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Take this thing on, uh, homosexuality.

I think the view we take here

is that there's
no place for the state

in the bedrooms of the nation.

I think for those of us

who grew up in the '50s and
'60s,

it's hard to communicate
what it was like

to begin to suspect

that you might be part
of this category of subhumans

that was really
the most shameful,

disgusting kind of thing
that anybody could possibly be.

We were invisible.

The straight world
wanted us to be invisible.

Being gay was an abomination.

It was a sin.

It was a form
of spiritual corruption.

We paraded in secret.

And then we were paraded...

through prison corridors
and the courts.

Homosexuality was
essentially illegal.

You could get 8 years in
prison or a mental institution.

Fascists!

We have crucial moments
where the state would attack us.

Gay rights now! Gay rights now!

We were forced to respond.
There was no choice.

Shame! Shame! Shame!
Shame! Shame! Shame!

As young activists,
we had a vision.

We wanted a world that
was free of homophobia.

It's just
a really beautiful thing

to think about the idea
of all of the people

who have stepped off of
the sidewalk and into the road.

This is that genealogy of
resistance.

I worked really hard
at not recognizing

that I was attracted
to people of my same sex

for a long, long time,

even though at a certain level,

I think I knew it.

I remember the
song Downtown.

And hearing that in Beaverton.

And, like,
Beaverton had a downtown.

It was the IGA, the post office
and the drugstore, right?

That was the downtown.

But this idea that there
might be this place

where you could go downtown
where you could be different.

I wanted to go downtown
but didn't know why.

♪ When you're alone
and life is making you lonely ♪

♪ You can always go downtown ♪

Toronto is a very gay city.

Yonge Street just seemed to be

one of the gayest streets
in the world.

♪ Downtown ♪

♪ Just listen to the music,
all the traffic in the city ♪

♪ Linger on the sidewalk ♪

♪ All the neon signs
are pretty ♪

Going back to the 1950s,

bars in Toronto hosted these
drag balls for Halloween.

So on Halloween night,
they would host these events,

these pageants where
drag queens would show up.

They would be judged.

They would win
awards and prizes.

And it was just sort of this
celebratory kind of atmosphere.

One of the big reasons
is because it was the only day

that, legally,
you could get dressed up.

Halloween.

So we would...

That's when we really pushed it.

The hot spot was
St. Charles Tavern.

By the 1970s,

the drag balls
attracted a more hostile crowd.

Holy mackerel!

Look at that!

It was a very
brave thing to do.

You know, drag queens were at
the sharp end, even back then.

But there was a kind of
great defiance and bravery.

They didn't care.
You know, ink, egg, spit...

The woman came running up
to me as I'm going in,

spit on me like a truck driver.

"Fucking faggot!"

And the police would
stand there: "Get that one!

You missed that one!"

Laughing.

It's comforting to know
that there were people before.

Yeah, they paved the way
for people like me,

as Michelle Ross did and others.

"Who's that
amazing woman on stage?"

And of course,
it was a drag queen.

But impeccable
and flawless.

And this was
Michelle Ross.

Michelle Ross,

a legendary Black queer
Canadian of Jamaican heritage.

When you walked into
a club on Yonge Street

where Michelle was performing,

you knew that a particular
kind of Black life

was being made present.

The majesty of her gowns.

I feel grateful
when I see those photographs,

and I also feel like those
people
need to be honoured and
remembered

because they were trailblazers.

We made a point.

"We're here, we're queer.

We're in your face."

My name is Jeanine Maes.
I'm 83 years old.

I am one of the last women

that was locked up
in a psychiatric hospital

for lesbianism.

It happened in
Saint-Jean-de-Dieu

in Montréal 1962.

The door closed behind me.

I saw the bars on the windows.

My husband and my psychiatrist
decided they were going to cure
me.

Because at that time,
being homosexual wasn't just
illegal,

it was considered a mental
illness.

They didn't have a lesbian wing,
so they sent me to the
schizophrenic wing.

And that's when the nightmare
began.

Every day, except on weekends,
I had to see my psychiatrist.

He was looking for the problem
in my head.

But that's not all.

The gynecologists were looking
for the problem in my vagina.

They were both looking for what
was wrong, but
nothing was wrong.

I was very comfortable
in my skin.

I had discovered I was a
lesbian,
that I liked women.

I didn't understand their
attitude at all.

And that was the second blow:
she never came back.

He stole my daughter
and gave her to his mother,

because for him, she was his
child.

He didn't want her
to be raised by lesbians.

So he gave her to his mother in
France.

I told him I wouldn't let that
happen,
I'd take him to court.

She was my child.

I went to see three different
lawyers.

They all said the same thing:

Don't try it, it'll cost a
fortune,
and it won't work.

You won't get her back.

Because you're a lesbian,
and she's a girl.

The view we take here is that
there's no place for the state

in the bedrooms
of the nation.

And I think that,
you know,

what's done in private
between adults

doesn't concern
the criminal code.

When it becomes public,
this is a different matter.

In December 1967,

Pierre Elliot Trudeau's
government introduced this bill

that has been labelled

the decriminalization
of homosexuality in Canada.

What it actually did
was to say that

if two people,
both of whom were over 21,

had sex...

in private and nobody saw it,

then the police
wouldn't arrest you

and you wouldn't go to jail.

You won't be
charged criminally

for gross indecency
or buggery

as long as
there's only two of you

and it's in
private, right?

Well, I was 17, and so
I would have been a criminal.

It didn't deal with
any kind of civil rights.

I mean, you could still be
fired from your job,

thrown out of your apartment,

refused service in a restaurant
if you wanted

if they thought
that you looked gay, right?

But I think that Bill C-150

actually dramatically
changed the conversation.

From something that was the love
that dare not speak its name,

it suddenly became something
everybody had to talk about.

It was on television.

At first it was very hard for
me.

Because so many people were
against me.

I developed a guilt complex.

They told me I was bestial.

That two women having sex was
disgusting.

Heterosexuals would often
insult me loudly, to my face, in
public.

It was really awful.

At that point, I got depressed.

I was the first who dared say,

officially and on television,

that I was a lesbian
and why I was a lesbian.

Are you abnormal?

I don't consider myself
abnormal,
not at all. Not at all.

I am like everyone else.

Of course, I wasn't cured.
I hadn't changed.

Rather, I was absolutely
convinced
that this was the life I wanted
to lead.

I think I was
queer from birth,

in that, you know,
like, I was a sissy.

I loved dressing up
in my mom's clothes.

In fact,
one of my earliest memories

is wearing
my cousin's wedding dress.

My father worked all the time.

In the evening,

he would come home and
go and sit on the back porch,

and it was my duty to bring him

what was called
"the evening news,"

which was the evening paper.

And I remember reading about
gay activists in 1969

and the Stonewall riots then,

and thinking somehow,
that was me.

Gay, gay all the way!

Think of those early
organizations
were called Gay Liberation
Fronts.

That was named after

the National Liberation Front
in Vietnam.

We had women's liberation,

Black liberation,
Chicano liberation.

And we saw ourselves part
of a much broader movement

for deep social change.

We were overwhelmingly male,
overwhelmingly white.

So it was kind of
a working class or middle class

upwardly mobile group
of young white men

who felt that we were
going to change the world.

Gay liberation, for me,
was the place where

I could express the truth
about my sexuality.

Discrimination became
more a reality

as gay people emerged from
the closet in larger numbers.

And we wanted to organize people

in opposition
to that discrimination,

in part to bring them out
in even greater numbers,

knowing that that was
a necessary precondition

for the creation
of the gay community.

In 1971,
Toronto Gay Action decided

to organize the first national
protest march in Ottawa...

and to, as the
substance of the march,

to write a document listing
all of our grievances

against the federal government.

When you're attempting
to build a political movement,

you have to
get your act together

and spell everything out.

One of the beauties of
the We Demand document

is that we saw it as
so incredibly utopian.

We didn't think
we had a hope in hell

of ever winning
any of those demands.

I made a lot of
the signs, you know.

But we didn't know much
about making protest signs

that would survive rainstorms.

So I think about 50% of them
disintegrated almost instantly.

I mean, I was running around
trying to take photos,

because I realized they would be
of historical importance.

Canadian homosexuals
are having their careers ruined,

being kicked out
of their churches,

having their children
taken away from them

and being assaulted in
the streets of our own city.

What have we done
to deserve this?

Love, that's all we have done.

All we want to do is
love persons of the same sex

and live our lives
we decide for ourselves.

They were basically
civil-rights-style demands.

They were forcefully made,

and it really set an agenda

that put this whole question
of gay sexuality on the map.

"Today marks a turning
point in our history.

"No longer are we
going to petition others

"to give us our
rights as gifts.

"We're here to demand
them as equal citizens

"on our own terms.

"Homosexual women and men
in Canada

"are fed up with being the butt
of other people's jokes.

"We are fed up with
the lack of basic respect

"due to all human beings.

"We're fed up with having to
hide to preserve our jobs.

"We're fed up
with having to hide

"to preserve our own freedom.

"We're fed up
with the genocide of gays,

"fostered by psychiatrists,

"using medieval tortures
to destroy us.

"We're fed up with
being discriminated against

"in employment,
housing and the courts.

"We're fed up with being
arrested and harassed

"by police forces
paid for by our own taxes.

"In fact, we're fed up

with paying the price
of other people's hangups."

"There's no homosexual
problem in Canada.

"There's a heterosexual problem.

"Two million homosexual
men and women in Canada

"are watching us.

"We're going to show them
that it can be done.

"We can go anywhere we choose
as homosexuals

"and as Canadian citizens
with full civil rights.

"Gay is proud and gay is good.

Let's say it wherever we go."

I suggested the most
important thing we could do

to build the movement
and build community

was to start
a newspaper of our own.

There was silence
in the media,

the mainstream media,

around homosexuality in general.

So I think the conclusion was:

"We need to have
our own newspaper

where we can write
what we want to write."

And I think that became
an important thing

that there really was a place

where you could
actually look at something

written by queer people.

For a Canadian publication,

the Body Politic
was pretty unique

because it had achieved
a reputation internationally...

which very few Canadian
periodicals have done.

Chris Bearchell
was the only woman

on the editorial collective
of the Body Politic.

She was this
feisty little dyke

who made sure that feminism
was on the agenda

and made sure
that gay liberation

was on the agenda for feminists.

All of us
on the initial collective,

we would sell the newspaper
on the street.

I mean, I can remember going out
with a bundle of 100 papers

and selling them all.

Yeah, there was lots of
reaction.

I mean, I have to say I was
pretty cute.

You know, I was 21 and wearing
a gay pride T-shirt and so on.

And they'd all say, "Oh,
I don't want your paper,

but I'll take you,"

and all this kind of stuff.

You know, lots of
cruisy stuff going on.

I'd say: "Oh yeah, well, you
know,

I cost more
than 25 cents, ha-ha."

The Body Politic, you
know,

had to decide
what kind of covers,

what kind of art on the covers
would be used.

We began to cover
stories we'd heard

of people being arrested in
washrooms,

you know, people being
thrown out of apartments

because they were queer.

One of them would be Douglas
Wilson,

who was a teacher
in Saskatchewan.

He was fired because
he was openly gay.

Really at the time,

the Body Politic
was globally recognized

as being one of the leaders
in terms of debates, discourses,

fights, theories,

development of a rigorous
queer liberation theory.

There was this sense of:

"I'm getting this amazing
immersion and education

in what gay liberation
can look like."

People growing up
in small towns and so on

say that they saw
the Body Politic in the library,

and they couldn't believe it.

You know, they couldn't believe
that such a thing existed.

I found the Body Politic.

Who knew the Cedarbrae
Public Library

was so progressive
to have all of this.

That where I was there
feeling isolated,

it gave me a space
to sort of find myself.

And so, the Body Politic

actually located queerness
and gayness in Toronto.

So I knew, you know,

not far from where I was sitting
in Cedarbrae Public Library,

that there was a whole
community.

I started buying
the Body Politic on the sly,

and I started reading the paper

and found that there was going
to be this Gay Pride march.

It started at Allan Gardens.

And I remember hiding
sort of behind the bushes

and kind of watching
these people as they formed up.

Then as they began to
pick up things to go,

I thought: "This is the moment."

And so I walked over
and picked up a sign that said,

you know, "Gay Liberation Now,"
or something.

I had a bullhorn
at the front of the parade

and was calling out the chants.

We were all pumped
and excited and chanting:

"Two, four, six, eight,

gay is just as good as
straight."

And the advantage
of having so few people

was that I was recognized
as a new face in the crowd,

picked up, taken home,
had sex with,

given a stack
of gay liberation literature

and told to come back for more
when I finished reading.

And I read.

I saw this very masculine,
handsome young guy on the side
there.

And so I asked him
if I could hold his hand.

To pull him
into the march, really.

So we held hands,
and then we became...

very close for a year.

And that was very lovely.

And that helped Tim
evolve into...

perhaps the most important
single gay activist in Canada.

That's how I see it.

So in that way,
if I played a positive role,

I'm proud of that.

Jearld Moldenhauer
provides an invaluable record

of those early days,

both in photographs
and in the Super 8 footage.

Jearld is a remarkable
archivist.

Why it's important
to document history?

It shows real live human beings
in their situation

trying to change their society.

When people see that, you know,
especially as time goes by,

and they look back and they see
what those people did,

that they took a stand,
they participated,

and that's how change occurs.

This was a joyous,
in-your-face,
profoundly political event

because it was not OK
to be out back then.

We were very young and committed
to resisting, rebellion

and being out to everyone.

That was new.

Do you understand,
those of you who are not gay,

how we have been violated since
the very beginning of time?

Do you understand that they
violated us during the
Inquisition

by burning millions of us
as witches at the stake

because we were interested
in herbal medicine

or that we spoke out with the
truth?

Do you know how men
got the name "faggot,"

for any of you guys that still
use the word "faggot"?

Because they were
tied to the witches,

doused with gasoline
and lit on fire.

And that's how they
got the name "faggot".

They were used as a wood
to burn the women.

My name is Robin Tyler.

And I knew I was born a lesbian
when my mother delivered me

and the doctor hit me,
and I hit him back.

I was the first out
gay or lesbian comic.

I've also been an activist
all of my life,

including here in Winnipeg.

I never came out of the closet.

I was never in the closet.

I remember falling in love
with Sheri Bernstein

at the Banff School
of Fine Arts, you know,

and picking up a book
called The Ladder.

And it was: "If you're a woman,
you love another woman,

"what you are is a lesbian.

If it feels right to you,
it is right."

I ran down the Banff School
of Fine Arts screaming:

"I'm a lesbian,
I'm a lesbian, hooray!"

And my teacher, who was just
like this Maggie Smith

in The Prime of Jean Brodie,

came out and said:

"There, there, dear,
we're all thespians.

That's why we're here, right?"

So I couldn't even come out
when I came out.

I remember being
on a work crew with a woman

that, um, wore blue jeans,
and she had an army jacket,

and she was a poet,

and she was yummy.

And I said to her:
"Can I kiss you? I must kiss
you."

And she said yes.

I remember thinking,

as we were in bed having
wild sex for the first time,

it's like: "OK, I'm a nice
Catholic girl
from, you know, northern
prairies,

and this is worth
going to hell for."

I come from
a very repressed family

in a small town
in British Columbia, in Kelowna.

It was very tiny.

It was very conservative.

I used to have
these reoccurring nightmares

that these beautiful women
turned into witches

and they were trying to get me.

And I would run
and run, and I would panic,

and I would wake up.

And it was kind of like
this terror nightmare.

And I thought: "Oh my God,
lesbians are witches.

"Clearly, like, it's bad.

It's a bad thing
that I'm feeling this."

And I guess one day, I actually
analyzed it differently.

And I thought: "It's just...

"It's what I'm afraid of,

because it's going
to change my life."

♪ My fear has turned to anger ♪

♪ As my anger's
turned into rage ♪

♪ And I won't live
my life in a cage ♪

♪ So we're gonna fight back ♪

♪ In large numbers ♪

♪ Fight back ♪

♪ I can't make it alone ♪

♪ Fight back ♪

♪ In large numbers ♪

♪ Together we can
make a safe home ♪

♪ Together we can make
a safe home ♪

Two, four, six, eight,

lesbians are really great!

Lesbian organizations were
popping up all over the country.

And it really was a time when we
needed to separate from gay men.

Because what
we were fighting for

felt very different as women
and as feminists.

♪♪ Angry young woman ♪

♪ I've been around ♪

♪ Angry young woman ♪

♪ I'll bust up the town ♪

♪ Angry young woman ♪

♪ They call me a dyke ♪

♪ I don't know much about it ♪

♪ I just know what I like ♪

This is a time that requires
that we be on the street.

This is a time that
requires us to be visible.

This is a time that
requires us to take up space.

And we did.

♪ A motorbike with whistles ♪

♪ Hey, you want a ride? ♪

♪ You don't understand
when I say no, it's no ♪

I believe that
we began to build in 1977.

Now, originally, when we
were trying to figure out

what to call
ourselves, actually,

the first idea was the Toronto
Organization of Lesbians.

But we didn't like the
acronym, which was TOOL.

So we flipped it

and decided it would be the
Lesbian Organization
of Toronto,

LOOT.

And we found this house.

It was a little ramshackle,
but that was OK.

Women started coming in,

and we started seeing
that we weren't alone.

Just the notion
that we could be out there,

we could be together,
we could celebrate,

we could flirt, we could,
you know, find a new lover,

we could find a new friend,

we could go out afterwards,

we could go home afterwards
with somebody.

All of that was just, uh,
oh, it was so luscious.

♪ I just know what I like ♪

I knew what a lesbian was.

That still wasn't really
what I felt comfortable with.

And after going there for
about, I guess, 3 or 4 days,

I heard the word "dyke,"
and I asked what that meant.

And they said:

"Oh, you know, "that's somebody
who is politically active,

and they like to kick ass."

And I said: "Well, that's me."

When it was my shift
on the phone lines

and young women would call up,

and they would hear my accent,
my Trini accent,

they would say: "Oh,
you sound like my mother,"

or, "You sound like my aunt,
but I was born here.

Can I come down and meet you?"

I don't know
how I ended up there.

Somebody took me there,

but I ended up playing some
of my first gigs at LOOT.

And I was so bad.

Oh my God,
I was so bad.

But they were so supportive,
and it gave me...

Just watching these women
talking together,

you know, I was a little...

I was a little baby dyke
at that point, right?

I was still fresh
and new in this world,

and I didn't know...

how I was going to evolve.

But I knew that these women
were going to be a piece of it.

I have been blacklisted for
exercising the right of a mother

to defend her children
and all children

against their being recruited
by homosexuals.

Anita Bryant
was coming to town.

And we knew she was dangerous.

We knew she was
having an impact,

especially in the United States.

And there were many of us
who really can't stand it

when anybody
in the United States

has any kind of influence
over our politics here.

She was going around the US

campaigning against
human rights for queers,

in particular, human rights
for queer teachers.

Would you welcome, please,
Bob and Anita Bryant-Green.

God bless you.

Anita Bryant
was very dangerous.

The first thing was
her hair was very stiff.

So if you bumped into her,
you could get wounded.

Do you know what I mean?

There was so much hairspray that
it was a helmet that she wore.

But she was also dangerous
because it wasn't her.

It was really a huge
right-wing factory.

The war goes on
to save our children

because the seed
of sexual sickness

that germinated in Dade County

has already been transplanted
by misguided liberals

in the US Congress.

700 lesbians, gay men
and feminists

went up on a very cold, cold,

chilly, blistering-cold night

and marched and protested
against her speaking.

Hey, hey, ho, ho!

Anita Bryant's gotta go!

Hey, hey, ho, ho!
Anita Bryant's gotta go!

The presence
of Anita Bryant in Canada

galvanized queer activists.

There we were,

furious with
this right-wing backlash.

And it also
kind of connected us to,

especially lesbian
feminists like myself,

to gay liberationists

in a way that we
hadn't been connected before.

Gay rights now! Gay rights now!

Gay rights now! Gay rights now!

Gay rights now!

Even as we were having
leaps of visibility

and extraordinary
gains in the public sphere,

and as a community,
were exerting ourselves

and expressing our agency.

And it wasn't
just through the protests

or through the pride parades,

but it was through all
the day-to-day changes

that were occurring

that was making queer visible,

but equally making
queer vulnerable

to that sort of backlash
or that sort of attack.

In 1976, Montreal
hosted the Olympics.

This was Mayor Jean Drapeau's
major event for him.

He made sure that the city was,
quote unquote, cleaned up.

So there were a lot of arrests.

A lot of arrests
of gay people,

a lot of arrests of
street workers, sex workers.

And that continued
into 1977.

We went to this place--

it was relatively new--
called Truxx.

And it was on
an upper floor.

And it was kind of dark.

And it was just
people sitting around,

talking and drinking beer.

And I remember shortly
before all hell broke loose,

Warick saying:

"This is really boring.
Let's go somewhere else."

The police showed up suddenly.

They were carrying long guns.

They harassed us,
hitting us on the legs.

And then they loaded us into
vans.

I remember sitting
in this paddy wagon.

There was a lot of distress,

because there were people,
for instance, married men.

There were people
who weren't out.

There was one guy who had some
kind of immigration problem

that he was
really worried about.

There was a lot of anguish.

The police forced us
into a physical inspection,

including our sexual parts.

This was an operation among
the 3 police forces.

They treated it as if
this was a major crime scene,

which of course it never was.

In the meantime,
gay rights activists

were planning a protest
for the next day.

Over 2,000 people showed up.

It was like being on
the crest of a wave.

It wasn't like we
started the wave.

The wave was there
and carried us with it,

and we were
just there manifesting.

We decided that, no more
slinking away into the night.

The defence would be
one of identification.

What happened would be

that they would call a policeman
to the stand, the prosecution.

"Can you identify the accused?"

Well, in those days,
if I may say so,

a lot of gay people, you know,

were dressed
and looked very much alike.

And so how would the policeman

remember that
particular accused?

Could not point them out
in the courtroom.

And the case collapsed.

In the meantime,

me and my friends in the
organization
were asked to write a brief

to the Minister of Justice.

Well, above all, I asked them

to include in the Charter of
Freedoms
for the Quebec population

a clause stating
that sexual orientation

is not grounds for
discrimination.

It was the first
such amendment,

first protection
at the provincial level

or state level in North America.

And was a major, major, major
milestone for gay civil rights.

Quebec has become
the first province

to make discrimination
against homosexuals illegal.

Saskatchewan and Ontario
are considering a similar law.

Human rights have to be
codified.

They have to be made as broad,
as wide, as widely understood,

as widely protected as possible

for everyone
in our Canadian society

and, in this case, for one of
our more beleaguered minorities,

for the gay and lesbian people
of Canada.

The gains of the community

were being noticed
by our community's enemies.

And our community's enemies,
they were galvanized,

and they fought back
against our progress.

There were a lot of debates
within the Body Politic.

And one of them was the idea

that gay men's sexuality
shouldn't be policed.

And at the same time,

I was very clear that I did not
want to fall into the trap

of, uh, supporting a moralistic
view

around sexuality
and representation.

Gerald Hannon
was my best friend.

Gerald, I think, became one of
the most important activists

in the country.

And one of the reasons is that
he was such a good writer.

Gerald Hannon had written
a number of articles

about youth sexuality.

The law had been
partially changed

to allow sex between men
in private at 21.

So that's quite old.

But, I mean, for heterosexuals,
it was something like 16.

It was about,

when do young people
have a right to sexuality?

When can they choose to be
sexual?

We were about to publish
another article in the series

when the Emanuel Jaques
murder happened.

Emanuel, the shoeshine boy.

He was about a 12-year-old boy
and his brother.

Everybody got to know of them.

Like, they just loved them.

Even if their shoes were clean,

give the kid
a few bucks and that.

The media decided to
sort of conflate this

as being a gay crime.

Clean up Yonge
Street!

Clean up Yonge Street!
Clean up Yonge Street!

That lit the bomb everywhere,
with the police and everything.

Because then, we were all
murderers and pedophiles.

Any premeditated
murders should be

pained with the same pain!

The decision to publish
the article Men Loving Boys
Loving Men

was not taken lightly,

and we all had
differing opinions.

I was not certain that this
was the right time to do it.

There's no time is right.

And in an introduction,
we said that.

And we published the article.

We had different ideas about
what sexual liberation was.

And I understood, in particular
regarding
the article Men Loving Boys
Loving Men,

that Gerald Hannon was
interested
in pushing boundaries.

All these debates were very
personal and very intense.

And people came
from very different histories.

Like, a white gay male notion
of liberation

had a very different inflection
than a feminist.

We had different histories.

It was controversial, but we
felt it needed to be addressed.

It led to the Toronto Sun
in particular, Claire Hoy,

going on and on about, you know,
how horrible homosexuals were,

molesting children,

and calling for some kind of
reaction from the police.

And it's not
the sort of thing

that I want
the homosexual groups

to get into
the schools,

which is really the main area
where they want to get in,

and they'll
tell you this themselves,

and preach their gospel
of homosexuality

to impressionable kids.

I don't want that to happen.

We had never ever
in a million years

thought there would be,
you know, the police coming in

and raiding the office,
and then laying charges.

That was a very traumatic night.

It was late.

They just walked in the door.

They showed us
the search warrants.

They took the
subscription lists.

But that's what scared us,

was that they now
had a list,

you know, addresses of a whole
bunch
of queer people across the
country.

We were in an old warehouse,

so it was like an
old industrial elevator

that kind of slowly descended.

And that was my image of these
boxes slowly descending.

But that night was a pretty
seismic moment for me

in terms of my sense of police
and what they could do.

It seemed obvious
that the goal

was to put it out of business

and therefore
achieve a suppression

of the exchange of ideas

within the gay
and lesbian movement.

So ultimately,
it would be instrumental

in destroying the gay movement.

We were charged with
the use of the mails

to transmit immoral, indecent
and scurrilous literature.

We were acquitted the first
time.

It went to an appeal court,

and we were acquitted
the second time.

This was a censorship trial.

We won, and I think
the message to the state

was that we would
not be censored

and that freedom
of the press was important.

Operation Soap
began in August 1980

by sending 3 undercover agents

into the various bathhouses
across the city.

The police were already going
into the bathhouses before then.

They raided the Barracks
bathhouse in December 1978.

It was an ordinary night.

All of a sudden,

this kind of crowd that were
a little boisterous came in.

And as soon as
I buzzed the door,

all of a sudden, there's a whole
burst of them going through

when they hadn't
actually been signed in.

Operation Soap really
was a perfect storm

that hit in the early 1980s.

They had four bathhouses
in their targets:

the Richmond Street Health
Emporium, the Barracks,

the Club Baths
and the Romans Health Spa.

Any act that would
take place in private

would be covered
under the 1969 reform,

and so the men
couldn't be charged.

So, the bedrooms of the nation.

Public is defined as any place

where more than two people
are present or taking part.

So the bath houses,

because there were
lots of people around,

and in some cases,

men were having sex
with more than just one person,

these places
were considered public.

The door came off its hinges

and flew onto the bed
where I was sleeping.

With a policeman screaming
at me to get up and get out.

I remember the police
insulting us,
calling us "faggots."

And I thought to myself:
"I'm not doing anything wrong."

Whatever officer, he put
his head in and he yelled out:

"You're lucky there's
no gas in the showers."

They called this investigation
Operation Soap

because they wanted to
clean up the city.

It was really meant
to morally judge the queers

and to condemn that sex
as being dirty

and somehow a threat.

You know, I was one of 36 men
who were actually found guilty

out of 288 who were charged.

As a result of that night,
two men took their own lives.

This was one of the largest
mass arrests
in Canadian history.

We see this sort of trajectory
that our community was on

toward human rights,

but also
toward sexual liberation

and this reaction,
this violent reaction

that comes from, you know,
the moral reformers in the city,

but also from
the Toronto police,

to try to, you know,
push us back into the closet.

Gay rights now!

The next night, thousands
poured into the streets.

That was a real experience
for people in a demonstration.

It had never been
like that before.

Gays fight back!
Gays fight back!

As we walked up towards Yonge
and Wellesley,

you could see more and more
queers and lesbians and drag...

coming out.

And by the time we got to Yonge
and Wellesley, it felt enormous.

Gays fight back!

Gays fight back!
Gays fight back!

We expected 300 people.
I think we got 3,000.

That gives you the
courage to carry on.

There are people behind you.
You're not alone.

All of these things
are really important

in terms of the development
of the movement.

Chris got up,
and she starts with:

"No more shit. No more shit."

No more shit! No more shit!

No more shit!

We're overflowing
out onto Yonge Street

in the opposite direction
to where we'd intended to go,

to head down
toward 52 Division,

where so many of them had been
processed the night before.

So the major slogan

that had spontaneously
emerged in the crowd was:

"Fuck you, 52."

Fuck you, 52! Fuck you, 52!

They were responsible
for the raids.

And so, "Fuck You, 52,"

became a real focus
for the anger,

because that's where
this thing had started.

No more shit!
No more shit! No more shit!

Don't be afraid of
violence and anger!

Protect yourself
and keep fighting!

It felt frightening
to be in the protest.

You didn't know what
kind of level of violence

was going to take place.

Everyone who chose to be
on that street at that time

had to kind of dig into
a level of courage.

You'd think that something

that had required
so much police person power...

would have to have
some sort of political support

from farther up.

And then,
almost as spontaneously,

people said: "Queen's Park."

There were a series of other
demonstrations that took place

over that winter and spring
right into June.

One of the most important
moments was when Lemona Johnson,

who was the widow
of Albert Johnson,

who had been
gunned down by the police

in his own home
in front of his kids,

I think a year before,

she actually spoke.

A Jamaican immigrant
talking about

what was happening
to the Black community.

Raids and arrests of members
of this Toronto gay community

is a further indication
that the police force of this
city

is lacking in discipline
and proper supervision.

The police force in this city

is being used as a political
tool
by politicians.

The outcome of this

extraordinary
grassroots response

was 80% acquittals,

unprecedented in terms
of activism and fighting back.

This truly was our Stonewall.

We were particularly shaped

by the police attacks
on our community,

not uniquely, but profoundly.

And that opened up doors
to solidarity

and working together
with Black community,

with other communities who
suffered at the hands of police.

This was truly a game changer.

I came out in
the early '80s,

at a time when
the Black community

was really organizing
around police violence.

As young activists,

we had a vision for the kind of
world we wanted to live in

and really took it seriously
that it was our responsibility

to create that world.

And so, we wanted a world
that was free of homophobia.

We wanted a world where
Black queer people will be seen

and recognized
within Black struggle.

And we also wanted
a world where,

within the larger queer
community,

issues of race
and racism will be addressed.

As we did this work,

more and more, we were hearing
from young Black people

that they didn't
have any place to go,

that they didn't know
where to show up.

Dewson House was very much
about the energy

of the women
who lived in that house,

the women who owned the house.

So there was Makeda,
and then her partner Stephanie.

Dewson House, I think for
many of us, was ground zero.

It is where not only we
developed our politics

around being queer,

it was a place where
people came to party.

It's the place
where Black lesbians

who lived in Scarborough,

who were closeted from Monday
to Friday in their jobs

and then their families

on a Friday or Saturday night

can come downtown
to Dewson House

and know that
they would be welcome.

You know, it was
in the front room

that I first heard
Nina Simone, right?

It was in that space where
I first danced with another man.

You know, it was in that space

that Blackness and queerness

and Caribbean-ness
was normalized.

I put an ad
in the Body Politic

for people who were
interested in starting a group.

And that was the beginning,
for me, of Gay Asians Toronto.

It was the first
organization that was,

you know, specifically looking
at people who were not white.

You know: "If you're white,
you're all right.

If you're brown, turn around."

There just was no space
for people of colour.

At least that was
my experience of it.

In the summer of '82, they
were actually trying to look for

someone from
Gay Asians Toronto

to be a speaker
at the Pride parade.

And the parade
went through Chinatown.

And of course,
as Gay Asians Toronto,

we recruited in Chinatown.

We put up posters in Chinatown.

That was really
very affirming for me,

to be marching in a parade

where people all around you
were cheering you, you know.

And so like: "Hello, here I am!"

For most of them who hasn't
really come out, like myself,

it was really
a groundbreaking thing.

And I think that was
actually the first time

that I feel really proud
of my own community.

To have that courage
to break through those barriers.

The '70s and early '80s
were a time of enormous growth

and organization
in queer communities.

And then out of left field,
people started getting sick.

Strange cancers
were occurring

in otherwise healthy
young gay men.

I was brought in
to do support services,

which was basically helping

really young,
scared gay men die.

That was basically the job.

I had no idea.

I thought for sure if they could
send a man to the moon,

they would have
AIDS done by September.

I spent my next 30 years
working in HIV and AIDS.

Some people thought
it was poppers, right?

Or they didn't like poppers.

Other people said it was, like,

too much sex, drugs
and rock and roll,

just too much sex in general.

Right? Christian fundamentalists
said it was God's
retaliation,

God's punishment
for sinfulness, right?

The reaction to the pandemic,
the AIDS pandemic,

by the straight world
was shocking in that context.

The fact that
they didn't care,

even openly on some areas
of the religious right,

and others almost celebrated it.

We were dealing with
end stage of AIDS

of our friends, our lovers,

whether they were
Indigenous or non-Indigenous.

So it was that stigma,
that fear of AIDS,

the isolation
and the segregation.

And we were going to
palliative care wards.

You know, we were
arranging funerals

or cremations for our friends

without any support from
our families or their families.

It was that toxic combination

of political negligence
and criminal indifference.

Finally, I bid you pray
for the dying...

for those who
have to die alone...

for those who are
afraid to die...

and for those
who cannot wait to die.

I mean, that was
a real wake-up

for those of us who had already
been infected at that point,

but also in the gay community,

that they were
willing to just sit around

and wait for us to die off,

and then straight people
and the world would be safe.

The food was left
outside my door.

I had to get out of my bed
to get the food.

Almost nobody came in,

and if they came in,
they were in masks and gowns and
gloves

and spent as little time
as they could in the room.

The nurses, the orderlies,
the doctors,

all of them treated me
like I was a leper

back in the biblical times.

I remember the first time
sitting there getting a call

from somebody who says:

"I can't bury my lover.

No funeral home
will take his body."

And so we said:

"We need an organization
that takes on those issues."

And we could speak
truth to power.

We could say what
needed to be said.

- What do we want?
- AIDS action!

- When do we want it?
- Now!

- What do we want?
- AIDS action!

- When do we want it?
- Now!

- What do we want?
- AIDS action!

- When do we want it?
- Now!

- What do we want?
- AIDS action!

- When do we want it?
- Now!

- What do we want?
- AIDS action!

- When do we want it?
- Now!

- What do we want?
- AIDS action!

- When do we want it?
- Now!

In 1989, the AIDS conference
was scheduled for Montreal,

the first time in Canada.

And AIDS Action Now
and Act Up New York

and a smaller group
called Réaction Sida

decided that we needed to have
an impact at this conference.

Not victims,
not patients,

but people living with AIDS.

Not victims. Not patients.
But people living with AIDS.

At this point,

these conferences were medical
and scientific conferences.

And if people with HIV
appeared at all,

we appeared as kind of
specimens and patients

and nothing much else.

And we decided
that it was important

for our voices to be heard

as part of this political
project that we were engaged in,

because nobody else
was concerned

with accessing
experimental treatments.

History will recall,
Mulroney did nothing at all.

History will recall,
Mulroney did nothing at all.

We were out.

We had a group
of maybe 200 people outside

in this demonstration.

And all of a sudden,
I heard this ruckus behind me

and turned around
to see what was going on,

and it was the Act Up guys,

who just had barged through
the main gates to the Palais.

And so, all of a sudden,
the entire crowd,

who didn't know
what else to do,

decided: "Well,
we better follow them, right?"

Silence equals death!

And we seized the stage.

We die, major profits!

We die, major profits!

This government has been
criminally negligent.

People with AIDS have died
in this country

without care
and without treatment.

We got the message across
to the conference organizers

that these conferences
could not continue

unless people with AIDS
were front and centre.

Release the drugs,
stop the profiteering.

Release the drugs,
stop the profiteering.

As AIDS progressed and as
more and more people got ill,

then we began to see

that this was a kind of
a sense of community loss,

communal loss that needed
to be represented in some way.

And Michael Lynch formed a group

to put together
an AIDS memorial.

It was very important to kind of
mark the number of people

who were dying.

So this was
an extraordinary thing to see.

I had an uncle who was gay.

I was 11 years old
when he died.

What I grieve the most,
actually,

is not having that gay uncle,

that gay mentor sort of take me
through my teenage years,

my coming of age,
moving to Toronto,

finding myself
in our gay community.

I think I would have
really benefited

had he still been around.

Sometimes I would go to Pride,

and it would feel
like the universe

was Swiss cheese
with holes in it,

like I would see the people
who weren't there.

And there was a point where,
maybe three years,

I couldn't go to Pride events

'cause I would only
see the ghosts.

But I had this fantasy
when I was a baby lesbian

about, you know,
getting old with these guys

and the guys in my world.

And we'd have an old folks home,

and we'd have, you know,
cute little people to take care
of us

wearing French maid's outfits.

I don't know what I thought.

But it would be a community

that was growing old
and growing grey together.

And all those people that I went
dancing with when I came out,

they're dead.

Not just one or two.

They're all dead.

All dead.

Ultimately,
the AIDS epidemic

decimated a significant number

of the most important leaders

of the gay movement
here in Canada.

People I knew very well and
was very close to and respected

and knew how powerful they
had been in their contributions.

And many of them are forgotten,
totally forgotten today.

When I ran for public office,
of course, I realized

that it would be unthinkable
for me at that point.

I squashed it.

But I was also
absolutely determined

that while I at that
point couldn't come out,

that I would do
everything in my power

to fight for a world

in which people like me felt
totally comfortable and free

to be who we are
and to love who we love

and to have sex with
who we wanted to have sex with.

And so from the time
I was elected, I spoke out.

I want to ask the minister,

does he stand by the promise

that was made by his predecessor
as Minister of Justice?

And if so, when will he
finally move

to make equality a reality
for Canadian gays and lesbians?

In '81, I moved an amendment
to the Constitution of Canada

to include sexual orientation
in the Charter of Rights,

which was kind of revolutionary
back then.

Of course, my amendment
was defeated 22 to 2,

crashing defeat.

Madam Speaker, this is not an
amendment on sexual orientation.

This is an amendment
on sexual deviation.

I am afraid that our society
is becoming overly permissive.

We're at a point where
sodomites,
pedophiles, people who practice
bestiality

are becoming our children's
guardians.

I mean, really!

If they want to stay
in the bedrooms of the nation,

let them stay
in the bedrooms of the nation,

but Madam Speaker,
never let us allow them

into our armed forces, our RCMP,

and we will work with them
so they can stay silent.

Three years later,

a parliamentary committee was
established to hold hearings.

And I went to the
prime minister then,

Brian Mulroney, and I said:

"Look, you're gonna hold
hearings on this section.

"Sexual orientation
isn't in Section 15,

"but I have
a private member's bill

"to include sexual orientation
in human rights legislation.

"I want you to
let the committee,

"as part of its hearings
across the country,

deal with the issue
of sexual orientation as well."

On March 4th of 1986,

John Crosby stood up
in the House of Commons

and said the government accepts

the recommendations
of the committee.

"The government will take
whatever measures are necessary

"to ensure that
sexual orientation

"is a prohibited ground
of discrimination

in relation to all areas
of federal jurisdiction."

This was 1986.

We were the only country
in the world, in the world,

which actually
had a constitution

that prohibited discrimination
based on sexual orientation.

Good evening.

Never before
in Canadian history

has a politician
publicly declared

that he or she is a homosexual.

It has always been
something whispered about,

a rumour, an innuendo.

But now,
veteran MP Svend Robinson

has decided to
break that political taboo.

What I'm telling
Canadians, Barbara,

is that
I'm a member of Parliament

who happens to be gay.

I'm, I suppose, saying,
"So what?" to that.

But I'm also using this

as hopefully a means
of telling Canadians

that there are many other gays
and lesbians in this country

who are not able to live up to

their full potential
as human beings,

who are subject
to discrimination,

who can lose their jobs,

who can be
thrown out of their homes,

who can be
the subject of violence.

And I guess it's a plea for
understanding, for acceptance,

and for laws which will say
that we as a society

don't tolerate
this kind of discrimination.

I flew home to my constituency,
as I did almost every weekend.

And Saturday morning,
went into my office,

and it had been completely
smashed to bits.

The windows smashed,
hate literature there and so on.

I mean, I had death threats.

I had a bullet fired
through my office window.

And it was a big, big
reason for me coming out,

was to try to fight that hatred
and to say to people:

"Yes, maybe you're gay,
but that's a gift.

And nobody should take
that away from you."

In the early '80s,
I was living in Winnipeg.

I had returned from Vancouver
in 1983,

primarily because
we had learned, you know,

the Indigenous gay men
living in Vancouver,

that HIV was transmitted
by a virus.

So I thought I could outrun HIV
by coming back to Winnipeg.

When I came to the city,
I met other youth,

young people that were
struggling with their
sexuality

and struggling
trying to find themselves.

But I knew that if I stayed
here and I hung out here

and I met enough people,

I would figure out
what it was to be gay.

I have four names,
but two are only public.

Only two of them are public.

...is the woman that sits at
the centre of Four Directions.

And...

...is a second name
that I carry.

And it means you're a helper.

I'm a helper.

My job is to help people,
to help Mother Earth...

all creatures that are living.

I grew up in a little village
in Northern Manitoba

called Cormorant.

Very early on,

I knew about 5,
that I was different.

I was sort of magical
in some way.

In 1990, we decided
that we were going to host

a gathering in Winnipeg.

When we went to that land...

It's beautiful, beautiful land.

It was not gonna be
a mainstream gathering,

a conference
or anything like that.

It was going to be
a gathering of nations.

Not too tight, you know.

We wanted to have ceremony

as the main part
of what we were going to do.

A red-tailed hawk was flying
above us in Beausejour.

It was a very hot day.

And to me,
that was the sign.

That hawk revealed itself.

Myra came and told us...

While we were
in a sharing circle,

she came and told us

that she had had
this vision given to her,

and she was given this name

of who we were
as gay and lesbian people.

They gave me the
words Niizh manidoowag.

Niizh meaning two.

Manidoowag meaning spirit.

Manidoo would be one spirit.

Manidoowag is more than one.

So Niizh manidoowag
is what they shared with me.

And...

they spoke with me in a way
that was gentle and calm.

But it was also
with a certain strictness

that you don't fool around
with this.

You don't play with this.

This is sacred.

We opened a portal
into the spiritual world

because we had
followed those instructions

by our elders
and our knowledge keepers

of how to petition the spiritual
world for what we need.

And out of that portal
came a name, Two-Spirit People.

That name went everywhere,

because everybody heard
what she had visioned.

Naming or renaming
or self-naming

is an act of liberation.

I felt strange sometimes.

Not only because of being gay,

but because of who I was,
my background.

There was something missing.

I needed other Latinos
there with me.

I would go to parties,
and I'd see Samuel.

And Samuel was already out.

Samuel was
the gayest Latino there was.

There was no way that we were
going to be part of something

that we didn't belong to.

So we needed to create
our own moment,

our own movement.

What was clearly needed
is to have a group.

And then HOLA started.

At that time,

it's when the
immigration explodes.

Homophobia is intense
in Latin America.

It's a crime in some of
those countries to be gay.

So, many people were fleeing.

And say, if your friend
had arrived here,

the board of volunteers
will help people,

go pick people up
at the airport...

you know, give them shelter,
you know, give them clothing,

winter coats,
whatever, food,

take them to,
you know, a lawyer,

help them go
all the way to immigration.

Chabuka went to
immigration a few times.

I went there.

In drag, I went to immigration
to help people.

Marching with Grupo HOLA,
the first time...

We were apprehensive.

We were, of course, afraid.

But it was time.

Laugh, enjoy

Life is beautiful

Live, sing.

There was a lot of us.

And there was solidarity.

There was care.

There was laughter.
There was fun.

There was love.
There was camaraderie.

My heart was beating, marching.

And it was emotional, uh...

Just to be free...

and just be ourselves.

When I started
doing my parties,

it was right in the middle
of the whole AIDS crisis.

My primary goal was to
try and make sex positive

and good and sexy.

I went to the party,
from what I remember, two times.

I just remember
it was very underground.

You know, we were
in a special place.

It was a space that was
free of prejudice,

free of judgment.

We could just dance
and feel beautiful.

Nicolas tapped me
on the shoulder and said:

"Listen, I think
we're gonna be raided."

We just, you know, got our stuff
together and ran out the door,

ran out the window,
jumped out the window and hid.

They basically came in,

a bunch of them
with flashlights.

A lot of the policemen
had removed their badges,

which is definitely
a warning sign.

People reacted very quickly.

Go away, fascist cops!

There was a big protest
outside of the police station,

the ones that
were responsible for the raid.

- Pas de violence!
- No!

- Pas de violence!
- No!

- Pas de violence!
- No!

The police,
they taunted people.

They used their batons

and made reference to,
like, dicks,

and they would say:
"Come suck my dick."

We're here, we're queer,
and so are some of you!

We're here, we're queer,
and so are some of you!

We're here, we're queer,
and so are some of you!

We're here, we're queer,
and so are some of you!

We're here, we're queer,
and so are some of you!

We're here, we're queer...

Pas de violence!

Fascist!

Shame, shame, shame,
shame, shame, shame!

Shame, shame, shame!

I remember my friend standing
in front of the crowd

and crying and showing his
bruises
and saying:

"Look at what they did to me."

Every social
movement is like this.

People get brutalized
by the police.

Sex Garage was about
the activism

that came out of it.

As marginalized people,

we wouldn't
take that shit anymore.

The 1990 raid
on the Sex Garage

really set the precedent for
establishing Pride in Montreal.

This is seen
as this major turning point

in the history of the city
for the queer community,

and it really revealed
to our community

that the fight wasn't over.

Officer!

I remember
walking up Church Street

sometime in
the mid to late 1990s,

seeing the police at Pride

and being, like,
really taken aback.

I was, like,
just really taken aback by it,

and I was like:
"What is happening?"

It's about to come to an end.

They're going to take it over.

Pride is going to
morph into something

that we will soon
not be able to recognize.

What we saw
is a simultaneous policing

of what queer life
and possibility

and expression should look like.

Folks that were not
Black, queer, and trans

were not thinking that
police were an issue.

There were a lot of people
who felt safe around police.

And because they felt
safe around police,

"We won't listen
to you Black folks

when you're talking about
police issues," right?

So there was often...
Folks felt that erasure.

Folks were really upset

and folks wanted somebody
to say something.

Sumaya's life matters!

Sumaya's life matters!

Philando's life matters!

Black Lives Matter,
they were the honoured group.

They were leading
the parade that year.

Black lives matter!

It was the first pride

that a prime minister
was marching in the parade.

And so Justin Trudeau was
marching in his linen outfit,

and he was ready to go.

And everything
had to move smoothly.

There were snipers
on the roof.

The level of, like,
police presence

was at an all-time high.

I was part of the
Black Lives Matter contingent

who marched
at the front of the parade.

So many young Black people

just in all of their full glory.

We had to do a lot of work
behind the scenes

to be like: "Trust us, y'all.

We're not just going to,
we're not..."

We were like: "No,
if we're going to do this,

it's gonna be an action."

ide Toronto!

We are calling you out
for your anti-Blackness!

Your anti-Indigeneity!

We will not be moved!

I don't think we have much
to be proud about.

I don't think
this is a cause for celebration!

Garbage! Assholes.
Racist bastards!

Oh, boo!

The only time I've ever heard
this

was from a community who should
understand
what it feels like to be
oppressed.

We fought for you.
We threw bricks for you.

We got locked up for you!

And so we created the demands,

and it was deliberate that we
chose 8 demands about Pride

and one about the police,

because let's be honest,

people were going to
focus on the one.

Everyone in this space, sit
down!

Stopping the parade for us

didn't mean Pride
would not happen.

In fact, it would
bring back Pride

to its roots of direct action,

of spontaneous action,
of people-led action.

It started out
that Prides

were a way of winning visibility

for fairly concrete demands.

The first pride that I went to

was calling for the inclusion
of sexual orientation

in the human rights code.

When you look at Pride,

you really see
what we fought for.

Who we became.

How we grew as a community.

And what we lost along the way.

Watching that
evolution
over decades...

Inevitably, we would see
that collision

around conservative politics,
conservative assimilationist,

and the sort of community-based
liberation politics.

If you're a trans
high school student

or you're a queer
racialized person,

you might not have access
to these victories,

these gains that we've made.

You may not.

The kind of work that
we should be doing

has to do with
broadening out the notion

of what our movement is about.

Right now, the debate
is about trans youth.

I follow it closely
because I was a trans youth.

I can't believe somebody
would oppose what I was doing.

For me, it was
completely the opposite.

My family supported me.

I first came out
as a young queer kid.

And then when I got to be
a little bit older,

I realized there was
a bit more going on.

I wanted to be able to
look in the mirror

and see myself looking back.

That was so important to me.

So there I was,
realizing that I was trans,

and so I came out again.

I think that for some of us,
there is...

a sense of being
at home everywhere you go.

For some of us,
everywhere is your living room.

And for the rest of us,

unfortunately,
that's not the case.

Leave our kids alone!

Protect trans kids!

Protect trans kids!
Protect trans kids!

It is a time to stand up,

and I'm really proud of
those youth around the world

who are standing up
to this patriarchy,

to this fascism.

Love is louder!

I'm thinking about the young
who,
if the laws change,

if their rights
are once again taken away...

I won't be here to see it.

It could happen.
I hope it doesn't.

I don't want them to go through
what I went through. No. No.

Protect trans kids!

My granddaughter is also
homosexual.

She will suffer if the times
change.

Do you think a boy is a girl?

What does it matter to you?

It's like we did
3 steps forward,

and now this million
for children

is bringing us so far behind.

The same people
who wouldn't visit their sons

when they were
dying from AIDS

are back forming committees
to protect their children,

to ban books.

And the backlash is upon us.

History matters because of
what it can do for us today.

The fights maybe
are in very different places

than they were 50 years ago,

but the necessity to fight
is as urgent now as it was then.

Phobia is about not knowing.

Hate is about not knowing
anything about real life.

If Niizh manidoowag
could spread like wildfire,

why can't peace,
love and respect?

That's my question to the world.

Love is louder!

Closed Captions: MELS