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A brief take on the history and evolution of gay movements: its lessons and impact.

The recent passing of the law in Spain and Canada, giving full legal rights and protection to gay marriage, both happening within the space of 3 days, had flooded the LGBT community in a wave
of euphoria. With a stroke of a pen, LGBT communities in these two countries are now given the choice of whether or not, to tie the knot with their loved one, and if they do, to enjoy the full marital
rights enjoyed previously only by heterosexual couples.

These landmark decisions in the two Western countries contrasted sharply with another recent heart-wrenching legal judgment in Iran, where two teenage homosexuals were condemned to
death by hanging for an alleged crime of rape against another teenager. Not only that the nature of the crime is questionable and dubious, but the execution of two human lives still in their innocent teenage screams a gross transgression of human rights, and disregard for life.

Gay rights are essentially human rights as the LGBT community wanted nothing more than the same, basic human rights accorded to the heterosexual community. But law, as a product of
human beings, can only evolve as the community and culture which the law governs, evolve and progress.

It is a known fact that homosexuality was regarded as a pathology and that gay sex was a crime in the West till as late as the 1960's. And as we read about the evolution and changes that had
occurred in the West, it also struck us that the community had indeed come a long way to reach where they are right now.

Homosexuality is really nothing new. In the 17th century, during the Tokugawa period (1600 - 1867), Japan has the best recorded tradition of male same-sex love in world history. There was widespread prevalence of homosexual relations among men of the samurai class as well as urbanites generally. In China, the first recorded male love dates back to Zhou Dynasty, 500 BC involving the Duke Ling of Wei and his lover Mizi Xia. Since then, China has seen countless
bisexual and homosexual rulers. For two centuries at the height of the Han, China was ruled by openly bisexual emperors. The names of their male favorites were recorded in the official histories by Sima Qian and Ban Gu.

In other cultures as well, notably that of the ancient Greek and Roman empires, homosexuality was not only widely practiced, but was regarded as a more esteemed and elevated form of human love. Besides that, there had also been records that homosexual practices were in fact part and parcel of cultures of various communities in Africa and Oceania.

Nonetheless, the IDENTIFICATION of homosexuality is something new in terms of human history. While there were obviously homosexual relations between men and women in the past, the homosexual identity was not an issue. People just functioned as they would as a member of the society and did what they felt they had to do.

It was only towards the end of the 19th century when the idea developed that there were `homosexuals', not simply homosexual acts. As Michael Foucault puts it" "Homosexuals was now a species". ~ (The History of Sexuality)

Economic changes in the form of industrial revolution, had freed large numbers of individuals from dependence on family and village, and thus also from the dependence on traditional values and ideas. Homosexuals for once, were able to congregate in the big cities and see for themselves that there were people sharing the same sexual identity as them. Karl Heinrich Ulrich (1825 - 1895), a pioneer gay rights activist, from Germany, came out in 1862 and wrote a statement of legal and moral support for a man arrested for homosexual offences. This was the first public "coming out" and the first recorded example of gay rights activism.

In 1869, Karl Maria Kertbeny, an Austrian-born Hungarian journalist, memoirist and human rights campaigner first coined the new term `Homosexuality" to mean the group of people who are attracted to members of their own sex and was made known after being adopted by both the medical and non-medical fields.

With the emergence of the identity homosexuality, institutionalized homophobia quickly followed. There are three main factors that led to the prevalence of homophobia at that time. Firstly, new medical literature emerged with new authoritativeness - science at that time, had taken the liberty to describe homosexual orientation as pathological. Secondly, Individuals publicly identifying themselves as homosexuals in a proactive manner began to claim legitimacy for their identity and desires. Thirdly, new laws were formed in response to the change of social landscape in order to exert new measures of social control.

It first began in England. Influenced by the new Judo-Christian beliefs which is convinced that the only legitimate aim for sex is procreation, heterosexual and homosexual anal intercourse, or "Buggery" was made a crime by the English Parliament in 1534. Acts of "gross indecency", which also included any form of sexual contacts other than the penile-vaginal contact, were banned in
England in 1885. In the late 20th century, attempts were made to standardize the English Common Law and the Continental Civil Law, and amendments were made. Sodomy, which was not considered a crime in the other countries in Europe before that, was finally made a crime after the amendments.

The feverish colonialism that swept the world during the 19th and 20th century also exerted a profound effect on the laws of the colonies all over the world. The export of the British Common Law to the British colonies worldwide had changed the face of local legislation completely, without being reflective of the local culture. In countries which were never colonized, e.g. Thailand, law
remained free from the homophobic legislation from the United Kingdom.

The first Homosexual Rights Organization, called "The Scientific and Humanitarian Committee", was founded by Dr Magnus Hirschfeld in Berlin in 1897. It promoted public education with pamphlets
like `What the people should know about the Third Sex" in 1902, conducted polls, organized petitions, tried to secure visiting rights for jailed homosexuals and offered lesbians legal protection
from violent husbands. It also delivered medical certificates for cross-dressing members to obtain transvestism permit from police and worked with the `Pedestrian Division' of the Berlin Police to combat blackmailers for homosexuals.

In the US, The Society for Human Rights founded in 1924 in Chicago becomes America's earliest known gay rights organization.

After World War II, many homosexual army personnel who were decommissioned, stayed at the big cities and did not go back to their respective home towns. This created a sudden surge of gay
populations in big cities such as San Francisco, New York. This brought about an increase in repression from the state. Homosexuals were purged from state bureaucracies, crackdowns occurred frequently on gay meeting places, and homosexuals were depicted as threats to the nation's security.

However, the increased repression triggered increased opposition.

Founded in 1951, The Mattachine Society became the first national gay rights organization in US. It was formed by Harry Hay and Chuck Rowland, and is considered by many to be the founder of the gay rights movement. 4 years later in 1956, The Daughters of Bilitis, a pioneering national lesbian organization, was founded by Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon.

In Europe, gay organizations were established first in Amsterdam, followed by Copenhagen, and subsequently in other major European countries.

Thus, homosexual activism was born...

In 1948, a prominent scientist and researcher, Alfred Kinsey, published his famous and controversial book, "Sexual Behavior of the Human Male". The Kinsey Scale of human sexuality tells us that a person may not be completely homosexual or heterosexual based on a 7-continuum scale. Kinsey's seven-point scale charted the gradations of orientation. This challenged the idea that any one point on the scale was `normal' and that homosexuality is pathological. Sexual variation was in fact, a fact of life.

In the 1950's, a new legal argument known as the privacy/morality argument emerged. In 1955, the American Law Institute, Moral Penal Code 1955, stated that consensual homosexual acts as matters of private morality should only concern spiritual authorities. This led to the first decriminalization of homosexual acts in Illinois in 1960.

A similar argument also began to hold footing in UK. Wolfenden Committee of UK 1957 stated that private morality should be outside legal control. This led to decriminalization of homosexual acts in
England in 1967.

Though both important and landmark decisions, `Privacy' did not offer homosexuals equality, only limited space. Nonetheless, they cracked open the door in for subsequent breakthroughs in gay
movements in the West.

In 1969, The Stonewall riots transformed the gay right movement from one limited to a small number of activists into a widespread protest for equal rights and acceptance. Patrons of a gay bar in New York's Greenwich Village, the Stonewall Inn, instead of submitting to the countless and relentless harassment from the police, fought back during a police raid on June 27, sparking three days of riots. The riot was subsequently known as the `Riot that sparked the Gay Revolution'.

Following Illinois in 1960 and Connecticut in 1969, there came a rush to decriminalize homosexual acts in all the other states in USA. The decriminalization of homosexual acts in England and Wales
in 1967 also triggered similar responses in other countries in Europe.

The fight for gay rights continued in the form of peaceful rallies and intellectual debates for many years. In 1973, after intense lobbying by gay right activists, The American Psychiatric Association finally removes homosexuality from its official list of mental disorders. And for the first time in history, homosexuality is no longer regarded as a disease to be treated, but a normal variant of human sexuality to be celebrated as well as to take pride in.

In the span of two decades, the USA had witnessed 4 gay marches that pressed for social change. The first, known as the 1979 March, marked the tenth anniversary of the Stonewall riots and came in the wake of the lenient jail sentence given to Dan White for the assassination of openly gay San Francisco city supervisor Harvey Milk. The First National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay
Rights on October 14, 1979 was an historic event that drew more than 100,000 people from across the United States and ten other countries. The first march succeeded in drawing attention to the
civil rights of homosexuals and in 1982, Wisconsin becomes the first state in the U.S. to pass a gay civil rights law protecting the rights of her homosexual citizens.

The 1987 March, the second national March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights was held on October 11, 1987. It attracted more than a half million people from all over the USA. Triggered by the AIDS epidemic in USA, many of the marchers were angry over the government's slow and inadequate response to the AIDS crisis. 1987 march succeeded in bringing national attention to the impact of AIDS on gay communities. In the shadow of the U.S. Capitol, a tapestry of nearly two thousand fabric panels offered a powerful tribute to the lives of some of those who had been lost in the pandemic. It was the first display of the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt. Each quilt represented a person died of AIDS. Each of them a memorial to a unique life filled with love and joy. Since then, the AIDS Memorial Quilts had been unfurled for public display in most major cities and many local chapters of the NAMES project had been formed all over the world.

The '87 march also spurred the dynamism of the AIDS movement, leading to the passage of Ryan White AIDS Care and the ADA (American Disability Act). The U.S. Congress passes the Ryan White
Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency (CARE) Act to provide help for people with AIDS who do not have health insurance or other resources. The ADA included AIDS as a disability and thus allowed people suffering from AIDS to claim for social support and compensation when they were no longer fit enough to work.

The date of the march, October 11, has been celebrated internationally ever since as National Coming Out Day to inspire members of the LGBTQ community to continue to show, as one of the
common march slogans proclaimed, "we are everywhere."

On April 25, 1993, nearly a million people attended the third March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay, and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation. It was the largest demonstration in United States history to that
time. The failures of the government to respond adequately to the AIDS crisis as well as the right of lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals to serve in the armed forces were especially prominent themes during the march.

On 30 April 2000, The Millennium March on Washington for Equality was called and directed by the Human Rights Campaign and the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches. Main events included a stadium concert, a wedding ceremony involving about 1,000 same-sex couples on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and a festival of gay-friendly vendors and entertainment.

On Dec 1, 1988, The first World AIDS Day was held by the World Health Organization in Switzerland. For one day - December 1st - each year, we are encouraged to remember those who have died from AIDS related illnesses and recommit ourselves to shared communication, education, and AIDS awareness

On December 1, 1989, loss prompted artists in New York to organize the first "Day without Art." On that day, museums and art galleries were closed; drawings and arts were covered with white cloths as a sign of mourning for the numerous artists succumbed to the ravages of AIDS.

On Oct 1, 1989, the world witness a monumental victory of gay movement when Denmark, the Land of the Midnight Sun, became the first country in the world to legally recognize same-sex
partnerships, essentially sanctioning gay marriages. The landmark decision were quickly adopted by the other Scandinavian countries.

On April 26, 2000, running in the forefront as a champion of human rights in spite of the conservative political climate in the country, Vermont becomes the first state in the USA to legally
recognize civil unions between gay or lesbian couples. Though stopped short of referring to same-sex unions as marriage, which the state defines as heterosexual, the law states that these "couples
would be entitled to the same benefits, privileges, and responsibilities as spouses".

Not contented with merely extending partnership rights to LGBT couples, on April 1, 2001, The Netherlands jumped to the forefront of human rights history when its lower house of parliament enacts the world's most comprehensive legal recognition of gay rights, making the Netherlands the first country in the whole world, to recognize full fledged gay marriage. The Dutch law allows same-sex couples to marry and gives them the same rights as heterosexuals when it comes to adopting children of Dutch origin.

Belgium legalised gay marriage 31 Jan 2003, becoming the second country in the world to recognize gay marriage. In the same year, the Canadian provinces of Ontario and British Columbia legalized
same-sex marriage.

In November 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that barring gays and lesbians from marrying violates the state constitution. The Massachusetts Chief Justice concluded that
to "deny the protections, benefits, and obligations conferred by civil marriage" to gay couples was unconstitutional because it denied "the dignity and equality of all individuals" and made them "second-class citizens." Following that ruling, same-sex marriages become legal in Massachusetts on May 17 2004.

On Feb. 12, 2004 in San Franciscon and on Feb. 21, 2004 in New Paltz, city official began to issue marriage certificates to same sex couples. With remarkable disregard towards human rights and
mocking the spirit of liberty the country stood for, the officials in both cities were soon ordered by the court to stop the issuance of marriage certificates to same sex couple. Following that, the
same-sex marriages in San Francisco were declared null and void by the California Supreme Court. In comparison with the other countries which is moving forward and progressively towards enshrining LGBT rights in their constitutions, these decisions had reduced the USA as a hypocritical nation that practices not what it preaches. The USA had, with a court ruling, lost its role as a champion of liberty and human rights.

In a sharp contrast, Spain legalised gay marriage on 30 June 2005, becoming the third country in the world to offer full fledged gay marriage, after the Netherlands and Belgium. Moving one step
further, on 8 August 2005, Spain's Justice Ministry ruled that the country's gay marriage law allows marriage to a foreigner regardless of whether that person's homeland recognizes the partnership.

In speaking to the parliament on the day same-sex marriage became law, Spanish Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said, "Today, the Spanish society answers to a group of people who, during many years have, been humiliated, whose rights have been ignored, whose dignity has been offended, their identity denied, and their liberty oppressed. Today the Spanish society grants them the respect they deserve, recognizes their rights, restores their dignity, affirms their identity, and restores their liberty.

On June 28, 2005, The Canadian parliament passed a bill legalizing gay marriage throughout the country. On July 21, 2005, Marriage equality for same-sex couples became the law of the land. In his speech, Canadian Prime Minister, Paul Martin said, "The people of Canada have worked hard to build a country that opens its doors to include all, regardless of their differences; a country that
respects all, regardless of their differences; a country that demands equality for all, regardless of their differences."

"We were not the first, but I am sure we will not be the last. After us will come many other countries, driven, ladies and gentlemen, by two unstoppable forces: freedom and equality."~ Zapatero.

And the spirit lives on.

Prepared by:
Darrel

The participants of QT gathered together to discuss issues pertaining to the topic, with particular focus on the situation in Malaysia. Read more...What We Can do In Malaysia?