For Dakota, a 17-year-old transgender high school student in the San Gabriel Valley, it was an older transgender girl at her school that made a difference. She made Dakota feel less alone and gave him hope.
“This made me realize, okay, I’m not alone in this. There are other transgender people out there. They exist,” Dakota said. “If she’s real, maybe I can be real too.”
As queer lives and culture come under threat, “Our Queerest Century” highlights the contributions of LGBTQ+ people since the nation’s first gay rights organization was founded in 1924. Order a print version of the series.
Judith Webb, an 89-year-old grandmother who was raised in a progressive Hollywood film family, said she inherited an attitude of acceptance of LGBTQ+ people from her parents at an early age. “I was ‘woke’ when I was 10 years old,” she said.
Now, she cherishes visiting her mobile home in San Pedro with her gay grandson and his husband. One time he played the piano for her for an hour. Another time, while her husband slept, they went for an early morning walk in the rain.
“We had a little dog with us, and it was the first time since we got married that I had a chance to talk to him at length,” she said. “He’s a really great kid.”
Over the past year, LGBTQ+ people have become the political right’s favorite punching bag. That includes President-elect Donald Trump, whose campaign spent millions of dollars on anti-transgender ads and vowed to roll back transgender rights during his second term.
Misinformation about gay people, especially gay youth, and their medical care is being pervasive, thanks in part to Mr. Trump, his supporters, and some of his recent picks for administration positions.
One Institute Executive Director Tony Valenzuela spoke at an event with LA Times reporters during Circa Festival in October.
(Nicolette Jackson-Pownall)
But across the country, Americans are also learning to interact with, know, and love LGBTQ+ people like never before. The queer community is growing and thriving, the average American knows more about transgender people, and queer kids are coming out sooner and becoming more widely accepted. It’s coming.
Today, young people identify as LGBTQ+ at the highest rate in history and far below the numbers of previous generations.
The over-politicization of LGBTQ+ issues is part of a broader backlash against growing LGBTQ+ knowledge, understanding, and community. In some parts of the country, anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment is strong and growing stronger. But this rollback of gay rights is not the only LGBTQ+ trend.
LGBTQ+ Americans also positively impact the lives of those around them every day, strengthening America’s acceptance of LGBTQ+ people in the process.
“Real people, real lives”
In June, The Times published “Our Queerest Century,” a look back at the enormous and unforgettable contributions of LGBTQ+ Americans from 1924 to 2024.
Queer issues had risen to the center of the country’s political debate, with numerous anti-LGBTQ+ laws being proposed across the country. Efforts to erase gay people—banning LGBTQ+ books, drag queen performances, gender-affirming medical care, and the mere mention of LGBTQ+ identities in schools—were everywhere.
This project placed these changes within the broader context of our shared LGBTQ+ history. It includes essays by queer writers about the contributions of LGBTQ+ people since 1924, when the nation’s first gay rights organization was founded, as well as news analysis of national polls on LGBTQ+ issues today. People who knew someone who was queer were shown to have less sexual interest. I have anti-LGBTQ+ views.
The project also asked readers how queer people have positively impacted their lives, and dozens responded primarily to their loved ones, including LGBTQ+ uncles, aunts, and cousins. They wrote about their parents, siblings, children, grandchildren, and friends.
One respondent wrote, “If you search the entire planet, you won’t find a more kind, loving, and fun relative.”
Another person said that her LGBTQ+ family members “are real people, just like the rest of us, with real lives, real emotions, real feelings,” and that it “doesn’t matter to her.” “It normalized things,” he wrote.
A third woman said her gay loved ones have taught her to be “less judgmental and more curious about many other human differences, not just sexual orientation, but race, family structure, faith, etc.” “I was taught to hold my own and put myself in other people’s shoes,” he wrote. people’s shoes. ”
“Hope for the future”
Dakota (whose full name has been withheld to protect her safety) was the youngest respondent. She wrote that the “openly proud transgender girls” at her school (who were also popular and kind) became “instant role models” for her.
In a recent interview, Dakota called this election cycle “absolutely crazy” and “very scary” given President Trump’s “lot of anti-trans rhetoric.”
Her mother also said, “As a mother of a transgender child, I’m horrified.” “I’m basically trying to take comfort in the California wall that we have, a metaphorical safety wall for all marginalized groups, but I’m trying to take comfort in the California wall that we have, a metaphorical wall of safety for all marginalized groups, but I’m trying to make sure that no matter what kind of hate President Trump has, Even after causing a tsunami, we don’t know how strong it will be two years from now, four years from now.” ”
Dakota said she’s especially afraid for her fellow trans Americans who live in Republican states, but she doesn’t want to dwell on being depressed. Because there are too many other things in life.
She is socially accepted at school and her peers have no problem using her pronouns. She has applied to colleges all in California and is excited to start a new, more independent chapter. She loved her high school classes and plans to major in political science after realizing the importance of this election.
“I want people to understand that being transgender does not define who we are as people. Because there are so many other things going on,” she said.
Mr. Webb was the oldest respondent. She wrote in the Times that she was grateful for her “long exposure” to the gay community, which began with her parents’ gay friends, whom she visited frequently during her childhood.
Ms. Webb said she was a housewife before working at the University of Southern California for decades and befriending a gay graduate student, and is now “a grandmother of talented, fun, successful grandchildren.” “I’m married to a young man who is just as fun,” she wrote.
In an interview, Webb recalled morning walks and impromptu piano concerts. She also mentioned a visit after the election, where she said they had “a really good conversation about what was going on in the world” and that her grandson reassured her that he was happy.
“He’s just the most positive person,” she said.
solid foundation
Jennifer Moore, a transgender woman in her late 60s, called Trump’s victory and the anti-queer rhetoric he espoused “a nightmare” that some of his candidates and other Republicans are “devastated” and “a nightmare.” “That’s it,” he called.
He said gay advocacy groups are advising transgender members to make sure their driver’s licenses and passports are up to date and to talk to their doctors about stocking up on transition drugs. Although she feels lucky to live in California, she has friends who are considering or have already fled the less progressive state and country at large.
Against that backdrop, Moore said it’s useful to look back at the country’s long history of queer progress. That’s documented in Our Queerest Century, but it’s also exemplified by the Times’ decision to publish, she said.
Moore said he first started reading the Times as a child in 1968 and was “always looking for information” about gay people like himself in the paper, but all he found was negative.
She said it was “incredible” that the Times would publish an article celebrating the achievements of queer people at length today.
Moore wrote in the paper that over the past 10 years, three LGBTQ+ people have been instrumental in her journey to transition. One was a lesbian former Catholic nun who told her she would be “miserable” until she became a real person, and one was the same transgender woman who spoke firmly about her. The first steps in her transition, and the gay colleagues who welcomed her on an AIDS charity bike ride and showed her that the world is full of queer people who are out and happy.
“The courage and normalcy of these three LGBTQ people taught me that it’s okay to live freely and authentically,” Moore wrote.
Trevor Radner, Head of Education Programs at One Institute, will speak about the Times’ “Our Queerest Century” project during October’s Circa Festival event.
(Nicolette Jackson-Pownall)
Owen Rennert, 24, an associate marriage and family therapist who primarily works with gay clients, said his grandmother, a longtime LGBTQ+ ally who campaigned for AIDS awareness in the 1980s, was “the queerest of us.” He said that he decided to write about it because he was given a section called “Century”. .
“She brought it to lunch and said, ‘Look, this is gay, you should check it out,'” Renato said with a laugh.
Renato, who is non-binary, said that having gay friends and mentors has “dramatically changed” the way he sees the world, adding that “learning how to dress as a teenager gave me a safe place to enter life. “It helped me understand my queer identity,” he wrote. As an adult. ”
They said in interviews that since the election, many of their customers have expressed a similar need to “surround themselves with queer people,” and “Our Queerest Century” believes there is a strong foundation for such a community to build on. He said it reminded him of that.
“Because it’s work, [but] It’s always been that way,” Renato said. “We were able to do it.”
the coming century
Tony Valenzuela, executive director of One Institute, one of the nation’s oldest LGBTQ+ organizations and a partner of the Times in hosting the “Our Queerest Century” event in October, considers the conflict of interest. said that focusing on queer history is “incredibly important” today.
“Our work is even more urgent to remind people that our creativity comes into play not only when we face challenges and are attacked, but also when we organize. It’s going to be what you need. [we] “I understand the importance of coalitions,” he said.
Valenzuela said gay leaders hope to use this moment to build gay networks, such as using the tactics of gay activists in the early days of the AIDS epidemic.
“There were activists on the streets. There were people working at the policy level. Some said that. [in] science and public health. The number of ways to raise money for nonprofits has increased significantly. “Frankly, there has been a call for wealthy people to step up,” Valenzuela said.
Craig Loftin, a history lecturer and LGBTQ+ scholar at California State University, Fullerton, spoke at a Circa Festival event in October about the Times’ “Our Queerest Century” project.
(Nicolette Jackson-Pownall)
Craig Loftin, an LGBTQ+ scholar and history lecturer at California State University, Fullerton, said queer history “provides all the answers to right-wing politics and Trump’s rhetoric” needed today. , agreed that this is why it must be taught.
It is full of hope and victory.
A few years ago, Loftin first discovered and published a collection of letters submitted by readers in the 1950s and ’60s to One Magazine, an early gay rights publication founded in Los Angeles in 1952.
Similar to the response to “Our Queerest Century,” there were responses from all over the country. Somewhat surprisingly, they were filled with as much hope and love as sadness and fear.
“I was prepared for darkness and doom, but I was transfixed by how these people exist within their environment and find happiness, find love, find meaning despite it all. , I found myself inspired,” Loftin said. “There was still a sense of humor. There was still a sense of hope. There was still a certain kind of positive spirit that was still there, and that’s what made me, as a queer person, no longer aware of what we’re facing right now with President Trump and rhetoric like this.” It taught me that even if you are, you have faced much worse situations in the past.”
“Our Century of Queer Rest” has similarly reminded us of the “enormous amount of LGBT history” that queer people and their allies can draw from today as they chart a path forward, he said. said.
“In the wake of Trump’s election, and in the wake of the storm that is already raining on us, we need to do even more.” [to] “Please share this history with the world,” he said. “For me, knowing the past is the way forward.”
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