In 1969 one of the most important events in LGBT history took place, the Stonewall Riots, later leading to the gay liberation movement. Neither Stonewall nor the riots will not be erased nor forgotten, nor the people who impacted the LGBT community. That was until 2015 when Stonewall was released.

Stonewall tells the story of the Stonewall riots from a viewpoint of cisgender gay white man, Danny Winters, who escapes his homophobic family only to stumble upon the Stonewall Inn. There he meets Trevor who introduces him to the world of gay activism.

The movie, though loosely based around the Stonewall Riots, erases the people who truly did something and made an impact. One of the most notoriously known members of the Stonewall Riots is Marsha P. Johnson. Johnson was a drag queen and gay activist at the time and was notably known for throwing the first brick at the stonewall riots.

In Stonewall, we see Winters throwing the first brick, thus erasing Johnson. Although Johnson is shown in the movie, she has no major involvement in the riots.

Many members of the LGBT community have claimed this movie “whitewashes” the actual Stonewall Riots, replacing many of the historic people of color with white actors or actresses.

At Neshaminy, Spectrum has spoken out about how Stonewall misrepresents the LGBT community as a whole. “The Stonewall Riots to me seem like the turning point for the LGBT community, the point where we broke out of submission. It was the ‘we’re not going to take it’ for us,” Joey Rippert, junior and Vice President of Spectrum, said. “This event sparked an entire rights movement and changed society’s views of all non-heteronormative people. That’s why I feel it’s so important and pivotal.”

America in whole has a problem of erasing people from history to make it seem as though white people are the only contributors to history. It needs to be recognized that people of color and the LGBT+ community have made as much of an impact on American history as anybody else.