Sylvia Rivera, born on July 2 in 1951, was a Latina American queer rights activist, member of the Gay Liberation Front, and community worker from the state of New York.
Rivera, who identified as a “half-sister”, participated in demonstrations with the Gay Liberation Front. With her close friend Marsha P. Johnson, Rivera co-founded the Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR), a socialist group dedicated to helping homeless young drag queens, gay youth, and trans women.
At different times in her life, Rivera battled substance abuse and lived on the streets, largely in the gay homeless community at the Christopher Street docks. Her experiences made her more focused on advocacy for those who, in her view, mainstream society and the assimilationist factions of the LGBT community were leaving behind.
Rivera died during the dawn hours of February 19th, 2002, at St. Vincent’s Hospital, of complications from liver cancer. Activist Riki Wilchins said this of her: “In many ways, Sylvia was the Rosa Parks of the modern transgender movement, a term that was not even coined until two decades after Stonewall”.
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Remember the radicalism of Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P Johnson
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“Our armies are rising:” Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson
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venting again about my dad cw: alcoholism
talking about my dad’s cough again. but my dad cough that he had since october woke me up this morning, again for like the third time now in the last few days. like it just sounds so bad. I don’t know how to describe it. other than his cough is loud, and sounds like he coughing up a lung or horse or something. that like how that one saying goes? I dunno something like that. like I keep saying it sounds so bad but like, it seriously just sounds like it keeps getting worse.
but like, my mom had copd before she died. and her cough was never this bad like my dad’s. I doubt when he went to the doctor weeks ago he mentioned this. and soon its gonna be october and a whole year since he had this cough that just only gets worse.
also like. I wish he would drink less carelessly. again. he not drinking water when he drinks. and he def. been drinking since this morning… again. but if he was more careful, he wouldn’t be drinking all day like always.