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The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center

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LESBIAN

A woman whose enduring physical, romantic, and/or emotional attraction is to other women. Some lesbians may prefer to identify as gay or as gay women.

GAY

The adjective describes people whose enduring physical, romantic, and/or emotional attractions are to people of the same sex. Sometimes lesbian is the preferred term for women.

BISEXUAL

A person who can form enduring physical, romantic, and/or emotional attractions to those of the same gender or more than one gender. People may experience this attraction in differing ways and degrees over their lifetime. Bisexual people need not have had specific sexual experiences to be bisexual; they need not have had any sexual experience at all to identify as bisexual.

TRANSGENDER

An umbrella term for people whose gender identity and/or gender expression differs from what is typically associated with the sex they were assigned at birth. People under the transgender umbrella may describe themselves using one or more of a wide variety of terms- including transgender or nonbinary. Some transgender people are prescribed hormones by their doctors to bring their bodies into alignment with their gender identity. Some undergo surgery as well. But not all transgender people can or will take those steps, and a transgender identity is not dependent upon physical appearance or medical procedures.

QUEER

An adjective used by some people whose sexual orientation is not exclusively heterosexual or straight. This umbrella term includes people who have nonbinary, gender-fluid, or gender nonconforming identities. Once considered a pejorative term, queer has been reclaimed by some LGBTQIA+ people to describe themselves; however, it is not a universally accepted term even within the LGBTQIA+ community.

QUESTIONING

Sometimes, when the Q is seen at the end of LGBT, it can also mean questioning. This term describes someone who is questioning their sexual orientation or gender identity.

INTERSEX

An adjective used to describe a person with one or more innate sex characteristics, including genitals, internal reproductive organs, and chromosomes, that fall outside of traditional conceptions of male or female bodies. Do not confuse having an intersex trait with being transgender. Intersex people are assigned a sex at birth - either male or female - and that decision by medical providers and parents may not match the gender identity of the child. Not all intersex folks identify as being part of the LGBTQIA+ community.

ASEXUAL

The adjective describes a person who does not experience sexual attraction. Sometimes shortened to "ace," it is an umbrella term that can also include people who are demisexual, meaning they do experience some sexual attraction; graysexual, meaning those who may not fit the strictest definition of the word asexual; and aromantic, meaning they experience little to no romantic attraction and/or has little to no desire to form romantic relationships.

NONBINARY

The adjective describes a person whose gender is not male or female and uses many different terms to describe themselves. Other terms include genderqueer , agender , bigender , genderfluid , and more. None of these terms mean exactly the same thing - but all speak to an experience of gender that is not simply male or female.

+ PLUS

The 'plus' is used to signify all of the gender identities and sexual orientations that letters and words cannot yet fully describe.

Find more LGBTQ+ information and resources by visiting our resource center or by giving us a call at 212.620.7310.

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LGBTQIA+ is an abbreviation for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning, intersex, asexual, and more. These terms are used to describe a person's sexual orientation or gender identity.

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- they feel as though they can't express themselves and show their true personality 

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Improving the Lives and Rights of LGBTQ People in America

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The incoming Biden administration has stated its commitment to advancing LGBTQ equality, which will require undoing the harms caused during the last four years and by generations of discrimination, as well as proactively championing a progressive agenda.

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Here is a look at LGBTQ milestones in the United States. LGBTQ is an acronym meaning lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer or questioning. The term sometimes is extended to LGBTQIA, to include intersex and asexual groups. Queer is an umbrella term for non-straight people; intersex refers to those whose sex is not clearly defined because of genetic, hormonal, or biological differences; and asexual describes those who don't experience sexual attraction.

Timeline:

1924 - The Society for Human Rights is founded by Henry Gerber in Chicago. It is the first documented gay rights organization.

1950 - The Mattachine Society is formed by activist Harry Hay and is one of the first sustained gay rights groups in the United States. The Society focuses on social acceptance and other support for homosexuals.

April 1952 - The American Psychiatric Association's diagnostic manual lists homosexuality as a sociopathic personality disturbance.

April 27, 1953 - President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs an executive order that bans homosexuals from working for the federal government, saying they are a security risk.

September 1955 - The first known lesbian rights organization in the United States forms in San Francisco. Daughters of Bilitis (DOB). They host private social functions, fearing police raids, threats of violence and discrimination in bars and clubs.

July 1961 - Illinois becomes the first state to decriminalize homosexuality by repealing their sodomy laws.

September 11, 1961 - The first US-televised documentary about homosexuality airs on a local station in California.

June 28, 1969 - Police raid the Stonewall Inn in New York City. Protests and demonstrations begin, and it later becomes known as the impetus for the gay civil rights movement in the United States.

June 28, 1970 - Community members in New York City march through the local streets to recognize the one-year anniversary of the Stonewall riots. This event is named Christopher Street Liberation Day and is now considered the first gay pride parade.

1973 - Lambda Legal becomes the first legal organization established to fight for the equal rights of gays and lesbians. Lambda also becomes their own first client after being denied non-profit status; the New York Supreme Court eventually rules that Lambda Legal can exist as a non-profit.

January 1, 1973 - Maryland becomes the first state to statutorily ban same-sex marriage.

March 26, 1973 - First meeting of "Parents and Friends of Gays," which goes national as Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) in 1982.

December 15, 1973 - By a vote of 5,854 to 3,810, the American Psychiatric Association removes homosexuality from its list of mental disorders in the DSM-II Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

1974 - Kathy Kozachenko becomes the first openly LGBTQ American elected to any public office when she wins a seat on the Ann Arbor, Michigan City Council.

1974 - Elaine Noble is the first openly gay candidate elected to a state office when she is elected to the Massachusetts State legislature.

January 14, 1975 - The first federal gay rights bill is introduced to address discrimination based on sexual orientation. The bill later goes to the Judiciary Committee but is never brought for consideration.

March 1975 - Technical Sergeant Leonard P. Matlovich reveals his sexual orientation to his commanding officer and is forcibly discharged from the Air Force six months later. Matlovich is a Vietnam War veteran and was awarded both the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star. In 1980, the Court of Appeals rules that the dismissal was improper. Matlovich is awarded his back pay and a retroactive promotion.

1976 - After undergoing gender reassignment surgery in 1975, ophthalmologist and professional tennis player Renee Richards is banned from competing in the women's US Open because of a "women-born-women" rule. Richards challenges the decision and in 1977 and the New York Supreme Court rules in her favor. Richards competes in the 1977 US Open but is defeated in the first round by Virginia Wade.

October 14, 1979 - The first National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights takes place. It draws an estimated 75,000 to 125,000 individuals marching for LGBTQ rights.

March 2, 1982 - Wisconsin becomes the first state to outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation.

1983 - Lambda Legal wins People v. West 12 Tenants Corp., the first HIV/AIDS discrimination lawsuit. Neighbors attempted to evict Dr. Joseph Sonnabend from the building because he was treating HIV-positive patients.

October 11, 1988 - The first National Coming Out Day is observed.

November 1995 - The Hate Crimes Sentencing Enhancement Act goes into effect as part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. The law allows a judge to impose harsher sentences if there is evidence showing that a victim was selected because of the "actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, ethnicity, gender, disability, or sexual orientation of any person."

September 21, 1996 - President Clinton signs the Defense of Marriage Act, banning federal recognition of same-sex marriage and defining marriage as "a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife."

December 3, 1996 - Hawaii's Judge Chang rules that the state does not have a legal right to deprive same-sex couples of the right to marry, making Hawaii the first state to recognize that gay and lesbian couples are entitled to the same privileges as heterosexual married couples.

April 1997 - Comedian Ellen DeGeneres comes out as a lesbian on the cover of Time magazine, stating, "Yep, I'm Gay."

April 30, 1997 - DeGeneres' character, Ellen Morgan, on her self-titled TV series "Ellen," becomes the first leading character to come out on a prime-time network television show.

October 6-7, 1998 - Matthew Shepard is tied to a fence and beaten near Laramie, Wyoming. He is eventually found by a cyclist, who initially mistakes him for a scarecrow. He later dies due to his injuries sustained in the beating.

October 9, 1998 - Russell Henderson and Aaron McKinney from Laramie, Wyoming, make their first court appearance after being arrested for the attempted murder of Shepard. Eventually, they each receive two life sentences for killing Shepard.

June 2003 - The US Supreme Court strikes down the "homosexual conduct" law, which decriminalizes same-sex sexual conduct, with their opinion in Lawrence v. Texas. The decision also reverses Bowers v. Hardwick, a 1986 US Supreme Court ruling that upheld Georgia's sodomy law.

May 17, 2004 - The first legal same-sex marriage in the United States takes place in Massachusetts.

September 6, 2005 - The California legislature becomes the first to pass a bill allowing marriage between same-sex couples. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoes the bill.

October 25, 2006 - The New Jersey Supreme Court rules that state lawmakers must provide the rights and benefits of marriage to gay and lesbian couples.

May 15, 2008 - The California Supreme Court rules in re: Marriage Cases that limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples is unconstitutional.

November 4, 2008 - Voters approve Proposition 8 in California, which makes same-sex marriage illegal. The proposition is later found to be unconstitutional by a federal judge.

August 12, 2009 - Milk is posthumously awarded the Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama.

October 28, 2009 - Obama signs the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act into law.

September 20, 2011 - "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is repealed, ending a ban on gay men and lesbians from serving openly in the military.

May 9, 2012 - In an ABC interview,Obama becomes the first sitting US president to publicly support the freedom for LGBTQ couples to marry.

September 4, 2012 - The Democratic Party becomes the first major US political party in history to publicly support same-sex marriage on a national platform at the Democratic National Convention.

November 6, 2012 - Tammy Baldwin becomes the first openly gay politician and the first Wisconsin woman to be elected to the US Senate.

June 26, 2013 - In United States v. Windsor, the US Supreme Court strikes down section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act, ruling that legally married same-sex couples are entitled to federal benefits. The high court also dismisses a case involving California's proposition 8.

October 6, 2014 - The United States Supreme Court denies review in five different marriage cases, allowing lower court rulings to stand, and therefore allowing same-sex couples to marry in Utah, Oklahoma, Virginia, Indiana and Wisconsin. The decision opens the door for the right to marry in Colorado, Kansas, North Carolina, South Carolina, West Virginia and Wyoming.

May 17, 2016 - The Senate confirms Eric Fanning to be secretary of the Army, making him the first openly gay secretary of a US military branch. Fanning previously served as Defense Secretary Carter's chief of staff, and also served as undersecretary of the Air Force and deputy undersecretary of the Navy.

June 30, 2016 - Secretary of Defense Carter announces that the Pentagon is lifting the ban on transgender people serving openly in the US military.

November 9, 2016 - Kate Brown is sworn in as governor of Oregon, a day after she was officially elected to the office. Brown becomes the highest-ranking LGBTQ person elected to office in the United States. Brown took over the governorship in February 2016 (without an election), after Democrat John Kitzhaber resigned amidst a criminal investigation.

April 4, 2017 - The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals rules that the Civil Rights Act prohibits workplace discrimination against LGBTQ employees, after Kimberly Hively sues Ivy Tech Community College for violating Title VII of the act by denying her employment.

June 27, 2017 - District of Columbia residents can now choose a gender-neutral option of their driver's license. DC residents become the first people in the United States to be able to choose X as their gender marker instead of male or female on driver's licenses and identification cards. Similar policies exist in Canada, India, Bangladesh, Australia, New Zealand and Nepal.

June 30, 2017 - The US Department of Defense announces a six-month delay in allowing transgendered individuals to enlist in the United States military. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis writes that they "will use this additional time to evaluate more carefully the impact of such accessions on readiness and lethality." Approximately a month later, President Donald Trump announces via Twitter that the "United States Government will not accept or allow Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the US Military..."

November 7, 2017 - Virginia voters elect the state's first openly transgender candidate to the Virginia House of Delegates. Danica Roem unseats incumbent delegate Bob Marshall, who had been elected 13 times over 26 years. Roem becomes the first openly transgender candidate elected to a state legislature in American history.

February 26, 2018 - The Pentagon confirms that the first transgender person has signed a contract to join the US military.

November 6, 2018 - Democratic US Representative Jared Polis wins the Colorado governor's race, becoming the nation's first openly gay man to be elected governor.

June 30, 2019 - New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signs a law banning the use of the so-called gay and trans panic legal defense strategy. The tactic asks a jury to find that a victim's sexual orientation or gender identity is to blame for a defendant's violent reaction. New York follows California, Rhode Island, Illinois, Nevada and Connecticut as the sixth state to pass such a law.

February 10, 2020 - The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upholds a ruling that the state of Idaho must provide gender confirmation surgery for Adree Edmo, an inmate in the custody of the Idaho Department of Correction. The ruling marks the first time a federal appeals court has ruled that a state must provide gender assignment surgery to an incarcerated person. According to the court opinion, "the gender confirmation surgery (GCS) was medically necessary for Edmo, and ordered the State to provide the surgery." In July 2020, Edmo receives her gender confirmation surgery and a May 2020 appeal by Attorney General of Idaho, Lawrence Wasden, is denied as moot by the US Supreme Court in October 2020.

August 26, 2020 - The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals rules in favor of former student, Gavin Grimm in a more than four-year fight over restroom policies for transgender students. The ruling states that policies segregating transgender students from their peers is unconstitutional and violate federal law prohibiting sex discrimination in education. The decision relies in part on the Supreme Court's decision in June 2020, stating that discrimination against people based on their gender identity or sexual orientation violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In 2021, the Supreme Court chooses not to review the opinion by the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals.

February 2, 2021 - Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg becomes the first openly gay Cabinet member confirmed by the Senate.

March 24, 2021 - Dr. Rachel Levine, assistant secretary for health in the Department of Health and Human Services becomes the first out transgender federal official to be confirmed by the Senate.

June 21, 2021 - Carl Nassib, a defensive lineman with the Las Vegas Raiders, becomes the first active NFL player in league history to announce that he is gay.

June 30, 2021 - The State Department announces it will be updating its procedures to allow applicants to self-select their sex marker for passports and that it "will no longer require medical certification" if an applicant's self-selected sex marker doesn't match the sex listed on other official identity documents.

October 27, 2021 - The State Department announces that the US has issued the first US passport with an X gender marker. "As the Secretary announced in June, the Department is moving towards adding an X gender marker for non-binary, intersex, and gender non-conforming persons applying for a U.S. passport or CRBA," State spokesperson Ned Price says in a statement.

October 19, 2022 - The Social Security Administration announces that people can now choose their sex marker in their Social Security records.

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LGBTQ Rights Milestones Fast Facts | CNN

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Here is a look at LGBTQ milestones in the United States. LGBTQ is an acronym meaning lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer or questioning. The term sometimes is extended to LGBTQIA, to include intersex and asexual groups.

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Songs by members of the LGBTQ+ community 

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Songs by members of the LGBTQ+ community 

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https://www.autostraddle.com/top-queer-songs-of-2021/

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23 of the Best Songs by Queer Artists in 2021

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If you logged more than 100k minutes of music listening in 2021 according to your Spotify Wrapped, Congratulations, and Welcome. This one is for you. I myself am never without my headphones, streaming music into my ears for hours on end across Spotify, Soundcloud, Youtube, and Bandcamp.

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The night we got bashed we told Rusty how

they drove up, yelled QUEER, threw a hot dog, sped off.

are they just calling you queer? Good point.

Josey pitied the fools: who buys a perfectly good pack of wieners

and drives around San Francisco chucking them at gays?

And who speeds off? Missing the point, the pleasure of the bash?

Dear bashers, you should have seen the hot dog hit my neck,

the scarf Josey sewed from antique silk kimonos: so gay. You

missed laughing at us, us confused, your raw hot dog on the ground.

Josey and Rusty and Bob make fun of the gaybashers, and I

wash my scarf in the sink. I use Woolite. We worry

about insurance, interest rates. Not hot dogs thrown from F-150s,

homophobic freaks. After the bashing, we used the ATM

in the sex shop next to Annie's Social Club, smiled at the kind

owner, his handlebar mustache. Astrud Gilberto sang tall and tan

and young and lovely, the girl from Ipanema... and the dildos

gleamed from the walls, a hundred cheerful colors. In San Francisco

it rains hot dogs, pity-the-fool. Ass-sized penguins, cock after cock in

azure acrylic, butterscotch glass, anyone's flesh-tone, chrome.

Jill McDonough, "Dear Gaybashers" from Where You Live. Copyright © 2012 by Jill McDonough. Reprinted by permission of Salt Publishing.

Source: Where You Live (Salt Publishing, 2012)

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Dear Gaybashers by Jill McDonough | Poetry Foundation

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The night we got bashed we told Rusty how they drove up, yelled QUEER, threw a hot dog, sped off. are they just calling you queer? Good point. Josey pitied the fools: who buys a perfectly good pack of wieners and drives around San Francisco chucking them at gays?

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MACKLEMORE & RYAN LEWIS - SAME LOVE feat. MARY LAMBERT (OFFICIAL VIDEO)

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https://www.dosomething.org/us/11-young-activists-leading-the-way-for-lgbtq-equality

Young activists fighting for change and LGBTQ rights

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11 Young Activists Leading the Way for LGBTQ+ Equality

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recent uprising.
safe zones.