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The LGBT community marked the 41st anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion and the first anniversary of the Rainbow Lounge raid with a rally, march and candlelight vigil on Sunday evening, June 27 in Downtown Dallas.

A crowd of about 150 gathered outside the Dallas County Records Building at 6:30 p.m. Elizabeth Pax energized the crowd before a march through downtown.

Event organizer Daniel Cates said he was inspired by the words of gay rights pioneer Harvey Milk, who encouraged the LGBT community to march down Main Street. From Historical Plaza in front of the Records building, marchers proceeded down Commerce Street, turned the corner at Neiman Marcus and returned to the square walking hand-in-hand while chanting along Main Street.

The march took about 30 minutes and was led by a group representing each letter in LGBT. They carried a banner that said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

Another banner read, “Full federal equality now.”

Signs said things like, “Adam & Steve. Madam & Eve. It’s all good” and “Wake Up America. Being homophobic kills. Equality now.”

Several signs remembered Milk.

“Harvey Milk. American politician who became the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California, winning the seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors,” one sign read.

Shannon Kern, a straight ally, served as emcee of the rally that followed the march.

“Burst down those closet doors because you are perfect the way you are,” Kern said.

Jesse Garcia of Dallas gay LULAC council told the crowd to vote and encouraged straight allies to do the same. He challenged the group to reach out to fellow minorities who understand that the fight is for civil rights, and to stick together and not bow to forces that want the community to turn against itself.

When Rafael McDonnell from Resource Center Dallas spoke, he began by asking how many were attending their first gay-rights rally. About a quarter of the crowd cheered.

Get Equal Now activist Michael Robinson reminded the crowd of last week’s DART non-discrimination victory.

“Lock me up and set me free,” said activist Chastity Kirven. She was referring to her arrest at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office while protesting inaction on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.

Kirven led the group in several chants including “One struggle, one fight,” driving home the evening’s theme of unity.

Referring to the handful of anti-gay counterprotesters from a Mansfield church who’ve become a fixture at local LGBT events, Kirven questioned their morality.

“When they want to look into your bedroom, who’s the pervert?” Kirven shouted.

Renee Baker spoke on behalf of the transgender community and, as a Youth First Texas board member, on behalf of young people.

“I’m doing this for our youth,” she said. “They’re taking the brunt of this because they’re still in the public schools.”

Nonnie Ouch, president of the Gay Straight Alliance at Texas Tech University, also mentioned the counterprotesters.

“Let’s not be like our enemy who cowers behind his theology,” she said.

Cates responded to the Mansfield group’s signs saying homosexuality is a choice that does not deserve “special rights.”

“I’ll tell you what’s a choice. Religion is a choice and it’s protected by the constitution,” Cates said.

Cates finished his remarks by thanking the Republican Party of Texas for defining their hatred of gays and lesbians so heinously in its platform that it’s being ridiculed in the national media.

The Rev. Steve Sprinkle of Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth spoke about the response to last June’s Rainbow Lounge raid. He said the event united Dallas and Fort Worth into one LGBT community to produce an appropriate response.

He said while the goal of police was to harass and humiliate, the LGBT community showed it won’t be intimidated.

A candlelight vigil followed to remember those no longer with us.

Spencer Young, from the cast of the Tyler production of “The Laramie Project,” which right-wingers tried to cancel, remembered Nicholas West during the vigil.

West was 23 when he was kidnapped from a Tyler park and murdered on Dec. 30, 1993. Young compared that murder to Matthew Shepard’s five years later. As he told the story, the clock in the tower above Old Red eerily tolled the hour.

Pax ended the evening by leading the crowd in rounds of “We Shall Overcome.”

- Trinity Wheeler

By Kerry Eleveld, Advocate.com

In his first State of the Union address, which focused heavily on economic concerns and bolstering the confidence of middle-class Americans, President Barack Obama touted his administration’s hate-crimes achievement and reiterated his support for repealing the military gay ban.

“This year I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are — it’s the right thing to do,” said the president during his hour-plus speech.

The pledge was seen by some as progress even as it dismayed others, especially after reports emerged earlier this week that the president might announce more specific intentions for the policy.

“I think there’s going to be an element of our community that will be disappointed because people were hoping he would lay out something more aggressive and substantive,” said Alex Nicholson, executive director of Servicemembers United.

But Nicholson called it “a step forward” more because of the platform than because of the content of the speech.

“I think the simple fact that ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ is being included in the State of the Union address, alongside the ongoing wars and the economy and health care, is an unequivocal signal that the issue is being raised on the administration’s priority list,” he said. “Presidents don’t typically throw out issues like this in the State of the Union if the intention is to hold off on them until the following year.”

Nathaniel Frank, author of Unfriendly Fire and a senior fellow at the Palm Center, shared that sentiment.

“That’s certainly a step beyond saying it in front of a bunch of gay donors,” said Frank, referring to Obama’s pledge to end the policy during the Human Rights Campaign fund-raiser last fall.

But Frank also registered some reservations.

“My concern has been all year that the president is dithering — that’s a political mistake and an operational mistake,” he said.

Frank noted that a vacuum of leadership on the issue could allow opponents to circle their wagons.

“People of bad faith can exploit the opening and turn this into a culture war battle,” he said, “and make no mistake, they can win this if people of good faith think they can coast along or show up every once in a while with a vague reiteration.”

Aubrey Sarvis, executive director of Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, urged immediate action.

“We applaud the president tonight for his call to Congress to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell” this year,” Sarvis said. “We call on the president to repeal the archaic 1993 law in his defense budget currently now being drafted, that is probably the only and best moving bill where DADT can be killed this year. As Rep. Patrick Murphy and Sen. [Kirsten] Gillibrand have made clear, this is the year to repeal the law.”

This is not the first time a president has mentioned LGBT equality in a State of the Union speech. Bill Clinton called for employment nondiscrimination and hate-crimes protections in his 1999 address.

“Discrimination or violence because of race or religion, ancestry or gender, disability, or sexual orientation is wrong and it ought to be illegal,” Clinton said. “Therefore, I ask Congress to make the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and the Hate Crimes Prevention Act the law of the land.”

Ten years later, President Barack Obama signed that LGBT-inclusive hate crimes legislation into law.

“We finally strengthened our laws to protect against crimes driven by hate,” Obama noted during his speech.

Obama also sounded aspirational notes of hope and resilience during his address.

“I have never been more hopeful about America’s future than I am tonight,” he said. “Despite our hardships, our union is strong. We do not give up. We do not quit. We don’t allow fear or division to break our spirit. In this new decade, it’s time the American people get a government that matches their decency; that embodies their strength.”

But for LGBT Americans, this year will be a game of wait and see.

As Frank said, “It remains to be seen whether action will be paired with words.”