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12 days of Pride: Know Your Facts About the Stonewall Uprising

The modern-day LGBT rights movement began with a riot.

As LGBT Pride Month draws to a close and cities around the world host marches in solidarity and in search of equality, we're taking it back to where the modern-day movement began: Stonewall.
48 years ago on June 28, 1969, a series of spontaneous demonstrations and riots erupted following a police raid at the Stonewall Inn. The burst of fury was catalyzed by years of oppression and violence against the LGBT communtiy, and folks had had enough. It's important to note that Stonewall was initiated by and included a number of people of color. For the final installment of our 12 Days of Pride series, our own Shangela walks us through the history-making event. Watch below:

Shangela begins, "Some of you may be asking, 'What is Stonewall?' Well I would have to ask you, 'What rock, or stone have you been hiding under baby?" She adds, "Stonewall refers to the uprising that happened actually 48 years ago this month right here in New York City, in the village area."

"We had had enough, the gays had had enough of the police corruption, of the brutality, and so we had an uprising. That right! We had a resistance," she says. "So much can be traced back to the riots at Stonewall, so much in the LGBT movements. Anything that you think about in regards to our civil rights; same-sex marriage, don't ask don't tell, even me being able to stand up here in all my fabulosity baby. I want to say thank you to Marsha P, Johnson who reportedly threw the first brick. An out African American trans woman who picked up that brick and tossed it, and so began the riots, and so began our cultural movement."

Learn more about Stonewall with 12 Days of Pride, above.

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