Embedded Files
History of the Pride Flag
History of the Pride Flag
Melissa L.
Published on 2023.02.14
The rainbow flag, also known as the pride flag, is a main representation of the LGBTQ+ community. It empowers individuals as part of the community, permitting their recognition, as well as allowing their voices to be heard. Not only does it provide a place of sanctuary, it also acknowledges the individuality of each unique person, allowing for more embracement and acceptance of each other. However, with this meaningful definition of the flag, it is also crucial for everyone to take a step back, and learn about the significance of the rainbow flag as well as the reason behind this particular flag. The symbolic choices and designs of the flag enhances its meaning and allows for more possibilities to be expressed.
Science defines a rainbow as a natural phenomenon in which light is refracted to create an image of the seven colours that make up light. In the traditional mindset, rainbows provide a sense of warmth, colour and hope, as it is the beauty after a storm. Thus, in 1978, with the goal of emancipating the LGBTQ+ community, a gay artist named Gilbert Baker designed a flag—one of the most powerful symbols of pride, to really stand up for the identities of the people within the community (Gonzalez). Baker’s utilization of the rainbow initially came from his observations and beliefs that the rainbow was a natural flag of its own. With this, the rainbow’s colours would later on become a voice for embracing diversity.
It wasn't until 1994 that the symbol truly became a widespread representation of the community (Gonzalez). Since then, the flag has brought the people of the LGBTQ+ communities together, establishing them as who they are in current society. Today, there are six main colours that make up the rainbow flag, red—for life, orange—for healing, yellow—for sunlight, green—for nature, indigo—for harmony, and violet—for spirit. Together, the synonymous messages behind the flag are diversity, pride and freedom (Gonzalez).
As the LGBTQ+ community continues to grow, many variations of the flag have been created to represent more specific groups within the community, such as the lesbian pride flag, the bisexual pride flag and many more (Gonzalez). With the creation of the rainbow flag, a lot of individuals have had the opportunity to express themselves more freely. Every year, the community celebrates pride month in June, where everyone is able to take pride in who they are, and to come together for the beginning to a better future (Gonzalez).
Works Cited
Gonzalez, Nora. “How Did the Rainbow Flag Become a Symbol of LGBTQ Pride?” Encyclopædia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/story/how-did-the-rainbow-flag-become-a-symbol-of-lgbt-pride.
Why Is LGBTQ+ Health Data Disappearing From The CDC Website?
Why Is LGBTQ+ Health Data Disappearing From The CDC Website?
Sarah Mahmud
Published 2025.07.13
In early 2025, the Trump administration issued an executive order, titled Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism And Restoring Biological Truth To The Federal Government. This document outlines strict mandates for federal agencies about how sex should be defined, disavowing “gender ideology” as a concept. Thus, this order defines the male sex as a person who, at conception, was male [sic] and produces sperm, and the female sex as a person who, at conception, was female and produces ovocytes. Because of this new definition of sex and the directive to abolish “gender ideology,” some of the first federal materials to face widespread removal were online resources related to LGBTQ+ health and gender identity.
Who Was Affected?
Reuters authors Julie Steenhuysen and Ted Hesson report that among the most affected agencies are the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Reports indicate that the CDC has removed content pertaining to HIV prevention, barriers to LGBTQ+ health, data related to transgender individuals, and even an article answering the question of how to get an HIV test. Even a database tracking behaviors that increase health risks for youth was found to be offline.
This isn’t even a comprehensive list of everything taken down from the CDC website, either: Ethan Singer of the New York Times reports that a total of 8,000 pages were taken down from government websites to adhere to the new policy, some failing to be reinstated even after months had passed. Even though the CDC had agreed to restore some pages once met with legal backlash, American citizens were shocked to find that along with the removal of words such as “nonbinary” and “transgender,” the following message was displayed at the top of every previously removed page:
“Public health experts warn that these deletions may have severe consequences for not only the LGBTQ+ community, but medical research and healthcare accessibility.”
Ramifications
Our modern day society depends heavily on the dissemination of information, particularly online. This is why disinformation, about healthcare especially, runs rampant on news sites and social media. The continued removal of these resources on the CDC website is a trend that if other federal agencies were to continue to follow, could lead to catastrophic consequences.
For example, it is already difficult enough for transgender individuals to access care, gender affirming or not. They already face higher rates of discrimination in healthcare settings compared to other groups, and often need to rely on federally available guidelines for HRT and mental health support. It must also be stated that HIV/AIDS is not a condition faced only by gay men: HIV is transmitted through contact with infected blood, semen, and breast milk, and could even affect infants.
In an attempt to prevent the spread of “gender ideology,” a dangerous slippery slope has been established: by sticking essential health resources that aren’t even exclusively for gay and trans people under the same umbrella as ideological propaganda not only fuels misinformation on marginalized groups by hiding important data, but attempts to rationalize discrimination under the guise of simply being a reform to policy. It also proves to be a dangerous precedent to set for Canadians as well, as some of its LGBTQ+ health policies are founded upon American-based research that is now beginning to be wiped. Advocates warn that while Canada has stronger legal protections for LGBTQ+ rights, the impact of American policies often trickle across the border.
What Is Being Done?
After the executive order had been issued earlier that month, U.S. District Judge John Bates filed a lawsuit on February 14th, 2025 in response to claims from Doctors for America stating that the sudden removal of websites by the CDC and FDA diminished their ability to fight disease due to the removal of crucial data. Bates ordered all websites specifically identified by Doctors for America in its court filings be restored by midnight, along with any other materials the doctors relied on that had been wiped.
On March 12th, 2025, doctors Celeste Royce and Gordon Schiff from Harvard Medical School, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), also sued the Trump administration, arguing that the removal of their research from federal websites was a violation of both the First Amendment and the Administrative Procedure Act.
“Censoring information about transgender people or anyone a politician does not like, who have documented increased risks of negative health outcomes, is antithetical to the very mission of public health," said Dr. Schiff to the press. As of writing, this case is still ongoing, but the precedent set by the restoration of Schiff and Royce’s research in full without censorship could lead to further pressure from other doctors who had their work erased.
Works Cited
“Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.” The White House, (20 Jan. 2025) The United States Government, www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/defending-women-from-gender-ideology-extremism-and-restoring-biological-truth-to-the-federal-government/
Raymond, Nate. “Harvard doctors sue over Trump removal of articles mentioning LGBTQ health issues.” Reuters, (12 Mar. 2025) https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/harvard-doctors-sue-over-trump-removal-articles-mentioning-lgbtq-health-issues-2025-03-12/
Steenhuysen, Julie, and Hesson, Ted. “US Health Agencies Scrubbing Websites to Remove ‘gender Ideology’ | Reuters.” Reuters, (31 Jan. 2025) www.reuters.com/world/us/us-health-agencies-scrubbing-websites-remove-gender-ideology-2025-01-31/
Singer, Ethan. “Thousands of U.S. Government Web Pages Have Been Taken down since Friday.” The New York Times, The New York Times, (2 Feb. 2025) www.nytimes.com/2025/02/02/upshot/trump-government-websites-missing-pages.html
"Motsoalle"
"Motsoalle"
Sarah Mahmud
Published on TBD
Lesotho, formerly known as Basutoland prior to gaining independence in 1966, is a land-locked country in Southern Africa in which Sesotho is the official language. While Sesotho borrows many words from neighbouring languages, the word motsoalle holds a unique cultural significance to the country, and cannot be directly translated to any single word in English. Motsoalle is a term used to describe the romantic and sexual long-term relationships formed between Basotho women in Lesotho, and translates roughly into “a very special friend.” Unlike western labelling of relationships, these connections would exist alongside conventional heterosexual unions, not explicitly challenging societal norms nor traditional gender roles. Though previously celebrated amongst the Lesotho people, motsoalle relationships have recently begun to disappear in the country, despite their cultural significance.
Cultural Significance
Motsoalle relationships are typically first formed during adolescence, originally being likened by anthropologists as something similar to the western concept of “puppy love.” However, it’s evident that the depth of these relationships go far beyond simple crushes or platonic admiration. Often, motsoalle relationships would actually be acknowledged within Lesotho society, rather than something kept in secret in fear of persecution. In her book ‘Singing Away the Hunger,’ Anthropologist K. Limakatso Kendall documents an account by a Lesotho woman named Mpho 'M'atsepho Nthunya, in which Nthunya describes a large feast arranged by her husband in celebration of her motsoalle, evidence that these bonds were once not only recognized, but celebrated. Further anthropological studies would only further prove that these relationships were once incredibly common in Lesotho, with proof that motsoalle relationships provided many women with deep emotional intimacy and physical closeness with the same sex.
"Isn't That Just Another Word for Lesbian?"
No, it’s not. Although undoubtedly queer, making the distinction between western definitions of sexuality and motsoalle relationships is important, and to simply translate the Sesotho word motsoalle into “lesbian” would be Eurocentric. K. Limakatso Kendall writes that “women in motsoalle relationships ‘marry men and conform, or appear to conform, to gender expectations.’” These relationships would coexist with the women’s heterosexual marriages, rather than perceived as their own, independent relationship. The way the Basotho perceived sex required the involvement of a male partner in order to be classified as such, thus, intimate acts between women were not classified as sexual.
Though, with the deep affection and even physical intimacy associated with them, women in motsoalle relationships do not fit into western labelling of platonic female friendship either. Women in these relationships were, undoubtedly, committed to each other in a similar way lovers would be, and such a thing was entirely acceptable to Lesotho society. This is why it’s difficult to simply translate motsoalle to “lesbian,” because such a thing would be impossible to do without reducing the cultural context surrounding the place of motsoalle relationships in an African country to instead, a western concept.
Modern Decline
Motsoalle relationships have, over time, begun to disappear in Lesotho. This is in part due to the country’s rapid modernization in the 1960s and 1970s, along with the increased exposure to western cultural norms experienced by these communities. K. Limakatso Kendall hypothesizes that as the western concept of tightly labelled gender and sexuality spread to the Basotho, homophobic ideology heightened significantly, until, in the 1980s, public celebrations of motsoalle bonds had vanished, and today, such relationships are rare in Lesotho. Still, the cultural significance of these relationships cannot be understated in how they greatly influenced older Basotho generations.
Works Cited
Kendall, K. Limakatso. “Singing Away the Hunger: The Autobiography of an African Woman,” 1996.
Kendall, K. Limakatso. "'When a Woman Loves a Woman' in Lesotho: Love, Sex, and the (Western) Construction of Homophobia", 1997.
Sullivan, Jason. "Eras in Education "Mummy-Baby" Relationships in 1950s Lesotho: Learning About Loving", 2016.
Defining and Defending the Pink Triangle
Defining and Defending the Pink Triangle
Sarah Mahmud
Published on 2025.08.15
It is far less uncommon than one might think for an item once used as an instrument of oppression to become a symbol of freedom for many. This, for example, is the very reason a cross is used to denote faith, or a closed fist is used to represent black power. Among these symbols is the pink triangle: a small, downward facing triangle that, despite its simplicity, once marked gay men for persecution under Nazi Germany. Yet, after the Second World War, the pink triangle was revived as, instead, a symbol of protest against homophobia. Quite literally flipped upside down, both the downward and upward facing pink triangle have since been adopted by the LGBTQ+ community as a symbol of pride and liberation.
History
Inside of the Nazi’s concentration camps, each prisoner was required to wear a downward facing triangular cloth badge on their chest, the color of which identifying the reason for their imprisonment. Originally, gay men and transgender women were identified under the broader green (criminal), yellow (Jewish), or red (political prisoner) triangles, but later they would instead be classified under the pink triangle. The pink triangle, or “rosa winkel,” was a symbol of sexual deviancy, with sex offenders, zoophiles, and pedophiles also being classified under a similar symbol. If a prisoner was also classified as Jewish, the triangle would be superimposed over a second yellow triangle pointing the opposite way in order to resemble the Star of David. The rosa winkel was also notably larger than the other triangles, making those who wore it more visible and subject to heightened abuse.
After the Allied forces liberated the camps at the end of the Second World War, many of the prisoners imprisoned for homosexuality were reincarcerated by the newly established Federal Republic of Germany, as the Nazi amendments made to the law that classified homosexuality as a felony were not repealed until 1969. It wasn’t until 2002 that a formal apology to gay men was issued by the German government for their persecution, and it wasn’t until 2011 that the last known homosexual concentration camp survivor, Rudolf Brazda, would die at the age of 98. It is important to remember that these events are not far enough behind us in the past to discard from our memory completely, they are still extremely present and have directly affected the modern era for decades.
Reclamation
Gay concentration camp survivor Heinz Heger's 1972 memoir Die Männer mit dem rosa Winkel (The Men with the Pink Triangle) is often credited for bringing the symbol to greater public attention, with the German gay liberation group Homosexuelle Aktion Westberlin issuing a call in 1973 for more people to don the symbol as an act of respect towards victims of the Holocaust and to protest discrimination. Soon, more pieces of media would begin to adopt the symbol: The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) is famous for the inclusion of the pink triangle on one of the outfits of Dr. Frank N. Furter, a bisexual transvestite, in 1976, a famous German documentary denouncing fascism and oppression against gay men was produced, titled Rosa Winkel? Das ist doch schon lange vorbei... (Pink Triangle? That was such a long time ago...) Even within Canada, Toronto magazine The Body Politic included articles promoting the pink triangle as a memorial to those who had faced persecution and wrongful imprisonment.
The use of the pink triangle would continue throughout the 1980s, with the symbol growing to represent both gay and lesbian identity. Ironically, as a symbol once meant to broadly identify gay men and transgender women for persecution, some even began to use the symbol to secretly identify themselves as queer in a way heterosexual individuals would be oblivious to. In 1987, the logo for the March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights would be a silhouette of the US Capitol Dome superimposed over a pink triangle.
Defending the Triangle
The reason for this article’s existence is due to an event occurring in March of 2025. During the fallout of U.S. President Donald J. Trump’s anti-DEI policies, Trump shared a link to an image in which the rosa winkel is overlaid with a prohibited symbol. The rosa winkel is not just a symbol of gayness, nor is it just a symbol queerness in general. It is a symbol that has been used for decades in memoriam of those persecuted, incarcerated, and killed during the Holocaust that has now been disrespected.
It is easy to simply see the pink triangle as simply a denotation of something as queer, in fact, the reclamation of the rosa winkel has been criticized for this very reason for many years. Historian Klaus Müller argues that "the pink triangles of the concentration camps became an international symbol of gay and lesbian pride because so few of us are haunted by concrete memories of those who were forced to wear them." This is an entirely valid argument, and it is for this very reason it is so important to remember why the pink triangle is a symbol at all, to remember the pain it originally stood to represent. The importance of symbols like this which originally embodied oppression is to be a testament to the enduring spirit of those who have faced persecution, and for that to be acknowledged along with its transformed meaning.
Works Cited
Clarke, Amelia. "Yes, Trump posted a link that included a Nazi symbol for gay men in concentration camps" Snopes, 2025, https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-pink-triangle-nazis-gay/
Garcia, Arturo. "Were Gay Concentration Camp Prisoners 'Put Back in Prison' After World War II?", Snopes, 2018, https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/gay-prisoners-germany-wwii/
Gianoulis, Tina & Summers, Claude J. "Pink Triangle", 2004, http://www.glbtq.com/social-sciences/pink_triangle.html
Jensen, Erik N. "The Pink Triangle and Political Consciousness: Gays, Lesbians, and the Memory of Nazi Persecution." Journal of the History of Sexuality, vol. 11 no. 1, 2002, p. 319-349. https://dx.doi.org/10.1353/sex.2002.0008
Shankar, Louis. "How the Pink Triangle Became a Symbol of Queer Resistance", 2017, https://web.archive.org/web/20180822215528/https://hiskind.com/how-the-pink-triangle-became-a-symbol-of-queer-resistance/
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. "Gay Men under the Nazi Regime" https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/gay-men-under-the-nazi-regime
The Stonewall Uprising
The Stonewall Uprising
Owen W.
Published on 2025.08.15
The LGBTQ+ community may seem peaceful in current times; however, the history of oppression against the community should not be forgotten. In the past, people falsely recognised them as “mentally ill,” and as a result, they were discriminated against in their occupations, housing, and military service, among other places. It led to LGBTQ+ individuals being forced to obscure their identities, unable to live openly or authentically. But one event sparked a rebellion against this system of oppression: “The Stonewall Uprising.”
Context
The Stonewall Uprising took place at a gay bar in New York City called the ”Stonewall Inn”, located in Greenwich Village. During the 1960s, LGBTQ+ individuals were often targeted by the police in public spaces. However, certain bars like the “Stonewall Inn” accepted homosexuality, as the mafia mostly owned them, and they only cared as long as they were profiting from the business. It benefited members of the LGBTQ+ community as it offered a rare opportunity to express themselves without fear. But the bars were not always safe, as many queer establishments were frequently raided by police and subjected to police brutality.
Throughout the state, homosexuality was criminalised between the early 1800s to 1980 through the Sodomy Law: A law against certain sexual acts, which often targets same-gender relationships. Through these raids, the community’s anger only grew, ultimately sparking a rebellion. This rebellion inspired the marginalised members of the community to fight for their rights, leading to the first Pride parade in June 1970.
Marsha P. Johnson
Marsha P. Johnson was a Black transgender woman born in New Jersey on August 24, 1945. She was an LGBTQ+ rights activist, a drag queen and a sex worker. It is believed that she had started the Stonewall uprising when she threw a shot glass towards a mirror; this was known as “The shot glass heard around the world.” Marsha played a role in fighting against the police and set the uprising to be put in motion.
Sylvia Rivera
Sylvia Rivera was born on July 2 1951, in New York City. She was a trans-Latina sex worker and an activist for LGBTQ+ rights. She was involved in the Black Power Movement (a movement that strived for equality, freedom, and respect for Black people) and the Gay Activist Alliance, founded almost 6 months after the riots, and created to support the rights of gay and lesbian individuals solely. Sources report that she shouted, “I’m not missing a moment of this — it’s the revolution!” After the Stonewall riots, Rivera and Johnson created an organisation to aid LGBTQ+ teens, providing shelter for them. This organisation was known as Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR). STAR also fought against bills that were discriminatory against transgender people and sexual orientations and insisted on a non-discriminatory act.
What Happened?
On June 28, 1969, 9 policemen entered the bar to arrest the employees for not having a license to sell liquor; however, in the process, they hurt and hit the bar’s customers. In addition, they cleared the bar, arresting anyone who was not wearing gender-appropriate clothes, which they defined as disobedience towards a New York criminal statute. As a result, several people were taken into custody. But instead of retreating or surrendering to the police, they decided it was time to fight back and rebel. Through this decision, they began insulting and shoving the police and then throwing bottles and debris at the police. Because of the aggressive behaviour, the police had to barricade themselves in the bar and call for reinforcements. At this point, around 400 people rioted, and the barricade was breached numerous times, and the bar was set on fire. Luckily, the reinforcements arrived in time to extinguish the flames and to disperse the crowds. This event continued for 5 days, marking a day when members of the LGBTQ+ community united for a common cause.
Conclusion
This uprising was not just about fighting for our rights; this was a message to people that the LGBTQ+ community exists and is not a fairytale, and a reminder of the inspirational people who fought for the community and sparked change. No one should be discriminated against or ignored just because of our “differences.” In today’s world, people of the LGBTQ+ community are treated with more respect than in the past, though discrimination still exists, this progress is due to uprisings like Stonewall.. Stonewall showed that when people work together, they can accomplish anything they desire.
Works Cited
“Marsha P. Johnson.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 2 July 2025, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsha_P._Johnson.
Méndez, Lola, and Sassafras Patterdale. “Who Were the Stonewall Riots Leaders? Meet the Heroes of the Movement.” Honor the Heroes of the Stonewall Riots, the Birthplace of the LGBTQ+ Rights Movement, www.goodhousekeeping.com/life/a43877100/stonewall-riot-leaders/. Accessed 12 July 2025.
“Research Guides: LGBTQIA+ Studies: A Resource Guide: 1969: The Stonewall Uprising.” 1969: The Stonewall Uprising - LGBTQIA+ Studies: A Resource Guide - Research Guides at Library of Congress, Library of Congress , guides.loc.gov/lgbtq-studies/stonewall-era. Accessed 12 July 2025.
“Sodomy Law.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 3 July 2025, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodomy_law.
“Stonewall Riots.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, inc., 28 June 2025, www.britannica.com/event/Stonewall-riots.
“Sylvia Rivera.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 7 July 2025, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Rivera.
Wolf, Mackenzie. “’the Shot Glass Heard ‘Round the World’ - A Celebration of Pride.” The American Legion, www.legion.org/information-center/news/legislative/2024/june/the-shot-glass-heard-round-the-world-a-celebration-of-pride. Accessed 12 July 2025.
Lesbians in Francoist Spain
Lesbians in Francoist Spain
Sarah Mahmud
Published on TBD
Francoist Spain, often informally referred to as “fascist Spain,” was the period between 1936 and 1975 when dictator Francisco Franco ruled Spain following the Spanish Civil War. Under Franco’s new totalitarian state, the culture quickly shifted to that of conservative Roman Catholicism, where traditional gender roles were strictly upheld. Divorce was repealed, women were confined to the home as housewives, and homosexuality would only continue to be viewed as a mental illness and “social danger.” Consequently, lesbian culture in Spain was heavily suppressed.
Living in Secret
It is an ignorant yet commonly held belief that lesbians have somehow been “punished” less, or even not at all, compared to gay men throughout history. Though more rarely persecuted under the law for homosexual behaviour, lesbians were still oppressed and silenced under Franco’s fascist rule. Rather than the institution of prison, this oppression more often came through the use of cultural, religious, psychiatric and medical institutions to silence lesbian women. Along with social shunning, electroshock treatment, corrective sexual assault, conversion therapy, lobotomization, and even murder were very real and often lethal risks to being outed that many did not want to risk. With few outlets to escape the confines of marriage, it often felt like lesbians only had two narrow choices: conformity or death. This forced many lesbians into an inescapable closet, one that often led to suicide.
Many lesbians, thus, had to live in secrecy. Women would often use code words to identify each other, such as through the use of terms like libreras (librarian or bookseller) as identifiers, or the use of slang. Younger lesbians, for example, took up using the question: ¿Eres tebeo? ("Are you a comic?") The newfound segregation of sexes from public bathrooms and beaches would also provide lesbians with places to meet up covertly. While multiple men using public urinals would create immediate suspicion, the Franco regime’s misogynistic beliefs and inability to understand women and lesbianism outside of a surface-level view allowed for lesbian women to meet up in these places and organize cabarets where they could question gender norms with the same sex. In a fascist country where a woman’s finances were exclusively tied to her husband, lesbian women were able to set up economic networks to ensure their survival through these meeting places as well.
Lesbians also created their own unique non-traditional family units in response to cultural shifts to center the “nuclear family.” Some would marry men for the sake of convenience, as having husbands and children served to further reinforce their lie of being heterosexual. Many would also marry men before understanding their sexuality in order to conform, or choose to marry men after having served prison sentences for their homosexuality in fear of being shunned once more.
It should be mentioned that unmarried women were able to live together in a way that was, for the most part, culturally accepted, though the relationships between these women were often dismissed and referred to as “primas” (cousins,) and they were often societally mocked for being unable to “find men who would tolerate them.”
Lesbianism in Post-Francoist Spain
Following the death of Franco in 1975, Spain would enter a tumultuous period known as la Transición, which would be Spain’s transition to a democratic system after having suffered decades under the rule of a fascist regime. La Transición allowed for many of the previously marginalized Spanish minority groups to revolt against the dictatorship that oppressed them; for lesbians it marked the beginning of both a feminist and queer uprising. While broader gay and trans movements began to organize more openly, lesbian activism faced its own challenges in visibility, and developed largely within feminist movements. Even within those spaces, lesbians still struggled heavily for recognition.
On June 26, 1977, El Front d'Alliberament Gai de Catalunya (FAGC) would hold Spain’s first LGBTQ+ protest in Barcelona, where over 4,000 people, including lesbians whose identities were still undermined by the greater gay community, would march through the city demanding the government to repeal the Ley de Peligrosidad y Rehabilitación Social, a law that criminalized homosexuality. In the same year, lesbian women in Madrid would form Grupo de Lesbianas dentro del Frente de Liberación Homosexual de Castilla, a lesbian subsection of Frente de Liberación Homosexual de Castilla (FLHOC) meant to combat LGBTQ+ oppression. Spain’s first feminist lesbian publication, Nosotras, las lesbianas (We, the Lesbians), would also appear this year.
Legacy
Today, these lesbian protesters are honored for their courage in breaking a silence that had endured in Spain for decades. In June of 2023, a street in Barcelona’s Raval district was symbolically renamed to Carrer de les Lesbianes, or “street of the lesbians,” in order to honour lesbian activism during FAGC’s historic protest. The growing academic and cultural recognition of lesbian strength and resistance during and following the la Transición era shows just how significant lesbians were to the fight for equality.
Works Cited
Avila, Salmacis. "¿Las invisibles? Mujeres lesbianas en el franquismo". anthropologies.es, 2017
Davidson, Jessica. "Women, fascism and work in Francoist Spain: the law for political, professional and labour rights." Gender & history 23.2 (2011): 401-414.
Gunn, Elizabeth Shelley. The impossible subject: Reiterating lesbianisms in late twentieth-century Spain. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2004.
Kwan, Peter. "Querying a Queer Spain Under Franco." U. Mich. JL Reform 33 (1999): 405.
Monferrer Tomàs, Jordi M. "La construcción de la protesta en el movimiento gay español: la Ley de Peligrosidad Social (1970) como factor precipitante de la acción colectiva". Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas, 2004
Morcillo, Aurora G. The Seduction of Modern Spain: The Female Body and the Francoist Body Politic. Bucknell University Press, 2010.
Perez-Sanchez, Gema. "Franco's Spain, queer nation." U. Mich. JL Reform 33 (1999): 359.
Reeser, Victoria. "Exploring female identity in Francoist Spain." (2019).
Tusell, Javier. "Spain: From dictatorship to democracy." (2011).
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