MORRIS KIGHT, Humanist, Liberationist, Fantabulist: A Story of Gay rights and Gay Wrongs
MARY ANN CHERRY
Process (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$22.95 all editions, available now
Rating: 4* of five
The Publisher Says: Morris Kight fought for gay rights the only way he knew how—outrageously
New York and San Francisco gay liberation activists’ work is well documented but allow us to introduce Los Angeles' preeminent gay rights pioneer—say hello to Morris Kight. His activist work began in the 1930s as a teenager. As the only male living in his mother’s Texas brothel, he secretly helped women working there get vital healthcare.
During the 1950s, he was part of an underground network of gay ‘safe houses’ that provided bail, health care, and legal advice at a time when the United States had laws criminalizing same-sex relationships. He turned his unique charisma and organizing skills to the 1960s anti-war movement and then working the rest of his life in the now public fight for “Gay Liberation.” He fostered vital relationships with fellow activists, politicians, socialites, and gangsters. His style of organizing and activism showed the power of the “influencer” decades before social media brought millions together with a meme.
He founded groups that lead seminal protests that resulted in: The American Psychiatric Association removing homosexuality as a disease from its diagnostic manual, protecting civil rights for gay citizens in California, and reducing police violence against the gay community. And for every good thing Kight did, he took credit for more. He was a man who, with his many flaws, managed to alienate as many people as he brought together. His story brings to life his work as remembered by those who loved and loathed him.
Morris Kight, an exciting rebel among rebels, came to Los Angeles in the mid-1950s and immediately addressed the needs of a marginalized fraction of society: gay men. He wrote his phone number on walls in jails and bars to offer help with an underground bail fund, private counseling, and backroom treatment for STDs. This was the beginning of a community where there was none. Influential in the anti-war movement in the 60s, Kight then parlayed his energies into the post-Stonewall bi-coastal gay revolution. Through coalition building, he created a seat at the table of social reform for homosexuals.
This biography tells Kight’s personal tale entwined with a narrative of activism and the gay rights movement. Though Kight is included in many anthologies, historical narratives, and feature-length documentaries, this book is the first in-depth analysis of the man, the activist.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: Know any freshly-out babyqueers looking around for evidence of their elders? I can't think of a better character for them to learn about than abrasive, annoying, essentially contrarian and always cranky Morris Kight.
He comes across vividly in Author Cherry's personally grounded recreations of Morris' life of outsiderdom...mother ran a brothel in Bible-Belt Texas!
He came by his larger-than-life persona honestly. And Author Cherry writes it direct, pulls no punches, hides no warts. There were so many wonderful things he did, he started, he forced into being by his will alone. (Or so he'd've told you.)
All of this work, all of his contributions, and is he lauded and celebrated today? Under the current kakistocracy, of course not. But I am here to tell you, my cishet siblings, this man's life is one you should trumpet to the young, directionless, disheartened and downhearted, because there's no better cure for paralysis than action. Kight's story is a klaxon, a billboard with a searchlight on it, an unmistakable shout from the past: "Get up and do the work!"
I recommend it. I wish it'd had inline citations, but really the endnotes are very, very extensive; just not quite as useful for source checks as I would like. There are many illustrative snapshots and photo ops, but I left most of them out...much of a muchness after a while, more there to set the scene and build the mood of the times.
A quality addition to the fast-fading memory of my own elders, whose work and sacrifices have let me lead a better out-life than they could.
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