54th Anniversary of the Stonewall Riots

June 28, 2023

The events of June 1969 at the Stonewall Inn in New York marked a significant turning point in the fight for LGBTQ+ rights. In 1969, the police raided the Stonewall Inn, a bar located in Greenwich Village, New York, which served as a haven for the city’s gay, lesbian, and transgender communities. Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, two transgender women of color, are names often associated with the first brick thrown at Stonewall, and both were at the forefront of the LGBTQ+ rights movement that emerged from the riots. In 2001, Johnson stated, “Many historians have given me credit for throwing the first Molotov cocktail, but I always like to correct them. I threw the second one, I did not throw the first one.” Rivera said in 1989 that she was at Stonewall when it was raided. After being pushed onto the street, she said they asked, “Why do we have to put up with this? before the nickels and dimes started flying.” In Kosovo, within LGBTI organizations such as CEL Kosovo & CSGD, there are Drop-in Centers that have served for 20 years as safe spaces for LGBTQ+ individuals. These centers serve as meeting places for various activities, HIV testing, and provide legal, psychological, and social assistance. 55 years after the opening of the Stonewall Inn, and 54 years after the riots in America, Kosovo opens its first openly queer venue “Bubble Pub,” which serves as a safe spot for LGBTQ+ communities as well as feminist coalitions and other activism movements.