Wishing a joyful and rebellious Pride month to all who celebrate, even the straights. This week, I’m looking at how honoring the Stonewall Riots as they really were can help us orient our present-day politics. You can check out my appearance on one of my favorite podcasts, Sad Francisco (YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts), where I discuss my recent Substack piece “The End of Protest.”
The cops rushed in Greenwich Village’s Stonewall Inn after midnight. It wasn’t exactly a surprise. Homosexuality was effectively criminalized in New York City, and besides, the the Stonewall Inn broke plenty of other laws as well. A Mafia-owned business with no fire escapes, running water, or liquor license, its patrons could expect a police raid and shakedown about once a month, with arrests for “solicitation” or illegal cross-dressing. Virtually nobody considered such police tactics as discriminatory because queerness was, quite literally, mental illness; homosexuality would be listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for another half decade.
The raid was normal, expected, routine. The cops emptied the bar, lined up the patrons, checked their attire against the sex on their ID cards. Those judged to be cross-dressers were separated. The cops prepared to take these criminals down to the station, an occupational hazard of being queer in public in late 60s America.
But early in the morning of June 28, 1969, people fought back. A raucous crowd assembled to taunt the police as they waited for a patrol wagon to transport the arrestees. Someone shouted “Gay Power!” Someone threw a brick. Street kids uprooted a parking meter to use as a battering ram against the Stonewall Inn’s front door. The police were trapped inside the bar as the crowd attempted to set it alight, pouring lighter fluid inside the broken windows. A car was overturned to block the street. The victorious crowd would not disperse until just before dawn. By then, the modern gay liberation movement would be born.
Why it matters
Today, Pride events commemorate the Stonewall Riots, though few feature unhoused kids attempting to set buildings ablaze. And you know what? That’s okay. We need spaces for queer community and joy, now more than ever. With the rise of homophobic and transphobic legislation and street violence alike, a family-friendly parade can be a radical act.
But… it’s important to remember that Stonewall wasn’t a parade. Stonewall also wasn’t a protest, if by “protest” we mean a permitted march with protest marshals and matching signs. Pride month commemorates street kids attempting to set police officers on fire inside their mob-owned hangout. Stonewall was a riot: a violent, insurrectionary, illegal eruption that’s far easier to celebrate in the past tense. With enough distance, even nation-states can honor illegalist direct action—ever heard of the Boston Tea Party? But here’s the question: how many of those comfortable celebrating Pride month would really applaud if something like the Stonewall Riots happened in the present day?
And spontaneous, forceful resistance against the armed agents of the state is happening in 2025. On Friday, ICE raided an Italian restaurant in San Diego and kidnapped its employees. But the people fought back. Just like at the Stonewall Inn, a crowd gathered, taunted the police, even launched projectiles. ICE agents deployed flash-bang grenades against the crowd in an attempt to impose order, calling local police for backup. This was not the performative resistance that nonprofits and Democrats stage-manage for clicks and acclaim. It was the resistance of everyday people engaged in actual struggle against the state.
Spontaneous resistance is the floor, not the ceiling. But popular contestation, the willingness of everyday people to fight back wherever they are, is the foundation for everything else. If you support the riotous resistance of the most marginalized and oppressed sectors of society, you are on the side of liberation. If you look down your nose at actually-existing rebellion, you are objectively on the side of the status quo. If you think resistance must be authorized through protest permits or party flags, you are objectively on the side of the status quo, as well.
What comes next
As of this writing, ICE agents are posing as utility workers to sneak into people’s homes. The United States government is ready to forcibly detransition 275,000 people under threat of medically-induced death. Dozens of desperate people were massacred while waiting for meager food aid at a US-run “humanitarian” site in Gaza.
Stonewall was a riot, and it won’t be the last.
This post has been syndicated from In Struggle, where it was published under this address.