What was usually an outpouring on the streets of New York City looked a little different this year, thanks to social distancing rules required by the coronavirus.

The disruption caused by the virus would be an aggravation in any year but particularly in this one, the 50th anniversary of the first Pride march in the city.

The second annual Queer Liberation March on Sunday capped a month of Pride events, virtual and live, during which the celebration of LGBTQ lives has merged with the nationwide demonstrations ignited by the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis last month.

People chanted "No justice, no peace" as the crowd snaked through Manhattan, while techno music blasted from a pick-up truck carrying two DJs, one of whom led marchers in chanting "Black lives matter".

Reclaim Pride Coalition, the group that organised the march, staged its first protest last year by walking in the opposite direction to New York City's marquee Pride parade, rejecting that event's large uniformed police presence and the ubiquitous corporate-sponsored floats that normally drift down Manhattan's 5th Avenue each year.

This year, the march was the city's main in-person event on Pride Sunday after the official parade was cancelled in April for the first time in its 50-year history due to the pandemic.

On June 28, 1969, patrons of the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in Manhattan's Greenwich Village, fought back during a police raid, sparking days of sometimes violent demonstrations against harassment and giving birth to the modern LGBTQ rights movement.

Activists memorialised the first anniversary of the Stonewall rebellion with what they called Christopher Street Liberation Day, starting an annual Pride tradition that is now celebrated around the world.

Marches and rallies with a focus on racial injustice, and the struggle of Black transgender people in particular, took place in other US cities.

Australian Associated Press