Where are the Women? In Search of a New Queer History

In the summer of 2011 I was consumed, as I suspect many fifteen year olds are, with the dual pursuits of Photoshopping images of celebrities to make them look like they were about to make out, and Googling gay youth groups. Though reasonably successful in one arena, I was disappointed with results in the other; in contrast to the seemingly endless options for inter-character romance, I was left with next to nothing in terms of visible queer community. I learnt instead that my prescribed substitute—the Outsider Kid Classic—was books, TV, and movies about the more liberated and their more liberated lives.

A little earlier, aged fourteen, I am—unsurprisingly—ensconced with the television set. Dug in between the cushions of the decrepit old couch mum hates, I immerse myself (for the fourth time) in the story of a camp young gayboy overcoming adversity. It’s my self-proclaimed favourite genre. Sitting on the floor beside me is a memoir featuring the optimistic young man my TV series was based on. In this book he speaks of a childhood, steeped in poverty but homely nonetheless, and a young adulthood where suppressed desires rushed into reality but the panic of the AIDS crisis began to loom. Somewhere within me is an insistent pang of recognition, something I can’t yet place or articulate.

I read his second memoir the following week, it’s not as good.

*****

Interestingly, lesbianism has—on a technicality—never been illegal in Australia, or any Commonwealth country.^[1] This does not imply, unfortunately, that lesbian Australians escaped the many forms of persecution launched at them during the early and mid-20th century; it does, however, cast queer women during this time in a very particular position. Invisibility was a constant struggle and all connections between these women added a link in the vital underground network that, in the dark, drew queer community together. In the lead-up to the gay liberation movement that developed from the late 1960s through to the late 1980s, lesbian figures who broke the deafening silence around homosexuality were wholly sensationalised and villanised: the ‘most violent woman in Sydney’ Iris Webber, lesbian murderer Sandra Willson and numerous ill-fated souls whose love affairs were deployed in press scandals to illustrate the rise of such ‘misfit practices’.^[2]

Similarly to the experience of gay men in Australia at the time, this period of silence and fear was shattered by the wave of change that was gay liberation in the 1960s whose origins can be traced to the Stonewall Riots in New York City. The political timelines of gay men and women spin in and out of orbit with each other often. Though their sexual politics never aligned, lesbian activists and community members were present in the campaign to decriminalise homosexual sex between men. They too were among those arrested during early Mardi Gras rioting, risking their jobs and social security for the liberation fight.^[3]

*****

Aged pretty much sixteen, still fifteen really, I decide in that adolescent fashion that memoirs are my ‘thing’ and that I will learn more queer history. Being well-read is desirable, but it is irresistible to me that somewhere out in times past might be the answers to all my queer questions. Book upon documentary sinks into my mind, each bringing a new understanding of the AIDS, pre-war Berlin, San Francisco, Mardi Gras, tops, bottoms, bears and twinks. The thought is ever-present that my life will be different, much easier than it was for people of the past. Absent is the thought that it will be different because I am not, as our history assumes, a gay man.

The universal themes of closeted youth tide me over for a short time. After all, who am I to deny the sad reality of lovelorn gazes thrown at unsuspecting classmates currently comprising my own weekday? Only over time I realise that the queer stories I defer to, supposedly made with me in mind, bear as much resemblance to my actual life as Harry meeting Sally. I keep a despairing watch out for the women who aren’t there, who seem to recede into the background before my very eyes, assuming the grand role of placard holder or office coffee vendor.

Constructed as a female counterpart to the gay man, it is inferred that the lesbian experience is self-explanatory once the life and times of gay men have been so thoroughly deconstructed. She is nothing but the same after all, just this time in a dress. I keep reading and watching in search of the magical gay man of our history who just so happens to actually lead the life of a shy high school lesbian, to no avail.

Aged 16 now, I am more confident speaking about the AIDS crisis and pre-war gay culture in Berlin than the one lesbian I have so far met, who has since returned to the closet.

*****

Despite ongoing legal persecution—something which was just as likely to reach openly gay women as men, albeit through more indirect channels^[4] —gay liberation thrived on underground bars operating by careful discretion and hushed word of mouth. Mainly patronised by men, this most famous Sydney gay ‘scene’ relied in actuality on the pioneering of one entrepreneurial lesbian icon. Widely and highly regarded still within Sydney’s gay community, Dawn O’Donnell was an ex-ice skater who turned her hand to business after revelations of her sexuality left her without her previous teaching job. She was not a woman of a spotless record, being connected (by sources of varying reliability) to brothel ownership, arson and perhaps even murder, but in her life she was able to establish a staggering legacy within Sydney’s gay culture. She was the owner of multiple bars, including the first (of very few) lesbian bars as well as sex shops, steam rooms and drag clubs. Her love of drag ran rampant throughout her career; she would frequently bail out drag performers who were taken into custody, and the shows and queens she fostered in her venues were so influential they have been specifically noted as inspiration for seminal Australian queer film Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994).

*****

One time I am aged fifteen and a half and a friend asks me, with complete innocence, why I care so much about gay support groups when my life as a gay teen glides on with almost comical ease. I shrug defensively and mentally catalogue this comment to stew about for the coming 3 years of high school. I’m unprepared to admit the deep yearning for acknowledgement that has come to a leaden rest in the pit of my stomach. When I realise I fit only to the point of how far I can minimise my queerness within my high school’s tightknit straight community, I reach even deeper to find queer women with whom I can share experiences. I feel vague embarrassment at the fact that I too don’t assimilate with the wallpaper, following suit with the only role models I can see.

It doesn’t feel quite the same to send the confessions and proclamations – emails, texts and sweaty lunchtime oval conversations don’t bring me the acknowledgement I’m looking for. When my straight friends think of outness and of “pride” they don’t think of me, and to be honest neither do I. One time I paste my face over a picture of Elton John and we laugh about how there’s not that much difference between us.

*****

During the gay and women’s liberation movements, lesbian activists encountered a form of discrimination which shook the course of the movement completely. It became apparent that gay men were not immune to the commonplace misogyny of this time; lesbian issues were sidelined in campaign focuses and it was said often gay press “either ignores women or puts them down”.^[5] The routes that lesbian women would take to join women’s organisations were often also fraught, as there they faced homophobia from straight feminists who were uncomfortable with masculine presentation and overt homosexual affection, and unafraid to say so.^[6] It was argued that to include lesbian content in key political publications “would shock potential new members and turn them off joining Women’s Liberation”.^[7] The result of these pressures was that many women were squeezed out into ‘lesbian separatist’ spaces—the activist group Radicalesbians, the autonomous publication Lesbian Newsletter.

If this move did provoke some backlash from more moderate lesbians and other members of the gay community, it also provided much needed breathing space and an activist platform that was well and truly their own. Radicalesbians held an autonomous conference in Sorrento in 1973,^[8] ‘Lesfests’ of discussion as well as entertainment and relaxation were held,^[9] and a collective of women owned several hundred acres of women-only land called ‘Amazon Acres’. These collectives were interested in political activism like the idea of ‘coming out’, an ongoing campaign by mainstream gay liberation to publicise ordinary gay people and encourage wider acceptance in the hetero world, and they were also interested in coming together for their own sakes. Lesbian groups facilitated the first of a long tradition of adopted queer families who were capable of real understanding, helping each other work through the often still internalised homophobia^[10] they carried so that they could love themselves and each other.

*****

From an external point of view, I understand the homonormativity that informs the straight world’s understanding of queer as singularly cisgendered and male, as well as confining their overall comfort zone to this one lucky man. When I look into the gay community, to the broad church with so many different breeds of sheep to its flock, it is mind-boggling to see the same image presented to us.

Aged 18, I’m with some new far-flung friends in my old home town, yelling to each other about the polarising phenomenon that is ‘snapback lesbians’. As a joke, I will often say that I’m not sure I know anyone straight anymore; the knowing cackles and vaguely uncomfortable glances alike bring me an almost illicit satisfaction. It’s satisfying because it’s been a long wait; years went by before the placard-holding lesbians were able to speak to me. I’m aware it’s not ideal—to move a thousand kilometres away and escape the problem has never exactly been recommended by Dr Phil. Even now, to know my generation’s queers helps no more to anchor me to any lesbian roots than the gay biopic’s leading men ever did before.

So we stumble forward together yelling as loud as we can, because there is a whole future of girls out there trying to hear us.