Harry Hay Professions : Activist Born : April 7, 1912 Died : October 24, 2002 Browse All Authors Top 22 quotes by Harry Hay I knew that I was gay in every bone of my body. So I did the only thing I could do. I started the movement. Harry Hay movement gay body I always say to people, "If you share my dream, why don't we walk together?" And that's my only organizing tool. Harry Hay together dream people Give yourself permission to enjoy being gay. You do have to give yourself permission. You have been told you may not. Give yourself permission to be free. Harry Hay gay may giving When we begin to love and respect Great Mother Nature's gift to us of gayness, we'll discover that the bondage of our childhood and adolescence in the trials and tribulations of neitherness was actually an apprenticeship for teaching her children new cutting edges of consciousness and social change. In stunning paradox, our neitherness is our talisman, our fairie wand, our gift we bring to the hetero world to....transform their pain into healings; ...transform their tears to laughter: ...transform their hand-me-downs to visions of loveliness. Harry Hay laughter pain mother With the full realization that, in order to earn for ourselves any place in the sun, we must with perseverance and self-discipline work collectively for the full first-class citizenship participation of Minorities everywhere, including ourselves. Harry Hay perseverance self class Out of the mists of our long oppression, / We bring love for ourselves and each other, / And love for the gifts we bear, /So heavy and so painful the fashioning of them, /So long the road given us to travel them. A separate people, /We bring a gift to celebrate each other, /’Tis a gift to be gay! / Feel the pride of it! Harry Hay gay pride long Up until I was eleven years old, I thought I was the only one of my kind in the world. I couldn't find anybody else who felt as I did. Harry Hay kind world years I've always felt I carried a golden secret, a wonderful secret. Every time I thought about it, it made me feel warm inside and good. Harry Hay golden secret wonderful The moment you say, "We are proud. I'm proud to be this, and I'm proud to be that," what you're saying is we're almost as good as the others. "Almost" always means not quite. Harry Hay proud moments mean The assimilationist movement is running us into the ground. Harry Hay movement running I was accustomed to walking alone. I'd find other people who agreed with me, but they also said, "I wouldn't dare mention it." I was the only one who would say, "We've got to stand." And they said, "Well, yes. And after you make it safe, then I'll stand, too. But you have to make it safe." Harry Hay walking-alone safe people Assimilation is the way you excuse yourself. It absolutely never worked at all. You may not think you are noticeable. But they know who you are. They know you're a degenerate, and they've never forgotten that. Harry Hay degenerates may thinking Underneath that facade, I'm a terrified little sissy, just like everybody else. But I never let it show. Harry Hay facade sissy littles I'm not looking for a boyish girl. I'm looking for a boy. And I'm not looking for a girlish boy either. Harry Hay boyish girl boys The police had a practice of entrapping people. This was done all over the country, but we had a particularly vicious group here in Southern California because of the Hollywood situation. They knew they could get a lot of them. They were shaking down people for thousands in blackmail. Harry Hay california practice country Confronted with the loving-sharing Consensus of subject-SUBJECT relationships all Authoritarianism must vanish. The Fairy Family Circle, co-joined in the shared vision of non-possessive love - which is the granting to any other and all others that total space wherein each may grow and soar to his own freely-selected, full potential - reaching out to one another subject-to-SUBJECT, becomes for the first time in history the true working model of a Sharing Consensus! Harry Hay vision circles space Giving votes in exchange for ideological support. To wit: identity politics for homosexuals. Harry Hay identity-politics support giving Ostracism means you don't exist at all. And that's a very difficult situation to live with. As gay people, we had been chasing ostracism by that point for probably 300 years. You just knew that you should have dropped into your black hole. Harry Hay difficult-situations gay mean I condemn the national gay press for its emphasis on consumerism. Harry Hay consumerism emphasis gay I was an older brother. So I had to do a lot of things first. My father was a self-made man, and he would beat me senseless. But he was a Scotsman, and stubborn. I'm his son, and I'm stubborn, too. I go on being stubborn. Harry Hay brother father son Similar Authors Brooke Axtell activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali activist Assata Shakur activist Arun Manilal Gandhi activist Arthur Hertzberg activist Arlene Holt Baker activist All Authors
