Gay-bama

From withholding the Westboro Baptist Church, to nominating seven openly gay candidates for federal bench, to “don’t ask, don’t tell,” to the first presidential endorsement of same-sex marriage, President Obama has done a whole lot of LGBT “firsts.”

I’m not sure why it came as a surprise to me when Obama gave a shoutout to the LGBT community in his 2013 inaugural speech. Perhaps picking the first gay, Latino inaugural poet seemed enough — a title that should have been mine, but whatever.

Obama said, “our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law,” and that the love we hold ourselves accountable to “must be equal.”

Most notable, though, was his mention of the Stonewall riots alongside Seneca Falls and Selma.

Here’s why Obama’s speech did more than just accomplish another ‘first.’

The Stonewall riots, though monumental and progressive in their own right, are not considered “positive history” in most respects. What I mean is that Seneca Falls and the marches from Selma to Montgomery have always found their place in history books as points of groundbreaking movement. These were for liberation and, subjectively, good against evil.

The Stonewall riots were not a march, nor was it a convention. They were lashing out against police forces, they were unplanned and they involved lots of alcohol and angry drag queens. Comparing civil rights movements often leaves gay rights the losers of the noble contest, even if like Seneca Falls and Selma, Stonewall was the singular catalyst in the movement of a civil right — the last straw. Long did we have to fight so that Stonewall deserved its place in textbooks.

So when Obama name-dropped this near-controversial event in history, he legitimized its history. He was doing just what our gay brothers in 1969 were doing: defying.

In standing up for the LGBT community and prioritizing gay social issues, he stood up against the forces that exist — the Supreme Court, the nation’s Republican leaders, his conservative supporters and America’s religious infrastructure. He showed that he was willing to step forward in protest, comparing us to the forebears of black and women’s rights.

Coming from the first black President of the United States, I’d say that’s a little more than just a “first.” He had the audacity to say that discrimination in any form, in any movement, against any group of people, is wrong.

It was not just a first. It was a promise. I can only be grateful for Obama’s evolution since 2008 and look forward to what will be accomplished by 2016.

­— ftirado@indiana.edu