Michelangelo Signorile to LGBT community: ‘Keep pushing forward, keep demanding full equality’

“It’s not over.”

The ongoing fight for LGBT rights in the United States and the continuing struggle for equality has been reignited in the media following the mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.

“It’s yet another attack on a LGBT space, a place, a sanctuary where people meet, where historically people have gathered in bars and clubs and gone there to find refuge because their families didn’t accept them,” Michelangelo Signorile told Trevor Noah during an appearance on The Daily Show.

He described the “victory blindness” that exists for many following last year’s historic Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell vs. Hodges, which made same-sex marriage legal nationwide. According to Signorile, just “because we won marriage equality, it didn’t mean that hate went away.” In his aptly titled book, It’s Not Over, Signorile describes the backlash that grew across the country.

“You can see in states across the country — these religious liberty laws meant to protect the religious people and allow them to keep discriminating,” Signorile said in reference to the recently passed laws in North Carolina and Mississippi.

“The strategy is to keep being confrontational, keep pushing forward, keep demanding full equality,” Signorile continued giving advice to the LGBT community. “Don’t be magnanimous, say ‘no, we want it all, we want full equality.’ That’s what this country is all about.”