# In modernity, when were gay people first described as anything but deviants? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 30, 2004, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222 "2004-03-30T01:39:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/1 "2004-03-30T01:39:42Z")
In modern society, when were gay people accorded anything resembling respectful consideration by the mass media? Post the 1960’s most mentions of gay people seem to be the context of a furtive, shadowy, deviant sub-culture. What was the first major change documented in this attitude (and yes I know this attitude it still exists in many places). ---
**Author:** ![owlofcreamcheese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/97f17d/32.png) [@owlofcreamcheese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/owlofcreamcheese)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/2 "2004-03-30T02:18:13Z")
they have had bursts in the past of being seen as sick in a tragic way… instead of sick in a devient way in psychology occationally since it began (sick like a person with the flu, instead of sick like a rapist). with cures even! thats not really want you were looking for though. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/3 "2004-03-30T03:22:36Z")
Everything started to change with the Stonewall Riots of 1969. Prior to that, homosexuality was always considered either a sin or a mental illness. Growing up during that period, I was always aware that my deepest feelings indicated that there was something seriously “wrong” with me. The most pro-gay people were the ones who believed that we were sick, and it wasn’t our “fault.” I just figured that someday I’d go into therapy, and get “cured.” I \*\*never \*\*heard anyone say that being gay was ok. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/4 "2004-03-30T03:41:02Z")
What exactly happened with Stonewall? I’ve always wondered that. ---
**Author:** ![rfgdxm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c0e974/32.png) [@rfgdxm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rfgdxm)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/5 "2004-03-30T03:44:12Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > I \*\*never \*\*heard anyone say that being gay was ok. Then you must not have known any anthropologists, or serious students of history. The OP mentioned the attitudes expressed in the mass media, which represented what the vast majority of the citizenry thought. However, anyone who was familiar with ancient Greek history would know that homosexuality was hardly thought anything that weird. Including involving boys of such an age that today most would consider this pedophilia. And any anthropologist would have been aware of a number of cultures where homosexuality was either at least tolerated, and in some cases thought within the bounds of normal. I also guess you didn’t know any libertarians. While I guess many libertarians might have personally considered homosexuality perverse, it would to them be “OK” in the sense that what consenting adults do in private is their business only. ---
**Author:** ![Roches](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bc8723/32.png) [@Roches](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roches)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/6 "2004-03-30T03:52:37Z")
The _mass_ media generally preferred not to discuss homosexuality (but then, neither did the mass media discuss heterosexuality) until the 60s, I think. If there were occasional references, they would not have been positive, but I really think the subject was mostly ignored. In literature, positive depictions of homosexuality go back much further (but are often hidden). There were viable gay subcultures long before Stonewall – in Weimar Germany, for example. Or in London, or any major city in Europe. I think I’ve seen mention of ‘gay bars’ existing in London as far back as 1800. These probably existed in the US as well. Really, the issue is not that the mass media began to portray homosexuality specifically in a more positive light – it’s that it began to reflect domestic reality. A newspaper in the 1950s or 1920s would have vilified premarital sex nearly as loudly as it would have vilified homosexuality, and yet well over half – as much as 75% – of women had had premarital sex. The same would go for other things which the media no longer portrays as deviant or abominable, such as having affairs, birth control, or single motherhood. These things existed, and may have been discussed and even tolerated to a certain degree, well before the media stopped prescribing morality and began to describe reality. ---
**Author:** ![cornflakes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@cornflakes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cornflakes)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/7 "2004-03-30T04:12:40Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > What exactly happened with Stonewall? > > I’ve always wondered that. [Stonewall](http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/eresources/exhibitions/sw25/case1.html) > [@](#): > > On Friday evening, June 27, 1969, the New York City tactical police force raided a popular Greenwich Village gay bar, the Stonewall Inn. Raids were not unusual in 1969; in fact, they were conducted regularly without much resistance. However, that night the street erupted into violent protest as the crowds in the bar fought back. The backlash and several nights of protest that followed have come to be known as the Stonewall Riots. If I have my history right, police in larger cities had details dedicated to prosecuting gays and other “perverts.” Stonewall was the first time that anyone stood up against this institutional harrassment. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/8 "2004-03-30T04:29:25Z")
The Board of Trustees of the American Psychiatric Association decided at the end of 1973 that homosexuality should not be considered a mental illness. It was removed from the DSM’s list of mental illnesses. So in _that_ way, homosexuals were not considered _abnormal_. As more and more people felt comfortable in being open about their homosexuality and heterosexuals were no longer living in ignorance, then confusion about its being a perversion all but disappeared except among those who remain uneducated, insecure or bound by certain religious dogma. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/9 "2004-03-30T05:17:34Z")
I think the AIDS epidemic had a large role in the turnaround. When gay people started dying there was more willingness by the media and popular culture to actually start looking at them as people. The news media began to explore “gay culture” and individuals with a less sensationalistic eye and plays like _Longtime Companion_ showed the humanity of gay people as victims. In an ironic way, I think that AIDS forced the news media to take homosexual men seriously as people and led the way to more realistic, less “deviant” depictions in popular culture. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2004, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-modernity-when-were-gay-people-first-described-as-anything-but-deviants/237222/10 "2004-03-30T09:22:15Z")
> [@cornflakes](#): > > Stonewall was the first time that anyone stood up against this institutional harrassment. Not to get all GD or anything, but I think that in large measure depends on how you define “standing up.” Stonewall may have been the first time there were “gay riots” (although I would swear I remember reading about something similar in Los Angeles pre-dating Stonewall but I can’t locate it in my reference books) but there had been an organized “homophile” movement on the West Coast for two decades before Stonewall, including the founding of the Mattachine Society in Los Angeles in 1950, the founding of the Daughters of Bilitis also in the 1950s, the candidacy of Jose Sarria for San Francisco supervisor in 1961 (winning 5600 votes) and a gay Tavern Guild organized in 1962 to oppose police harassment. There were also annual pickets at Independence Hall by the Mattachines throughout the 60s and they also picketed the White House on at least one occasion, in 1965.