WEBVTT - Part One: Stonewall: The Criminal Queers Who Birthed a Movement 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:02.760 Hello, and welcome to Cool People Did Cool Stuff, the 0:00:02.840 --> 0:00:05.280 podcast that doesn't have a tagline because the title conveys 0:00:05.320 --> 0:00:08.920 the general purpose well enough on its own. I'm your host, 0:00:08.920 --> 0:00:14.160 Margaret Kiljoy, and with me today is Shrine Uness who rules. Hi, Shrine, Thanks, 0:00:14.600 --> 0:00:17.680 thanks for thinking I rule. I'm hi, I'm good. Hi. 0:00:17.960 --> 0:00:22.360 Are you all right? Good to know you're hi? Cool? Okay, 0:00:22.480 --> 0:00:26.079 moving up? Sharin? You you make stuff? What kind of 0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:29.600 stuff do you make? I make films. I make even 0:00:29.600 --> 0:00:33.320 saying art is weird quote unquote art. Yeah, I just 0:00:33.400 --> 0:00:36.200 make things. I just made a film like a little culte, 0:00:36.240 --> 0:00:38.680 like a video essay thing that I think is not 0:00:38.800 --> 0:00:40.680 too bad, which is a lot because I hate everything 0:00:40.680 --> 0:00:44.960 I do. But yeah, it's I just make things. I 0:00:45.080 --> 0:00:50.760 make things cool. I appreciate that today we are running 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:54.720 without a producer. Oh yeah means to men, means we 0:00:54.760 --> 0:00:57.720 can say anything we want. This goes heywire. That's why. 0:00:58.440 --> 0:01:05.000 So the way they build the Moltoft cocktail is and 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:11.560 then you oh really yeah yeah no, it's it's different 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:13.720 than people in my thing And the most important thing 0:01:13.840 --> 0:01:22.679 is no matter what never ever, Ian as our audio 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:29.000 engineer and on woman, wrote or theme music. So Sharine Margaret, 0:01:29.640 --> 0:01:34.880 did you know that a lot of people are queer, gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans, 0:01:34.880 --> 0:01:37.920 two spirit asexual intersects or otherwise don't line up into 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:40.760 the nice heterosexual binary sex system that Western society tries 0:01:40.760 --> 0:01:43.520 to fit everyone into. I do know that. I do 0:01:43.560 --> 0:01:47.880 you know that? Excellent? Well that will make this conversation. 0:01:48.400 --> 0:01:51.720 Was like, no, what do you mean? Yeah, you're like 0:01:52.680 --> 0:01:56.800 one man and one woman. Yeah, did you know that 0:01:56.840 --> 0:02:00.440 some people don't like that? Were like that, like they 0:02:00.480 --> 0:02:05.200 don't like queer people? Yeah? Yeah, I think they. I mean, 0:02:05.240 --> 0:02:08.680 I think everyone is on the queer spectrum. Even the 0:02:08.680 --> 0:02:11.760 people that say they hate they hate it because they 0:02:11.760 --> 0:02:15.639 are on it. Yeah. I think that's fairly true. Yeah. 0:02:16.960 --> 0:02:19.760 I remember the first time of a gay friend of 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:22.880 mine sat me down, was like, the reason people say 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:24.960 the sexuality is a choice is that for them it's 0:02:24.960 --> 0:02:29.960 a choice. Who oh my god, well, how I never 0:02:30.000 --> 0:02:35.359 thought of that. That is very very good point. Yeah, friend, Well, 0:02:35.440 --> 0:02:38.160 today we're going to talk about some of the queer 0:02:38.160 --> 0:02:40.160 people who did something about the people who don't like 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:44.720 queer people. Hell yeah, it will eventually get to Molltop cocktails. Actually, 0:02:45.240 --> 0:02:50.160 although this is our first four partner on the show. Um, 0:02:50.480 --> 0:02:54.240 it felt timely to talk about this stuff, and I 0:02:54.280 --> 0:02:56.160 couldn't find a simple way to do it. So it's 0:02:56.240 --> 0:02:59.919 four parts, so it's going me by the end of 0:03:00.200 --> 0:03:05.560 So buckle up, strap in, folks. Yeah, today we're going 0:03:05.639 --> 0:03:07.720 to talk about how in June nineteen sixty nine, in 0:03:07.800 --> 0:03:10.959 Greenwich Village in New York City, someone bit a cop 0:03:11.520 --> 0:03:13.160 so hard that the cop had to go to the 0:03:13.160 --> 0:03:17.120 hospital and the gay Pride movement was born. Wow, wish 0:03:17.160 --> 0:03:20.160 that was me. That is amazing. I know, I want 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:21.920 to bite a cop so hard that he just like 0:03:22.160 --> 0:03:25.720 loses an arm. That is amazing, just zombie a cop. Yeah, 0:03:27.320 --> 0:03:31.519 today we're gonna talk about motherfucking Stonewall. And by today 0:03:31.600 --> 0:03:33.640 I mean in this four part series that will encompass 0:03:33.680 --> 0:03:37.120 both this week and next week. You have you heard 0:03:37.200 --> 0:03:40.120 much about Stonewall? Yeah, I've heard of it. It's a 0:03:40.200 --> 0:03:43.520 thing that was really important. Yeah, it was. It was 0:03:43.560 --> 0:03:47.839 a very important thing. And before we get into it, 0:03:48.160 --> 0:03:51.680 we're gonna use my favorite thing in the world, context 0:03:51.880 --> 0:03:54.440 aka backstory, or as I call it when I'm talking 0:03:54.480 --> 0:03:57.920 about my show, to my friend's side quests. Oh wow, 0:03:58.280 --> 0:04:01.560 a lot of side quests today, tomorrow, next, Monday and 0:04:01.680 --> 0:04:06.080 next Wednesday. It's good to understand the main quest. How 0:04:06.120 --> 0:04:09.000 else are I'm going to understand it? I know exactly 0:04:09.560 --> 0:04:15.800 that L adds flavor, and I don't know. So there's 0:04:15.800 --> 0:04:18.200 two things that regular listeners are probably tired of hearing 0:04:18.200 --> 0:04:21.599 me say. First, queer people have always been here. Second, 0:04:21.640 --> 0:04:23.640 the ways in which we define things like same sex 0:04:23.720 --> 0:04:26.400 attraction and having a gender identity or presentation different from 0:04:26.400 --> 0:04:30.000 your sex assigned at birth. Those definitions are socially constructed, 0:04:30.040 --> 0:04:34.480 and they change over time. The concepts of homosexuality and heterosexuality, 0:04:34.480 --> 0:04:37.280 for example, in the Western context, were invented in the 0:04:37.360 --> 0:04:39.719 late nineteenth century, and a lot of who we're going 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:44.640 to be talking about today would not don't map to 0:04:44.640 --> 0:04:48.159 today's definitions and labels, or didn't at the time, but 0:04:48.279 --> 0:04:51.120 are still alive today, or were alive recently and then 0:04:51.160 --> 0:04:53.200 like later talked about it. So it's like we're going 0:04:53.240 --> 0:04:55.080 to talk about like a lot of for example, like 0:04:55.160 --> 0:04:59.400 drag queens, many of whom would have identified as gay men, 0:04:59.480 --> 0:05:02.480 many of whom later identified as trans women. We're going 0:05:02.520 --> 0:05:05.840 to talk about transvestites, which is a word that a 0:05:05.880 --> 0:05:08.240 lot of people don't use anymore, but a lot of 0:05:08.240 --> 0:05:10.440 people used at the time. I used to use for 0:05:10.520 --> 0:05:12.840 myself actually before I came out as trans, because I 0:05:12.880 --> 0:05:15.160 consider myself across dresser for a very long time who 0:05:15.200 --> 0:05:18.720 just happened to have a woman's name and never not 0:05:18.920 --> 0:05:22.920 wear women's clothes, you know. So things are different and 0:05:22.960 --> 0:05:27.159 they change. That's my that's my background. In our episode 0:05:27.160 --> 0:05:30.839 about gay resistance to fascism, that was with you, I think, 0:05:30.880 --> 0:05:33.960 wasn't it. I think, yeah, we talked about all the 0:05:34.279 --> 0:05:36.479 yeah they ruled everyone should go back and listen to that. 0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:38.680 That was a good one. I love being here for 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:43.640 the gay ship, that's share. But yeah. So we talked 0:05:43.680 --> 0:05:46.400 about some of the earliest homophile organizations as they might 0:05:46.440 --> 0:05:49.000 have called themselves, and we talked about how they were 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:53.360 violently repressed under the Nazis and how they didn't they 0:05:53.360 --> 0:05:58.680 also violently unrepressed against the Nazis when they could. We 0:05:58.680 --> 0:06:01.360 talked about queer people were putting to camps, and about 0:06:01.440 --> 0:06:04.760 how kind of importantly at the end of the war 0:06:05.440 --> 0:06:09.000 when the camps were liberated, both the capitalist block and 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:12.200 the Soviet Block immediately through the queer prisoners back into 0:06:12.240 --> 0:06:16.640 prison because being gay was illegal and ikey and whatever 0:06:17.920 --> 0:06:20.640 that's where we left off. We're going to pick up 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:24.400 that thread with the Cold War nineteen forties America just 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:28.240 after World War Two. It's gonna be a situation that 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:30.560 is going to be completely unfamiliar to the modern audience. 0:06:31.960 --> 0:06:35.520 Acceptance of gay gay lifestyles was flourishing in some places, 0:06:35.640 --> 0:06:41.000 especially Yeah wow, yeah extus to me. Actually, well, that's 0:06:41.000 --> 0:06:42.520 actually kind of one of the things is that, like 0:06:43.000 --> 0:06:47.480 we have this way of talking about gayness as if 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:50.800 it was like everything was bad and then someone threw 0:06:50.839 --> 0:06:53.080 a brick at a cop at a place called Stonewall 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:56.599 and everything became good, you know. But so acceptance of 0:06:56.600 --> 0:07:00.599 gay lifestyles was flourishing in cities, while I'm Arican culture 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:03.800 more broadly was moving in a more conservative direction. So 0:07:03.839 --> 0:07:05.760 everything got set up for conflict. So the cops and 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:07.640 all that shit are getting more and more conservative, and 0:07:07.640 --> 0:07:09.920 the government's getting more and more conservative. But more and 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:12.000 more gay bars are opening, more and more people are 0:07:12.000 --> 0:07:13.880 finding each other, and more and more people are starting 0:07:13.880 --> 0:07:16.360 to be like, there's literally nothing wrong with who I 0:07:16.400 --> 0:07:18.040 am except for the fact that the cops ain't me. 0:07:18.160 --> 0:07:20.960 I mean that sounds like present day, like it sounds 0:07:20.960 --> 0:07:25.040 like we're still doing that. So yeah, a number of 0:07:25.040 --> 0:07:29.840 fucking just one to one comparisons about what's happening right now. 0:07:29.960 --> 0:07:33.520 It's people don't change. It feels like history just repeats 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:36.440 itself or just like stays the same rather even end 0:07:36.440 --> 0:07:43.400 and start again. It just like keeps yes sackness, Yeah, totally. Well, 0:07:43.440 --> 0:07:47.960 you know, a little tiny micro loops. Right, so we'll 0:07:48.000 --> 0:07:51.680 talk about some of this conflict we've all heard of 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:55.560 the Red Scare. Really there were two reds maybe the podcast? 0:07:55.840 --> 0:07:57.600 Sorry what if I all thought it was a podcast 0:07:57.640 --> 0:08:00.480 is not an actual thing. I'm I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Wait, 0:08:00.480 --> 0:08:06.120 what's the podcast? Uh, I've never listened to it. To 0:08:06.240 --> 0:08:08.080 be fair, I just I kind of make fun of 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:11.880 it a lot. This is part's a podcast with it's 0:08:11.920 --> 0:08:14.400 not really historical. It's just like a it's just a 0:08:14.400 --> 0:08:17.120 podcast with two gals. And that's all I'm gonna say 0:08:17.120 --> 0:08:21.600 about that, because I don't want to get it all right, Yeah, 0:08:21.640 --> 0:08:24.720 fair enough, Well there's I was going to say there's 0:08:24.760 --> 0:08:26.480 two and a half Red Scares, but there's actually three 0:08:26.480 --> 0:08:28.080 and a half because one of them is a podcast. 0:08:30.840 --> 0:08:34.720 The first Red Scare was nineteen seventeen to nineteen twenty 0:08:35.240 --> 0:08:37.800 when the US freaked out about the Russian Revolution and 0:08:37.840 --> 0:08:42.160 they started deporting the anarchists, which is funny because at 0:08:42.200 --> 0:08:45.080 the same time the Russian Bolsheviks also were freaked out 0:08:45.080 --> 0:08:49.960 about the anarchists and we're shooting them. Wow. And so 0:08:50.000 --> 0:08:53.040 they passed the US past this anti Anarchist Sedition Act 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:56.120 of nineteen eighteen, which is part of why I'm very 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:00.480 mad that people are calling the January six rioters seditionists 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:04.200 because I literally have the word sedition tattooed on my knuckles. 0:09:04.559 --> 0:09:07.319 Oh my god, you do, Oh my god, she does. 0:09:07.520 --> 0:09:10.600 I'm looking at her knuckles now in the camera. I 0:09:10.640 --> 0:09:13.280 did not know you had that tattoo. Yeah, I got 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:17.600 it a while ago. That's hilarious. As so mad when 0:09:17.640 --> 0:09:22.960 they started calling anyway um sedition being the crime of 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:26.960 speaking against the government essentially, which is they called they 0:09:26.960 --> 0:09:29.880 called January six people that I didn't realize they would 0:09:29.920 --> 0:09:32.599 call it. That's not that's stupid, I know. I know. 0:09:34.559 --> 0:09:37.080 Also during this Red Scare, there was the Palmer Raids 0:09:37.640 --> 0:09:39.760 which made use of UM. Did you know that in 0:09:39.800 --> 0:09:42.160 the United States it is still illegal to be a 0:09:42.160 --> 0:09:46.079 foreign born anarchist? What about so you can be a 0:09:47.160 --> 0:09:51.560 national National National Yeah, nation board are anarch Yeah. Because 0:09:51.600 --> 0:09:54.640 of free speech, it's legal to be born in the 0:09:54.720 --> 0:09:59.439 US and become an anarchist. But um, there's this law, 0:10:00.120 --> 0:10:03.440 the Immigration Act of nineteen oh three that specifically is 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:06.640 like kick out all of the foreign born anarchists. That 0:10:06.800 --> 0:10:09.200 is so interesting. I did not know that. It's like 0:10:09.240 --> 0:10:12.480 you can be It's the line they draw as far 0:10:12.480 --> 0:10:15.480 as where you're born is like anarchy and president that's 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:19.880 what it sounds like. And so it's not enforced anymore, 0:10:20.440 --> 0:10:23.760 but it'll be interesting because it's still on the books. 0:10:23.880 --> 0:10:28.600 And so anyway, they raid and deport a bunch of people, 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:31.960 and immediately people are like, that's an infringement of free speech. 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:35.679 Even at the time people are like, I don't think 0:10:35.679 --> 0:10:37.400 you're allowed to do that. In the government's like we 0:10:37.440 --> 0:10:41.079 don't care, you know, and we get it into a bit. 0:10:41.120 --> 0:10:42.720 If you want to hear more about this in the 0:10:42.800 --> 0:10:45.280 birth control episodes we did last year with Katie Stole, 0:10:46.200 --> 0:10:49.320 then you get the mini Red Scare, the half red Scare, 0:10:49.600 --> 0:10:52.199 or as I like to call it, or at least 0:10:52.200 --> 0:10:54.839 I wrote it into the script, the Red Thrill, because 0:10:54.960 --> 0:10:57.800 the thrill feels like a half scare. Right, Oh yeah 0:10:57.800 --> 0:11:00.400 it does good. Yeah, good call on that. Thank you, 0:11:00.559 --> 0:11:04.280 thank you. This one was exclusive to New York City. 0:11:04.320 --> 0:11:07.280 It took place in nineteen between nineteen forty nineteen forty two. 0:11:07.960 --> 0:11:12.120 And it's particularly funny that this happened because overall during 0:11:12.160 --> 0:11:15.280 these years, there was some other stuff happening in the 0:11:15.280 --> 0:11:18.840 world right between. That's why I'm surprised. I mean, I 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:22.800 guess like when you you forget that other stuff was happening, though, 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:25.200 when you only know that it was like World War two, 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:28.400 I forget that there was other stuff happening because it 0:11:28.559 --> 0:11:32.120 sounds like the whole world was doing this was in 0:11:32.160 --> 0:11:36.040 World War two, because but um, it's interesting to hear 0:11:36.120 --> 0:11:38.280 that this was all happening at the same time, I know. 0:11:38.360 --> 0:11:41.200 And it's particularly interesting because at the time, the USSR 0:11:41.360 --> 0:11:46.000 was the United States's ally. Oh my god, and so 0:11:46.040 --> 0:11:47.800 it was like actually a time when like even the 0:11:47.840 --> 0:11:51.720 government was like, like, we don't trust communists, but they're 0:11:51.760 --> 0:11:54.959 not our enemy. The Nazis are. Well what a time 0:11:55.600 --> 0:11:59.000 unless you're in New York City. It's called the rap 0:11:59.080 --> 0:12:04.000 Cod Codare Committee. It's a name of two people. Basically, 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:06.920 they investigated the public universities to make sure they didn't 0:12:06.920 --> 0:12:10.959 find any pinko's teaching kids, and refusing to testify before 0:12:11.000 --> 0:12:16.200 this committee was grounds for immediate firing. And they got 0:12:16.240 --> 0:12:18.920 one ex communist to read out fifty four other teachers 0:12:19.400 --> 0:12:22.880 and whoa, if you're the word pinko much. I really 0:12:22.920 --> 0:12:25.319 liked this word. No you said it, and I was 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:27.160 going to just pretend I what you what you meant, 0:12:27.160 --> 0:12:30.640 but please explain it, okay. So pinko is this pejorative 0:12:30.640 --> 0:12:34.160 word for communist, and it's it's an old timey word. 0:12:34.200 --> 0:12:39.480 It's our like grandparents pejorative word for communist, and it 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:43.440 goes back to nineteen twenty five, I think, um, but 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:46.720 it actually being like pink salons was a way to 0:12:46.720 --> 0:12:51.240 talk shit on communist gathering places even before that. And 0:12:51.320 --> 0:12:54.439 they used pink because it's for two reasons. One, it's 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:56.800 a softer shade of red, and therefore these are like 0:12:56.840 --> 0:13:00.920 the soft communists, the socialists. And so that we can 0:13:01.040 --> 0:13:02.760 understand how this ties into why am I talking with 0:13:02.840 --> 0:13:05.400 the red scares. If we're talking about anti gayshit they 0:13:05.559 --> 0:13:09.839 basically we're calling all the socialists gays. They were being 0:13:09.920 --> 0:13:14.679 like these effeminate men, these like pink men. That's so interesting, 0:13:14.960 --> 0:13:21.040 and communism is effeminate. Yeah, you know, nothing's effeminate like 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:27.400 seizing the means of production, Yeah, exactly, or like millions 0:13:27.440 --> 0:13:31.680 of you charging German tanks. Yeah, I mean like whatever 0:13:31.760 --> 0:13:35.840 that is. Gays did that too, but like, yeah, it's interesting. 0:13:35.920 --> 0:13:38.480 I did not know that. Yeah. No. And it's like 0:13:38.920 --> 0:13:42.000 one of the politicians who liked using the word pinko 0:13:42.080 --> 0:13:44.160 in the twenties, I think he would. Basically he had 0:13:44.200 --> 0:13:46.920 these quotes about how like these soft handed men they 0:13:46.920 --> 0:13:49.800 were working, but they didn't use their hands, you know, 0:13:51.360 --> 0:13:53.520 just funny because guys, we know how to use our hands. 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:58.199 And Okay, I know you were thinking, you're thinking, can 0:13:58.280 --> 0:14:01.240 Margaret tie the UNI bomber into this supisode? I think 0:14:01.280 --> 0:14:05.400 exactly what I was thinking. Actually the answer is yes, wow, 0:14:06.280 --> 0:14:09.520 please continue. Yeah, okay, cool. This one I'm gonna be 0:14:10.080 --> 0:14:14.120 This one is from my memory of being involved in 0:14:14.160 --> 0:14:17.400 social movements and not something I can directly source. Ted 0:14:17.480 --> 0:14:20.320 Kazinski the unibomber, he goes to jail, and for a 0:14:20.320 --> 0:14:23.440 while a bunch of environmentalists supported him because he was 0:14:23.800 --> 0:14:27.120 trying to dismantle industrial civilization and all of that stuff. 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:30.720 But then he wrote this like public letter complaining about 0:14:30.800 --> 0:14:34.880 pinko's and one publisher was like, oh, we can't use that. 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:39.080 That's an anti gay word, and Uncle Ted was like, what, No, 0:14:39.200 --> 0:14:41.960 it's not about gays. It's an anti communist word. I 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:44.120 hate the left, and while I'm at it, I hate 0:14:44.120 --> 0:14:46.600 gay people too, But that's not why I said it. 0:14:48.120 --> 0:14:51.160 Oh my god, I did not know that even half it. Yeah, 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:54.400 it's incredible, that's incredible, and I'm paraphrasing this, so please 0:14:54.440 --> 0:14:57.840 don't assume me, mister unibomber. That's so funny that like 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:00.160 it's like, no, it's not the hates through the you 0:15:00.160 --> 0:15:02.280 think it is. It's the other hatesler or is the same. 0:15:02.360 --> 0:15:05.080 I don't know it. Of course I hate that minority, 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:09.520 but that's not what I was saying right now, Yeah, exactly. Yeah, 0:15:09.520 --> 0:15:12.640 back to the mini red scare. I just wanted to 0:15:12.680 --> 0:15:16.080 talk about pinkos as a word. We should bring it back. 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:18.800 I mean, I maybe other people know about it. I 0:15:18.840 --> 0:15:22.440 had never really heard it, So you have educated me. 0:15:22.560 --> 0:15:26.480 I'm sure someone else is like me, being like, oh wow, 0:15:27.760 --> 0:15:33.200 new word that we can all use. Yep. So it 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:35.400 wasn't illegal to be in the Communist Party this time, 0:15:36.040 --> 0:15:38.680 but the main reason they had this mini red scare. 0:15:38.840 --> 0:15:41.360 It was pretty much to destroy the teachers union, and 0:15:41.400 --> 0:15:44.920 they fired more than four hundred union teachers and blacklisted 0:15:44.920 --> 0:15:48.640 them because they were teaching things that they didn't want 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:52.040 them to teach. Yeah, because they like possibly had any 0:15:52.120 --> 0:15:55.400 like leftist inclinations at all. And this of course meant 0:15:55.480 --> 0:15:58.280 firing the first black faculty member ever hired by a 0:15:58.280 --> 0:16:01.280 New York City public college, whose name was Max Jurgan. 0:16:01.760 --> 0:16:04.040 And to tie everything into what's happening now in this 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:06.800 case in Florida, he was teaching a class called Negro 0:16:06.920 --> 0:16:10.760 History and Culture at City College of New York. So 0:16:12.040 --> 0:16:16.320 you know what we're like, nineteen forty to nineteen forty two, okay, Yeah, 0:16:16.440 --> 0:16:19.600 so he gets fired basically for teaching black studies. Well, 0:16:20.200 --> 0:16:24.920 and also it was also an anti gay panic. The 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:27.800 judge said about why it was important to fire teachers 0:16:27.800 --> 0:16:30.440 who teach that being gay is okay, that the court 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:34.400 will quote not tolerate academic freedom being used as a 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:37.560 cloak to promote the popularization in the minds of adolescence 0:16:37.640 --> 0:16:41.400 of acts forbidden by the penal law. Penal law. That 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.080 was funny. I know what, I know what you need, 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:46.040 but it's funny just to hear it in that the 0:16:46.120 --> 0:16:48.840 end of that sentence. Uh yeah, what I said earlier, 0:16:48.960 --> 0:16:55.480 history repeats itself in just different clothing. Yep. What I 0:16:55.520 --> 0:16:58.480 came up with while writing this was, you know, people 0:16:58.520 --> 0:17:00.600 say that history doesn't repeat it ryan times, but then 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:02.560 I actually think it's more like we just keep going 0:17:02.600 --> 0:17:06.320 back to the chorus, Yeah, where the verse has changed, 0:17:06.320 --> 0:17:09.240 and then the chorus of kill all the minorities keeps 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:11.879 coming on. I love that That's exactly what it is. 0:17:12.040 --> 0:17:15.400 It's also it's maybe it's even just like you mess 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:16.840 up and you have to go back to the beginning, 0:17:16.920 --> 0:17:18.879 and then you keep like messing up different places, so 0:17:18.920 --> 0:17:21.000 you go back to the beginning. Oh my god, civil 0:17:21.040 --> 0:17:28.800 rights is groundhog Day. Yeah, exactly. Fuck. The bronx Borough 0:17:29.119 --> 0:17:34.080 president said, quote, the colleges would either be godly colleges 0:17:34.119 --> 0:17:41.119 American colleges, or they would be closed. Well, good old America. 0:17:41.640 --> 0:17:44.640 That was red Scare one point five. Now it's talking 0:17:44.640 --> 0:17:47.320 about the big one, Red scare two point zero. Mm. 0:17:47.880 --> 0:17:49.520 The second red scare is the one that most people 0:17:49.560 --> 0:17:51.919 know about. If someone says the red scare, they probably 0:17:51.960 --> 0:17:54.160 mean the second one. This is the one that gets 0:17:54.200 --> 0:17:58.200 called McCarthyism right nineteen forty seven to nineteen fifty seven. 0:17:58.480 --> 0:18:01.200 It's target was more communist an anarchist this time, but 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:04.959 both red scares went after both. This Red scare, for example, 0:18:04.960 --> 0:18:07.840 included the anarchist Charlie Chaplin being forced in exile away 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:10.359 from the US. And I really only include this because 0:18:10.359 --> 0:18:12.320 I like leaving threads to other episodes. So if you 0:18:12.320 --> 0:18:14.760 want to see the app hear more about that. The 0:18:14.760 --> 0:18:17.680 episode of Anti Fascism and Film with Caitlin Durante talks 0:18:17.680 --> 0:18:21.880 about that is marketing genius. Thank you, Thank your job. Yeah, 0:18:21.960 --> 0:18:24.359 I just get really excited about this, like really intensely 0:18:24.520 --> 0:18:27.480 dense web of anyway. No, it's a great way to 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:30.520 just be like this the same the same way that 0:18:30.560 --> 0:18:32.160 you're like, I had no idea this is happening. At 0:18:32.160 --> 0:18:34.480 the same time, it's good to know that like there's 0:18:34.520 --> 0:18:37.840 all these threads that just like, oh, this is all intermingled, 0:18:37.880 --> 0:18:41.119 because that's fucking history. It's not just like I don't know, 0:18:41.400 --> 0:18:44.480 totally traded somewhere. And also that our struggles have like 0:18:44.560 --> 0:18:46.720 always been tied together in all of these ways, right, 0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:49.600 like the specifically crysto fascist, like you must be a 0:18:49.640 --> 0:18:53.159 godly college thing, the firing of the gay teachers, the 0:18:53.200 --> 0:18:57.040 firing of the like the black studies professor, like it's 0:18:57.080 --> 0:19:01.720 all been tied together forever. Yeah, I think that's why, 0:19:01.840 --> 0:19:04.520 Like when people are shocked about stuff, sometimes it's a 0:19:04.560 --> 0:19:07.840 little bit like this has been happening. That's not how 0:19:07.920 --> 0:19:09.360 I feel like. It's just like it's not like, how 0:19:09.400 --> 0:19:11.480 do we get this way? What happened to people? It's 0:19:11.520 --> 0:19:15.919 like we've always been this way. It's just been like 0:19:16.080 --> 0:19:19.159 bolstered in certain people because it's been so long. I 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:21.199 don't know if that makes sense. I just think it's like, 0:19:21.840 --> 0:19:25.280 I don't know. Yah. For flavors of the same thing, well, 0:19:25.320 --> 0:19:28.600 if you want different flavors of the same thing, you 0:19:28.640 --> 0:19:32.800 should try American capitalism, where you can go to the 0:19:32.840 --> 0:19:36.600 store and buy a million types of oreos, most of 0:19:36.600 --> 0:19:41.959 which a vegan. Yeah they they are. And also you 0:19:42.000 --> 0:19:51.359 can consume these products and services the support this show. Okay, 0:19:51.640 --> 0:19:56.640 we are back, and we're talking about this mass hysteria 0:19:56.840 --> 0:20:00.000 about communists take over the US or whatever the House 0:20:00.200 --> 0:20:05.320 on American Activities Committee. But and it's famous stuff, and 0:20:05.320 --> 0:20:08.080 I'm sure we'll talk about it more sometime, or if 0:20:08.200 --> 0:20:09.960 only there was like a podcast that was like about 0:20:09.960 --> 0:20:13.760 bad stuff instead. But hmm, get on that. Yeah we should, 0:20:13.800 --> 0:20:17.320 we should make a proposal for that. Yeah, I heart 0:20:17.359 --> 0:20:19.040 would love it. Yeah, I think it would do. Really 0:20:19.040 --> 0:20:24.439 want nothing like it out there. Yeah, So importantly to 0:20:24.480 --> 0:20:29.240 our story, the Red Scare has this shadow the Lavender Scare, 0:20:30.000 --> 0:20:33.080 which targeted gay folks of all stripes, and as far 0:20:33.119 --> 0:20:35.520 as I can tell, it was just as wide reaching 0:20:35.560 --> 0:20:38.080 and impactful as the Red Scare in terms of number 0:20:38.119 --> 0:20:40.760 of people who were like fired and shit as a result. 0:20:41.640 --> 0:20:43.760 Is that is this something that people know about? Or 0:20:43.800 --> 0:20:45.919 am I? Am I just a dummy? Like this is 0:20:46.040 --> 0:20:49.200 not known about? Okay, because I've never heard that before. 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:52.720 It's that's fascinating. Yeah it um, it doesn't get called 0:20:52.760 --> 0:20:56.800 this or anything at the time. It's just happening. It's 0:20:56.840 --> 0:20:59.280 just the government fucking up gay people's lives. In two 0:20:59.280 --> 0:21:02.320 thousand and four, a guy named David K. Johnson wrote 0:21:02.359 --> 0:21:04.639 a book on the whole thing, called the Lavender Scare, 0:21:04.800 --> 0:21:08.720 and this kind of cemented the name. Then the name 0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:11.600 comes from one of the bigots responsible for this repression. 0:21:12.119 --> 0:21:14.160 This one happened to be a Republican. I've run across 0:21:14.200 --> 0:21:18.480 Democrats and Republicans, both being his very bipartisan. This guy's 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:21.560 name is Everett Dirkson, and he's famous for being the 0:21:21.600 --> 0:21:24.240 Republican who help pass the nineteen sixty four Civil Rights Act, 0:21:24.320 --> 0:21:28.879 crossing the party lines to devote the Democrats. He hated 0:21:28.920 --> 0:21:32.840 gay people, and he liked to use a somewhat popular 0:21:32.880 --> 0:21:35.000 anti gay phrase at the time, and he called gay 0:21:35.040 --> 0:21:39.400 men lavender lads. That's kind of sick. I don't think 0:21:39.400 --> 0:21:43.680 he means it that way. That's kind of sick. Thanks, dude. 0:21:43.920 --> 0:21:45.960 I know I'm not a gay man, so I can't 0:21:45.960 --> 0:21:49.879 tell you what slurs to reclaim. But imagine the street 0:21:49.920 --> 0:21:53.159 gang called the Lavender Lads. You would want to go 0:21:53.200 --> 0:21:56.119 to their parties. You would not want to fucking cross them, 0:21:56.160 --> 0:21:58.280 and you wouldn't want to bring your boyfriend because he's 0:21:58.320 --> 0:22:00.439 going home with a lavender lad instead of that is 0:22:01.200 --> 0:22:03.760 I mean, you can't. I feel like you can't get 0:22:03.840 --> 0:22:05.840 mad at that. Like it's all like he chose anything 0:22:05.880 --> 0:22:09.000 negative in either of those words. It's all like lavender losers. 0:22:09.080 --> 0:22:12.640 It's not like lavender anything bad. It's just like lads. Yeah, 0:22:12.760 --> 0:22:20.600 you know, but despite its sick name, the Lavender scare 0:22:20.720 --> 0:22:23.439 was a bad thing. Right. Its main task was to 0:22:23.520 --> 0:22:25.720 root out and fire all the gay folks in the government, 0:22:25.720 --> 0:22:28.320 in the military. And I don't like the government or 0:22:28.359 --> 0:22:31.160 the military, but that's still fucked up. In the first 0:22:31.200 --> 0:22:33.320 three years of the Scare alone, four hundred and twenty 0:22:33.359 --> 0:22:36.440 people were fired from government jobs on suspicion of homosexuality. 0:22:37.400 --> 0:22:42.120 Seventeen hundred others had their applications denied, four thousand, three 0:22:42.240 --> 0:22:44.800 hundred and eighty people were kicked out of the military. 0:22:45.680 --> 0:22:50.120 That's so, how does who's deciding who's gay and who's not. Well, 0:22:50.160 --> 0:22:53.560 this is that's part of the thing about anti gay repression, 0:22:53.600 --> 0:22:55.680 and we see this also with what the Nazis did, 0:22:56.200 --> 0:22:58.119 is that when you decide to go against gay people, 0:22:59.240 --> 0:23:03.920 you can call anyone gay. It's really hard to prove that, 0:23:04.000 --> 0:23:08.959 Like you don't like scissorin, you know, like it's just 0:23:08.960 --> 0:23:11.600 like your word against theirs. And if the person that 0:23:11.840 --> 0:23:13.840 is calling you gay has more power than than you're 0:23:13.840 --> 0:23:17.320 fucked even if you are or are not gay. Yeah, yeah, 0:23:18.080 --> 0:23:21.119