Since the offences were public but often carried out behind closed lavatory doors, the police sometimes found it easier to use undercover police officers, who would frequent toilets posing as homosexuals in an effort to entice other men to approach them for sex. A number of homophobic attacks have occurred around the area, including the murder of Jody Dobrowski. Already a keen amateur photographer, he used the school’s darkroom to teach himself how to print pictures.

The piers weren’t much to look at — a series of decaying wood and steel structures jutting into the Hudson River from Christopher Street up to Chelsea — but their location as well as their storied nightly sex spots solidified their place as the most famous gay cruising site in the United States. In Oklahoma, a senate bill would ban books from school libraries that focus on "the study of sex, sexual lifestyles, or sexual activity.

Take a pilgrimage to see them — it will be bittersweet, considering how many died during the plague years — but save the public cruising for one of New York’s many gay nightclubs. In March, Tennessee lawmakers passed a bill, allowing people the right to refuse to perform a marriage if they disagree with the couple's sexual orientation. As the UK’s first gay male dating show I Kissed A Boy airs on BBC Three, gay men discuss some of the discrimination they’ve faced for their sexuality. The new mechanic that will go into effect next year will ensure children and teens are only able to check out books that correlate with their age group unless they are given parental permission.

But we can find clues in polling data related to the LGBTQ+ community and how others feel about the country’s queer population.

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