Election Day = Binders full of Women

What happened on Election Day was as significant for women as it was for so-called “minorities.” A big win for women and people of color.

As I sat with my friend Ivy Bottini that night watching the numbers play on the big screen, I jumped with joy as Democratic woman after woman trounced, or narrowly beat, their male opponents running for Senate seats. Even before 8 p.m. California time,
The trend was clear; women were pissed and were voting for women. Five out of seven Senate races were emerging with victories for the Democratic women who were up for election.

“There’s something happening here,” I leaned over and whispered to Ivy as the seven o’clock hour began to disappear—“what it is ain’t exactly clear. But I hear a rumble across the country." A Democratic rumble! A binder full of women was sweeping the Senate.

Finally the coalition we liberals have been trying to RE-build for a decade—the coalition of people of color, labor, women and gays—not to mention youth—was taking shape that night. This is the coalition that swept JFK and Bill Clinton into office.
But this was the coalition that had also disintegrated throughout the Reagan and Bush eras. Is this Coalition of the Left here to stay? People of color have done their job—coming out in huge numbers, so its only gays and women who need to stay aligned and active.

Gay and lesbian, and all queer activists have been saying for years now that gays have to crawl out of our own self-defined exclusive identity politics and take up our rightful position in the ranks of the new, new, new liberal and progressive movement. We are a natural part of this coalition if we understand that the Democratic Party is far more likely to embrace full equality faster if we are loud and active.

The “something’s happening here” election on Nov. 6th also marked a long sought sea-change in our fight for marriage equality. By popular vote three states finally turned the tide. In Maryland, Washington, and Massachusetts, we won!  Over the last two decades gays have lost state-wide equality initiatives 32 times. That’s a lot of money down the drain some might say. But democracy moves by increments. I believe gay rights have achieved critical mass in the national consciousness. I for one never thought I’d see the day when a gay issue (marriage) became THE straight-liberal litmus test.

Obama won his election, true. But women, gays, people of color, and labor won too!  And my, it feels good, doesn’t it?

Lesbians Leading the Marriage Fight …I don’t think so!

A rebel dyke’s thoughts on marriage

I was shocked to read in Don Kilhefner’s last column in Frontiers IN LA, that he believes lesbians are leading the same-sex marriage fight. Part of me wants to say, “And what’s wrong with that? White-gay-men have led almost every fight in our movement for the past 40 years. And the other part of me wants to ask, “Where did you get this crazy notion?”
In his article, “The Same-Sex Marriage Steamroller” Kilhefner says, “Let me respectfully suggest that the same-sex marriage issue is largely a lesbian-led one.” As evidence for this odd conclusion, he cites an article printed in the New York Times that “indicates that nearly 70% of same-sex marriages in Massachusetts are between women.”
I don’t doubt that lesbians are getting married far more than gay men. This is nothing new. Dykes have been more into commitment, home-building together, and nesting than gay men’s more freewheeling lifestyle -- decades before the ‘marriage’ issue wound up on the front burner of our political agenda.
But to cite the fact that lesbians are more inclined toward marriage than gay men as evidence that the marriage issue is “largely a lesbian-led one” is a sloppy and sexist conclusion. It is true that there are lesbians in the leadership of the marriage fight, but for every gay woman in leadership, I cite gay male names and organizations like Geoff Kors of Equality California, Rick Jacobs of the Courage Campaign, Cleve Jones, blah, blah….
And yes, for the first time in our history, some organizations also have lesbian leadership like Torie Osborn, Kate Kendall, and Jenny Pfizer, and our home-grown maverick, Robin Tyler. So, for the first time in the 40 year history of the LBGT struggle, perhaps the marriage fight is truly co-gender in its leadership. And I realize that to some men, equal leadership might feel like lesbian domination but this is not fact.
Kilhefner goes on to say that “if something was so far out of balance in favor of gay men’s issues, our sisters, right so, would and have in the past, fervently pointed it out to gay men.” To that adjudication I say – the LGBTQ movement has almost always been out of balance in its pursuit of issues that affect gay men. In the radical 70s the movement was led by gay men who sought to eradicate laws inhibiting gay men’s sexuality. In the 1980s and ‘90s, the male leadership’s single-issue was fighting AIDS. And in this century the energy-field has been all about the T, as in transition and transgender. So there has never been a decade in which an L word issue has dominated. Until, perhaps now. So please guys, don’t get all hen-pecked over the fact that dykes are co-leading the marriage fight. We lesbians have been with you and supporting your issues for a very long time.

And as to marriage itself, I do heartily agree with Kilhefner and Ivy Bottini’s recent essays that our LGBT movement is in danger, not from lesbians, but from our co-gender leaders who think that marriage is the only issue on the gay agenda. I am a lesbian who does not believe in state-sanctified relationships. And I know thousands of lesbian feminists, like myself, who are not getting married because we believe that the vow we make to each other in front of family and friends IS the most sacred and important.
I do believe that we LGBT folk might be over-narrowing our movement into a single-issued struggle that will not serve us in the future. I saw the Women’s Movement almost die because it focused all of women’s liberation on the ERA Amendment (which never did pass). The Suffragette Movement (for women to get the vote), did disappear from the map with the passage of the 20th Amendment. The Black Civil Rights movement became narrowly focused on the Civil Rights Act (1964) and after it passed, that movement lost much of its steam. So history does tell us, a single-issued movement can be quickly cut off at the knees. Social movements are strongest when they put forth a broad range of goals.
I worry, along with Bottini and Kilhefner, that the over-focus on marriage weakens the broad health of our struggle for full equal rights for every lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, and queer person not just in California, but in the whole world. We should be sending money and troops (organizers) to small towns in America and countries in the world where gender-variant people like us are in jail. We should be in the streets protesting the discharge of women and men from the armed services. We should be right there, with legal defense and money, when people are murdered on the small streets of the Midwest. We shouldn’t allow ourselves to be caught up in the luxury of quibbling over which year to return to the California ballot. As long as we are divided, that’s a signal that the time is not now. But now is the time to build and strengthen our political, social service and cultural institutions. Yes, we will win the right to marry one day soon. The real question is -- will we endure as a community long after the last vote has been cast on marriage?

Time to Pass The Torch

Katha Pollitt's recent column in The Nation is about intergenerational feminist conflicts. Read it at this link... & then my response below... http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090615/pollitt

I write to affirm Katha Pollitt’s view that it is not about waves, it is about power. And to suggest that 2nd wave feminists (and I am one, albeit a youngster of 60) all need to start pass the torch to Generation O, the Obama Generation.
Perhaps we do more action and less hair splitting here in L.A., where this passing of the torch is already well underway. And I am speaking more of the LGBT Movement, which strongly overlaps the re-burgeoning young feminist movement.
Both had their re-birth with the same historical events in 2007 – the campaign between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. And in California, at least, Generation O has further earned their stripes on the same Election Day November defeat over Proposition 8, which would have given same-sex couples the right to marry.
For the last eight months, California’s Generation 0, a huge passel of high school, college and post college young kids – often led by young women – have taken to the streets in protest on a weekly basis. They have organized so many new groups that we’ve had to form a coordinating coalition called OUT West that now includes 40 organizations.
I have met these young militant adults at a half dozen history-teach-ins, civil disobedience actions, panels, rallies, marches, and on Facebook. And unlike their parents’ generation – the 40 to 60 years olds who went partying or lip-sticking during the Bush’s dead years - they want to hear from us, their grandmothers of the 2nd wave.

That’s the real news -- that the kids are back on the streets again and wanting us to tell them: what is consciousness raising? How do you get a thousand people to a rally? What are the tricks of the trade?
With a looming defeat on our state’s agenda, and having been radicalized in Hillary’s campaign AND Obama’s brilliant grass-roots organizing, the only thing they want to know is – how do we win?

These young women – and dare I say, young men as sweet and feminist as their grandmothers raised them to be. Their vigor and idealism warms my heart. They are a super-bright, socially conscious lot and I sleep well at night knowing that after the fallow years (80’s & 90s’s) – the kids are back!
And now it is our job to school them, (Our Council of Elders is putting a book list together that covers everything from Simone de Beauvoir to Kate Bornstein), to support them, and turn the power over to them. We need to be pushing them forward, making sure that on every panel of old feminists, there are Gen O speakers too. We need to open our meetings to them, yes the top planning meetings too. And make sure their views and interpretations of the world get air time too.
And now, Robin Morgan, we do need to pass the torch. We had our day and did a hell of a job with it. But now it is time to be mentors to them. They are the future.

LEX... produces GenderPlay Exhibit in West Hollywood

GenderPlay in Lesbian Culture
Exhibit opening – Saturday, March 14th 3pm - 6pm

With singer & boi-wonder Phranc & emcee Marie Cartier & performance art from Latina trio Butchlalis de Panochtitlan.

L.A.’s first-ever exhibition that explores gender and its boundaries and the changing nature of lesbian identity.

Discover cross-dressers and tobacco-chewers of the American Civil War and the Wild West, stone butches, high femmes, and kiki's of the 1950s through the Lesbian Feminist 1970s to queers, bois, and trans people of today. See how ‘passing’ gave opportunity and language to women’s sexuality – from two spirit to genderqueer today.

GenderPlay challenges our labels, asks us to re-think our stereotypes, and looks at how lesbians define ourselves & what turns us on. All re-mixed with vintage photos, archival docs, film clips, and historic first person quotes.

ONE Archives Gallery & Museum 626 N. Robertson Blvd., West Hollywood CA 90069 (Gallery Entrance on El Tovar)

Produced by LEX - the Lesbian Exploratorium & ONE Gay&Lesbian Archives

co-sponsored by City of West Hollywood & Christopher Street West/LA Pride

For details: thelexinfo@gmail.com

Bird Watching at the Dinah Shore - a sociopolitical field trip

I used to go to the Dinah Shore lez-forget-about-the-golf weekend in Palm Springs way back in the 80s, before it became the largest lesbian hang in California. I thought I’d seen it all. But a new young friend told me, “It’s waaaay different now, ya gotta stay relevant. Check it out!”
So I dragged me and my blog-mate, Lily B. Wit, out to Palm Springs to see what the gen X, eGen, queer, lipstick forever, whatev, young lezbianas (that’s the Latina plural for lesbians) are doing these days.

The sun was shining but the wind-chill at Club Skirts on Sunday was bold enough to make a thousand nipples stand out. That didn’t bother the huge crowd hanging at the pool, half naked and bouncing, listening to “Betty” sing their theme song from The L Word. The trio – Alison, Amy & Elizabeth -- also has a new song, “Did You Tell Her?” with lyrics about things you don’t want to tell your lover.

But me, I was checking out the dozens of hairdo’s the young lesbians were sporting. For butches, futches and bois wearing shirts that hung to their knees, I could see that their pride was their HAIR. And for the ladies, femmes, and the feminine – HAIR has always been god.
And no-one wanted to mess up their hair by jumping into the pool.

So I went. I saw. I took photos.

And here’s a look at ........... HAIR AT THE DINAH

Photography by Lynn H. Ballen

Next week's post… tune in for “What’s in a name?” – I’ll explain all the new L-words that different generations are using to describe ourselves.

from our Archives

The Lesbian Tide had very colorful covers even when they were in monochrome. Doesn't this cover make you want to read what's inside - even today ... and be one of the 2,000 women who showed up on the campus of UCLA, April 17, 1973?
Posted by ANG

Jeanne at the Gay Woman's West Coast Conference, L.A. 1971

Margie Adam Said ...

"The first invitation I ever received to perform in public was made by Jeanne Córdova of The Lesbian Tide magazine in Los Angeles after she heard me sing at an open mike at Kate Millet's Sacramento Women's Music Festival. I told her I wasn't a performer. I told her I wasn't political. She said just come and sing your songs at our benefit. Come and sing your woman's life for us. I went to LA. I sang songs about my life at a benefit for this lesbian feminist magazine." Margie Adam

Jeanne Córdova and The Lesbian Tide

The Lesbian Tide

Jeanne Cordova, lesbian feminist activist and organizer, was the founder of The Lesbian Tide magazine in 1971. Cordova was one of twelve children born in Germany to a culturally conservative Catholic family. After coming to the US with her family, she attended Catholic High School, where she was involved in sports and the student body organization. After graduating, she entered the convent, fulfilling the desire she had from the age of seven to be a nun. Her exposure to poverty, homosexuality, drugs and the peace movement during her work in the convent led her to seek a career in social work. After leaving the convent and getting her BA in social work in 1970, Cordova became involved in the gay rights movement. She was active in the Gay Liberation Front, Lesbian Feminists, Daughters of Bilitis (DOB), and the Crenshaw Women's Center and was one of the organizers of the first Gay Women's West Coast Conference.

Source: http://salticid.nmc.csulb.edu/cgi-bin/WebObjects/OralAural.woa/wa/interview?pt=109&bi=1&col=a1000&ser=a1004&prj=lafn101