The Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Community have faced extreme difficulties throughout time when the topics of equality and civil rights issues have been brought to the public's attention. The rights that existed, or for better use of words, did not exist for homosexual men will be discussed, not only in the state of New York, but across America and how it affected the gay community in New York. The lives of homosexual men were highly scrutinized and judged during the time of the rapid rise of the AIDS epidemic during the early 1970s to the late 1980s. Societal view also affected particular rights and liberties for homosexual men due to the fact that the government during this time period was the conservative Republicans. Many …show more content…
Bill Kraus, who was a homosexual man himself, stated in a Democratic platform that he only ask that the American government recognize that homosexual men are human as well. However, even though Kraus fought for the rights of the gay community, he too was on board with the idea of closing the bath houses. During the late 1970s to the mid 1980s, bathhouses were used by homosexual men to seek pleasure from other men. He did this to campaign for safe-sex and bring about an awareness that the bath houses were causing this disease to spread easier. Many people felt as though their rights to obtain pleasure however they see fit was being taken from them strictly on the basis of their homosexuality. This led to an increase in the gay rights movement across America. The LGBT movement began in 1924, but was not widely recognized until The Stonewall Riots of 1969; the incident that occurred shaped the gay right movement forever. On June 28, 1969, police raided a popular gay bar known as the Stonewall Inn and began …show more content…
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also recorded a rare and unusual disease that was also infecting only homosexual men mostly in New York, which was known as Kaposi's Sarcoma. At the time, the CDC did not understand or know what exactly was infecting and killing these gay men due to the government's lack of interest, low funding, and outdated equipment. The Republican government, under the presidency of Ronald Reagan, did not even acknowledge the fact that a new disease was spreading amongst the gay community. They ignored the disease and the please and cries for help from the LGBT community. It is facts like these that point the finger at the government and accuse them of not giving the same kind of care or treatment as they would to heterosexual people. The government had no intentions of funding research to help discover what the disease was or how it was affecting people. By 1982, almost 1,620 were diagnosed with AIDS and 619 were dead; it was not until certain events occurred that the government decided to lend a hand in 1985, which was four years after AIDS spread across America. Famous people like Elizabeth Taylor and Joan Rivers spoke up about the spread of this disease, which alarmed the Reagan administration because of the idea that famous individuals