Following this explosion of rage, LGBTQ+ people in New York and further afield transformed the small pre-existing gay rights movement. While the Stonewall riots were a spontaneous eruption of anger against police harassment, they had been a long time in the making, and while the riots lasted only a few days, their repercussions continue to this day. After Stonewall, things could never go back to how they were before.
Baird’s story is echoed in the accounts of thousands of LGBTQ+ people across the the world.
