section_path: Demographics/Sexual orientation and gender identity
section_name: Sexual orientation and gender identity
paragraph_text: Sexual orientation and gender identity
  
  New York City has been described as the gay capital of the world and the central node of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) sociopolitical ecosystem, and is home to one of the world's largest LGBT populations and the most prominent. The New York metropolitan area is home to about 570,000 self-identifying gay and bisexual people, the largest in the country. Same-sex sexual activity between consenting adults has been legal in New York since 1980's New York v. Onofre case, which invalidated the state's sodomy law. Same-sex marriage in New York was legalized on June 24, 2011, and were authorized to take place on July 23, 2011.
  
  The annual NYC Pride March proceeds southward down Fifth Avenue and ends at Greenwich Village in Lower Manhattan; the parade is the largest pride parade in the world, attracting tens of thousands of participants and millions of sidewalk spectators each June. The annual Queens Pride Parade is held in Jackson Heights and is accompanied by the ensuing Multicultural Parade.
  
  Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019 was the largest international Pride celebration in history, commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, with 150,000 participants and five million spectators attending in Manhattan alone. New York City is home to the largest transgender population in the world, estimated at more than 50,000 in 2018, concentrated in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens; however, until the June 1969 Stonewall riots, this community had felt marginalized and neglected by the gay community. Brooklyn Liberation March, the largest transgender-rights demonstration in LGBT history, took place on June 14, 2020, stretching from Grand Army Plaza to Fort Greene, Brooklyn, focused on supporting Black transgender lives, drawing an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 participants.