Pride Month

Pride month is a time for members of the LGBTQ community and allies to get together and celebrate the advances of LGBTQ+ rights as well as to honor those lost to hate crimes and HIV/AIDS.  It is also a time to recommit to the work that still needs to be done to achieve equality.

The catalyst for Pride was the 1969 Stonewall Riots – a response to a police raid at the Stonewall Inn, a gay club in Greenwich Village, NY.   The raid resulted in bar patrons, staff and neighborhood residents rioting and demanding places where LGBTQ+ people could go and be open about their sexual orientation without fear of arrest.  Pride Month is largely credited as being started by Brenda Howard who organized Gay Pride Week a year after the Stonewall riots.

Bill Clinton was the first US President to officially recognize Pride Month in 1999.

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Education

“First Person” Video Series

PBS produced a show about gender identity, sexuality and queer community. There are three (3) seasons that explore gender identity and sexuality, and a variety of LGBTQ-related news and issues.

First Person PBS Video Series

Division Spotlights

BSN SPORTS
Varsity Spirit
Herff Jones

LGBTQ+ Trailblazers:

  • Alan Turing: A groundbreaking mathematician and scientist who is considered to be the father of artificial intelligence and computer science. He is credited with breaking  Nazi codes during WWII
  • Gertrude Pickett: Also known as, Ma Rainey, is recognized the mother of the blues. In a time when most people were closeted, she sang openly about her relationships with other women and about living life as a black woman in America. She became a popular performer in the 1920s and her work inspired poets such as Sterling Brown and Langston Hughes.
  • Kathy Kozachenko: She was voted on to the city council of Ann Arbor, Michigan, making her the first openly gay person to be elected to office in United States in 1974.
  • Marsha P. Johnson: A transgender black woman, was one of the organizers of the Stonewall riots in 1969.
  • Edith Windsor: Plaintiff in the US Supreme Court case that overturned the Defense of Marriage act in 2013, making same sex marriage legal in the US.
  • Harvey Milk: The first openly gay person elected to public office in California in the late 1970’s who was assassinated.  He was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009.
  • Gilbert Baker: A gay artist and activist who created the Rainbow flag without licensing it so the LGBTQ+ symbol would spread worldwide.

Ways to Celebrate Pride Month