I’ve written a lot about the history of LGBTQ parents to help show that we’re not really a newfangled and untested phenomenon, despite opinions to the contrary. We have a past to be proud of and the shoulders of role models to stand on. Here’s a recap for LGBTQ History Month.
I love LGBTQ History Month almost more than I love Pride Month. Going to grad school in history will do that. Keeping in mind the truism “History is written by the victors” and philosopher George Santayana’s observation, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” I find there’s something about looking at our queer past that feels empowering and vital.
October is LGBT History Month, and I want to celebrate with a look at some of the historical milestones—of laws, visibility, and community—related to LGBT parents in the U.S.
I love this short film about a blue-collar, African American, lesbian mom in the early 80s — a lovely portrait of a life at a time when lesbian lives, much less those of lesbians of color and lesbian moms, were little known.
As this year’s LGBT History Month gets into full swing, I find myself wondering, “Who was the world’s first known LGBT parent?” To the best of my knowledge, she was the Greek poet Sappho, whose island home of Lesbos gave us the term “lesbian.” Sappho seems to have had a daughter named “Cleis”—meaning we can trace LGBT parents back to about 600 BCE.
And the answer to yesterday’s LGBT History Month parenting trivia question is:
What better way to celebrate LGBT History Month than with a trivia question about a historical LGBT parent? Can you name this famous LGBT parent, described by his son as below (after the jump)?
(This is a slightly revised version of a piece I wrote for my Mombian newspaper column several years ago, but which seemed worth reposting in honor of LGBT History Month.)
Gay AmericaLGBT History Month is the perfect time to write about Linas Alsenas’ Gay America: Struggle for Equality (Amulet: 2008), a history of gay men and lesbians in the U.S. from the mid-nineteenth century through 2005. It fills a much needed gap, not because of the subject (there are a small but a growing number of LGBT-specific histories), but because of its audience: teens.
We lesbian moms sure have made our mark. The day after I posted about Roberta Achtenberg being selected as an LGBT History Month Icon, lawyer Mary Bonauto was named one as well. Bonauto is best known as the lead counsel in the historic case that won same-sex couples the right to marry in Massachusetts.
It’s LGBT History Month, and one of the icons being celebrated by the Equality Forum is lesbian mom Roberta Achtenberg, a commissioner of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, the first openly gay presidential appointee confirmed by the Senate, and cofounder of the National Center for Lesbian Rights. Here’s a short clip Equality Forum did about her;
