<\/div>\n

\u201cI am a homosexual. I am a psychiatrist<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

When these words were uttered in 1972 at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association (APA) in Dallas, the medical group still considered homosexulity to be a mental illness. The man who stood up and made this proclamation did so wearing a Richard Nixon mask and oversized suit to protect his identity \u2014 that\u2019s how dangerous the admission felt.<\/p>\n

The short but shocking speech, given by Dr. John Fryer, then known only as Dr. H. Anonymous, helped galvanize support within the APA to declassify homosexuality as an illness.<\/p>\n

Gay people finally got their \u201cinstant cure,\u201d as one headline described it<\/a>, in December 1973, when the APA voted to remove homosexuality from its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders<\/em>. Freed from the mantle of being considered mentally ill, LGBTQ+ people over the ensuing decades would gain the ability to qualify for government security clearance, serve openly in the military, and marry their partners, among other key rights.<\/p>\n