The ‘L’ Effect by Morgan M. Hurley
Pride season is here… and this one is special. It is the 50th anniversary of the night members of our community said, “I’ve had enough” of police brutality and rioted in the streets outside the Stonewall Inn in New York’s Greenwich Village. Ever since that uprising five decades ago, the actions of those brave souls has continued to reverberate, taking its place in history time and again.
In President Barack Obama’s second inaugural address in January 2013, he said: “We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths — that all of us are created equal — is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall; just as it guided all those men and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this great Mall, to hear a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear a King proclaim that our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth.”
For many years after June 28, 1969, Pride was recognized as a protest march. Today, in cities around the world, we not only commemorate that date but celebrate who we are and how far we have come since the night a riot kicked off our long march to the freedoms we currently enjoy.
My very first Pride celebration was in ’88, here in San Diego at the Balboa Naval Hospital parking lot, on a small square of asphalt facing Park Boulevard. Just 11 months prior, I “voluntarily” left active duty in the U.S. Navy, after the third increasingly invasive investigation to determine whether I was gay. It hadn’t mattered that I excelled at my job and as a sailor, or that I was beloved by my superiors and coworkers.
In 1987, five years before “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” became policy, all that mattered was that I might prefer the companionship of women over men. Luckily, after five long months of B.S., the investigation once again ended without an indictment and I was free to go (or stay) on my own terms, though the entire process left indelible marks on my psyche.
We’ve long since moved the festival to beautiful Marston Point in Balboa Park and our parade has expanded to be the largest civic event in our city, and I’ve been lucky to attend most every subsequent Pride celebration and without those old fears of retribution. There are many wonderful memories: like in the 1990s when the main stage was located down in “the loop” and the performances competed with the planes. There was only one beer garden and you could stay there for an entire afternoon and run into everyone you knew.
I watched the parade from Bank of America and was just two blocks from the tear gas incident in 1999, experiencing both the panic and the sting. In 2000 and 2001, I helped kick off the parade as a member of the Womenmoto contingent on my Harley Davidson; from 2009 to 2016, I rode on a trolley “float,” walked the parade route, and worked endless hours in a booth representing two different LGBTQ media organizations.
In 2012, I celebrated our new Pride flag and the opening of our new LGBTQ craft beer brewery and rejoiced for marriage equality in 2013. I stood in the pouring rain to get a glimpse of Ruby Rose in 2015 and I mourned the losses of the Pulse shooting victims in 2016.
It seems everything that happens in the world, especially the events that impact our community, is channeled through our Pride celebrations and it always brings us all closer together.
While the current administration does not seem to revere the same evident truths that President Obama proclaimed for women, people of color, or the LGBTQ community, history remains our teacher—the star that guides us—and it will continue to inform our future, despite those who get in the way.
This year’s theme for San Diego is Stonewall 50: A Legacy of Liberation and Melissa Etheridge is performing!
Happy Pride San Diego, I’ll catch you at the Spirit of Stonewall Rally on Friday, July 12!
Morgan M. Hurley is an award-winning journalist and freelance writer. You can reach her at morganmhurley8@gmail.com.