Harvey Milk: Celebrating This Pioneer Politician
Today is International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia. Marking a worldwide celebration of sexual and gender diversities, its important to honour those who have stood for LGBTQIA+ rights. Harvey Milk is one such pioneer. With his birthday also happening this week, today’s blog will be talking about the importance of these movements and the people who help to drive them.
What is LGBTQIA+?
Wanting to move towards inclusivity, the shorter LGBT has expanded. Thus, adding new letters to represent members of the community. Keep reading to see what this acronym represents.
- L is for Lesbian. Defined as a female-identifying person who is attracted to another female-identifying person.
- B is for Bisexual — referring to someone who is attracted to more than one gender.
- G is for Gay. This is a male-identifying person who is attracted to another male-identifying person. Harvey Milk identified as a gay man.
- T is for Transgender. This is someone whose gender identity/expression does not conform to they sex they were assigned at birth. Having to do with gender and not sexuality, transgender people may identity as other LGBQIA+ terms.
- Q is for Queer or Questioning. Referring to anyone who is not straight or cisgender, Queer is an umbrella term in the community for those who don’t wish to use labels. Historically, the term was as a slur. But, recently LGBTQIA+ people reclaimed it. Questioning is a term for those who are not sure about how they identify.
- I is for Intersex — referring to people who naturally have biological traits which don’t match what is typically identified as male or female.
- A is for Asexual/Aromantic or Ally. Another umbrella term, Asexual is for those who do not experience attraction to others. Ally includes those who identify as cisgender and straight, but support the LGBTQIA+ community.
A lot of this community faces prejudice and biases. International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia seeks to speak out against these terrible unfair treatments. One way of doing this is celebrating the lives of those who fought for LGBTQIA+ rights.
The Life of Harvey Milk
Dreaming of a better tomorrow, Harvey Milk hoped for a future filled with equality and devoid of hate. Before he was killed, he served less than a year in public office . But, the work he did very much change a city, nation, and a global community.
Being the first openly gay elected official in California, Milk was the most pro-LGBTQIA+ political in the United States. Although politics and activism were not his interests early on, he was spurred into action after his experiences in the counterculture movement of the 1960s.
Moving from New York City to San Francisco, Harvey Milk was amongst a migration of gay and bisexual men also travelling West. Despite running unsuccessfully three times, Milk’s campaigns earned him increasing popularity until he eventually won a seat as city supervisor in 1997.
During his time in office, Harvey Milk sponsored a bill banning the discrimination in public accommodations, housing, and employment on the basis of sexual orientation. After his death, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009.
His final campaign manager, Anne Kronenberg, wrote of him:
“What set Harvey apart from you or me was that he was a visionary. He imagined a righteous world inside his head and then he set about to create it for real, for all of us.”
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