Lesbian Feminist Liberation was a
lesbian
A lesbian is a Homosexuality, homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate n ...
rights advocacy organization in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
formed in 1972.
Formation
Lesbian Feminist Liberation was originally the Lesbian Liberation Committee and a part of the
Gay Activists Alliance
The Gay Activists Alliance (GAA) was founded in New York City on December 21, 1969, almost six months after the Stonewall riots, by dissident members of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF). In contrast to the Liberation Front, the Activists Alliance s ...
(GAA). In 1972, when the members felt the GAA was not giving enough focus to lesbian and feminist issues, they left GAA and formed the Lesbian Feminist Liberation.
The departure was coordinated by
Jean O'Leary
Jean O'Leary (March 4, 1948 – June 4, 2005) was an American lesbian and gay rights activist. She was the founder of Lesbian Feminist Liberation, one of the first lesbian activist groups in the women's movement, and an early member and co-dir ...
.
The formation of Lesbian Feminist Liberation left the
Radicalesbians
This article addresses the history of lesbianism in the United States. Unless otherwise noted, the members of same-sex female couples discussed here are not known to be lesbian (rather than, for example, bisexual), but they are mentioned as part ...
(RL) group with few members.
The Lesbian Liberation Committee, and initially the Lesbian Feminist Liberation as well, met at an old firehouse at 99 Wooster Street in
SoHo
Soho is an area of the City of Westminster, part of the West End of London. Originally a fashionable district for the aristocracy, it has been one of the main entertainment districts in the capital since the 19th century.
The area was develop ...
, the location was known as "The Firehouse."
Activities
In 1973, Lesbian Feminist Liberation participated in the campaign to lobby the
New York City Council
The New York City Council is the lawmaking body of New York City. It has 51 members from 51 council districts throughout the five Borough (New York City), boroughs.
The council serves as a check against the Mayor of New York City, mayor in a may ...
to add sexual orientation to the city's anti-discrimination city ordinance.
Twenty-five members of the organization attended ''
The Dick Cavett Show
''The Dick Cavett Show'' was the title of several talk shows hosted by Dick Cavett on various television networks, including:
* ABC daytime, (March 4, 1968–January 24, 1969) originally titled ''This Morning''
* ABC prime time, Tuesdays, We ...
'' and disrupted his interview with
George Gilder
George Franklin Gilder (; born November 29, 1939) is an American investor, author, economist, and co-founder of the Discovery Institute. His 1981 book, '' Wealth and Poverty'', advanced a case for supply-side economics and capitalism during the ...
, an author the organization believed was anti-feminist and anti-lesbian.
The organization also organized a demonstration with 200 participants, and a large fake lavender colored
dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...
outside the
National Museum of American History
The National Museum of American History: Kenneth E. Behring Center collects, preserves, and displays the heritage of the United States in the areas of social, political, cultural, scientific, and military history. Among the items on display is t ...
to protest sexism at the museum.
They picketed at a
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (also simply known as Lincoln Center) is a complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. It has thirty indoor and outdoor facilities and is host to 5 millio ...
movie theater that was showing
Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Rainer Werner Fassbinder (; 31 May 1945 – 10 June 1982), sometimes credited as R. W. Fassbinder, was a German filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the major figures and catalysts of the New German Cinema movement.
Fassbinder's main ...
's ''
The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant
''The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant'' (german: Die bitteren Tränen der Petra von Kant) is a 1972 West German romantic drama film written and directed by Rainer Werner Fassbinder, based on his own play. Featuring an all-female cast, the plot tak ...
'', which some feminists found offensive for its depiction of lesbian sadomasochism.
The organization opposed the performance by
drag queen
A drag queen is a person, usually male, who uses drag clothing and makeup to imitate and often exaggerate female gender signifiers and gender roles for entertainment purposes. Historically, drag queens have usually been gay men, and part o ...
s at the 1973
LGBT Pride March in New York City. As they passed out flyers,
Sylvia Rivera
Sylvia Rivera (July 2, 1951 – February 19, 2002) was an American gay liberation and transgender rights activist September 21, 1995. Accessed July 24, 2015. who was also a noted community worker in New York. Rivera, who identified as a drag q ...
, of
Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries
Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR) was a gay, gender non-conforming and transvestite street activist organization founded in 1970 by Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson, subculturally-famous New York City drag queens of color.Fein ...
, took the microphone from emcee
Vito Russo
Vito Russo (July 11, 1946 – November 7, 1990) was an American LGBT activist, film historian, and author. He is best remembered as the author of the book ''The Celluloid Closet'' (1981, revised edition 1987), described in ''The New York Time ...
and spoke against the sentiment and spoke of the harassment and arrests of drag queens on the street, some of whom had been involved with the
Stonewall riots
The Stonewall riots (also known as the Stonewall uprising, Stonewall rebellion, or simply Stonewall) were a series of spontaneous protests by members of the gay community in response to a police raid that began in the early morning hours of Ju ...
. Lesbian Feminist Liberation's Jean O'Leary then insisted on responding by denouncing
drag as misogynist and criticizing the march for being too male-dominated. This prompted
Lee Brewster
Lee Greer Brewster (April 27, 1943 – May 19, 2000) was an American drag queen, transgender activist, and retailer. He was a founding member of the pre-Stonewall activist group, Queens Liberation Front. In the 1970s and 1980s, he published ''Drag' ...
of
Queens Liberation Front
Queens Liberation Front (QLF) was a homophile group primarily focused on transvestite rights advocacy organization in New York City. QLF was formed in 1969 and active in the 1970s. They published ''Drag Queens: A Magazine About the Transvestite'' ...
to denounce anti-
transgender
A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through tr ...
lesbian feminists. The increasingly angry crowd only calmed when
Bette Midler
Bette Midler (;''Inside the Actors Studio'', 2004 born December 1, 1945) is an American singer, actress, comedian and author. Throughout her career, which spans over five decades, Midler has received List of awards and nominations received by Be ...
, who heard these events reported on the radio in her
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...
apartment, arrived, took the microphone, and began singing "
Friends
''Friends'' is an American television sitcom created by David Crane and Marta Kauffman, which aired on NBC from September 22, 1994, to May 6, 2004, lasting ten seasons. With an ensemble cast starring Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa ...
". This was one of many events in early 1970s where lesbian and transgender activists clashed.
When
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...
aired "
Flowers of Evil", an episode of ''
Police Woman'' about a trio of lesbians murdering nursing home residents for their money, the organization staged a
zap at NBC's New York City headquarters on November 19, 1973. Ten women entered the building in pairs at 15-minute intervals, traveling by elevator to different floors before converging on the
Standards and Practices
In the United States, Standards and Practices (also referred to as Broadcast Standards and Practices or BS&P for short) is the name traditionally given to the department at a television network which is responsible for the moral, ethical, and leg ...
offices. Advised that vice president
Herminio Traviesas would not return to the office until the following week, demonstrators announced their intention to wait until he returned and occupied his office overnight. Around 75 women demonstrated in front of the building. The following morning half of the women left, along with the children of the lead protester. The remaining protesters unfurled a twenty foot long banner from the balcony of vice president Herminio Traviesas's office reading "LESBIANS PROTEST NBC". They and street-level picketers chanted slogans like "NBC works against lesbians" and "Lesbians are sitting in".
The demonstrators hoped to attract both network news coverage and arrests. When they realized neither was forthcoming, they left the building. While the networks ignored the story, it was picked up by local media and the
wire services
A news agency is an organization that gathers news reports and sells them to subscribing news organizations, such as newspapers, magazines and radio and television broadcasters. A news agency may also be referred to as a wire service, newswire, ...
.
Ultimately, NBC agreed not to rerun the episode.
In 1974, the organization worked with
New York Radical Feminists
New York Radical Feminists (NYRF) was a radical feminist group founded by Shulamith Firestone and Anne Koedt in 1969, after they had left Redstockings and The Feminists, respectively. Firestone's and Koedt's desire to start this new group was a ...
to increase the visibility of women at the New York City LGBT Pride March.
See also
*
Gay Activists Alliance
The Gay Activists Alliance (GAA) was founded in New York City on December 21, 1969, almost six months after the Stonewall riots, by dissident members of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF). In contrast to the Liberation Front, the Activists Alliance s ...
*
History of lesbianism in the United States
This article addresses the history of lesbianism in the United States. Unless otherwise noted, the members of same-sex female couples discussed here are not known to be lesbian (rather than, for example, bisexual), but they are mentioned as part ...
*
LGBT culture in New York City
New York City is home to one of the largest LGBTQ populations in the world and the most prominent. Brian Silverman, the author of ''Frommer's New York City from $90 a Day,'' wrote the city has "one of the world's largest, loudest, and most power ...
References
External links
{{Authority control
1972 establishments in New York City
Lesbian culture in New York (state)
Lesbian feminist organizations
Lesbian history in the United States
Lesbian organizations in the United States
LGBT political advocacy groups in New York (state)
Organizations based in New York City
Organizations established in 1972
Articles containing video clips
1972 in LGBT history