The homophile movement in
the U. S. developed early in the 1950s with the formation of the
Mattachine Society, the Daughters of Bilitis, and One. Donald
Webster Cory's The Homosexual in America served as a manifesto
for these groups which were dedicated to improving the "plight of
the homosexual." The tiny groups' publications in the 1950's
encouraged gay and lesbian people to "act normal" and fit in
(lesbians belong in dresses, gay men don't), and recruited prominent
"experts" like psychiatrists and psychologists to comment on homosexuality.
The experts were often willing to concede that homosexuals are not
dangerous, and that they can even "make a contribution to
society," but precious few granted that homosexuality is anything
but a mental illness.
The accommodationism
of the homophiles has often been criticized as cowardly, but had they
marched in the streets in 1955 shouting "out of the closets into
the streets," the way gay libbers
did fifteen years later, they would have found themselves locked up en
masse on Lewd Vag charges, or worse.
