Three Marches

This week started with our class presenting our projects that we have been working on for the past 3 weeks. The first group that presented did their project on showing the movie 'It's Elementary' on campus in the Ostrander Auditorium. They explained the purpose and goal that they wanted to achieve which seemed like a very good idea. They tried to get as many professors and teachers to attend that they could in the short amount of notice they were able to give. They had a fair amount of people show up at the beginning of the movie but by the end of the showing only 8 people were still left. This group wanted to get the reaction out of all the students and teachers that attended and to see what they thought of the film. From the responses we heard during their presentation it sounded pretty interesting and the feedback was pretty diverse and people stood on both sides of the issue.

The next group to present did their project on going to different restaurants and retailers to ask them a couple questions about their employee benefits and if they would hang a rainbow colored triangle in their window. A lot of the responses, from the managers or supervisors, seemed to be pretty safe responses, meaning that they didn't respond in a mean way and explain that they do not support gay rights but at the same time it doesn't mean they fully embrace it either. They just seemed to express that they accept it.

In one of our readings this week, the article Three Marches, Many Lessons was one of the most interesting articles I read this semester. It described the three biggest marches in Washington D.C. to support LGBT rights. The three marches that were described were the marches in 1979, 1987, 1993. Following the Stonewall riots in 1969 many advances occurred for the LGBT community such as the first openly gay person was on national television, and the first open gay male, Harvey Milk, was elected to office. Following Harvey Milk's assassination in 1978 sparked sadness in thousands of people’s lives. In response to this assassination the 1979 march was assembled and it became the 'first national mass action for queer liberation (page 442).' I really thought it was funny how they described this march, 'if Stonewall marked the beginning of the modern gay movement, the first national queer march in 1979 was it's coming out party (page 442).' The article goes on to explain that now marches are valued by how many people participate in the march but the more accurate way to determine a successful march is by the effect it had and the events following the march.

The second march that occurred in 1987 was in response to the AIDS epidemic. When the disease was first in the media some people that were religiously against gays, believed this was a punishment. Approximately six hundred people attended this rally from all across the country to view the AIDS Quilt.

The platform for the third march that occurred in April 1993 didn't differ that much from the 1987 march. This third march had seven different demands. One of the first things was demanding was a LGBT civil rights bill. Another very important thing they were demanding for was for more research on AIDS and more funding for the education of it. This seems like this shouldn't even be a demand because it's an illness that is killing so many people, and just because people don't agree with how these people chose to live out their lives and who they fall in love with does not mean that they should be denied the right to be treated for this disease and not have it taken seriously.

The article concludes with saying when and if there will be another march. There was a proposed idea to have a march in 2000 that didn't end up happening because the idea was not embraced well and organizations had other ideas and plans they were trying to coordinate.