Liberation News Service and protest Young returned to the United States in June 1967 and worked briefly for
The Washington Post before resigning in the fall of that year to become a full-time
anti-Vietnam War movement activist and staff member of the
Liberation News Service. Young,
Marshall Bloom,
Ray Mungo and others worked in the office at 3
Thomas Circle producing the news packets that were sent to the hundreds of underground newspapers bi-weekly or tri-weekly. A member of the
Students for a Democratic Society he was part of the
Columbia University protests of 1968 and was among more than 700 arrested.
Venceremos Brigade In February and March 1969 Young went to Cuba, where he was instrumental in the organization of the
Venceremos Brigade. Young became disillusioned with the
Castro regime after observing the lack of civil liberties and other freedoms, and especially the government's anti-gay policies. After the
Mariel Boatlift he wrote
Gays Under the Cuban Revolution, breaking with those
New Leftists who continued to defend the
Cuban Revolution.
Gay Liberation movement After the
Stonewall riots in New York City, Young became involved in the
Gay Liberation Front. During the second half of 1970 he lived in the Seventeenth Street collective with Carl Miller,
Jim Fouratt, and Giles Kotcher where he was involved in producing
Gay flames.
Fag Rag, and
Gay Community News among others. His 1972 interview with
Allen Ginsberg, which first appeared in
Gay Sunshine is often reprinted and translated. Young has edited four books with
Karla Jay including the ground breaking anthology
Out of the Closets.
Continuing activism Young moved to rural Massachusetts in 1973 to an 'intentional community'. Carrying a sign which read
Royalston, Mass. population 973 he attended the
National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights. He was a reporter and assistant editor for the
Athol Daily News from 1979 to 1989, and Director of Community Relations for the
Athol, Massachusetts Memorial Hospital, 1989 to 1999. He joined the
Montague Nuclear Power Plant protests shortly after Sam Lovejoy's toppling of the weather tower in 1974. He has served on the board of directors of the
Mount Grace Land Conservation Trust, and in 2004 received the Writing and Society Award from the
University of Massachusetts Amherst English Department "honoring a distinguished career of commitment to the work of writing in the world." Since 2009, he has been writing a weekly column, entitled Inside/Outside, for the Athol Daily News. ==Works and publications==