As a 10-year-old queer boy, Sylvia Rivera left her home in 1961 because she was rejected by the grandmother who was raising her. While she identified as an effeminate boy until the late 1960s, she eventually identified as a drag queen, then a “transvestite,” and lastly as transgender. Rivera was for

In fact, Rivera’s life would be plenty exciting even if Stonewall hadn’t happened. She fought for queer and trans people; she raised the issue of queerness and transness with the Black Panther Party and the Young Lords Party. She got radicals who were not queer to support the LGBTQIA2S+ community and even convinced queerphobes and transphobes to change their thinking and support the fight for liberation.