English subtitles for clip: File:Announcing the Stonewall National Monument.webm

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President Obama: Back
in 1969, as a turbulent

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decade was winding down,
the Stonewall Inn was a

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popular gathering place
for New York City's

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LGBT community.

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At the time, being gay,
lesbian, bisexual, or

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transgender was considered
obscene, illegal, even a

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mental illness.

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One night, police raided
the bar and started

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arresting folks.

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Raids like these were
nothing new, but this time

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the patrons had had
enough, so they stood up

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and spoke out.

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The riots became
protests...

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the protests became
a movement...

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the movement ultimately
became an integral

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part of America.

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So this week, I'm
designating the Stonewall

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National Monument as
the newest addition to

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America's national
parks system.

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Stonewall will be our
first national monument to

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tell the story of the
struggle for LGBT rights.

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I believe our national
parks should reflect the

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full story of our country,
the richness and diversity

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and uniquely American
spirit that has always

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defined us: that we are
stronger together, that

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out of many, we are one.

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Male Speaker: Having been
at Stonewall, being back

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here, I think I have a
kind of survivor's guilt,

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I could call it because
like on the Stonewall

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picture with Fred
McDarrah, I'm probably the

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only one still alive.

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Most of them never lived
to get to be like 24 or 25

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years old.

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Back then, I didn't think
about it being difficult.

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You just had to
get through it.

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Most gay people back then,
if they had any kind of a

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job, they were scared to
death of even being found

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out to be gay.

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We had nothing,
so we had to lose.

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It's like the Bob Dylan
song where it says, "When

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you ain't got nothing,
you got nothing to lose."

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Female Speaker: I remember
the late 1960s, gay people

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were victims on a culture
that had no respect,

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no tolerance.

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Female Speaker: We were
being brutalized.

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We were being murdered.

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We were being
ostracized, in a sense.

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Stonewall was a safe
haven for LGBT people.

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Female Speaker: The
Stonewall riots in 1969, I

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think, obviously was a
very pivotal point

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in our history.

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It was when we all stood
up, and a trans woman of

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color said, "Enough is
enough," and it started

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a movement.

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And it started a movement
that said, "We're not

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less than you.

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We are your equals." When
you think about the riots,

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you think about unity; and
that unity is something

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that we've never lost.

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Female Speaker: Today we
have gay and lesbian

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elected officials.

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We see cultural changes
in television, in movies.

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President Obama has
been the most proactive

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president for LGBT
people in America.

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There is no second place.

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Male Speaker: President
Obama in his second-term

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inauguration speech,
actually mentions Stonewall.

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That never
happened before.

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Stonewall is now
historically given like a

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definitive place through
a President of the

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United States.

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President Obama: "We the
people declare today the

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most evident of truths,
that all of us are created

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equal" is the star that
guides us still, just as

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it guided our forebearers
through Seneca Falls and

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Selma and Stonewall, just
as it guided all those men

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and women, sung and
unsung, who left

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footprints along this
great mall, to hear a

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preacher say that we
cannot walk alone, to hear

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King proclaim that our
individual freedom is

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inextricably bound to the
freedom of every soul on earth.