[Calpernia]

NAMBLA emerged from the tumultuous political atmosphere of the 1970s, particularly from the leftist wing of the Gay Liberation movement which followed the 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City. Although discussion of gay adult-minor sex did take place, gay rights groups immediately following the Stonewall Riot were more concerned with issues of police harassment, nondiscrimination in employment, health care and other areas.

More at this thread

 
 

HARRY HAY and the SPIRIT OF STONEWALL New York, 1994

 

Harry made the following statement to a press conference on June 24, 1994, in the former Stonewall Inn on Sheridan Square in New York, site of the riots that launched the modern gay movement in June 1969. The press conference was called to announce the Spirit of Stonewall (SOS) contingent in the Stonewall 25 march two days later. It was moderated by SOS co-organizer and indefatigable activist Bill Dobbs. Other participants were Christine Martin, sex educator and documentary filmmaker; Glenda Orgasm (aka Glenn Belverio), drag queen activist and filmmaker; Scott O�Hara, editor and publisher of Steam magazine; Val Langmuir of Feminists Against Censorship (London); Julia Smedley, member of Stonewall Now; and Charley Shively of Fag Rag and professor of American Studies at the University of Massachusetts.

This statement was transcribed from a videotape of the press conference. A much shorter version�which omits any mention of NAMBLA or SOS, as well as the entire last half of the statement and the first paragraph�appeared in Radically Gay: Gay Liberation in the Words of Its Founder Harry Hay, ed. Will Roscoe (Boston: Beacon Press, 1996), p. 303. These omissions seem odd in view of the fact that Harry read from a written text. The truncated version also used capital letters for words such as �Brothers and Sisters� and �Queers,� a convention that is not followed here since this complete version is not based on a written text.

Sir Julian Huxley, the great English biologist, said, at the beginning of this century, no negative trait�and, as you know, a negative trait is one that does not reproduce itself�no negative trait ever appears, and reappears, millennia after millennia after millennia, unless it in some way serves the survival of that species. We gays and lesbians may embody, or have discovered, some things that you folks desperately need to know about.

I�m here today as a survivor, as well as the founder of the first ongoing gay organization in the United States, the Mattachine Society, first formed in 1950 in Los Angeles, and now, naturally, a member of SOS, the Spirit of Stonewall, because things we discovered about ourselves and principles we developed in 1950 to �53 are now being trashed by queers who don�t know their own history, all over the place.

We decided from the beginning that, first, because we were still discovering our parameters, we wouldn�t censure each other. If people like NAMBLA self-identify themselves to me as gays and lesbians, I accept them as brothers and sisters with love.

Second, when we decided to rejoin the social or political mainstream again, we would integrate as the group we saw ourselves to be, complete with our own set of values, or we would not integrate at all.

And third, we would no longer permit any heteros�nationally or internationally, individually or collectively�to tell us who we are, what persons our groups should or should not consist of. We assert our right to self-determination, we assert our right to collective self-definition. We queers will decide for ourselves who our members should be.

Members of SOS, notably NAMBLA, have been accused of child molestation. Insofar as child molestation is concerned, the most common form is the sexual coercion by which gay and lesbian children are bedeviled into hetero identities and behaviors. And this is practiced daily by the whole national and international hetero community�parents, family, teachers, preachers, doctors, lawyers, and Indian chiefs, not to overlook U.S. senators and pooh-bah media.

This outrageous coercion of gay kids into hetero identities and behaviors against their wills is not only sexually abusive, it is spiritually devastating rape, because the child unbeknowingly is being led into developing self-loathing at the same time. For this gigantic criminal trespass against not only today�s children but against all of us also�all of us�since childhood, from the queers my age of 82 down through all the generations of queers assembled here in New York, to the gay kids still being bedeviled by sexual coercion against their wills, we the international gay and lesbian people here this week should unite to sue the whole guilty heterosexual community lock, stock, and barrel to within an inch of their lives, and for every nickel they�ve got, as a beginning of compensation. And while we�re at it, we should request our first-class citizenship as well. This could be the class-action suit of the century.

Copyright © NAMBLA, 2003. All rights reserved.
 

 
 

HARRY HAY and the SPIRIT OF STONEWALL New York, 1994

 

Harry made the following statement to a press conference on June 24, 1994, in the former Stonewall Inn on Sheridan Square in New York, site of the riots that launched the modern gay movement in June 1969. The press conference was called to announce the Spirit of Stonewall (SOS) contingent in the Stonewall 25 march two days later. It was moderated by SOS co-organizer and indefatigable activist Bill Dobbs. Other participants were Christine Martin, sex educator and documentary filmmaker; Glenda Orgasm (aka Glenn Belverio), drag queen activist and filmmaker; Scott O�Hara, editor and publisher of Steam magazine; Val Langmuir of Feminists Against Censorship (London); Julia Smedley, member of Stonewall Now; and Charley Shively of Fag Rag and professor of American Studies at the University of Massachusetts.

This statement was transcribed from a videotape of the press conference. A much shorter version�which omits any mention of NAMBLA or SOS, as well as the entire last half of the statement and the first paragraph�appeared in Radically Gay: Gay Liberation in the Words of Its Founder Harry Hay, ed. Will Roscoe (Boston: Beacon Press, 1996), p. 303. These omissions seem odd in view of the fact that Harry read from a written text. The truncated version also used capital letters for words such as �Brothers and Sisters� and �Queers,� a convention that is not followed here since this complete version is not based on a written text.

Sir Julian Huxley, the great English biologist, said, at the beginning of this century, no negative trait�and, as you know, a negative trait is one that does not reproduce itself�no negative trait ever appears, and reappears, millennia after millennia after millennia, unless it in some way serves the survival of that species. We gays and lesbians may embody, or have discovered, some things that you folks desperately need to know about.

I�m here today as a survivor, as well as the founder of the first ongoing gay organization in the United States, the Mattachine Society, first formed in 1950 in Los Angeles, and now, naturally, a member of SOS, the Spirit of Stonewall, because things we discovered about ourselves and principles we developed in 1950 to �53 are now being trashed by queers who don�t know their own history, all over the place.

We decided from the beginning that, first, because we were still discovering our parameters, we wouldn�t censure each other. If people like NAMBLA self-identify themselves to me as gays and lesbians, I accept them as brothers and sisters with love.

Second, when we decided to rejoin the social or political mainstream again, we would integrate as the group we saw ourselves to be, complete with our own set of values, or we would not integrate at all.

And third, we would no longer permit any heteros�nationally or internationally, individually or collectively�to tell us who we are, what persons our groups should or should not consist of. We assert our right to self-determination, we assert our right to collective self-definition. We queers will decide for ourselves who our members should be.

Members of SOS, notably NAMBLA, have been accused of child molestation. Insofar as child molestation is concerned, the most common form is the sexual coercion by which gay and lesbian children are bedeviled into hetero identities and behaviors. And this is practiced daily by the whole national and international hetero community�parents, family, teachers, preachers, doctors, lawyers, and Indian chiefs, not to overlook U.S. senators and pooh-bah media.

This outrageous coercion of gay kids into hetero identities and behaviors against their wills is not only sexually abusive, it is spiritually devastating rape, because the child unbeknowingly is being led into developing self-loathing at the same time. For this gigantic criminal trespass against not only today�s children but against all of us also�all of us�since childhood, from the queers my age of 82 down through all the generations of queers assembled here in New York, to the gay kids still being bedeviled by sexual coercion against their wills, we the international gay and lesbian people here this week should unite to sue the whole guilty heterosexual community lock, stock, and barrel to within an inch of their lives, and for every nickel they�ve got, as a beginning of compensation. And while we�re at it, we should request our first-class citizenship as well. This could be the class-action suit of the century.

Copyright © NAMBLA, 2003. All rights reserved.
 

[Calpernia]

Post 32, Harry Hay is speaking on this parade: SPIRIT OF STONEWALL, New York, 1994

More on this parade:

"Stonewall at 25," October 1994.

On June 26, 1994, scores of fully naked men and women marched in an illegal parade yelling "F___ You" at those on the steps of St. Patrick's Cathedral. They masturbated in the street, pointed their middle fingers at the Cathedral, did satanic dances and dressed as cardinals, nuns, and priests. All of this was done in full view of Police Commissioner William Bratton and the New York City police force. Mayor Rudolph Giuliani watched from above in a helicopter. No one was arrested for anything.

...

...(re the '95 parade...): ..."All the usual suspects were there: drag queens, cross-dressers on Rollerblades, the Butch/Femme Society, the sado-macho brigade in black leather, Men of Discipline and other lovely types. Commercialism was most evident as about a third of the floats were sponsored by various gay bars and clubs. Though there were no signs indicating that the North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) was there, the child molesters were listed in the program..."

...There were men dressed as women and there were fairies on stilts. Hundreds of men wore nothing but jock straps, shaking their bodies to the beat of the blaring rock music. Olympic diving champion Greg Louganis was one of the grand marshals and pop singer Cyndi Lauper danced and sang her hit "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun." Strange looking people were everywhere and often it was difficult to tell whether it was a man or a woman, and in some cases it appeared that it was both. And yes, some of the girls did bare their breasts (a few of them apparently spray painted their chests), but in all fairness it must be said that most of the girls managed to keep their clothes on. The police carried yellow blankets to cover the girls up but decided against using them. Following tradition, no one was arrested.

There's a fat and ugly guy who shows up every year dressed as the pope carrying a sign "My church organ is bigger than yours." He was there again this year. There was one car that passed by with a string of unrelated four letter words and sexual terms on it. Some marchers wore shirts with various vulgarities inscribed on them. There were large pictures of men performing oral sex and there were several examples of men simulating oral sex live atop the floats. The latter exhibition led Norm Siegel of the ACLU to declare "I love watching the First Amendment in action," thus demonstrating how far we've come in our understanding of free speech.

No Gay Pride Parade would be complete without a little Catholic bashing. It should be noted that the place where the march began, 52nd Street, is not a major cross street, making it all the more conspicuous what the intent was in starting there. If Catholic bashing wasn't central to the parade, then surely the request to start the march just south of the Cathedral would have been granted. Indeed, when Janice Thom, the co- chairman of the parade's sponsors, Heritage of Pride, was asked to comment on my statement that her group had deliberately targeted St. Patrick's, she responded briskly, "That's an interesting idea."

The most flagrant anti-Catholicism came from Catholic Ladies for Choice. In this group, there were gays and lesbians dressed as nuns carrying coat hangers and lesbians dressed as nuns carrying tambourines. Most incredible was the gay man who wore a black bra and a black jock strap with a huge set of rosary beads wrapped around his otherwise naked body. There was also someone dressed as the pope with a banner that read, "The Catholic Church, a history of murder, lies, censorship, oppression, and hypocrisy."

And what did Mayor Giuliani have to say about all this? He called it a "very dignified parade."