Endless Mountains Pride Speech
By Fred Strugatz
Given June 6, 2025
Courthouse, Towanda, PA
It is an honor to be speaking to our gathering this morning
Being 70 years of age I have given witness to our community for a long time.
Even from my adolescence, I always considered myself lucky to have known that our community was special and unique.
I was excited to know I was part of a group of people who were unlike anyone else.
We are a powerful tribe!
We are mighty and talented and strong!
We gather here today proud and in solidarity
All one people
On a quest for our human rights
And the dignity to live our lives in a full and meaningful way
To live with repect for ourselves
And to have respect from others
Yet we are abused
We are made to think we are less than
We are attempted to be erased
We have been jailed and killed
We have a glorious history
People of our community who have given the world
Ideas in art, music, science, political thought,
Literature, sports, business
From ancient times of Sappho writing lesbian love poems and alexander the great as a military leader
To artists like Leonardo di Vinci, Michaelangelo and Carravaggio to Frida Kahlo, Andy Warhol and David Hockney
Musicians and composers from Tchaikovsky to Stephen Sondhiem, Freddy Mercury, Elton John
Great writers from Oscar Wilde and Emily Dickenson, Walt Whitman, Langston Hughs, James Baldwin, Tennessee Williams
Entertainers from Josephine Baker to Laverne Cox
Dancers from Rudolf Nureyev to Alvin Ailey
Politicians from Harvey Milk to Barney Frank and out trans congressperson Sarah McBride
People of science from Alan Turing to Sally Ride
People in sports from Glenn Burke, the first baseball player to come out
To Carl Lewis and Billie Jean King
And our all-important activists from Angela Davis to Marsha P Johnson
As well as Dan Choi, a former infantry officer in the Iraq war speaking out for LGBTQ rights
These are just a few of the incredible talents of our beautiful history. Know there names because they helped and continue to help to shape our world
Yet we are abused
We are made to think we are less than
We are attempted to be erased
We have been jailed and killed
Todays world is certainly not the first time we have been targets
In world war 2 our people were rounded up
Along with Jewish people
And put into concentration camps
To wear the pink triangles
Designating us as less than and enemies of society
And in times of adversity, we rise up
In those years there was Fredy Hirsch who protected children
In the concentration camps of Terezin and Auschwitz
Willem Arondeus and Frida Belinfanye who blew up the citizen ID registry in Amsterdam
Gad Beck, a promiscuous, effiminate teen who led the largest resistance group in Berlin
And the white rose, an heroic group of college students who rose up in the heart of Nazi Germany
Brave people who rose and resisted
Bravery in the time of adversity
In my lifetime of 70 years, I have witnessed two uprisings
The first was the Stonewall Rebellion of 1969
Stonewall was a fight to make this a free country
A fight back to never stop resisting
Strong people who finally said ‘no’
We will not be abused, we will not disappear
It was the uprising heard round the world
And the gay liberation movement was born out of that time
Our community started to have a voice – to be seen
I marched in the early gay pride parades in NYC
The energy of our community was vibrant and alive
The closet was no longer a place to hide
We were seen!
And Marsha P Johnson was a leader of that rebellion and today there is the Marsha P Johnson state park in New York, named in their honor
A decade later our community was struck with horror and dismay
I lived through the HIV/AIDS onslaught
Friends and colleagues died
There was no medicine, no care
We were disappearing for real and it was horrible
And out of that terror
Our community rallied
Act up was the activist organization that took to the streets
And let the world see what was happening to our people
Silence = death was the slogan born out of that movement,
That we still must understand today – silence = death
And the pink triangle was the symbol on the silence=death campaign
A historical symbol transformed
The gay men’s health crises was born to help our community heal
And Broadway cares, equity fights aids
Still does fantastic work to heal and make our community be seen
And even in Bradford County in those scary years,
I worked for the Southern Tier aids task force and the valley aids task force
Yes, even in our own community we gathered in those terrible times
We cried together, laughed together
And gave each other love and support
Yes, in our own backyard we rose up and fought the good fight
This is our history
We rise up in times of adversity
This is what we do
We will not be abused
We will not disappear
We will not be erased or killed
So how do we find the strength to keep fighting
Today our transgender brothers and sisters are the ones on the front lines of this battle.
And it is a war
My partner Jack and I have been together for 47 years
Together we created the IAM Center for Creative Healing in New Albany
Yes, two gay guys in Bradford County
Creating a healing center
We quietly developed our work and forged on to bring light to people
In spite of being, ‘those gay guys up on the hill’
What we developed was a theory we call the Inner Politic
It is an inner system of healing
Many of us may have grown up with harsh voices that influenced us
In our childhoods.
We might have been told we are less than, don’t deserve and need to be rejected
For some of us, those voices diminished us in childhood and makes our adulthood more difficult
At the IAM Center we nurture people to banish these inner voices and claim the true self
And that is what we must do in today’s climate
We must claim our true self
The I am consciousness that is our birthright
Can never be taken away or disappeared
This takes hard work – to claim our true beauty
To see ourselves as the greatest reflection of our humanity
To love ourselves with all the joy and spirit that we possibly can
Our community has lived in difficult times
But we have always risen up
To proclaim who we are and be who we are
We must continue this fight
We will not be abused
We will not disappear
We will not be erased or killed
So, we gather here today in pride
We give thanks to our ancestors who lived and died so we may be free
We give thanks to the all-important allies of our community
Who fight for our rights and our dignity
And our work is to love ourselves and be who we are
That is our legacy
That is our right
In spite of decades of adversity, and in response we have accomplished enormous strides
Pride is not just a celebration.
It is an act of remembrance and resistance
So, say it with me-
We are a powerful tribe!
We are mighty and talented and strong!
We deserve to be who we are!
Stay strong and
Happy pride weekend
