workingclasshistory:

On this day, 21 January 1966, police in Forest Town, Johannesburg, raided a private home where over 300 gay and gender nonconforming white men (and almost certainly some trans women) were having a party. Nine people described as men were arrested for “masquerading as women”.
Conservatives in South Africa were outraged, and called for tighter laws to criminalise white, male and predominantly Afrikaner, sexuality. The incident triggered a national debate and many gay and gender nonconforming people did begin to speak out and argue, albeit anonymously, in favour of LGBT+ rights. While some stricter laws were passed, in some respects the new laws could be interpreted to decriminalise sexual acts between consenting adult men in private, although prosecutions for homosexuality did continue through the 1970s.
Same-sex relationships in the Black working class, which were widespread especially in places like mining communities, were largely ignored by the apartheid authorities who were more concerned with “corrupting” influences on white masculinity. https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.1819457841572691/2191632421021896/?type=3