Be Gay, Do Crime

""The history of queer people is marked by resistance and resilience against significant hostility and harassment from those in power. Be Gay, Do Crime explores the strategic use of arrests and police violence as tools to suppress individuals who bravely refused to go back into the closet. This almanac highlights incredible acts of defiance in the face of power and shows us all on whose shoulders we stand."" --Erin Reed, transgender activist and journalist ""Day by day, the collective vigilance of queer people in the US and around the world has led us on paths toward liberation. This book of days names the names--some renowned and many forgotten--and celebrates quotidian victories, one day at a time. This daybook is a keeper!"" --Rahne Alexander, intermedia artist and writer from Baltimore ""Without an understanding of trans/queer insurgent history it's hard to Imagine beyond the cage of gay pragmatism. As necessary remedy, this collection invites us all to know collective revolt's past so that we might also make its future."" --Eric A. Stanley, author of Atmospheres of Violence: Structuring Antagonism and the Trans/Queer Ungovernable ""It takes a multiplicity of tactics and histories to make liberation, and we can only win by struggling persistently together, day by day. Be Gay, Do Crime offers insight to forge queer and trans revolt and inspires new futures by naming our collective past. Use this book!"" --Emily Hobson, author of Lavender and Red: Liberation and Solidarity in the Gay and Lesbian Left ""The short queer histories throughout the book culminate into a larger picture of the dire importance of queer history and activism. Be Gay, Do Crime is illuminating, eye-opening, and a much-needed text to understand our past and present. Reading it should reignite anyone's commitment to social justice."" --Beck Banks, transgender media studies scholar and activist ""Be Gay, Do Crime is a beautiful collection of daily bite-sized lessons in queer history. It serves as an excellent reminder of those who have come before us and what they have endured. As LGBTQ+ people continue to face challenges today, we must return to our roots and Be Gay, Do Crime."" --Allison Chapman, LGBTQ+ activist and legislative researcher ""Be Gay, Do Crime is a provocation. What if learning about queer and trans histories was an everyday practice? What if we marked time by honoring the lives of queer and trans activists past and present, instead of the birthdays of saints or presidents? What if queer and trans people had an accessible way to place themselves in the larger story of liberation? Organized like a daily calendar rather than a history textbook, this unique and useful book brings together stories that are usually separated by centuries: the birth of Emma Goldman in Lithuania on June 27, 1869, for example, appears alongside the launch of the first Trans Pride March in Toronto on June 27, 2009. By disrupting our commonplace ideas about chronology and progress, Be Gay, Do Crime offers a way to think about history differently: not as a straight line leading to a single inevitable present but as a queer tangle, spawning multiple possible futures. Help get queer and trans history out of the ivory tower and into the chaotic share houses where it belongs: buy this book for everyone on the Signal chat, have arguments about it, and let it inspire your next wave of mischief."" --Cassius Adair, assistant professor of media studies, the New School ""This clever book shifts the way many understand what kind of queer history deserves to be recorded, and it is an important reminder that state violence has always been central to queer experience. I learned so much from re