Harvey Milk was a visionary and fearless gay rights’ activist and a Supervisor in San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Although his leadership was short-lived as a fellow supervisor and long-time opponent, Dan White, assassinated him his legacy remains as the prominent Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered (LGBT). At that time, the community was entirely homophobic and standing staunchly to the fight against discrimination of the gay community. Harvey Milk was born on May 1930 in Woodmere, New York. He grew up in a middle-class Jewish home. Milk grew up knowing his sexual orientation from his young age, as a teenager, he was different from the rest of his peers (West 184). He graduated from Albany State College in 1951and joined the U.S Navy
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However, that did not stop him from forging alliances between the gay community and organized labor. He was popularly known as a champion representing the diverse neighborhoods of San Francisco against the interests of the corporate culture. After several failed attempts to earn a political position, Milk was finally elected to the Board of Supervisors in 1977. In this paper, I will start by analyzing Harvey Milk’s speech of June 24th, 1977 concerning “You have got to have hope.” This speech marked Milk’s extraordinary entrance in politics as a defender of gay’s rights. Milk emphasized the importance of ensuring that gay leaders are empowered, self-identified, and respected in their fight for the undeserving community. The limited space in which Milk could tread to make sure that the gay community was accepted in the larger citizenry clearly shows how complicated it was to sustain gay powered politics in the 1970s (Donahue, …show more content…
It was not until when he moved to San Francisco that he dramatically changed to become a social change driver. This was after he had quit his job as a Wall Street broker. Since the time of World War II, San Francisco had become the home of a significant number of the gay community. Although gays and lesbianism were outlawed in San Francisco, the city had a long history of brave activists who championed for the end of homophobia in the region. Since the 1950s the Mattachine Society and Daughters of Bilitis were founded making the city to have a reference point in the homophobic movement (Witeck, 19). In the 1970s there was a massive increase in gay immigrants and an extension in gay culture and politics. The dynamic economic and demographic landscape of the city exacerbated this growth in the population of the gay community in the city. Within few years of the uncontrolled immigration, San Francisco was converted from a manufacturing center into a metropolis, and this quickly depleted the blue-collar straight families. There was an increase in the number of young people and mushrooming of inexpensive housing in Castro. The populous homosexual community caused the growth of political possibilities; the gay community began enjoying some freedom and communal identity deepened. This increase in numbers and unity created the need for a political class to bring about unity through diversity (Stewart,
However, that did not stop him from forging alliances between the gay community and organized labor. He was popularly known as a champion representing the diverse neighborhoods of San Francisco against the interests of the corporate culture. After several failed attempts to earn a political position, Milk was finally elected to the Board of Supervisors in 1977. In this paper, I will start by analyzing Harvey Milk’s speech of June 24th, 1977 concerning “You have got to have hope.” This speech marked Milk’s extraordinary entrance in politics as a defender of gay’s rights. Milk emphasized the importance of ensuring that gay leaders are empowered, self-identified, and respected in their fight for the undeserving community. The limited space in which Milk could tread to make sure that the gay community was accepted in the larger citizenry clearly shows how complicated it was to sustain gay powered politics in the 1970s (Donahue, …show more content…
It was not until when he moved to San Francisco that he dramatically changed to become a social change driver. This was after he had quit his job as a Wall Street broker. Since the time of World War II, San Francisco had become the home of a significant number of the gay community. Although gays and lesbianism were outlawed in San Francisco, the city had a long history of brave activists who championed for the end of homophobia in the region. Since the 1950s the Mattachine Society and Daughters of Bilitis were founded making the city to have a reference point in the homophobic movement (Witeck, 19). In the 1970s there was a massive increase in gay immigrants and an extension in gay culture and politics. The dynamic economic and demographic landscape of the city exacerbated this growth in the population of the gay community in the city. Within few years of the uncontrolled immigration, San Francisco was converted from a manufacturing center into a metropolis, and this quickly depleted the blue-collar straight families. There was an increase in the number of young people and mushrooming of inexpensive housing in Castro. The populous homosexual community caused the growth of political possibilities; the gay community began enjoying some freedom and communal identity deepened. This increase in numbers and unity created the need for a political class to bring about unity through diversity (Stewart,