaker 1: for real estate. Yeah, it's nice, it's great. I like
5:47
Speaker 1: the Lower East Side a lot too, though, I have
5:49
Speaker 1: to say, yeah, and you know what, last time I
5:51
Speaker 1: was in New York, Emily and I spent and I
5:54
Speaker 1: used to hang out some in the East Village. In fact,
5:58
Speaker 1: that's kind of where I used to go, mostly because
6:00
Speaker 1: that's where my friends were back in the nineties. And um,
6:03
Speaker 1: I went there and it is still nice and grimy.
6:06
Speaker 1: Uh what the village, the East Village. Yeah, it's uh, yeah,
6:10
Speaker 1: I mean it's not you know, it's it's been I
6:13
Speaker 1: don't want to say modernized, but it's been what's the word,
6:16
Speaker 1: not gentrified maybe gentrified updated. Yeah, it's been updated a
6:20
Speaker 1: little bit. But they're still kind of a scummy, which
6:23
Speaker 1: is great. You know, it definitely has a feel to
6:27
Speaker 1: it still for sure, and a smell. Okay, So so Chuck,
6:30
Speaker 1: I think we You said you've been to the stone
6:33
Speaker 1: Wall before. Did you know much of the history? Yeah,
6:36
Speaker 1: I mean that's why I went. Um and oddly enough
6:39
Speaker 1: I went. I just happened to be there in the
6:42
Speaker 1: days following the nightclub shooting in Florida. So there were
6:48
Speaker 1: like armed guards at the stone Wall end and the
6:51
Speaker 1: you know, because it's a national monument now, well, I
6:53
Speaker 1: know a lot of people flocked to stone Wall, the
6:56
Speaker 1: stone Wall in after the Pulse nightclub shootings just to
6:59
Speaker 1: show solidarity and comfort one another. So the Stone Wall
7:04
Speaker 1: has become this hub, the center of gay life in
7:08
Speaker 1: the United States, not just in New York and then
7:10
Speaker 1: the United States I would even say probably globally had
7:14
Speaker 1: that much of a significance. But what's interesting about the
7:17
Speaker 1: Stone Wall, the Stone Wall in is that it also
7:20
Speaker 1: had that same significance just for a much much smaller
7:24
Speaker 1: community of gays um prior to June nineteen sixty nine.
7:29
Speaker 1: But it has for decades and decades been a center
7:34
Speaker 1: of gay life. Is just there was pre Stone Wall
7:37
Speaker 1: and post Stone Wall, and what that club meant to
7:42
Speaker 1: people really just changed by how many people um knew
7:47
Speaker 1: about it but were pulled to it. Good way to
7:51
Speaker 1: say it, thanks man, uh so um, I think we
7:54
Speaker 1: should start as Ed suggests, as the grabs are suggested
7:58
Speaker 1: by talking about war Stone Wall. Yeah, and a little
8:02
Speaker 1: bit about the sad state of uh life as a
8:07
Speaker 1: as a gay person, as a trans person. Uh, the
8:10
Speaker 1: whole LGBTQ community, which of course they didn't call it
8:13
Speaker 1: that back then, but to be in that community and
8:17
Speaker 1: the nineteen fifties and the nineteen sixties was uh. I mean,
8:21
Speaker 1: it's interesting to talk about this stuff because there's still
8:23
Speaker 1: a long way to go. But you can't help but
8:26
Speaker 1: look at the progress when you look at the way
8:29
Speaker 1: things were in the fifties and sixties. Well, what's crazy
8:32
Speaker 1: is that the fifties and sixties were a low point.
8:36
Speaker 1: Yeah for for um, I don't know if gay rights
8:40
Speaker 1: is the right where, but gay acceptance of gay the
8:43
Speaker 1: gay community by society at large, the fifties and sixties
8:47
Speaker 1: were a real low in that because prior to that, um,
8:52
Speaker 1: it was a little it was a little people were
8:54
Speaker 1: a little cooler with it, Like straights were a little
8:57
Speaker 1: cooler with the idea of people being gay than they
9:00
Speaker 1: were in like the fifties and sixties. And it's thanks
9:03
Speaker 1: to our friend McCarthy. Yeah, Like I got the feeling
9:07
Speaker 1: that there was a little bit of just a like
9:09
Speaker 1: don't ask, don't tell philosophy going on and not like
9:14
Speaker 1: the hammer coming down, which is what happened in the
9:16
Speaker 1: fifties and sixties. It was a big pushback, and you're right,
9:20
Speaker 1: McCarthy had a lot to do with it. He was like, well,
9:23
Speaker 1: not only am I gonna tackle McCarthy, is um, but
9:25
Speaker 1: while we're at it, let's let's castigate the gay community
9:29
Speaker 1: as well, right it uh we I don't know if
9:32
Speaker 1: you remember not, but we we talked about Joe McCarthy
9:35
Speaker 1: being gay himself most likely or definitely I can't remember. Um.
9:40
Speaker 1: But but in the midst of that, he he spent
9:42
Speaker 1: time like persecuting gays even though he was gay himself,
9:46
Speaker 1: which is pretty I mean, if the guy wasn't despicable before,
9:49
Speaker 1: that really does it, you know, puts him over the fence. Yeah,
9:53
Speaker 1: and it's you know, it's something that happens still, you know,
9:57
Speaker 1: but he almost I don't I don't want to say
9:59
Speaker 1: single handedly, but his his drive that whatever he embodied
10:03
Speaker 1: in the McCarthy is m trials or hearings or whatever. Um.
10:08
Speaker 1: He he helped take the He helped turn the tide
10:12
Speaker 1: back against gay people. Yeah, it was going like okay
10:15
Speaker 1: for a little while, and then this guy comes along
10:17
Speaker 1: and just screws everything up. And then the next thing,
10:19
Speaker 1: you know, the fifties and sixties, it's really really bad
10:23
Speaker 1: to be gay. As a matter of fact, in the
10:25
Speaker 1: United States outside of Illinois, every other state in the Union,
10:29
Speaker 1: if you were gay, you were illegal just by being you. Yeah,
10:34
Speaker 1: you're basically breaking the law. Through a web of laws,
10:38
Speaker 1: um that essentially criminalized it, whether it was anti sodomy
10:41
Speaker 1: laws or saying you can't dance in public with the
10:46
Speaker 1: same sex partner or you can't where I mean, they
10:49
Speaker 1: actually had laws on what was called gender appropriate clothing,
10:53
Speaker 1: where you had to wear a minimum of three pieces
10:56
Speaker 1: of clothing deemed appropriate for your gender. And uh, because
11:01
Speaker 1: you know, they saw a big threat with you know,
11:03
Speaker 1: they called people back then, they call it people dressing
11:05
Speaker 1: and drag um. But we're talking about well we're talking
11:09
Speaker 1: about different kinds of people, but a lot of times
11:10
Speaker 1: they were transgender people, uh dressing like they dressed, you know,
11:15
Speaker 1: like dressing according to the gender they identified with, and
11:18
Speaker 1: they would bring in they would find someone, they would
11:21
Speaker 1: bring in a female officer and they would take them
11:24
Speaker 1: into a bathroom and either uh feel for parts or
11:28
Speaker 1: make them undress and check out their clothing and arrest them. Yeah.
11:33
Speaker 1: And it wasn't always it didn't always even necessarily end
11:36
Speaker 1: and arrest. Like these laws were used as tools of
11:39
Speaker 1: intimidation and just general oppression, and the cops were acting
11:45
Speaker 1: in large part is as like this extension, the the
11:49
Speaker 1: action extension of like that part of America that just
11:52
Speaker 1: found gay people odious, just the whole the whole concept.
11:56
Speaker 1: So everybody was just totally cool with the gay community
12:00
Speaker 1: being harassed and arrested and um brutalized. Uh. There was
12:04
Speaker 1: a lot of um violent crime and murders against gay
12:07
Speaker 1: people at the time. The newspapers didn't report virtually anything
12:11
Speaker 1: that had anything to do with the gay community. Um.
12:15
Speaker 1: They were just complete open targets for exploitation and abuse. Um.
12:20
Speaker 1: And it was just a terrible way to live. And
12:22
Speaker 1: as a result, a lot of a lot of gay
12:25
Speaker 1: people at the time just opted to act straight. They
12:29
Speaker 1: got married, they had kids. Um, they just pretended in
12:34
Speaker 1: order to survive in the society they were born into. Yeah,
12:38
Speaker 1: it was. It was classified until three and the d
12:42
Speaker 1: s M as a mental illness aversion therapy was going on. Um.
12:47
Speaker 1: I had never heard of this place and saw I
12:48
Speaker 1: saw that documentary at Tasaca Darrow State Hospital in California. Yeah,
12:52
Speaker 1: I hadn't heard of it any oh man. They called
12:54
Speaker 1: it the Dachau for queers, where they would engage in
12:58
Speaker 1: shock treatment. They would show uh gay men pictures of
13:02
Speaker 1: naked men and then shock them and uh they would
13:06
Speaker 1: give them. There was one drug that they gave that supposedly, Yeah,
13:09
Speaker 1: had you heard of this, No, a drug that simulated
13:12
Speaker 1: the experience of drowning, they would give lobotomies. It's just
13:18
Speaker 1: unbelievable that this was happening in our country like fifty
13:21
Speaker 1: something years ago, right, And and and so it's bad enough
13:24
Speaker 1: if your family is sending you off for treatment or
13:28
Speaker 1: whatever to to to basically be treated for being gay,
13:33
Speaker 1: because again there's like the field of psychology and psychiatry said,
13:38
Speaker 1: this is a mental illness, and we cure mental illnesses,
13:42
Speaker 1: so you can cure gayness. Let's just figure out how
13:45
Speaker 1: to do it, and the most brutal means possible. So
13:47
Speaker 1: it's bad enough if your family sends you off commits
13:50
Speaker 1: you for being gay. But I think what strikes me
13:53
Speaker 1: is even worse for some gay people at the time,
13:58
Speaker 1: buying into the idea that they were mentally ill, that
14:01
Speaker 1: there was something profoundly wrong with them that made them
14:07
Speaker 1: m It's just so different that they would submit to
14:11
Speaker 1: this kind of treatment as well. You know, yeah, that
14:14
Speaker 1: that clip in the stone wall uprising up with the
14:18
Speaker 1: I don't know who that guy was that came to
14:20
Speaker 1: the school to talk to the kids. Um, just man, man,
14:25
Speaker 1: it's hard to hard to watch, to be honest, it
14:28
Speaker 1: really is. So the lavender scare is what it was
14:31
Speaker 1: kind of called under McCarthy in the nineteen fifties. And
14:36
Speaker 1: you know, uh, this is all pre Stonewall and uh,
14:41
Speaker 1: as Ed points out in the article, it was it
14:43
Speaker 1: was a dark time. But um, it was also a
14:46
Speaker 1: time where uh kind of underground the gay community was
14:51
Speaker 1: was setting. And when I say gay community and we
14:54
Speaker 1: say it, we're talking about l g B t Q
14:57
Speaker 1: as a whole, it doesn't roll off the tongue, so
15:01
Speaker 1: we're gonna say different things along the way. Um, But
15:04
Speaker 1: really what they were doing kind of quietly was setting
15:07
Speaker 1: the stage and laying a foundation for progress later on
15:12
Speaker 1: with these kind of uh underground societies. It was called
15:15
Speaker 1: the homophile movement, and you know, gay rights groups basically
15:19
Speaker 1: being founded, right, And the homophile movement was basically if
15:24
Speaker 1: Bob Newhart had been a gay activist, it was like
15:28
Speaker 1: button down penny loafers getting along with everybody, being very
15:33
Speaker 1: quiet and pleasant, um, being an upstanding neighbor, like really
15:38
Speaker 1: really taking care of your lawn like that kind of stuff.
15:41
Speaker 1: Like basically, the point of the homophile movement was to
15:46
Speaker 1: point out to straight society that gay people were totally normal.
15:51
Speaker 1: And the approach that they took was, we're just gonna
15:55
Speaker 1: we're gonna kill them with kindness. We're gonna win them
15:58
Speaker 1: over by by being nice and by being quiet and
16:03
Speaker 1: by not causing a fuss. Citizens Yeah, for sure. And
16:08
Speaker 1: one of the things that came out of this UM,
16:10
Speaker 1: the Homophile Movement UM was a society called the Madachine
16:15
Speaker 1: Society UM, which is basically an an underground gay I
16:22
Speaker 1: guess gay liberation movement, but like a very slow, preppy
16:27
Speaker 1: gay liberation movement, you know. But I founded a network
16:34
Speaker 1: for the first time, like gay people could communicate with
16:37
Speaker 1: one another through like newsletters that were set up by
16:39
Speaker 1: the Madachine Society and other UM small groups like them.
16:43
Speaker 1: That was a big deal. Like they showed footage of
16:46
Speaker 1: them in the Stone Wall Uprising documentary and they're they're
16:50
Speaker 1: all wearing suits and their hair is very nice, and
16:52
Speaker 1: it's all like very well thought out. This is an
16:55
Speaker 1: accidental UM. But they're acting not gay at all, but
17:00
Speaker 1: they're holding signs saying that proclaimed that they're gay and
17:04
Speaker 1: that they deserve rights. And I mean that was that
17:07
Speaker 1: was an extraordinarily brave thing to do back then because
17:10
Speaker 1: if you were out at as gay, and Ed I
17:13
Speaker 1: think very wisely points out on this article, back then
17:16
Speaker 1: you could be fired for being gay, and ED points
17:20
Speaker 1: out today you could still be fired for being gay.
17:23
Speaker 1: There's no federal protection against that. It has gotten better.
17:27
Speaker 1: It's horrible that that's still not protected. Right. But back
17:32
Speaker 1: in the day, if if, if you, if you had
17:35
Speaker 1: the wrong kind of boss and they call it win
17:37
Speaker 1: that you were gay, they could not only fire, they
17:39
Speaker 1: could make it so you would never work again, like
17:42
Speaker 1: your life would be ruined. So to stand there in
17:45
Speaker 1: a suit and tie in the middle of New York
17:47
Speaker 1: where with a sign that proclaimed you were gay and
17:50
Speaker 1: being like years old or something like that, and having
17:53
Speaker 1: your whole life ahead of you, that was a very
17:55
Speaker 1: brave act to do. Even though the machine society. Um
17:59
Speaker 1: it's I get the impression that they're they're fairly criticized
18:04
Speaker 1: in the gay community for being really slow and kind
18:09
Speaker 1: of plotting and not doing enough and not being radical
18:12
Speaker 1: at all. Um at the time, not really pushing gay
18:16
Speaker 1: rights forward as as much as as what would come after. Yeah,
18:19
Speaker 1: but like we said, what very importantly they were they
18:23
Speaker 1: were laying a foundation, uh for what would follow the
18:27
Speaker 1: Stonewall riots. Um, should we take a break, all right,
18:31
Speaker 1: let's take a break, and we'll talk a little bit
18:33
Speaker 1: about the refuge that was the stone wall in. All right,
18:58
Speaker 1: so we set the stage for or what life was
19:00
Speaker 1: like uh back then in the l g B t
19:04
Speaker 1: Q community, and um, kind of more than anything, there
19:09
Speaker 1: was no uh, there was no and the irony to
19:13
Speaker 1: me is just inescapable. There there was no meeting place,
19:15
Speaker 1: There was no way to normalize. Um, So what happens is,
19:20
Speaker 1: you know, you couldn't just go be gay and have
19:23
Speaker 1: a coffee with your gay friend out in public and
19:25
Speaker 1: be affectionate and just be a normal human being. So
19:29
Speaker 1: what happens is they ended up being driven underground and
19:34
Speaker 1: meeting in public bathrooms and in porn theaters and as
19:38
Speaker 1: uh in New York City, they were meeting in the
19:40
Speaker 1: backs of meat trucks uh for hookups. And so this
19:45
Speaker 1: further stigmatize them as like taking part in like perverted
19:50
Speaker 1: quote unquote perverted behavior because they had nowhere else to go.
19:55
Speaker 1: So it was sort of like this feedback loop, you know,
19:58
Speaker 1: like had they had a place to go to begin with,
20:00
Speaker 1: they might not have been meeting in bath houses and
20:04
Speaker 1: might not have had this stigma attached to them so well.
20:07
Speaker 1: I don't know if they wouldn't have still been meeting
20:08
Speaker 1: in bath houses, but I think they would have enjoyed
20:11
Speaker 1: having more places to to not just hook up. I
20:14
Speaker 1: think that's all that was available to them, was just
20:16
Speaker 1: hooking up, and that was it, well exactly. And there
20:18
Speaker 1: was one gentleman in that documentary that was just like
20:22
Speaker 1: we I just wanted to go place like two where
20:24
Speaker 1: I could fall in love with somebody and talk to somebody. Yeah,
20:27
Speaker 1: that guy, I can't remember his name, but he struck
20:29
Speaker 1: me as well. He was describing the Stone Wall. He's saying,
20:32
Speaker 1: like that was that place. It was one of those
20:34
Speaker 1: few places where you could just feel relatively safe being gay.
20:39
Speaker 1: It was like one of the few places you could
20:42
Speaker 1: slow dance. Um. And the way that he said it, Chuck,
20:46
Speaker 1: was it was a place where you could find love.
20:49
Speaker 1: It wasn't just about sex, although I'm sure there's plenty
20:52
Speaker 1: of hookups and apparently there was prostitution ring ring running
20:55
Speaker 1: out of the stone Wall, but it was a place
20:57
Speaker 1: where you could find like was there was just a
21:02
Speaker 1: vibe of love there supposedly is what the guy was saying,
21:05
Speaker 1: I think, And there weren't very many places like that
21:07
Speaker 1: in the world at the time. Yeah. So the Stonewall
21:09
Speaker 1: in itself was um. It was a pair of brick
21:12
Speaker 1: buildings originally that were horse stables way back in the day,
21:15
Speaker 1: and then later on it was a bakery and then
21:19
Speaker 1: eventually opened as the Stonewall In Restaurant in nineteen thirty
21:22
Speaker 1: four and uh in the nineteen sixties. Uh. And this
21:26
Speaker 1: was a pretty fascinating part of this whole story to
21:29
Speaker 1: me because I had no idea, but the mafia had
21:32
Speaker 1: a uh had a business idea where they would they
21:37
Speaker 1: saw an opportunity for gay people to meet and by
21:42
Speaker 1: booze and buy cigarettes and load money into the jukebox.
21:45
Speaker 1: And so the mafia kind of under had these underground
21:50
Speaker 1: uh gay bars all over New York City that they ran. Right,
21:53
Speaker 1: they'd be like, hey, we just hijacked the truck that
21:55
Speaker 1: was full of cigarettes and booze. We should just sell
21:58
Speaker 1: it to the gay people. It goal saloons. Yeah, since
22:01
Speaker 1: nobody else will. And the reason no one else would
22:05
Speaker 1: was because since it was illegal to be gay if
22:09
Speaker 1: you were a known gay person and you were at
22:13
Speaker 1: a bar, that bar could be shut down. So bars
22:17
Speaker 1: were like, you, you can't come in here. We're not
22:19
Speaker 1: gay bar. There's no gays allowed, basically, and not only
22:23
Speaker 1: was this, you know, legal, it was it was encouraged
22:28
Speaker 1: by the law. So the mafia was like, well, there's
22:30
Speaker 1: there's a huge market that's just needing to be satisfied
22:34
Speaker 1: here and we'll step up, no problem. Yeah. And you know,
22:37
Speaker 1: before you go thinking the mafia was was some benevolent
22:40
Speaker 1: group getting an outlet to the LGBTQ community. They they
22:46
Speaker 1: did do that, but they were a trying to make
22:48
Speaker 1: money and be uh they were also uh, you know,
22:51
Speaker 1: there were there were instances of blackmailing that would go
22:56
Speaker 1: on that they would get like maybe a straight acting,
22:59
Speaker 1: well yield gay man and as a target and say
23:03
Speaker 1: all right, well this guy's definitely got a good job
23:05
Speaker 1: in a family, so let's get his information and then
23:08
Speaker 1: hit him up for money or will out him. Um.
23:11
Speaker 1: So they weren't you know, they weren't just benevolent mafioso's. Uh.
23:17
Speaker 1: There was some you know, untowards stuff going on on there.
23:19
Speaker 1: And for sure, for sure, yeah, one of them, like
23:21
Speaker 1: I said, was the prostitution ring at the stone Wall
23:24
Speaker 1: and they were dealing drugs at the stone Wall in
23:27
Speaker 1: um and again like the the entire bar, the stone
23:31
Speaker 1: Wall in as a bar was an illegal bar. Uh yeah,
23:35
Speaker 1: and they weren't doing it out of the goodness of
23:36
Speaker 1: their hearts. They were exploiting like a a vulnerable population.
23:40
Speaker 1: But it's still regardless of the mob's intentions, gay people
23:45
Speaker 1: took the place and made at their own, their own
23:47
Speaker 1: spot and enjoyed it. As a result. It was also
23:50
Speaker 1: by all accounts, um not only a dive bar with
23:54
Speaker 1: water down drinks, but from the sounds of it, it
23:57
Speaker 1: was unsanitary. Oh yeah, like just gross and uh not
24:04
Speaker 1: because of the clientele, because the mafia was I mean,
24:09
Speaker 1: they just didn't care. They weren't keeping it clean the
24:11
Speaker 1: I mean they there was the one guy in the
24:14
Speaker 1: document was like I never bought a drink there. He
24:16
Speaker 1: was like, that's the last place I was going to
24:17
Speaker 1: actually get a drink, Like I would go to meet
24:19
Speaker 1: people and make friends, but um, no way was I
24:22
Speaker 1: going to be ordering and paying for whatever they were serving.
24:25
Speaker 1: He said they were serving like the beer out of
24:28
Speaker 1: pictures and water buckets and stuff. Yeah, and he's like,
24:32
Speaker 1: there's no telling what was in that beer. He said
24:34
Speaker 1: that there was a rumor that, um, some infectious disease
24:38
Speaker 1: had spread because of the beer at the Stone Hall.
24:42
Speaker 1: It was like it was a dirty, dirty place, but
24:45
Speaker 1: again it was a place where gay people could feel loved,
24:48
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, And one of the reason it was
24:50
Speaker 1: kind of allowed to, uh to run to a certain
24:53
Speaker 1: degree was the mafia was paying bribes and giving kickbacks
24:57
Speaker 1: to the cops of the six Precinct, which is where
24:59
Speaker 1: it was so chuck, they sort of had a deal
25:01
Speaker 1: worked out. I'm sorry to interrupt you, ma'am, but have
25:04
Speaker 1: you seen the documentary The seven five. I've seen it twice.
25:08
Speaker 1: How amazingly good is that. Yeah, it's one of the
25:13
Speaker 1: best documentaries I've seen in a long time. I agree.
25:16
Speaker 1: And Adam Diaz Man, come on, yeah, that's that guy's
25:21
Speaker 1: like a real person. I know. It's amazing. Yeah, if
25:25
Speaker 1: you're interested at all in bribes and dirty cops and
25:29
Speaker 1: kickbacks in New York City in the in the eighties, uh,
25:33
Speaker 1: definitely definitely watched that one. Yeah, it was amazing. The
25:37
Speaker 1: seven five, which was the seventy Precinct, correct, yes, which
25:41
Speaker 1: was cop talk. It's seven five. Yeah, I think it's like, um,
25:46
Speaker 1: Jamaica Queens. Maybe, yeah, I can't remember, but a guarantee
25:52
Speaker 1: they're making a feature film about that at some point.
25:54
Speaker 1: Surely it's too good too. It's like you can't write
25:57
Speaker 1: anything better, so sorry, man up to do your chester.
26:00
Speaker 1: We're talking about how the six was taking kickbacks from
26:03
Speaker 1: the owners of the Stone Wall. Yeah, so you know, uh,
26:06
Speaker 1: they were taking kickbacks. So it was allowed to a
26:10
Speaker 1: certain degree because they were getting paid off, right, and
26:12
Speaker 1: the place would still get rated. Apparently it got rated
26:15
Speaker 1: fairly frequently, but when it got rated, the owners would
26:18
Speaker 1: be tipped off. It would be rated on like a
26:21
Speaker 1: week night when the place was pretty much dead and
26:24
Speaker 1: a lot of people weren't gonna get hassled, and when
26:27
Speaker 1: it was rated, um, maybe there would be another bribe
26:31
Speaker 1: taken at the time the patrons would basically be let go.
26:35
Speaker 1: But the whole process was just a process of intimidation, right,
26:39
Speaker 1: Like you had to show your ID on your way
26:41
Speaker 1: out the door, and if you were gay and your
26:44
Speaker 1: life could be ruined for being out, and you didn't
26:46
Speaker 1: want to show any cop your I D. So it
26:48
Speaker 1: was the whole thing was just a bad jam and
26:50
Speaker 1: the idea that it didn't do anything really except maybe
26:54
Speaker 1: increase the kickbacks for the cops just made the whole
26:57
Speaker 1: thing even worse, you know. Yeah, and uh so this
27:00
Speaker 1: kind of went along for a while. But everything changed
27:02
Speaker 1: on the on the night of June and into the
27:06
Speaker 1: early morning when Deputy Inspector seymour Pine of not the
27:12
Speaker 1: sixth Precinct, which is notable, but Manhattan's first Division of
27:15
Speaker 1: Public Morals. Uh he led a different kind of raid
27:19
Speaker 1: with some undercover cops at about one am. And um,
27:24
Speaker 1: everything changed that night. Yeah, that night something was different,
27:28
Speaker 1: Like everything just kind of came together and just went
27:33
Speaker 1: a certain way. You know how, Like do you watch basketball? Sure,
27:37
Speaker 1: so it's astounding when you know one team can just
27:41
Speaker 1: be killing the other team and then all of a sudden,
27:44
Speaker 1: somebody on the losing team like steals a pass and
27:47
Speaker 1: takes it back and just dunks it or there passes
27:51
Speaker 1: it to somebody else for like three points and they
27:53
Speaker 1: sink it, and the momentum just completely turns and it
27:57
Speaker 1: can happen just like that. I have the opression that, like,
28:01
Speaker 1: in the course of of the gay rights movement, this
28:04
Speaker 1: was one of those instances where a pass of stolen
28:07
Speaker 1: and taken to the other basket and just dunked. Yeah,
28:10
Speaker 1: it's uh nice sports analogy. Um, you're right, there's something
28:16
Speaker 1: about that kind of momentum that can't be manufactured. Uh.
28:20
Speaker 1: It all just has to come together in an organic way.
28:23
Speaker 1: And Uh, it's funny Ed did put in here. There
28:27
Speaker 1: was There were some people throughout the years that have
28:31
Speaker 1: uh said that the death of Judy Garland earlier on
28:35
Speaker 1: June had had riled up the gay community because she
28:40
Speaker 1: was so big in the gay community. They're all upset
28:42
Speaker 1: over Judy Garland, and that is what kind of helped
28:44
Speaker 1: kick off the Stonewall riots. By all accounts, that's probably
28:47
Speaker 1: not true, but maybe they were grumpier than normal. Who knows.
28:51
Speaker 1: Maybe it just strikes me such like a demeaning, dismissive explanation,
28:56
Speaker 1: you know, like, oh, you gays were just mad because
28:59
Speaker 1: Judy Garland, so you acted up and it just happened
29:02
Speaker 1: to work out in your favor, you know, Right. So
29:05
Speaker 1: what happened is Pine comes in, He's got these cops
29:08
Speaker 1: and their intention was to uh not only shut down
29:12
Speaker 1: a gay bar, but to shut down a mafia bar
29:14
Speaker 1: for selling liquor without a license. Uh, And like you
29:18
Speaker 1: said before, it was just a part of a series
29:20
Speaker 1: of raids that summer all over Manhattan for these underground
29:24
Speaker 1: gay bars. Yeah, the the Checkerboard had gone under on
29:27
Speaker 1: its own, but the rumor was that the cops had
29:29
Speaker 1: shut it down. Of a Telestar, the snake Pit, the
29:32
Speaker 1: sewer Um, they all went down either on their own
29:36
Speaker 1: or because of police raids. But either way, the idea
29:40
Speaker 1: and the gay community was that they were in the
29:42
Speaker 1: midst of a major persecution. All of their places were
29:45
Speaker 1: getting shut down, and supposedly among the police they were
29:49
Speaker 1: shutting down mafia bars, but the gay community wasn't getting that.
29:54
Speaker 1: They were seeing that their gay bars are being shut down.
29:58
Speaker 1: So there was definitely a sense of person cution that
30:01
Speaker 1: summer in New York among gays who went to gay bars. Yeah,
30:05
Speaker 1: things were kind of kind of simmering at this point. Yeah,
30:08
Speaker 1: And one more thing, I want to give a shout
30:09
Speaker 1: out to David Carter, I believe his name is he
30:13
Speaker 1: literally wrote the book on stone Wall that the stone
30:17
Speaker 1: Wall Uprising documentary was based on. He's just he's in
30:20
Speaker 1: a story and of the stone Wall Uprising. So most
30:23
Speaker 1: of the stuff that we have that's legitimate comes from
30:26
Speaker 1: this guy's research, Yeah for sure. Uh. So what happens
30:31
Speaker 1: is these cops come in there, they start the routine
30:33
Speaker 1: like you were talking about, of exit the bar one
30:35
Speaker 1: at a time, we need your ID. They didn't just
30:37
Speaker 1: hurt everyone out in one big rush because they wanted
30:40
Speaker 1: that identification, which part of the intimidation. And so what
30:44
Speaker 1: happens is one by one, these people are filing out
30:47
Speaker 1: and they don't go home because they're hanging out outside
30:51
Speaker 1: waiting for their friends inside to get let out. And
30:53
Speaker 1: this crowd starts gathering. Uh. Then the crowd starts building
30:59
Speaker 1: not only from the people inside, but as Ed points
31:02
Speaker 1: out in this article, um, other people in the community
31:05
Speaker 1: and in the village. This is you know, it was
31:07
Speaker 1: a gay part of New York still is. And these, uh,
31:11
Speaker 1: the street kids start coming up, and these transgender people
31:14
Speaker 1: in cross stressors, and you know, basically everyone in that
31:17
Speaker 1: community was something to gain and nothing to lose, start
31:21
Speaker 1: kind of hanging around as this uh kind of a
31:27
Speaker 1: more intimidating. It feels like raid went on right right,
31:31
Speaker 1: and and they a lot of them they weren't like
31:34
Speaker 1: necessarily coming from down the street. A lot of them
31:36
Speaker 1: have been inside like the stone Wall. Yet another thing
31:39
Speaker 1: about the stone Wall, it was there was one of
31:40
Speaker 1: the few places where um, transgender people were welcomed, and
31:44
Speaker 1: it was actually kind of their bar um. And like
31:47
Speaker 1: you said, is people were filing out, showing their ide
31:51
Speaker 1: and waiting for their friends. That crowd was growing bigger
31:54
Speaker 1: and bigger, and they're growing on the other side of
31:58
Speaker 1: the cops. So now there's this crowd developing that and
32:01
Speaker 1: the cops are between the crowd and the outside of
32:05
Speaker 1: the stone Wall, right, so they're kind of trapped. Yeah,
32:08
Speaker 1: it's a pretty tight area anyway, if you've ever been
32:10
Speaker 1: over there, the whole West villages like that, but where
32:13
Speaker 1: the stone Wall is in particular, it's just not you know,
32:15
Speaker 1: it doesn't face some big, wide open Manhattan street scene. Yeah.
32:19
Speaker 1: And so there's this crowd is getting bigger and bigger.
32:22
Speaker 1: There's it's hot, they're getting a little restless, they're starting
32:25
Speaker 1: to shout some stuff at the cops. Um. And I
32:31
Speaker 1: think there's a number of things that ed Says contributed
32:35
Speaker 1: as as triggers or flashpoints from this what should have
32:40
Speaker 1: been a routine police raid to harass you know, gay
32:44
Speaker 1: bars are shut down a mafia owned bar um turning
32:49
Speaker 1: into this uprising um and there is there were there
32:53
Speaker 1: were several things. One of the things that the context
32:55
Speaker 1: that was in was this is a time in the
32:58
Speaker 1: United States as a whole when social all unrest was
33:02
Speaker 1: pretty prominent. There are a lot of groups that were
33:05
Speaker 1: organizing and agitating just against the status quo and the establishment,
33:10
Speaker 1: and so the idea of pushing back against police brutality
33:15
Speaker 1: was definitely you know, in the air in the United
33:18
Speaker 1: States more than say, you know, five or ten years earlier. Yeah,
33:21
Speaker 1: I mean, this was a time of war protests of
33:25
Speaker 1: the Black Panthers if you listen to that episode, and
33:28
Speaker 1: in fact, as you'll see in the days following, uh,
33:31
Speaker 1: not even following the riots, but as the riots extended
33:33
Speaker 1: into days two, three, four, or five and six, the
33:35
Speaker 1: Black Panthers actually showed up in support, which was great.
33:40
Speaker 1: Uh So another thing that happened was the uh there
33:45
Speaker 1: was no backup. There were there were not enough cops.
33:46
Speaker 1: They were calling for backup from the Six, but the
33:49
Speaker 1: Six had been getting kickbacks and kind of the story
33:52
Speaker 1: goes that they didn't so much appreciate this other group,
33:55
Speaker 1: the division of public morals coming into their did their
33:59
Speaker 1: uh zone and kind of taking charge of this raid.
34:02
Speaker 1: So they were like, you know, we're not gonna send
34:04
Speaker 1: anyone right now. At least that's how the story goes. Yeah,
34:07
Speaker 1: seymour Pine is actually interviewed in the Uprising documentary and
34:12
Speaker 1: he's saying like the radio kept cutting out every time
34:15
Speaker 1: he called for backup, and he's like that had never
34:17
Speaker 1: happened before. Um, So the the insinuation is is that, yeah,
34:21
Speaker 1: the six Precinct was like you're on your own, pal,
34:24
Speaker 1: this will teach you a lesson, but you could kind
34:26
Speaker 1: of understand from the six Precincts point of view, like
34:31
Speaker 1: it was fine, like any like three or four straight
34:34
Speaker 1: cops could handle any number of you know, gay people
34:39
Speaker 1: coming out of a gay bar during a raid. Because
34:42
Speaker 1: gay gay people were viewed as docile, effeminate, basically every
34:48
Speaker 1: everything that um the white male establishment viewed women as
34:53
Speaker 1: like in all of the the repugnant ways, they also
34:56
Speaker 1: viewed gay people in exactly the same way, right, So
34:59
Speaker 1: they idea that the sixth Precinct didn't send any backup
35:02
Speaker 1: wasn't like these guys are gonna get killed and we
35:05
Speaker 1: don't care. It was let those guys handle handle. You know,
35:08
Speaker 1: this the the administrative part of this raid or whatever.
35:13
Speaker 1: They bit this off. Now they can chew it right. Yeah,
35:16
Speaker 1: Like what's gonna happen. They're not gonna fight back, like exactly,
35:18
Speaker 1: you know that never happened. That was the idea. So
35:21
Speaker 1: all this is going on, there being fight out, filed out,
35:24
Speaker 1: this crowd is growing, tensions are brewing, and um, here's
35:29
Speaker 1: where it gets murky and and apparently there's a lot
35:32
Speaker 1: of versions of the story and even some infighting within
35:37
Speaker 1: the LGBTQ community on who actually started it. Uh. Some
35:41
Speaker 1: people say that someone named Marcia Johnson uh yelled from
35:46
Speaker 1: the bar, I got my civil rights and threw a
35:48
Speaker 1: shot glass through the bar mirror. It was called the
35:51
Speaker 1: shot glass heard around the world. Other people say someone
35:54
Speaker 1: named Jackie Hormona uh started it. And other people say
35:58
Speaker 1: this uh. One lesbian being stuffed in a cop car
36:02
Speaker 1: was battling so fiercely that she kind of got things going. Yes,
36:05
Speaker 1: supposedly she shouted, why don't you guys do something to
36:08
Speaker 1: the crowd. Is she's like fighting a bunch of cops. Yeah,
36:11
Speaker 1: to me, it doesn't matter who maybe lit the fuse,
36:16
Speaker 1: so to speak. Um, it could have been any number
36:19
Speaker 1: of people as far as I'm concerned. Yeah, well, yeah, sure, yeah,
36:23
Speaker 1: I mean it could have been that. It could have
36:24
Speaker 1: been um. The people started throwing pennies at the cops,
36:28
Speaker 1: and then pennies turned into bricks, and then somebody um
36:33
Speaker 1: set some garbage on fire outside of the uh the
36:37
Speaker 1: um stone wall, and and essentially something changed, right, the
36:42
Speaker 1: tone changed. It turned as if you were a cop.
36:45
Speaker 1: It turned ugly real quick and whatever started it, it
36:50
Speaker 1: started to to to move fairly quickly. And seymour Pine,
36:54
Speaker 1: Deputy Inspector seymour Pine of Manhattan's First Division of Public Morals, said,
37:00
Speaker 1: we need to get into the safety of the bar,
37:03
Speaker 1: which is really saying something about what the mood of
37:06
Speaker 1: the crowd was like if all of a sudden, the
37:08
Speaker 1: inside of the stone wall in was now the safest
37:11
Speaker 1: place to be, right it was. It became their refuge, ironically,
37:15
Speaker 1: so they locked themselves in and uh did not stay
37:18
Speaker 1: in there for too long. I mean, there were still
37:20
Speaker 1: some patrons in there. There was a reporter in there
37:23
Speaker 1: supposedly and uh yeah he was from the village voice. Yeah.
37:26
Speaker 1: And then they the people outside ripped up a parking meter.
37:29
Speaker 1: Um knocked down the door. Uh. And by all accounts,
37:33
Speaker 1: the cops were in a bit of a state of
37:36
Speaker 1: shock because they didn't see this coming. I think a
37:39
Speaker 1: lot of the protesters were surprised at themselves that they
37:42
Speaker 1: were standing up as one and and being physical with
37:45
Speaker 1: these police officers. Yeah. And one of the one of
37:48
Speaker 1: the people who was there, who was interviewed in the
37:51
Speaker 1: documentary was saying, like they crowd like saw it. They
37:57
Speaker 1: saw that the police were scared, and like crowd was
38:00
Speaker 1: feeding on that, Like it was just feeding the crowd
38:02
Speaker 1: that to see the cops who had always been in control,
38:06
Speaker 1: who are the ones who had abused you know, this
38:08
Speaker 1: community for so long, We're now suddenly scared for their lives.
38:12
Speaker 1: Just just this crowd was just eating it up, and
38:14
Speaker 1: it was feeding the energy that they were working off of.
38:17
Speaker 1: And Chuck, apparently there's one of the cops was so
38:21
Speaker 1: scared that he threw his gun at the crowd and
38:24
Speaker 1: from what I understand, no shoullets, That's what I'm saying.
38:27
Speaker 1: From what I understand, no shots were fired, which means
38:30
Speaker 1: that it would have been full of bullets. So basically
38:32
Speaker 1: that cop was like, here here's my loaded gun. Yeah,
38:35
Speaker 1: that's weird. That's what you're supposed to do in an
38:37
Speaker 1: old Western when you run out of bullets, right, or
38:39
Speaker 1: with Superman, right, you shoot at him and then all
38:42
Speaker 1: the bullets bounce off his chest, and then you throw
38:44
Speaker 1: your gun at him and he ducks. So weird. All right,
38:47
Speaker 1: let's take another break. The riot is in full swing
38:49
Speaker 1: at this point, and we'll come back and finish up
38:53
Speaker 1: and tell you the end of the story right after this. So, Chuck,
39:18
Speaker 1: I feel like we should well we're describing the rest
39:21
Speaker 1: of the riot. We should be playing yakety sacks, just
39:24
Speaker 1: to give it a light touch. So it was. Um.
39:27
Speaker 1: One of the one of the accounts that I saw,
39:30
Speaker 1: apparently compiled by David Carter was that um, it was.
39:36
Speaker 1: It was. It was a gay riot, right. There were
39:39
Speaker 1: a lot of transgender um people dressed up women dressed
39:44
Speaker 1: up UM doing a kick line at the police, like
39:49
Speaker 1: a Rockets kick line and singing right. Um. One transgender
39:53
Speaker 1: woman hit one of the police with her purse. Um.
39:56
Speaker 1: There was there was a there was you know, death
40:00
Speaker 1: only that element going on. The cops were apparently really
40:03
Speaker 1: caught off guard by this time. The the I think
40:06
Speaker 1: the sixth had gotten the word, and we're starting to
40:09
Speaker 1: send back up because they had heard that these cops
40:13
Speaker 1: were now holed up inside the stone wall and there
40:16
Speaker 1: was a riot going on outside, so they were sending
40:18
Speaker 1: back up. But even the backup and trained riot police
40:21
Speaker 1: were like powerless in the face of this completely bizarre riot. Right,
40:26
Speaker 1: they were used to a certain kind of riot, they
40:29
Speaker 1: were not used to a gay riot, and and it
40:31
Speaker 1: was throwing them off big time. Well, it's funny to
40:34
Speaker 1: the uh, the one of the guys in the documentary
40:37
Speaker 1: said the next day he was talking about all the
40:40
Speaker 1: the fake jewelry and the sequence on the street and
40:42
Speaker 1: he was like, it looked like just like a field
40:44
Speaker 1: of like shimmery diamonds and things. So this is you're right,
40:48
Speaker 1: this is unlike any riot they had experienced. And um,
40:52
Speaker 1: I guess this was precursor to SWAT. Was New York's
40:56
Speaker 1: tactical patrol force. Yeah, it might have been, what wasn't
40:59
Speaker 1: it And temporary SWAT was like called out for the
41:03
Speaker 1: against the Black Panthers in l A for the first time.
41:06
Speaker 1: It would have been like maybe that year, the year before,
41:08
Speaker 1: but New York wouldn't have had a SWAT team by then. Yeah,
41:11
Speaker 1: We did an episode on SWAT, so you can go
41:13
Speaker 1: listen to that and correct us at will. But so
41:16
Speaker 1: they call in the technical Patrol Force. Uh, things are
41:20
Speaker 1: definitely serious at this point, and uh they were probably
41:25
Speaker 1: you know, between six hundred and a thousand people. Uh,
41:28
Speaker 1: people started calling people on the phone. Uh, you know,
41:30
Speaker 1: get down here, it's going down, and um the crowd
41:34
Speaker 1: swelled in. You know, when you got a thousand angry
41:38
Speaker 1: people from the LGBTQ community that had had enough after
41:42
Speaker 1: years and years of mistreatment. Um, it was pretty serious affair. Yeah,
41:46
Speaker 1: for sure. I mean any time people are throwing bricks
41:49
Speaker 1: at cops, it turned serious pretty quick, right. Yeah. So, um,
41:55
Speaker 1: because you said before, like the the layout of the
41:57
Speaker 1: streets in in the um Westville are not like in
42:01
Speaker 1: a neat grid. The cops would chase the rioters or
42:06
Speaker 1: the um, the protesters, whatever you want to call him
42:09
Speaker 1: at this point down one street, and then the crowd,
42:12
Speaker 1: rather than running and dispersing, would just turn as a
42:15
Speaker 1: hole down another stream, come back around, and then they
42:18
Speaker 1: would be chasing the cops. So there was this whole
42:21
Speaker 1: like chase and and like just just changes in the momentum.
42:25
Speaker 1: Like we were talking about earlier. Um, and it just
42:28
Speaker 1: went on for hours and hours and hours basically until
42:31
Speaker 1: daylight from what I understand. Yeah, So eventually, um, this
42:35
Speaker 1: crowd dispersed, but uh, it did not end there. This
42:40
Speaker 1: went on for about six days, and uh. Another guy
42:44
Speaker 1: in the documentary said that he felt like people were
42:47
Speaker 1: even more angry on day two. Um kind of once
42:50
Speaker 1: word got around, Um, but on day two, three, four,
42:53
Speaker 1: or five and six, it was a little bit different. Things.
42:56
Speaker 1: Actually they got a little more organized, um, and not
43:00
Speaker 1: in a in a violent way, like you know, here's
43:03
Speaker 1: how we're gonna take them down strategically. But uh, like
43:07
Speaker 1: we said, people started coming out. Black panthers came out,
43:09
Speaker 1: hippies came out, so the rights protesters, tourists came out.
43:12
Speaker 1: It became a like Ed says, a counterculture event. And uh,
43:18
Speaker 1: before you knew it, it was. It was kind of
43:20
Speaker 1: the first big, major major gay protest was going on.
43:24
Speaker 1: Right They basically anybody who wanted to fight the cops
43:28
Speaker 1: was like, let's go do this, and they they did
43:32
Speaker 1: for like you said, two, three or four or five,
43:34
Speaker 1: six days. It was coalescing. It feels like day two
43:38
Speaker 1: though Day two seems to be like the the day
43:43
Speaker 1: when everything really came together, because there were still more
43:46
Speaker 1: protesters than cops. Apparently, although the cops changed tactics. They
43:51
Speaker 1: were no longer like hitting people with clubs in the legs.
43:54
Speaker 1: They were hitting him in the head and they were
43:56
Speaker 1: like a lot of people with head injuries laying around.
43:58
Speaker 1: It was pretty grizzly and brutal, but the protesters were
44:01
Speaker 1: still like fighting pretty hard. But in the midst of
44:05
Speaker 1: all this there were also people giving speeches and they
44:08
Speaker 1: were chanting gay power. Um. There was a political tone
44:13
Speaker 1: to it that hadn't been there the night before, and
44:17
Speaker 1: that that wouldn't be there necessarily for the following nights
44:21
Speaker 1: because a night I guess three, um, there were more
44:26
Speaker 1: cops than than protesters from that that moment on. But
44:29
Speaker 1: one of the one of the other things that that
44:31
Speaker 1: really kind of egged this whole thing along as well
44:34
Speaker 1: was that the next night, after this this riot and
44:37
Speaker 1: protests and um at following the raid, the stone ball
44:41
Speaker 1: In opened again for Saturday. So they opened up on
44:44
Speaker 1: Saturday and it was just a they just put out
44:46
Speaker 1: a welcome sign for all of the protesters saying, come
44:49
Speaker 1: on back, it's not done yet. Yeah. So Eventually everything
44:53
Speaker 1: quieted down after those six days by that next Sunday
44:57
Speaker 1: and UM, but the this would not be the end.
45:01
Speaker 1: It was really just kind of the beginning of what
45:02
Speaker 1: was to come. UM. A few months after that, they
45:05
Speaker 1: had a commemorative march in New York and across the
45:09
Speaker 1: United States, and then that was just one March. And
45:13
Speaker 1: then a year later, on the first anniversary of the riots, UH,
45:16
Speaker 1: they had what would become the first Gay Pride March.
45:19
Speaker 1: They didn't call it that at the time. UM. And
45:22
Speaker 1: in the in the documentary, it's it's really moving when
45:25
Speaker 1: UH they're talking about you know, at first they didn't
45:28
Speaker 1: you know, they said they didn't know if it was
45:30
Speaker 1: supposed to be from Christopher Street to UH to Central Park,
45:34
Speaker 1: and they said, we didn't know if we were gonna
45:36
Speaker 1: make it that far. We didn't know if there would
45:37
Speaker 1: be ten of us or twelve of us. UH. It
45:41
Speaker 1: was just sort of uncertain. You know. It was obviously
45:44
Speaker 1: way before internet, and so there wasn't you know, communication
45:47
Speaker 1: like you have today. But what they had relieflets, and
45:51
Speaker 1: they handed out thousands of them, UH, and there were
45:54
Speaker 1: a few hundred people at first, but all these people
45:57
Speaker 1: from the LGBTQ community were apparently in the streets and
46:00
Speaker 1: support and as they marched they joined in. I think
46:04
Speaker 1: I think there was a lot of fear to you know,
46:06
Speaker 1: hold up a sign and join a march until they
46:10
Speaker 1: saw other people doing the same thing, and so they
46:13
Speaker 1: kind of joined in. And by the time they got
46:14
Speaker 1: to Central Park, you know, there were thousands and thousands
46:17
Speaker 1: of people, uh in what would be, you know, the
46:20
Speaker 1: first Pride parade in the United States, and apparently the
46:25
Speaker 1: the time that was scheduled, Like, the parade finished in
46:29
Speaker 1: about half the time they had allotted for it because
46:32
Speaker 1: everybody was moving so quickly because they were so excited
46:35
Speaker 1: and so nervous about what was gonna happen. But yeah,
46:38
Speaker 1: it turned out to be the first gay Pride parade.
46:41
Speaker 1: The guy called it, they called it a run. Yeah,
46:43
Speaker 1: it was pretty funny. Yeah, but it's pretty amazing that
46:48
Speaker 1: as it went it just attracted support, Like that's a
46:50
Speaker 1: heck of a parade. When the bystanders get sucked into
46:54
Speaker 1: the parade, that's a good parade right there. Yeah. So
46:58
Speaker 1: out of this grew the activists Alliance the Gay Liberation
47:02
Speaker 1: Front UM ed pointed out an irony that it really
47:07
Speaker 1: never occurred to me. But one of the reasons it's
47:09
Speaker 1: considered sort of the birth of the modern gay rights movement,
47:13
Speaker 1: he said, is because it was not the start of
47:15
Speaker 1: the gay rights movement. And like we said earlier, there
47:17
Speaker 1: was that foundation was already there. Uh, this was just
47:21
Speaker 1: sort of the catalyst. They weren't starting from scratch. They
47:23
Speaker 1: had these groups that were together and they were kind
47:26
Speaker 1: of just I think waiting for this, for something to
47:30
Speaker 1: happen to really bring them attention. And UM. Even though
47:34
Speaker 1: there were some uprisings in sixty five and sixty six
47:38
Speaker 1: and sixty seven in San Francisco and l A, they
47:41
Speaker 1: weren't UM although the New York Times didn't cover this
47:44
Speaker 1: like they should have either, But those weren't covered by
47:47
Speaker 1: major newspapers at all, just underground newspapers, so they never
47:51
Speaker 1: really uh kind of got the the coverage, and they
47:54
Speaker 1: weren't as noteworthy a stone Wall ended up being. I
47:57
Speaker 1: was reading about that to the UM Compton caffee Compton's
48:00
Speaker 1: Cafeteria riot in San Francisco, and I think nineteen seven
48:05
Speaker 1: UM was a pretty big riot actually, and it was
48:09
Speaker 1: a transgender UM riot where transgender women who were UM
48:15
Speaker 1: working the tender Loin as sex workers because it couldn't
48:18
Speaker 1: get work anywhere else. Um, they were just sick of
48:22
Speaker 1: being brutalized by cops. And one of them was being
48:24
Speaker 1: arrested for being transgender, and she threw her a cup
48:27
Speaker 1: of coffee in the CoP's face, and the whole riot,
48:30
Speaker 1: just the whole the place just rioted. Like it was.
48:33
Speaker 1: It was just an explosion of violence in the face
48:38
Speaker 1: of brutality. And none of the papers mentioned it didn't
48:41
Speaker 1: even get mentioned. Like the mainstream media would not touch
48:45
Speaker 1: anything that gay people were doing, including rioting in the
48:49
Speaker 1: streets of San Francisco. Um, just they just wouldn't talk
48:53
Speaker 1: about it. Well. And yeah, like I said, the Times,
48:55
Speaker 1: while they did cover it, it was it wasn't a
48:58
Speaker 1: backpagees thing, but it definitely didn't at the attention that
49:01
Speaker 1: any other kind of like you know, violence against police
49:04
Speaker 1: would have gotten at the time. But um, the LGBTQ
49:08
Speaker 1: community didn't. They just didn't stop. Basically, they said, you know,
49:11
Speaker 1: we're going to turn these into groups and marches and
49:14
Speaker 1: rallies and parades and protests. And that was really the
49:18
Speaker 1: significance and and the legacy that Stonewall had today is it.
49:23
Speaker 1: It really just was sort of a uh parton the pun,
49:27
Speaker 1: kind of a coming out party for the entire movement.
49:30
Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, it was a debut tant fall for
49:33
Speaker 1: the gay community. It was. Yeah, that's pretty cool. Um.
49:37
Speaker 1: I think that was the key was organizing, like taking
49:40
Speaker 1: that momentum and organizing it, turning it into something big. Yeah.
49:46
Speaker 1: I think that's probably the key with anything like that. Yeah.
49:48
Speaker 1: And I think it also, um, I think it brought
49:51
Speaker 1: together that community in a way that it hadn't before. Um.
49:56
Speaker 1: It seems like they always sort of supported one another,
49:58
Speaker 1: but they're are in word or we're in our divisions
50:04
Speaker 1: of you know, kind of straight acting masculine gay men
50:07
Speaker 1: and lesbians and the trans community. But this seemed to
50:11
Speaker 1: bring everyone together of all races and um, just apparently
50:16
Speaker 1: the the entire riot and and uh protest scene was
50:21
Speaker 1: just incredibly diverse. You know. Don't watch the movies. Yeah,
50:29
Speaker 1: so very bad. Yeah, one of the heroes in one
50:33
Speaker 1: turns straight and marries a policewoman in the end. I mean,
50:35
Speaker 1: the documentaries are good, but there's been two movies two
50:39
Speaker 1: thousand fifteen, the one and two thousand fifteen was just
50:42
Speaker 1: an abomination. Basically. Yeah, documentaries are rarely bad, almost never bad. Yeah,
50:48
Speaker 1: the it's the the movies. Movies, they're not that great sometimes. Yeah,
50:54
Speaker 1: the one in Roland Emmerick made this movie and what's
50:58
Speaker 1: that name? Familiar? I know that name? He did Independence
51:01
Speaker 1: Day in Godzilla. Okay, Like, I have no idea what
51:04
Speaker 1: he was doing with this thing. Maybe he I don't know,
51:06
Speaker 1: Maybe he's gay, Maybe his heart was in the right place.
51:08
Speaker 1: I have no idea. Like, I don't know anything about
51:11
Speaker 1: the guy. But all I know is he was roundly
51:14
Speaker 1: criticized for whitewashing, uh what happened and fiction and he
51:18
Speaker 1: said it was fictionalized, But like, why fictionalize it? Why
51:22
Speaker 1: just cast a bunch of handsome white dudes when you
51:24
Speaker 1: can tell the real story, you know? Right? Yeah, and
51:27
Speaker 1: and and it's like you you said you already kind
51:29
Speaker 1: of touched upon. But I think it bears repeating. Like
51:31
Speaker 1: there's a lot of discussion about who did what and
51:36
Speaker 1: who played what role in in the Stone Wall Uprising,
51:40
Speaker 1: and I think the transgender community in particular feels like
51:44
Speaker 1: yet again they're being put in the in the back
51:47
Speaker 1: seat behind masculine, white gay males um when when in fact,
51:54
Speaker 1: they may not have played a bigger role or may
51:56
Speaker 1: have played an equally significant role to tran the trans
52:00
Speaker 1: gender community that was there at Stonewall Um. But historically speaking,
52:07
Speaker 1: the transgender community or sub community or subculture of the
52:11
Speaker 1: gay community has has usually taken a back seat to
52:14
Speaker 1: the what I guess what you would just call that,
52:17
Speaker 1: that white masculine male community. And and I can understand
52:22
Speaker 1: being upset about that if if you know, if you're transgender.
52:26
Speaker 1: Uh so in twenty six uh and I guess I
52:31
Speaker 1: was there right after this um because it was already
52:33
Speaker 1: a monument, the Stonewall in and the cute, little tiny
52:37
Speaker 1: Christopher Park right there next door out front was designated
52:42
Speaker 1: a national monument by President Obama, the very first such
52:47
Speaker 1: dedicated to gay rights. And the Pride March still ends
52:51
Speaker 1: on Christopher Street every year. And I say, go and
52:54
Speaker 1: have a drink there. It's a truly historic place, and
52:58
Speaker 1: it's a landmark. And I would guess now they've cleaned
53:01
Speaker 1: it up enough so you won't catch anything from the
53:03
Speaker 1: house beer. Yeah, it's not. They don't have buckets of beer.
53:09
Speaker 1: We have buckets of beer, but it's coronas in a
53:11
Speaker 1: bucket of ice. Yeah, find your find your beach is
53:16
Speaker 1: with the stone Wall. You got anything else? Nope? Man,
53:22
Speaker 1: go watch the Stonewall Uprising American Experience documentary everybody, especially
53:28
Speaker 1: the part of the footage of that first Pride parade
53:31
Speaker 1: when it ends in the park. It'll just do your
53:34
Speaker 1: heart good. Uh. If you want to know more about
53:37
Speaker 1: the stone Wall Uprising, you can type stone Wall in
53:40
Speaker 1: the search bar how stuff works dot com and it
53:42
Speaker 1: will bring up this excellent article by the Grabster. And
53:45
Speaker 1: since I said the grabs there, it's time for listener mail. Uh.
53:50
Speaker 1: You know what, We're gonna forego listener mail this week
53:52
Speaker 1: in favor of our annual call for uh iTunes reviews. Awesome?
54:00
Speaker 1: How about that? So one thing that always helps the
54:02
Speaker 1: podcast out. Um. People are always asking what they can
54:05
Speaker 1: do besides spreading the word, is if you go and
54:07
Speaker 1: leave a review on iTunes or I guess it's now
54:10
Speaker 1: Apple podcasts. Um, it helps us out. And even if
54:15
Speaker 1: it's bad, well, that didn't help us. But no, that
54:17
Speaker 1: doesn't help. Don't listen to Chuck, everybody listen to the
54:21
Speaker 1: first part, but not the second part. Just you know,
54:24
Speaker 1: leave your honest review and assessment and all that helps
54:27
Speaker 1: us out and it's been very effective over the years,
54:29
Speaker 1: it keeping us viable and vital. So yeah, we'll be
54:35
Speaker 1: back next week with listener mail, but we would very
54:37
Speaker 1: much appreciate that. Well. Thanks and if you want to
54:40
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54:43
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54:45
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54:48
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54:51
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54:54
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54:57
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54:59
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55:02
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