LGBT in the United States

LGBT in the United States

The Stonewall Inn in the gay village of Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City, the cradle of the modern LGBT rights movement.

The United States is currently in a transition period regarding Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) rights. The 1969 Stonewall riots in New York City are often cited as the beginning of the modern gay civil right era although the following decades saw relatively modest improvements in legal rights. Social acceptance progressed faster, especially in the fields of arts and entertainment.

In recent years, the LGBT political debate has tended to center on the issue of same-sex marriage and in the 2000s, the social conservative movement was successful in outlawing same-sex marriage under the rationale of protecting traditional marriage. In recent years, the gay rights movement has had several major successes overturning these laws in the courts. In 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States overturned the remaining bans on same-sex marriage. Other recent victories include the end of military's Don't Ask Don't Tell policy and the Obama administration's decision to no longer defend the Defense of Marriage Act.

In the pre-Columbian era some Native American accepted LGBT members as Two-Spirit people but, with European settlement, Christian mores and legal restrictions severely restricted LGBT rights. Sodomy was a capital offense and cross-dressing was a felony.

LGBT acceptance improved slowly in the 19th century and first half of the 20th century until the Gay Liberation began in the 1960s and the rise of activism because of the HIV/AIDS crisis in the 1980s. At the same time a number of writers, artists and entertainers publicly acknowledged their homosexuality and in the 1990s the popular media began including gay characters. Official church positions on LGBT issues have been slower to change and mostly among mainstream Protestant denominations.