1- W.I.R.E.S. - Womens Information Referral And Enquiry Service - 1975 - 1977 - NOS. 1 - 42 - The feminist archive, Bradford
Issue 4 - Womens movement publications
- National Lesbian Newsletter
- ENOUGH - The magazine of Bristols Women's Liberation group
- Women together - A comminuty magaznie for women in the middlesex area.
- NALGAY - newsletter of a gay group in NALGO
Books
- Sappho was a right-on woman, a liberated veiw of lesbianism
Issue 4 - pages 6 & 7
"2) LESBIAN MOTHERS FIGHT BACK.
Recently judges have been awarding the custody of children of divorced couples to the father if he wants them, unless the mother is remarried and has a conventional nuculear family set-up. An article in the Guardian (8th August) said "it is virtually unknown for the courts to award custody or care to a lesbian mother when the father contest her claim. This anti-woman, anti-lesbian and anti-mother move has been taking place for some time and needs to be exposed since custody hearings take place behind locked doors and no recording is allowed.
During the next law term women will again appear in court to contest the custody of her four children. She is not only fighting the patriacial legal system, but also the society which has labbelled her a lesbian and therefore an 'unfit' mother. She was divorced two years ago, and until recently was living in the family hone and caring for her four children with a wage of £5 pound a week from her ex-husband, who officially had custody. He recently remarried and asked her to leave. She appealed against the custody descision. All the children want to stay with their mother. He, then, started to pay her £40 a week maintinence, whcih made it impossible to get legal aid. The womens defence fund is hoping to pay some of the legal costs of this case and would be grateful for donations. "
FEMINIST SALES-
- BADGES - Lesbians Ignite; How dare you presume i'm heterosexual; Gays against fascism, Avenge Oscar Wilde.
- POSTERS - "two lesbians, haron and dee, "are willing to design and/or print and non-sexist posters for lesbian causes, be it political, propoganda ir proud to be dyke disco poster."
Issue 5
Womens movement publications -
I Lesbian teacher newsletter no 2, obtainable from Jane Dixon, 6 Rosetta street, London SW8 30p for issues 2 and 3.
"Women in Glasgow and Leeds are organising pub crawls of men-only bars on December 29th to celebrate the sex discrimination act coming into force that day - sounds like a good idea ..."
Reading list - Homosexuality and the teaching profession
"When I was as school I was told by my domestic science teacher: "Animals sweat, Men perspire and Ladies GLOW. "Hmm. Penny."
WOMEN SEEKING GROUPS
1) Dear sisters, I am a gay women living in Plymouth...(I have already contacted the local womens group and found them basically unsympathetic.)
Issue 10
Advert - THE GENDER TRAP - A closer look at sex roles - By Carol Adams and Rae Laurikietis - Look at other publications by them also
"6. COMMITTEE FOR LESBIAN ACTION NOW's statement:"
Attack on Lesbians at the moulin rouge club. "How long can lesbians go on accepting this type of oppression? The lines are being drawn up and we as sisters must realise the importance of our stand for recognition"
Issue 34
Notable names - Wages Due Lesbians, London
Wilmette Brown
Anne Neale
Ruth Chimowitz
Lesbian Express - 1978 - July & August - Manchester
"Abortion? I was once asked by a so called lesbian feminist "what has abortion got to do with me I'm never likely to need one"
She would be so lucky!! Abortion has a lot to do with us as lesbians. Aboriton is a womens inalienable right, the right to control her own body."
Lesbians and Policing project bulletin - Issue 1 September 1985
Lesbian teachers newsletter - Issue one - Spring term 1975\
Lesbian and gay socialist - Issue 17 - Spring 1989
So small So white - reveiw of the Lesbian Gaze photography exhibition.
Lesbian employment rights - Newsletter no.6 - July 1988
Lesbian mothers' Newsletter
Black lesbian & gay centre project - Newsletter: october/november 1990
Page 8 (The annueal lesbian stregnth and gay pride festival) - "Homophobia - In some ways, black lesbian and gay culture is flourising. Sometimes, however, it seems to exist in a vacuum. During the festival, some of us enthused about the growing volume of erotic images of black lesbians and gays in poetry, photographs and elsewhere. At the same time, a growing number of our sisters and brothers were becoming homeless, often loosing the chance to freely enjoy their own bodies and develop relationships on equal terms."
Lesbian express - Manchester - June 1979
AXE illustration "WHATS THIS?" Worn by women as a necklace or charm as it represents stregnth and solidarty against sexual attacks. "The axe was used by bands of womin who lived on their own, they had their own community and they lived around the time when there was goddess worship. The axe was used for hunting, and for defending themselves in their villages when attacked by groups of male rapists"
"All this part of our history or should I say herstory has been wiped out and distorted"
"Some women have asked why I spell WIMIN or WOMIN like this and not like this: woman/women. Well simply I don't like having to put MAN or MEN into the spelling every time I have to refer to my own sex, its as simple as that.
Lesbian News - July/August 1987
The wrong words of Wilma Wilde
Lesbian news and veiws NO.1 May, 1986
THE PARADOX OF LESBIAN CONFORMITY by e.singleton - page 3
"Lesbians are radical non-conformists who reject, at great personal cost, one of the most pervasive taboos of society. Lesbians are also slavish conformists who accept, without question and also at great cost, an entire set of irrational and confining socially generated standards."
"Lesbian non-conformity is obvious. By definition, a lesbian has rejected what might be called the primal imperative of the species: to perpetuate itself, or for individuals, to mate and reproduce"
"Whether sexual preferance is chemical, biological, psycological, political, social or mystical in origin, it can remain theoretical or be lived."
"Lesbians who choose to live their lesbianism do so in oposition to tremendous social pressures to conform to the social norm"
WHY ARE LESBIANS HAVING BABIES IN THE 1980'S - by Amanda Hayman and Linda Peterson
"Being heterosexual, and having babies, are considered to be the natural functions of women. Why then, do we as Lesbians reject the first but do not even question the second?"
Lesbian link - Print by amazon press, 75 back Picadilly, Manchester M1 2AZ - Decemeber 1986
LiP magazine
Lesbians come together - Eliza Connor 1889
Pg.4 "A woman who is totally independant of men, who obtains love, sex and self esteem from other women is a terrible treat to male supremacy. She doesnt need them and therefore they have less power over her." - Martha Shelly 1969
Lespop - the lesbians and policing project - bulletin no.3
Campaign for legislation for gay rights.
"In 1985 both the TUC and the Labour Party conferences for the first time passed resolutions supporting lesbian and gay rights."
The new legislation effected rights on unfair dismissale from work, child custody, adoption, provocation (in murder cases), marriage, cohabitation and more.
Amendments to the criominal law relating to sexual offences and public morality. - " The bill says that it would abolish the two 'offences' that are commonly used against lesbians and gay men. 'outraging public decemcy' and 'conspiring to outrage public decemcy'. Mainly used against pornographers but sometimes lonely hearts and any kind of gay rights group material.
Lebsian and gay youth magazine - multiple issues
Issue winter 1985-6 - pg 10 "Homosexuality is seen as a direct challenge to the repressive nuclear family - an institution that capitalism must bolster as the only means of instillin submission to authority and obediance to be a ruling class that blatently does not have the interwsts of society at heart."
"The rulers, poloticians, and official institutions continually reinforce the belief that sex of any sort outside of the legally defined limits of 'between one man and one woman for life' is immoral and dangerous. They might find a cure for AIDS, but we need a fundemental social overturn to even start to lift the terrible load of deforming guilt and misery about sex that is pounded into everyone by this sick society."
Revolutionary and radical feminist newsletter - 1978-1990 - The feminist archive Bradford
Look into the difference between revolutionary and radical!
Find Leeds R.F. Group paper 'political lesbianism'.
Newsletter 3 - pages 3 &4
"Choosing not to relate sexually to men is not an option we can make about how and where we get our sensual/sexual pleasures. It is a vitally important tactic in our stratedgy for liberation because heterosexuality is crucial to womens oppression."
"If lesbians are a political force because we are deviants making a stand against heterosexist society then we have a common cause with the other oppressed sexual minorities, like paedophiles, male homosexuals and coprophiliacs."
Newsletter 10 - summer 1982 - pg.21
Anti Lesbianism - "It is time for anti-lesbianism to be identified as a political oppression. We are angry that heterosexual feminists do not take responsibility for being members of an oppressive power group, do not appear to recognise or challenge the prviledges which go with that, nor do they bother to examine how all of this underminds not only our lesbian polotics, but our very existance"
"Anti-lesbianism is taking place everytime our childrearing is criticised and scrutinised in an unsupportive way, and everytime it is assumed that what we want, or ought to want, is to raise 'ordinary', 'normal' children."
"Lesbian oppression is about loosing our children, not having access to male money (most money), having fewer housing rights, getting barred from pubs, being forced to lie in order to keep our jobs."
"Lesbian oppression is also about being forced to remain silent about our lesbianism for fear of the reactions we know it brings."
"It's about feeling continually sick and ashamed of ourselves all the time we 'pass' as heterosexual, knowing that our silence - our failure to assert our lesbian identity - contributes to our own oppression, and that of our sisters"
The womens rights movement also often denys lesbianism as a crucial part of feminism. "This process is further reinforced by the media, including some self-defined feminists, represents lesbianism as the irrational force of feminism, the only place in the movement, and indeed the world, where man hating is to be found. "
"We are tired of being charecterised as sexual predators (a classic old stereotype), while being exploited by heterosexual and bisexual women for a sexual 'experiance' on the other."
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