It's amazing how much the world has changed in 40-some years. Make no mistake, there is still quite a way to go, but there's a huge difference from what it used to be like. Early in this documentary they interview a young man who was arrested several times for "committing homosexual acts", and faced a lifetime prison term if he were arrested again. That he describes himself as "sick" shows the true sickness of society's views back then. I have a friend who lived in Montreal in the 1950's, and he's told me of similar tales. About eight minutes in, the description of a homosexual lifestyle would cause a great uproar these days, but it was acceptable in the day. Watching this reminds me of the way we look back at medeivel medicine, where we scoff at the ideas they had in the time; "How could they be so foolish?" we think, and yet here we see the same mentality in a span of less than 50 years.
A great Thank-You to
whitetailfor the original link to this video. As he suggests, given the length of this video (a little over 43 minutes) it may be better to view it on its actual
YouTube page.
Click to view
For all the problems that GBLT people have these days, I am still glad to be living in our era; The horrors from just 45 years ago are unbelievable. Here's hoping that progress towards understanding and acceptance continues.