46th Anniversary of Compton Cafeteria Riot March & Rally - San Francisco

46th Anniversaryof Compton Cafeteria Riot March & Rally

5:oopm - August 20, 2012 - San Francisco, California

Meet at City Hall at 5:00pm on the Polk St. side to march, 

or join us at 5:30pm at the corner ofTurk & Taylor.

via the Facebook Event Page:

Join in celebrating the legacy of LGBTQ homeless youth in San Francisco's Tenderloin district. 

March from City Hall to Gene Comptons' Cafeteria (former site) on the corner of Turk and Taylor, where we will have speakers (more to be revealed as we get closer to the event), refreshments and use sidewalk chalk to leave remembrances on the sidewalk.

The Compton's Cafeteria Riot was spurred by a group of transgender women and the Vangaurd youth (queer street hustlers). The contemporary group of LGBTQ homeless youth known as Otro Vanguard will participate in this event with some of the heroes of the movement including Felicia Flames who was featured in the Screaming Queens documentary.

Clergy are invited to wear collars or a sign of their faith.

Confirmed speakers include: Felicia Flames, Pastor Megan Rohrer, Supervisor Scott Wiener and Trans Law Center Executive Director Masen Davis.

While most GLBTQ historians cite the Stonewall riots in 1969 as the start of the gay liberation struggle, in 1995 a new slice of LGBTQ history was brought to light by transgender historian Susan Stryker while she was researching her now best-selling book, “Gay by the Bay.” Stryker discovered an article in the 1972 Gay Pride program about a riot that took place in San Francisco at Gene Compton's Cafeteria in August of 1966.

Tired of the constant harassment by the SFPD, the drag queens refused to leave the cafeteria and rioted against the police. This event marks the first time in history where LGBTQ people fought back against the police and took a stand for themselves.

Susan Stryker, a transgender historian, author, professor, and filmmaker co-directed the 2005 documentary "Screaming Queens: The Riot at Compton's Cafeteria" which profiles these courageous women.

You can watch the first 24 minutes of the film here:

There are also several clips from the film available on YouTube:

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Top Ten Transgender Friendly Colleges

Campus Pride has published this list of top ten colleges in the United States on their Campus Climate Index that are particularly trans friendly and have pro-trans policies and programs.

The Top Ten:

Ithaca College – Ithaca, New York
New York University – New York, New York
Princeton University – Princeton, New Jersey
University of California, Los Angeles – Los Angeles, California
University of California, Riverside – Riverside, California
University of Massachusetts, Amherst – Amherst, Massachusetts
University of Michigan – Ann Arbor, Michigan
University of Oregon – Eugene, Oregon
University of Pennsylvania – Philadephia, Pennsylvania
University of Vermont – Burlington, Vermont

While I am not at all surprised at the selection or the fact they all are located on the West Coast or in the Northeast, I am surprised that Portland State University and UC Santa Cruz and Berkeley did not make the list.

This list is a good starting point, but by no means a complete list of schools that are trans-friendly. Many schools across the country are making strides in the way of LGBTQ folk and are great places for trans* people to go to school, even if they didn't make the list. Even schools in the south (like my alma mater, University of North Florida) are making strides in terms of creating a safe space for trans* students to go to school and are always open to ideas as to what they can do to accommodate transgender students and make their college experience as pleasant as possible.

In locations like the South and Midwest where one doesn't find the same mind-set of the progressive Northeast and West Coast, institutions of higher education are taking to the transgender movement more quickly than their non-university counterparts.