Monika: Today it is my pleasure and honor to interview Felicia Elizondo, also known as Felicia Flames, a transgender pioneer, diva, icon, and a Screaming Queen, 27 years survivor of AIDS and a Vietnam Veteran - one of the participants of the 1966 Compton's Cafeteria Riot, which was one of the first documented instances of transgender resistance to authority in the USA. Hello Felicia!
Felicia: Hello Monika and thank you for interviewing me, it is an honor for me.
Monika: I must say you can boast one of the most impressive LGBT legends. The Compton's Cafeteria Riot occurred in August 1966, so it preceded the more infamous 1969 Stonewall Riots in New York City. However, it is not so well-known …
Felicia: You have to remember it was in the 1960s, and a lot of people thought we were sick, mental, trash and nobody cared whether we lived or died. Our own families abandoned us, and we had nowhere to go. And we were tired of the police harassing us because of who we were meant to be.
We were murdered, killed, thrown in jail, raped, and thrown out like trash by our families and friends. And in those days, I hear that the mafia had control of the TL, and all documents to this day were lost and no record of that day survived except for an unknown newsletter that documented that day. And nothing else.
