The Republican-dominated Minnesota legislature is placing a constitutional amendment on the 2012 ballot that would ban same-sex marriage, setting the stage for a nationally significant showdown on LGBT rights. The question is before us: will Minnesota be just the next state in the long chain of electoral defeats for our movement? Or will we draw a line in the sand and build a mass movement uniting a majority of Minnesotans to say: “No Hate in Our State!”?

The growth of the LGBT movement and the winning of important reforms like the repeal of DADT have re-opened old debates on demands and strategy. For example, Bash Back!, a national network of anarchist queer activists, opposes the repeal of DADT and equalizing marriage laws on the grounds that “state recognition in the form of oppressive institutions such as marriage and militarism are not steps toward liberation but rather towards heteronormative assimilation” (from Bash Back! Points of Unity).

On December 18, 2010, the Senate voted to repeal the 17-year-old anti-gay policy known as “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT). President Obama signed the repeal into law on December 22, 2010, making it one of the few campaign promises he kept.

The military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT) policy recently made headlines when U.S. District Judge Virginia Phillips issued an injunction halting its enforcement. The Obama administration opposed Judge Phillips, just as they opposed overturning the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) last year. Obama’s Department of Justice issued a legal challenge and won a stay on the injunction, allowing for workplace discrimination at our country’s largest employer, the Department of Defense, to continue.

On October 14 in Minneapolis, 1,000 people gathered at a vigil in Loring Park to grieve the loss of students in the Anoka-Hennepin School District and talk about solutions to the national crisis of teen suicide. Across the country, vigils were held in New York, Boston, Los Angeles, and Austin.

Since getting elected with the support and money of the LGBT community, Obama has done little more than pay lip service to LGBT issues. He has consistently refused to support Gay Marriage (supporting only “civil unions”). In the more than a year that the Democrats have controlled the White House and Congress, the Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA) - banning gay marriages from being federally recognized – has not been repealed, and the Employee Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), which would federally ban employment discrimination against LGBT people, has not been enacted. Even Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT) - which bans LGBT people from openly serving in the military - has been slightly weakened but has not been repealed.

Being an LGBT person means facing discrimination in the workplace, bullying at school and in many cases from family members, not being able to marry your loved one legally, and being faced with higher rates of suicide and homelessness (between 20 and 40 percent of homeless youth identify as LGBT).

On October 11, over 100,000 people joined the National Equality March in Washington, D.C. to demand full equality under the law for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people nationwide. It was the largest demonstration for LGBT rights in over a decade, and according to veteran gay rights activist David Mixner, it represented “the coming of age of the gay and lesbian civil rights movement.”

When Proposition 8 took away same-sex marriage rights in California last November, it was the last straw. Almost overnight, there was a major explosion of protest and activism for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) equality. New activists breathed new wind into the sails of the movement.

These days, our society claims to promote tolerance, yet LGBT people still face outrageous and systematic oppression.

As lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals continue to face glaring discrimination while being denied many rights, the Obama Administration has done almost nothing. LGBT activists have taken matters into their own hands, calling a National Equality March on Sunday, October 11 in Washington, D.C.

Frustrated by the inaction of the Obama Administration and unwilling to continue to accept their oppression and second-class status, gay rights activists have called for a National March for Equality in Washington, D.C. on Sunday, October 11. There is the potential for this to be one of the largest demonstrations for LGBT rights in U.S. history, drawing hundreds of thousands of people to D.C., if a bold lead is given.

Something unremarkable happened on June 27, 1969 in Greenwich Village in New York, an event which had occurred a thousand times before across the U.S. over the decades. The police raided a gay bar.

On Tuesday, May 26, in a 6-1 ruling, California’s Supreme Court upheld Proposition 8, which bans same-sex marriage. In response to this ruling and the continued discrimination faced by LGBT people across the country, activists have called for a National March for Equality in Washington, D.C. the weekend of October 10-11 to demand full, equal rights for all LGBT people.

Forty years ago, the now-famous Stonewall riots took place. These riots marked a turning point in the battle for rights for LGBT people.