Part 1 of an extensive LGBTIQ history from before the common era to the present.

1. RECOVERING THE PAST:
A “WESTERN” LESBIAN, GAY,
BISEXUAL, TRANSGENDER,
INTERSEX & QUEER HISTORY:
PART ONE
Warren J. Blumenfeld
warrenblumenfeld@gmail.com

2. •Dr. Warren J. Blumenfeld is
available to come to your campus
or community organization.
•Contact:
warrenblumenfeld@gmail.com

3. HIDDEN FROM HISTORY
• Our lives, stories, histories INTENTIONALLY hidden by socially
dominant individuals and groups through:
• Neglect
• Deletions / Erasures
• Omissions
• Bans
• Censorship
• Distortions / Alterations
• Trivializations
• Changing Pronouns Signifying Gender
• Other Unauthorized Changes

4. MARCUS GARVEY
“A people without the knowledge of their
past history, origin and culture is like a tree
without roots.”

5. GERTRUDE STEIN
“Let us recite what history
teaches. History teaches.”

6. “PERVERSE PRESENTISM”
“…projecting contemporary
understandings back in time.”
Or viewing the past from a contemporary
perspective, framework, lens.
J. Jack Halberstam

7. THE FLOW
1. Before the Homosexual & Trans Person
2. The Early Emancipation Movement
3. LGBT People under the Nazi Regime
4. The “Homophile” Movement
5. Post-“Stonewall”
6. AIDS & Beyond
7. Deconstructing Identity

8. WORKING DEFINITIONS

9. INTERLOCKING SYSTEMS OF
OPPRESSION
SEXISM is the overarching system of
advantages bestowed on males. It is prejudice
and discrimination based on sex, especially
against females and intersex people, founded
on a patriarchal structure of male dominance
through social and cultural systems.

10. HETEROSEXISM is the overarching system of
advantages bestowed on heterosexuals. It is the
institutionalization of a heterosexual norm or standard,
which establishes and perpetuates the notion that all
people are or should be heterosexual thereby privileging
heterosexuals and heterosexuality, and excluding the
needs, concerns, cultures, and life experiences of
lesbians, gay males, bisexuals, asexuals, trans, queer,
and intersex people. Many times blatant and at times
subtle, heterosexism is oppression by design and intent,
and by neglect, omission, erasure, and distortion.

11. •BIPHOBIA is oppression directed against
people who love and sexually desire people
of more than one sex or those who are
pansexual or polysexual.
•ASEXUAL OPPRESSION is oppression
directed against asexual people.

12. “TRANS” & “CIS” FROM CHEMISTRY

13. • Cisgender: a term for individuals who match
the sex assigned to them at birth with their
bodies, and their personal gender identities.
Other terms include “gender normative,”
“cismale,” “cisfemale,” and others.
• The Latin prefix cis means “on the same
side (as)” or “on the side (of)” or “to/this the
near side.”
• CISSEXISM (“Binarism,” “Transgender
Oppression,” “Genderism”) comprises a
conceptual structure of oppression directed
against those who live and function external to
the gender/sex binary, and/or the doctrine that
they do not exist at all.

14. • INTERSEX OPPRESSION is oppression directed against
intersex people.

15. ALL OF THESE FORMS OF OPPRESSION
HAVE THEIR ROOTS IN SOCIALLY
CONSTRUCTED BINARY SYSTEMS.

16. INTERLOCKING SYSTEMS OF OPPRESSION
Sexism
Biphobia
Heterosexism
Cissexism
Intersex
Oppression

17. TO “MINORITIZE”
• An action, a verb, not an adjective or noun.
• It is the process of objectifying, subordinating,
marginalizing, dominating, controlling, disenfranchising,
violating “the Other”
• Through the practices of
• Defining
• Stereotyping
• Scapegoating
• Tokenizing

18. TO “OTHER”
 To Other and the process of Othering
 “Othering” is something people and
groups do –- it is an action, a verb, not an
adjective or noun.
 “Otherness”: is not static, intrinsic,
immutable characteristics or traits.
Nathaniel Mackey

19. • A stereotype is an oversimplified, preconceived, and
standardized conception, opinion, affective attitude,
judgment, or image of a person or group that is held in
common by members of other groups.
• Originally referring to the process of making type from a
metal mold in printing…
• …social stereotypes can be viewed as molds of regular and
invariable patterns of evaluation of others.
TO “STEREOTYPE”

20. The origin of the scapegoat dates back to the Book of
Leviticus (16:20-22). On the Day of Atonement, a live goat
was selected by lot. The high priest placed both hands on
the goat’s head, and confessed over it the sins of the
people. In this way, the sins were symbolically transferred to
the animal, which was then cast out into the wilderness.
This process thus purged the people, for a time, of their
feelings of guilt, shame, and fear.
TO “SCAPEGOAT”

21. • Social scapegoating occurs when groups single out
individuals and other groups as targets of hostility and
violence, even though they may have little or nothing to do
with the offenses for which they stand accused.
• With scapegoating, there is the tendency to view all members
of the group as inferior and to assume that all members are
alike in most respects. This attitude often leads to even further
marginalization.
TO “SCAPEGOAT”

22. • Tokenism occurs when dominant
groups generally and leaders
specifically single out one or a few
individuals from minoritized groups for
acceptance or advancement to give
the appearance of social inclusivity
and diversity,
• Members of dominant groups perform
this to avoid challenges to their
dominant group privilege, power,
domination, and control and
accusations of social discrimination.
TO “TOKENIZE” PEOPLE

23. • When stereotyping occurs, people tend to overlook all
other characteristics of the group. Individuals sometime
use stereotypes to justify the subjugation of members of
that group.
• In this sense, stereotypes conform to the literal meaning
of the word “prejudice,” which is a prejudgment,
derived from the Latin praejudicium.
PREJUDICE

24. • Oppression is prolonged cruel or unjust treatment
and control.
• The concept of “Oppression” can be represented by the
equation…
O = P + SP
…in which “Oppression” Equals
… “Prejudice” plus
…the “Social Power” to enforce that Prejudice
on a number of different levels…
OPPRESSION

25. Oppression occurs on a number of different but
interrelated levels:
• Personal
• Interpersonal
• Institutional
• Larger Societal
THE LEVELS OF OPPRESSION
Rita Hardiman Bailey Jackson

26. • Microaggressions are the everyday verbal, nonverbal,
and environmental slights, snubs, or insults, whether
intentional or unintentional, which communicate hostile,
derogatory, or negative messages to target persons
based solely upon their marginalized group membership.
(from Psychology Today)
MICROAGGRESSIONS

27. • Genocides are the deliberate murdering of large groups of people based on
their minoritized “other” status.
GENOCIDE

28. Before the
Homosexual & Trans
Person

29. PREHISTORIC CAVE ART
• Same-sex couples in the Paleolithic Era
Male Couple in French Cave Female Couple, Gönnersdorf, Germany Cave

30. PREHISTORIC GRAVE SITE
Evidence of gender variation as far back as 5,000 years in a grave
site in a suburb or Prague, Czech Republic. Discovery of a male
skeleton with its head facing eastwards and surrounded by
household jugs. These burial rituals were only previously seen in
graves of females.

31. BEFORE THE HOMOSEXUAL & TRANS PERSON
• Same-sex behavior and many differing forms of gender
expression have probably always existed,
• Concept of
• homosexuality,
• bisexuality,
• heterosexuality,
• transgenderism,
• sexual identity,
• gender identity,
• Indeed, the notion of identity and sense of community based on
these is a relatively modern Western invention.

32. • Some ancient cultures approved of same-
sex relations and many approved many
forms of gender expression (not necessary
within a binary frame):
• Celts
• Scandinavians
• Egyptians
• Chinese
• Southeast Asian Indians
• Africans
• In the (current) “Americas”

33. GALLI
• Large numbers of
transsexual women in
classical times, known as
galli, served as priestesses
in Anatolia (known today
as Turkey) for
approximately 5 thousand
years dating back to the
Stone Age.

34. HIJRA
• Hijra of South Asia have
long performed religious
ceremonies in relation to
the mother-goddess
Bahuchara Mata, and
worship of the Hindu god
Shiva as half man, half
woman Ardhanarisvara.

35. BACHA POSH
AFGHANISTAN & PAKISTAN
• Mehran Rafaat, left, with his
sisters, Benaf sha and Behishta,
outside their family home in Qala-
e-Naw, Afghanistan. Mehran, 6,
formerly called Manoush,
regarded as a boy by his family.
Such children are called “bacha
posh,” which means “dressed up
as a boy” in Dari.

36. LUGBARA
• Among the Lugbara of Africa, transgender women priests are called
okule and transgender men priests are called agule.

37. 25TH-24TH CENTURY BCE
• Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum's tomb built in Egypt
during the fifth dynasty.
• Believed the two men may have been lovers
• First historical record of a homosexual relationship.

38. ANCIENT CHINA
• “Men with the Cut Sleeve”
• Reference to Emperor Ai
• 27 B.C.E. –1 C.E.
• Severed sleeve of his garment
rather than disturb sleep of
male lover lying on it

39. FEUDAL JAPAN
• 17th-century
• Male Community
• Onna Girai

40. TWO SPIRITS
• Native American Indian
Tradition
• Gender-Variant Dress,
Behavior, Sexuality
• Many Held Esteemed Tribal
Positions

41. TWO SPIRITS
• We’wha, Zuni Two-Spirit
• White House
• Visited President Grover
Cleveland

42. RELIGIOUS TEXTS ON
SAME-SEX SEXUALITY
& SAME-SEX
RELATIONSHIPS

43. POLYTHEISM
• Some Common Themes
• Gods are Created
• They Give Birth
• Engage in Sexual Relations
• With Other Gods
• With Mortals
• Universe is Continuous, Ever Changing, Fluid
• Gender Roles Often Blurred
• Some Male Gods Give Birth
• Some Female Gods Have Considerable Power
• Some Gods Engage in Same-Sex Relations
• Some Deities Transform Gender

44. SRI ARDHANARISVARA
Hindu example of deity transcending gender norms and
manifesting multiple combinations of sex and gender.

45. MONOTHEISM
• Some Common Themes
• The Supreme Being without Origin
• Neither Born nor Dies
• Existence Completely Separate from Humans
• Transcendent from the Natural World
• No Sexual Desire
• Strict Separated between the Creator and the
Created
• Strict Separation between the Sexes
• Gender Roles Clearly Defined
• For Humans, Sexuality Accepted in Narrowly-
Defined Contexts

46. RUTH & NAOMI
• Jewish Bible
• Same Hebrew root ‫ק‬ ַ‫ב‬ ָ‫ְד‬‫ו‬
(v'davak - cleave) used in
Genesis 2:24 to describe
Adam’s connection to Eve is
used in Ruth 1:14 to describe
Ruth and Naomi’s
connection.

47. ADAM & EVE
• For Adam and Eve,
affectionate and sexual
components:
• Genesis 2:24
‫ל‬ַ‫ע‬-‫ָב‬‫ז‬ֲ‫ע‬ַ‫י‬ ‫ֵּן‬‫כ‬‫ת‬ ֶ‫א‬ ‫יׁש‬ ִ‫א‬‫ת‬ ֶ‫ְא‬‫ו‬ ‫יו‬ ִ‫ב‬ ָ‫א‬-‫ּמֹו‬ ִ‫א‬‫ק‬ ַ‫ב‬ ָ‫ְד‬‫ו‬
‫ד‬ ָ‫ח‬ ֶ‫א‬ ‫ר‬ ָ‫ש‬ ָ‫ב‬ ְ‫ל‬ ‫יּו‬ ָ‫ְה‬‫ו‬ ‫ּתֹו‬ ְ‫ׁש‬ ִ‫א‬ ְ‫ב‬.
Therefore shall a man leave
• "Therefore shall a man leave his
father and his mother, and
shall cleave unto his wife, and
they shall be one flesh.”

48. RUTH & NAOMI
• In the story of Ruth & Naomi,
which describes a very strong,
loving, caring and mutually
supportive relationship
between these two women
during a serious, life-threatening
crisis in their lives.

49. NAOMI & RUTH
• Israelite woman, Naomi, and her husband, Elimelech, leave their hometown
of Bethlehem
• Israel suffering from famine.
• They move to nearby nation of Moab.
• Naomi’s husband dies.
• Naomi’s sons marry Moabite women named Orpah and Ruth.
• After ten years of marriage, both of Naomi’s sons die.
• Famine subsided. Naomi decides to return to Israel.

50. NAOMI & RUTH
• Naomi tells Ruth and
Orpah, her daughters-in-
law, about her plans.
• Orpah decides to
remain in Moab.
• Ruth insists upon staying
with Naomi.

51. "Entreat me not to leave you, or
to turn back from following you;
For wherever you go, I will go;
And wherever you lodge, I will
lodge; Your people shall be my
people, and your God, my
God. Where you die, I will die,
and there will I be buried. The
LORD do so to me, and more
also, if anything but death parts
you and me." (Ruth 1:16–17)

52. DAVID (‫ִד‬‫ו‬ ָ‫)ד‬ & JONATHAN (‫ן‬ ָ‫ָת‬‫נ‬‫ְהֹו‬‫י‬)
• Jewish Bible, Book of Samuel
• Jonathan, son of Saul, king of
Israel
• David son of Jesse of Bethlehem
• David became king
• Some Biblical scholars interpret
their relationship as romantic
friendship, which may have
involved sexuality.

53. HEBREW SCRIPTURES

54. GENESIS 19:1-25
• The story of the destruction of Sodom is
frequently cited to justify condemnations
of homosexuality. However, there are a
number of problems in interpreting this
story as an argument for a divine
proscription of homosexuality. Many early
Jews and Christian, and some current
Biblical scholars, interpret the sin of Sodom
to be that of inhospitality toward strangers,
and unrelated to sex, while other argue
that the sin is clearly sexual in nature.

55. LEVITICUS 18:22
• Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with
womankind: it is an abomination.
• Some Biblical scholars argue that these
condemnations of same-sex sexuality between
males were in fact referring to same-sex temple
rituals, a practice that was apparently common
among the Canaanites, Greeks, and other
neighboring groups, and was not a
condemnation of “homosexuality,” per se—a
concept that was largely unknown in ancient
times as we know it today.

56. CHRISTIAN SCRIPTURES

57. ROMANS 1:26
• In consequence, God has given them up to shameful passions. Their
women have exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural.

58. ROMANS 1:27
• And likewise also the men, giving up natural relations with women,
burn with lust for one another; males behave indecently with males,
and are paid in their own persons the fitting wage of such perversion.

59. TIMOTHY 1:10
• For whoremonger, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for
menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other
thing that is contrary to sound doctrine.

60. 1 CORINTHIANS 6-9
• Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of
God? Be not deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor
adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind.

61. THOMAS AQUINAS
• Dominican scholar
• Born 1225
• Early proponent of
“natural law”
• Morality based on
constraints of human
nature.

62. THOMAS AQUINAS
• Aquinas believed that
same-sex sexuality (and
any sexual act not
intended for procreation,
including masturbation)
were vices against nature,
which violated the will of
God.
• Against “natural law”

63. QUR’AN

64. THE QUR’AN AND
HOMOSEXUALITY
• Though Mohammed warns against the abuse of sexuality,
the Qur’an does not condemn homosexuality per se and
does not recommend specific punishments for it.
• The references to the story of Sodom are more of an
illustration of God’s power rather than a condemnation of
male same-sex sexuality per se.

65. 26:161
• Your Lord is the Mighty One, the Merciful, Lot’s people, too
disbelieved their apostles. Their compatriot Lot said to them:
“Will you not have fear of Allah? I am indeed your true
apostle. Fear Allah then and follow me. I demand of you no
recompense for this; none can reward me except the Lord
of the Creation. Will you fornicate with males and leave
your wives, whom Allah has created for you? Surely you are
great transgressors….”

66. 27:54
• And tell of Lot. He said to his people: “Are our blind that
you should commit indecency, lustfully seeking men
instead of women? Surely you are an ignorant people.”
• Yet this was their reply: “Banish the louse of Lot from
your city. They are men who would keep chaste.”
• So We delivered him and all his tribe, except his wife,
whom We caused to stay behind, pelting the others
with rain; and evil was the rain which fell on those who
had been warned.

67. 29:28
• And We sent forth Lot to his people. He said to them: “You
commit indecent acts which no other nation has committed
before you. You lust after men and assault them on your
highways. You turn your very gathering into orgies.
• But his people’s only reply was: “Bring down Allah’s scourge
upon us, if what you say be true.”
• “Lord,” said he, “deliver me from these degenerate men.”
• And when Our messengers brought Abraham the good news
they said: “We are about to destroy the people of this town,
for they are wicked men.”

68. 37:133
• Lot, too, was an apostle. We delivered him and
all his kinsfolk, except for an old woman who
stayed behind, and utterly destroyed the
others. You pass by their ruins morning and
evening: will you not take heed?

69. 55:33
• The people of Lot disbelieved Our warning. We
let loose on them a stone-charged whirlwind
which destroyed them all, except the house of
Lot, whom We saved at dawn through Our
mercy. Thus We reward the thankful.
• Lot had warned them of Our vengeance, but
they doubted his warning. They demanded his
guests of him. But We put out their sight and
said: “Taste My punishment, now that you have
heard My warning.” And at daybreak a heavy
scourge overtook them….

70. The Greeks and Romans
approved of same-sex relations
until the 3rd century C.E.

71. • Creation Story of Three Sexes
• Male (descended from the Sun)
• Female (descended from the Earth)
• Hermaphrodite (half male and half female)
• They All Had:
• Rounded Backs and Sides
• Four Arms, Four Legs
• One Head on Cylindrical Neck
• One Face on one side of Head
• A Second Face on other side of Head
PLATO’S SYMPOSIUM

72. • King of the gods, Zeus
• Wanted to weaken them, but not destroy
them
• Split them in two
• They desired to reunite with their missing half.
• Man with Woman
• Woman with Woman
• Man with Man
PLATO’S SYMPOSIUM

73. SAPPHO
• Famed Girls’ School
• Greek Isle, Lesbos
• circa 580 B.C.E
• Earliest known Lesbian writings
• Only one complete poem
survived Catholic Church’s
attempts to destroy them
• Little else known about
lesbianism during this period

74. GREEK GODS & MORTALS
Zeus & Ganymede

75. GREEK GODS & MORTALS
Hyacinthus & Sun God Apollo

76. GREEK MORTALS
Patroclus & Achilles

77. PLATO
• Plato’s writings (circa 393 to 387
B.C.E.) celebrate male same-sex
love.
• Sexual relations between men,
often older and younger,
common in this period.
• Young boy who did not have an
older male lover was disgraced

78. ANCIENT GREECE
• Relationship between older & younger man thought
crucial to maturation process of young men.
• After age 19, young man expected to marry woman
& establish family.

79. ANCIENT GREECE & EARLY ROME
•Misogynistic Patriarchal Societies
•Women viewed as intellectually and morally
inferior to men
•Useful for having children but not suitable to
be men’s companions
•Many forbidden education

80. AMAZONS
• Bronze statue: Horsewoman
• NW Greece, c. 550 B.C.E.
• Represents “Amazon” all-
women societies
• Africa, Asia, Europe, South
America, North America

81. “HERMAPHRODITE”
• god/goddess of love
called Cupid by Romans,
Eros by Greeks.
• Child of Hermes and
Aphrodite
• Genitalia outside the
Male/Female binary frame
• “Hermaphrodite”
• Today “Intersexual”

82. ROMANS
• Early Romans
venerated male
homosexual love
• Greek lovers
Harmodius &
Aristogiton

83. ROMANS
• The Warren Cup
• Silver drinking cup
decorated in relief
• Images of two men
involved in sex
• 1st century C.E.

84. CONSTANTINE I
• Declining years
Imperial Rome
• Climate of intolerance
• 313 C.E. Christianity official
religion
• Pronouncements against
same-sex sexuality
• Christian teachings
influenced Roman law

85. ROMAN EMPEROR THEODOSIUS
• Theodosius Legal Codes
• 438 C.E.
• Death to men engaging
in same-sex activity

86. Roman law affected many later
civil laws throughout Europe,
eventually United States.

87. LE LIVRES DE JUSTICE ET DE PLET
• French legal code of 1270
• Castration, loss of limb, or death for men and women convicted of
engaging in same-sex behavior
“He who has been proven to be a sodomite must lose his
testicles and if he does it a second time, he must lose his
member, and if he does it a third time, he must be burned.
A woman who does this shall lose her member each time,
and on the third must be burned.”

88. JOAN OF ARC
• Peasant, Domremy, Lorraine
Province, French territory
• Age 17, 1429, talked to
Prince Charles, Heir to throne
• Led army, 10,000 peasants to
purge English from French
land
• Stated God advised her to
dress in so-called “men’s
clothing”

89. • Joan’s Army forced
English retreat
• Joan persuaded Charles
to claim throne in Rheims
• Charles crowned King with
Joan by his side
• Consolidation of France as
nation-state.
Charles of France

90. JOAN OF ARC
• Joan captured by
Burgundians, allies of
English
• French nobility
refused to pay
ransom
• Joan, leader of
peasants, posed
threat to feudal class

91. Henry VI of England
English urged Catholic
church to condemn her for
“crime” of transvestism:
“It is sufficiently notorious and well-
known that for some time past, a
woman calling herself Jeanne the
Pucelle (the maid) leaving off the
dress and clothing of the feminine sex,
a thing contrary to divine law and
abominable before God, and
forbidden by all laws, wore clothing
and armor such is worn by men.”

92. JOAN OF ARC
• Joan asserted her cross-
dressing a religious duty &
higher than Church authority
• “For nothing in the world will I
swear not to arm myself and
put on a man’s dress.”
• Catholic Inquisitors condemn
her to death for wearing
men’s clothing and armor
• Burned at the stake as
heretic, 1431.

93. SPANISH INQUISITION
• Begins 1483
• “Sodomites” stoned, castrated,
and burned.
• Between 1540 -- 1700, More than
1,600 people prosecuted for sodomy

94. HENRY VIII
• England in 1533
• “Buggery” (or sodomy)
law
• Penalty of death for “the
detestable and
abominable Vice of
Buggery committed with
mankind or beast.”

95. QUEEN ELIZABETH I
• 1564: Death penalty
same-sex acts between
men permanent part of
English law until 1861
• Women exempt
• British courts decided sex
between two women not
possible

96. “CATAMITE”
• A negative derivation of the name “Ganymede” in Europe
referring to men who had sex with men.

97. KING JAMES I
• King of England & Ireland,
1603 until his death
• Known as King James VI of Scotland
1567-1603
• Unified England, Ireland, & Scotland
• Commission “King James Bible” to
whom it was dedicated
• Loved and had sex with both women
& men
• Men included favorite male lovers,
the Earl of Somerset and the Duke of
Buckingham

98. ENGLAND
• 1885 Criminal Law, punishable
by imprisonment up to two years
• Remained until 1967

99. “FLAMING FAGGOTS”
• Originally Bundle of Sticks
• Men accused of same-
sex behavior rounded up
• Tied together
• Set ablaze
• This, however, has been
disputed by historians
since they were hanged,
not set ablaze.

100. CHINA
• 1740, during the Qing dynasty (1644-1911), government
passed its first laws against homosexuality.
• Punishable by a month in prison and 100 blows of a stick

101. COLONIALISM
• Exploitation
• Violence
• Kidnapping
• Genocide
Christopher Columbus & Crew

102. “PURITANS”
• Left England to practice “Purer”
form of Christianity
• Divinely chosen to form “a
biblical commonwealth”
• No separation of “church &
state” (religion & government)
• Intolerant of other religious beliefs
• Killed Quakers, Catholics, others

103. “WITCH” TRIALS
• Europe & Colonial America
• 16th-18th Centuries
• Women & men accused
being “witches”
• 14 women, 6 men
executed
• Salem, Massachusetts
• 1692
• All but one by hanging.

104. “FIRSTS”
Richard Cornish:
1624
First man executed for same-sex behavior in
an American Colony
“Offense” of Sodomy

105. “FIRSTS”
 Sarah White Norman and Mary Vincent Hammon:
 Plymouth, Massachusetts, 1649
 First women in American colony prosecuted for “lewd behavior
with each other upon a bed.”
 Mary was reprimanded since she was younger than 16.
 Sarah was ordered to publically confess her “unchaste
behavior” with Mary, and she was warned against future
offenses.

106. ANNE HUTCHINSON
• Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1637
• Imprisoned for reinterpreting the Bible & for Preaching
• Facilitated Women’s Bible Study Group
• A male minister said:
“You have stepped out of your place. You have rather
been a husband than a wife, a preacher than a hearer,
and a magistrate than a subject.”

107. ANTI-CROSSDRESSING LAW
• 1696
• Massachusetts Bay Colony
• First to pass law banning cross-dressing

108. CROSSDRESSING
• Edward Hyde
• Lord Cornbury
• Colonial Governor, New
York & New Jersey
• 1702-1709
• Publicly dressed in wife’s
clothing
• Tribute to cousin: Queen
Anne of England

109. “MOLLY HOUSES”
• England, 1700-1830s
• Network of men
gathered for
company & sex
• Series of houses or
rooms in pubs
• Some raided by
police
• Men tried,
• Some executed

110. THOMAS JEFFERSON
• “Liberal Reformer”
• Enclaved, had sex with,
and traded enslaved
people.
• He proposed eliminating
death penalty for same-
sex behavior for men
and women
• Proposed in 1779

111. THOMAS JEFFERSON
“Whosoever shall be guilty of Rape,
Polygamy, or Sodomy with man or
woman (or beast) shall be punished, if a
man, by castration, if a woman, by
cutting thro’ the cartilage of her nose a
hole of one half inch diameter at the
least.”

112. • New ideas in the 18th Century
• Stepping away from faith and ideas that
could not be verified by evidence
• Idea the people had “equal worth”
• A contradiction: except people of color,
Jews, women

113. JOHN LOCKE
• Concept of Separation of Religion & Government

114. • 18th century C.E., so-
called “Age of
Enlightenment.”
• American & French
Revolutions based on
belief that individual
has certain
unalienable rights,
including life, liberty,
and pursuit of
happiness.

115. • French National Assembly , 1789
• Liberty “to do anything that does not
injure others.”
• Abolished punishments for crimes:
“…created by superstition, feudalism, the
tax system, and despotism.”
• Eliminated death penalty from French
sexuality laws
• 1791, French Revolutionary Constituent
Assembly removed homosexuality from
list of punishable offenses
THE DECLARATION OF THE RIGHTS
OF MAN AND OF THE CITIZEN

116. • Liberalize legislation in other countries under
French domination:
• Belgium, much of Italy, Spain, Portugal,
Romania, & Russia, & several Latin
American countries.
• Bavaria abolished laws criminalizing
homosexual acts between consenting
adults in 1813, Hanover in 1840.
• This did not extend to countries outside
French sphere, including Prussia,
Scandinavian states, and after 1871, to
the newly unified Germany, which united
under the Prussian realm.
FRENCH NAPOLEONIC CODE
(1810)

117. EARLY UNITED STATES
• However, people suspected of same-sex activity
were punished. All states passed anti-sodomy laws.
• Most states prescribed imprisonment: Examples,
• Pennsylvania: 5-10 years
• New York: 10 years
• Massachusetts: 20 years

118. BELOVED
“FRIENDSHIPS”
• Evidence through letters Dickenson Gilbert
• No clear evidence of sexual contact
• Emily Dickenson loved friend Sue Gilbert.
• Dickenson wrote Gilbert, 1852
“ Suzie, will you indeed come home next Saturday, and be my own
again, and kiss me as you used to?...I hope for you so much, and feel
so eager for you, feel that I cannot wait, feel that now I must have
you—that the expectation once more to see your face again makes
me feel hot and feverish and my heart beats so fast.”

119. BELOVED
“FRIENDSHIPS”
• Marquis de Lafayette & Lafayette Washington
George Washington
• Lafayette wrote Washington, 1799
“ My Dear General…There never was a friend, my dear general, so
much, so tenderly beloved, as I love and respect you: happy in our
union, in the pleasure of living near to you, in the pleasing satisfaction
of partaking every sentiment of your heart, every event of your life, I
have taken such a habit of being inseparable from you, that I cannot
now accustom myself to your absence, and I am more and more
afflicted at that enormous distance which keeps me so far from my
dearest friend.”

120. BARON FRIEDRICH WILHELM
VON STEUBEN
• Renowned Prussian tactical military
specialist
• Military trainer for Continental Army
• Turned scrubby assemblage of farmers
& merchants into unified, efficient,
powerful force.
• Decisive winning Revolutionary War of
Independence
• Steuben was what we would know
today as “gay”

121. CONTINENTAL ARMY
• Some people assigned “female” at birth
• Presented gender as “male” and joined Continental Army
• Deborah Sampson
• Born 1760, Plymouth, Massachusetts
• Entered army as Robert Shurtlift
• Extracted bullet from own thigh
to avoid being detected
• Honorably discharged after wounded
• Discovered after serving 3 years.
• Married Robert Gannett.
• Wrote book with author Herman Mann

122. CROSS-DRESSING
• 16th – 19th centuries, England & U.S.
• Assigned “female” at birth,
• Presented gender as “male”
• Some married women
• Europe, if discovered
prosecuted by courts
• Punishments:
• From floggings - death
Title page,1746 novel,
The Female Husband by Henry Fielding

123. CONTINENTAL ARMY
• Lieutenant Gotthold Frederick Enslin
• 1778, first, dishonorable discharge
for “sodomy”
• General George Washington
demanded Enslin be "dismiss'd
[from] the service with Infamy." He
was "to be drummed out of Camp
tomorrow morning by all the
Drummers and Fifers in the Army,
never to return.“

124. “DEISTS” IN U.S.
• Many “founders” of U.S., Deists
• Including: John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson,
James Madison, Thomas Paine, and George Washington
• Washington, though technically Anglican, more deist
• Believed in a higher power, but not necessarily organized
religion or Biblical scriptures

125. EXCEPTIONS TO
“ALL MEN ARE
CREATED EQUAL”
• United States Constitution
• “3/5 Clause”: Enslaved Africans counted as 3/5 person
• For census: Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3
“Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among
the several States which may be included within this Union,
according to their respective Numbers, which shall be
determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons,
including those bound to Service for a Term of Years
[‘indentured servants’], and excluding Indians not taxed, three
fifths of all other Persons.”

126. SLAVERY IN AMERICAN COLONIES
• For Europeans & Africans, began as “Indentured
Servitude,” for up to 5 years.
• By 1650s, beginning of lifetime servitude for Africans
• Approximately 4 million by mid-1800s

127. • Scriptural justifications used
to support slavery
• Many slave ships had on
board a Christian minister to
help oversee and bless the
passage.
• Slave ship names included:
“Jesus,” “Grace of God,”
“Angel,” “Liberty,” &
“Justice.”
http://propagandapress.org/2006/09/20/the-first-slave-ship-to-land-in-
america-was-called-jesus/
http://www.pleasecomeflying.com/2007/10/lucille-clifton-
slaveship.html
SLAVERY

128. “[Slavery] was established by
decree of Almighty God...it is
sanctioned in the Bible, in
both Testaments, from
Genesis to Revelation...it has
existed in all ages, has been
found among the people of
the highest civilization, and in
nations of the highest
proficiency in the arts.”
Jefferson Davis

129. U.S. ANTI-SLAVERY MOVEMENT
Large-Scale Organizing begins Early 1830s

130. SOJOURNER TRUTH
• Born c. 1797 Isabella Baumfree
into slavery
• Abolitionist & women’s rights
activist
• Famous speech, “Ain’t I a Woman?”
• 1851, Ohio Women's Rights
Convention

131. FREDERICK DOUGLASS
• Born c. 1818, Frederick Augustus
Washington Bailey into slavery
• Social reformer, abolitionist,
supported women’s suffrage,
Native American Indian rights,
immigrants rights.
• Writer, orator, diplomat

132. ELIZABETH CADY STANTON
• Abolitionist, Feminist, Sufferist
• 1848, organized first Women’s
Rights Convention
• “Declaration of Sentiments &
Resolutions” based on
Declaration of Independence
• Stanton believed women could
live independently from men

133. SUSAN B. ANTHONY
• Born 1820, Susan Brownell Anthony
• Abolitionist, feminist, sufferist
• Traveled U.S. & Europe for 45
years speaking on civil rights
• 1868, published weekly journal
with Stanton, The Revolution
• Motto :
"The true republic—men, their rights and nothing more; women,
their rights and nothing less."

134. FIRST-WAVE FEMINISM: SUFFRAGE
Many early feminists active
in the anti-slavery movement

135. • Beginning of U.S. Women’s
Movement
• Fought for Women’s Suffrage
• At the time, the vote only for white males.
The Declaration of Sentiments
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and
women are created equal; that they are endowed by
their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among
these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to
secure these rights governments are instituted, deriving
their just powers from the consent of the governed.
Elizabeth
Cady
Stanton
Lucretia
Mott

136. CROSS-DRESSING
DURING CIVIL WAR
• About 400 people assigned “female at birth” presented
gender as “male” and served in North & South armies
Sarah Emma Edmonds
(“Franklin Thompson”)
fought in Union army.

137. “BOSTON MARRIAGE”
• Late 19th-century New England
• “Boston marriage”: long-term monogamous relationship between two
unmarried women
• Financially independent of men
• Women spent lives with other women forming emotional ties.
• From Henry James’s book,
The Bostonians, 1886

138. WOMEN’S COLLEGES
• Women often locked out of college
• Women’s college founded for
primarily middle-class women,
• Mt. Holyoke College
• Vassar
• Smith College
• Wellesley College
• Bryn Mawr, and others

139. DR. EDWARD CLARKE
• Conservative critics against women’s education
• Dr. Edward Clarke
Massachusetts Medical Society
• 1873 book: Sex in Education
• Warned that study would interfere
with women’s fertility, causing
chronic uterine disease

140. HAVELOCK ELLIS
“[W]omen’s colleges are the
great breeding ground of
lesbianism. When young
women are thrown together,
they manifest an increasing
affection by the usual tokens.
They kiss each other fondly on
every occasion….They learn
the pleasure of direct
contact...and after this, the
normal sex act fails to satisfy
them.”

141. SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION
OF IDENTITY
• “Identities” socially constructed:
• Sexual Identity
• Gender Identity
• Race
• Nationality
• Religion
• Disability
• Handedness (at one time)

142. SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION
OF IDENTITY
 Same-sex behavior & gender non-conformity
probably always existed in human species.
 Relatively Modern Construction:
Sexual Identity
Gender Identity
Communities around Sexual and Gender
Identities
 Historic Shift
Mid-19th Century

143. CHANGES IN MID-19TH CENTURY
1. Agrarian Economy to
Industrial Economy
2.Competitive
Capitalism & “Free
Wage Labor”
3.Modern Science
D’Emilio

144. Only within last 150
years , organized
sustained political
effort to protect
rights of lesbian, gay,
bisexual, trans*,
intersex, & queer
people.

145. DIASPORIC IDENTITIES: DISPERSED
THROUGHOUT CULTURES & FAMILIES

146. EDWARD CARPENTER
• In England, Mid 19th Century
• Writer, social reformer
• Early defender of homosexuality
• Socialist labor union organizer
• Wrote of evils of Capitalism
• Envisioned new era of
democracy, comradeship,
cooperation, sexual freedom

147. EDWARD CARPENTER
“Eros is a great leveller. Perhaps the true Democracy
rests, more firmly than anywhere else, on a sentiment
which easily passes the bounds of class and caste, and
unites in the closest affection the most estranged ranks of
society. It is noticeable how often Uranians of good
position and breeding are drawn to rougher types, as of
manual workers, and frequently very permanent
alliances grow up in this way, which although not publicly
acknowledged have a decided influence on social
institutions, customs and political tendencies.
from The Intermediate Sex: A Study of Some
Transitional Types of Men and Women, 1908

148. CARPENTER & WHITMAN
• Inspired by poems of
Walt Whitman
advocating women’s
rights, ending slavery,
& celebrating
homoeroticism
• Carpenter traveled
to U.S. confer with
Whitman

149. WALT WHITMAN
 1860, Leaves of Grass
 Section titled “Calamus”
 Clearly homoerotic
 Kalamos in Greek mythology turned
into a reed in grief for his young
male lover, Karpos, who drowned
 Acorus calamus, a marsh plant
 For Whitman represented the love
of Kalamos and Karpos

150. LEAVES OF GRASS
• Removed from library shelves at Harvard
• Placed in locked cabinet with other books thought to
undermine students’ morals
• Whitman fired from job at U.S. Department of the Interior

151. And that night, while all was still, I heard the waters roll
slowly continually up the shores,
I heard the hissing rustle of the liquid and sands, as directed to
me, whispering, to congratulate me,
For the one I love most lay sleeping by me under the same cover
in the cool night,
In the stillness, in the autumn moonbeams, his face was inclined
toward me,
And his arm lay lightly around my breast -- And that night I
was happy.

152. VICTORIA WOODHULL
• First women to run for
President of the
United States
• Argued against
governmental and
societal regulations
on sexuality and
affection

153. VICTORIA WOODHULL
“Yes, I am a Free Lover. I have an inalienable,
constitutional and natural right to love whom I may, to
love as long or as short a period as I can; to change that
love every day if I please, and with that right neither you
nor any law you can frame have any right to interfere.
And I have the further right to demand a free and
unrestricted exercise of that right, and it is your duty not
only to accord it, but as a community, to see I am
protected in it. I trust that I am fully understood, for I
mean just that, and nothing else.”
From a speech co-written by Stephen Pearl Andrews, And the Truth
Shall Make you Free: A Speeech on the Principles of Social Freedom,
1871

154. PRESIDENT JAMES BUCHANAN
• U.S. first homosexual or bisexual President?
• 15th President, 1857-1861
• Biographer Jean Baker suggests romantic relationship with
William Rufus DeVane King, 13th U.S. Vice President
James Buchanan William Rufus DeVane King

155. OSCAR WILDE
• British writer / playwright
• Arrested, imprisoned “gross indecency” & “sodomy”
• Young nobleman
Lord Alfred Douglas
• Wilde sentenced
2 years hard labor.
• After released, died in exile in France

156. LORD ALFRED DOUGLAS
A euphemism for Homosexuality
from his poem "Two Loves“
“The love that dare not speak its name.”

157. U.S.: EMMA GOLDMAN
• 1869, Born in Russian Empire
• 1885, Emigrated New York City
• Joined anarchist movement
• Writer & lecturer: anarchist
philosophy, women's rights,
other social issues
• Early supporter of Oscar Wilde
• In U.S., tradition of social activism

158. FRANCIS GALTON, 1822-1911
• A cousin of Charles Darwin.
• British psychologist.
• A founder of the “Eugenics
Movement.”
• He coined the term
“eugenics” in 1883 from the
Greek, “well born” or “good
origins or breeding.”
• The science of improving
qualities of a “race” by
controlling human breeding.

159. “RACE,” IMMIGRATION, & CITIZENSHIP
• 1790, Naturalization Act in U.S.
• Excluded “nonwhites” from citizenship
• Enslaved Africans
• Asians
• Native Americans (“domestic foreigners”)
• 1924, Native Americans rights of citizenship
• Asians continued denied naturalized
citizenship status

160. “RACE,” IMMIGRATION, & CITIZENSHIP
• 1882, Chinese Exclusion Act
• Also illegal for Chinese to marry Whites or Blacks
• 1917, Immigration Act further prohibited
immigration from Asian countries, the “Barred
Zone.”
• China, India, Siam, Burma, Asiatic Russian,
Polynesian Islands, Afghanistan.

161. Over 5000 Black
People Lynched

162. EUGENICS & MASS STERILIZATION
• Approximately 65,000 U.S.-Americans sterilized (many
involuntarily) 1900 -1970
• Supreme Court: Buck v. Bell, 1927: compulsory
sterilization constitutional “for the protection and
health of the state.”

163. MADISON GRANT, 1865-1937
• U.S. Lawyer, Eugenicist
• Co-founder, with Henry Fairfield
Osborn, of the Galton Society for the
Study of the Origin and Evolution of
Man, 1918.
• Grant Influential in Immigration
Restriction and Anti-Miscegenation
Policies.
• Book: The Passing of the Great Race
(1916) detailing the so-called racial”
history of Europe:
• A work of “scientific racism.”

164. • European “Racial” Hierarchy:
• “Nordics” (Northwestern Europe—superior)
• “Alpines” (Central Europe—somewhat inferior)
• “Mediterraneans” (Southern and Eastern
Europe—inferior)
• Jews (most inferior)

165. • Nordics: natural rulers & administrators,
accounting for England’s “extraordinary ability
to govern justly & firmly the lower races” (Grant,
1916, p. 207).
• Alpines: “…always and everywhere a race of
peasants” with a tendency toward
“democracy” although submissive to authority.
(p. 227).
• Mediterraneans: inferior to both Nordics & Alpines in
“bodily stamina,” but superior in “the field of
art.” Also, superior to the Alpines in “intellectual
attainments,” but far behind Nordics “in
literature and in scientific research and
discovery” (p. 229)

166. 1924 U.S. IMMIGRATION ACT
 1924 Johnson-Reed Immigration Act: a.k.a.
“National Origins Quota Act,” or “National
Quota Act”
 Restrictive quotas: Eastern & Southern
Europe
 Viewed as Europe’s lower “races”
 Jews (“Hebrew race”), Poles, Italians, Greeks, Slaves
 Prohibitions of “aliens ineligible
to citizenship”
(Asians from 1790 Naturalization Act)
 Increased numbers allowed
 Great Britain, Germany

167. JAPANESE AMERICAN
INTERNMENT CAMPS, WWII
• 120,000 Japanese Americans
• Uprooted from homes
• Transported to Internment Camps
• Interior U.S.

168. “COMSTOCK” LAWS
• Founded, New York Society for the
Suppression of Vice
• 1873, “Comstock Act”
• U.S. Federal Law
• Banned: “obscene, lewd, and/or
lascivious" materials through mail
• Including anatomy books,
contraceptive devices, sexuality
education information & abortion
information
Anthony
Comstock
Former U.S. Postal
Inspector, Member of the
National Purity Party

169. JOHN HARVEY KELLOGG
• Argued for sexual abstinence: “…neither
the plague, nor war, nor small-pox, nor
similar diseases, have produced results as
disastrous to humanity as the pernicious
habit of onanism [masturbation – from
biblical Onan].”
• Believed whole grains in daily diet would
eliminate desire to masturbate.
• Created Corn Flakes for this purpose
• Founded Kellogg Cereals

170. TEMPERANCE MOVEMENT
• Alcohol disastrous on society
• Brings about prostitution
• Causes men to have sex out of marriage
• Causes men to leave wives and children
• The Women’s Christian Temperance Union, 1893
• Movement resulted in Eighteenth Amendment to U.S.
Constitution

171. WOMEN’S INCREASING
ACTIVISM
• Haverlock Ellis: female homosexuality increasing
because of feminism
• This made women independent of men
• Echoes of these charges resurfaced
in 1960s to discredit
feminist movement.
• Greater numbers of women,
especially from college campuses,
become politically active
1911, women
boycotting U.S. census
for women’s suffrage

172. EARLY 20TH CENTURY
MOVEMENTS
• Feminism, Women’s Suffrage, Sexual Freedom,
Reproductive Rights, Sexuality Education
• Mary Casal, 1930 autobiography, referring to earlier
decades in The Stone Wall:
“People are now daring to talk about birth control, and
important provisions are being made for the execution of
such methods….There is no suffering comparable to
unsatisfied sex desire, not any condition that brings about
such dire results….The time is coming when a man’s love
for a man and a woman’s love for a woman will be
studied and understood as it never has been in the past.”

173. WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE
• 1920
• Women’s Suffrage
• Ratification of
Nineteenth
Amendment
• U.S. Constitution

174. LABOR MOVEMENT
• Fought for Worker’s Rights
• Better Working Condition
• Collective Bargaining
• Workplace Safety
• Fair Wages
• Shorter Weekly Hours
• Gender Equality in Workplace

175. GROWTH OF U.S. CITIES
• U.S. change from agricultural to
industrial economies, late 19th century
• Cities with large number of unmarried
people
• People of different identities mixed:
race, class, gender
• Homosexual subcultures and networks
• Many single-sex boarding houses,
hotels
• Bars, Cafés, Theaters, Dance Halls,
Clubs, Parks, Streets

176. HARLEM RENAISSANCE
• Drag balls in pre-World War II New York gay society.
• Harlem Renaissance, homosexual women and men
part of black night club life.
“Beau of the Ball”
Photographer:
James VanDerZee

177. GLADYS BENTLEY
• Many songs had homosexual
subthemes.
• Clam House in Harlem
• Flirted with & dedication songs to
women in audience

178. GLADYS BENTLEY
“Married” a woman in New Jersey civil ceremony.

179. LANGSTON HUGHES
• Born 1902, James Mercer Langston Hughes
• U.S. poet, novelist, playwright,
short story writer, columnist
• Innovator “jazz poetry’” in
Harlem Renaissance
• Some biographers say he was
homosexual, but closeted
• His story, "Blessed Assurance" –
a father's anger with son's effeminacy
• Called by Senate committee on alleged
communism.

180. “A DREAM DEFERRED”
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?

181. NEW YORK, ARISTON BATHHOUSE
FEB. 21, 1903
• First New York anti-gay police raid
• Police detained 60 men, arrested 14.

182. 1920S LESBIAN NOVELS
• 1928, The Well of Loneliness, Radclyffe Hall.
• Declared obscene England & U.S. Banned for a
time.
• Violated British Obscene Publications Act of 1857,
which stated:
“The test for obscenity is this —
whether the tendency of the matter
charged as obscenity is to deprave
and corrupt those whose minds are
open to such immoral influences
and into whose hands a publication
of this sort may fall.” Radclyffe Hall

183. TOKLAS & STEIN
• Alice B. Toklas & Gertrude Stein -- poet & novelist
• American ex-patriots in France where attitudes more progressive

184. SOCIETY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
• U.S., negative atmosphere.
• 1924, Chicago, first homosexual rights group.
• Society for Human Rights
• Henry Gerber, German American
• U.S. soldier in Germany
after W.W.I
• Influenced by German
Emancipation Movement

185. SOCIETY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
• Group short-lived.
• Only 10 members.
• Chicago police arrested members
• Gerber fired from U.S. Postal Service

186. EARLY SILENT U.S. FILMS
• 1895, “Dickson’s Experimental Sound Film”
• 1912, “Algie the Miner”
• 1924, “Mikaël”
• 1927, “A Wanderer in the West”
• 1932, “Call Her Savage”

187. “DICKSON’S EXPERIMENTAL
SOUND FILM”
• 1895, William Dickson
• Associate of Thomas Edison
• Dickson plays violin onto
off-screen wax cylinder
• 17 seconds

188. “ALGIE THE MINER”
• 1912, Algie Allmore
• “Sensitive” young man from East
• Travels West to marry woman
• Must prove his “masculinity”
to woman’s father
• Close to male bunk-mate
“Big Jim”
• Director, Alice Guy-Blache
• First U.S. woman film director
Algie & future
father-in-law

189. “MIKAËL”
• a.k.a, “Chained: The Story of the Third Sex”
• Directed by Carl Theodore Dreyer, 1924
• Older artist infatuated with a young male model

190. “A WANDERER OF THE WEST”
• 1927, Homophobic wild west scene for a “laugh.”
Clarence termed as:
"One of Nature's
mistakes in a
country where Men
were Men."
“I wonder if you’re
going out with the
boys tonight.”

191. “CALL HER SAVAGE”
• 1932, drag scene by 2 singing gay waiters in gay bar
• Greenwich Village

192. MOTION PICTURE PRODUCTION
CODE
(“HAYS CODE”) 1934-1968
• By motion picture producers and distributors
• Prohibited depiction of homosexuality in film
Will H. Hays,
Creator

193. MOTION PICTURE PRODUCTION
CODE
1934-1968
• 3 Principles:
• No picture shall be produced that will lower the
moral standards of those who see it. Hence the
sympathy of the audience should never be thrown
to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil, or sin.
• Correct standards of life, subject only to the
requirements of drama and entertainment, shall be
presented.
• Law, natural or human, shall not be ridiculed, nor
shall sympathy be created for its violation.

194. NEW YORK STATE LIQUOR
AUTHORITY
• 1930: did not allow homosexuals to be served in licensed bars in New
York state
• Penalty: revocation of the bar's license to operate.
• Confirmed by a court decision in the early 1940s.
• Mere presence of homosexuals in
bars constitutes “disorder.”

195. “MASQUE BALL” ARREST
NYC, 1939
• 1930, Conservative era
• Frequent police raids

196. J. EDGAR HOOVER
• F.B.I Director
• Emotionally and possibly sexually
involved with his assistant, Clyde Tolson
• Hoover wrote in 1936:
“The present apathy of the public toward perverts
[homosexuals] generally regarded as ‘harmless,’ should
be changed to one of suspicious scrutiny. The harmless
pervert of today can be and often is the loathsome
mutilator and murderer of tomorrow…The ordinary
offender [turned] into a dangerous, predatory animal,
preying upon society because he has been taught he can
get away with it.”
“War on the Sex Criminal,” New York Herald Tribune
Tolson & Hoover

197. “GAY”
• Derivation unclear
• England, term for female sex workers
• 19th century, “Gaie,” French slang for homosexual man
• Last century, code word between homosexual men and women
• Chosen term to distance from label “abnormal,” “ill,” “sinful”

198. “BRINGING UP BABY”
• 1938, introduced in film “Bringing Up Baby”
• Cary Grant, dressed in Katheryn Hepburn’s night gown while his wet
clothes were drying,
“I just went
gay all of a
sudden.”

199. End of
Part One