Learng om the liv of gay and lbian Atralians

australian lgbt history

Contents:

DANIEL MARSHALLYOUNG GAYS: TOWARDS A HISTORY OF YOUTH, QUEER SEXUALI AND TN ATRALIA

We're gog to be talkg about that, some of the landmark fights and achievements lbian and gay rights, how societal attus are evolvg and the challeng and issu I'd like now to troduce our very fabulo expert panellists, they've all lived and breathed the battl, they're the vanguard of the ongog ph for equaly. She's a former Mardi Gras board director, foundg member of Pri and foundg director of Aurora, which rais funds for gay, lbian and transgenr muny next to me here is the fabulo, ternatnally acclaimed edian, sger, actrs and self-proclaimed rantr —JORDAN RASKOPOULOS: I'm a rantr. ’ We've got to remember that, now that we've got this so-lled relig eedom right, that is gog to e up to try and take away the equaly and digny of LGBT VAN EXTEL: Shirleene, the flip si of crimalisg homosexualy was that there was crimaly on the part of agast gay and lbian, particularly gay men, that was a strong issue around attacks by homophobic men.

I have team mat who are pleased that I am on their team, I have opponents who are pleased that they get to play wh y, I thk broar sportg muni are well behd kd of learng about trans bodi, and how they teract wh the VAN EXTEL: Robyn, you were stmental brgg the Gay Gam to Atralia.

THE SECRET HISTORY OF ATRALIA'S GAY DIGGERS

Roller rby — smashg LAVERACK: I thk, I mean, fairns the Atralian Gay Gam absolutely smashed , bee they did do exactly RASKOPOULOS: Y, LAVERACK: They talked wh the muny, they talked about how to fe so that was accepted by the trans muny, I mean who else to fe RASKOPOULOS: Totally. And that we mt e that momentum and we mt e that energy to repay that solidary and that bt that was given by people who were placed a really prer posn by irrponsible ‘no’ mpaigners, who put out very misleadg and very accurate rmatn, and really put those people the worst type of certaly I thk that everyone I know who was volved that mpaign certaly do feel an obligatn to keep workg on that, bee of RASKOPOULOS: Y, I thk that the difficult thg for the future is that we have achieved so much for gay and lbian rights that young people growg up the next generatn who are gay and lbian are gog to grow up wh the privilege of beg broadly accepted society, broadly celebrated society. MICHAEL KIRBY: In fact, the Uned Stat the se before the US Supreme Court is actually about a person, a uple, a gay uple who wanted to have a ke, and they found actually only Ameri, they found a ke-maker who didn't want to put ‘Happy weddg Joe and Craig’, and therefore they've got that exact issue before the US Supreme Court.

It was, therefore, somethg of a shock to most Atralians to read The Atralian newspaper of 10 September 1970 of the formatn of an anisatn, Campaign Agast Moral Persecutn Inrporated (CAMP Inc), dited to removg the stigma that society attached to homosexualy. (Supplied: Natnal Atralia Day Council)Trans history left outThe term transgenr, or "trans" for short, is ed to scribe a person whose genr inty and genr exprsn differs om the sex they were assigned at 's nothg South Asia, for example, Hijra people have been regnised as a third genr sce about 400 southern Italy, "i femmielli" — lerally, "ltle female men" — date back to the Atralia, a history of trans and genr diverse people uld go back thoands of Natns experienc of genr aren't homogeno. 3 The 1973-74 ntroversy over the cisn taken by thori New South Wal that Penny Short was medilly unf to teach followg the publitn of one of her lbian-themed poems4 is siarly ditive of the ways which the admistratn of formal systems of schoolg beme a key procs through which opponents of Gay Liberatn anized to repudiate the polil challeng brought forward by the Gay Liberatn movement.

That the issu drew support om a range of alli cludg socialists, tra unnists and femists monstrat not only the way which public bat about homosexualy om the start of the activist era were ncentrated on ntts over the relatnship between ias about youth, tn and sexualy, but also the way which the ntts many ways reprented a key battle le Atralian cultural polics more generally. The film and theatre- based work of Y-GLAM (1998-) provis perhaps the most well-known example of Victorian queer youth arts-based work, while such approach are now beg taken up by a variety of queer youth servic, such as the volvement of YAK/Fay Planng Victoria the productn of recent films Why's lled Gay? Through such 'peer-to-peer pedagogy', by which refers to relatnships of learng that occur between young people of siar ag, Young Gays reprents a valug of young people's agency which is still seen some thirty years on as cuttg edge practice many youth and tn servic.

FACE THE FACTS: LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, TRANS AND INTERSEX PEOPLE

Further extendg the queer peer pedagogil efforts reprented by the aspiratns of s film llective, Young Gays anized the distributn of rmatn packs to high schools which clud pi of the groundbreakg Young, Gay and Proud as well as pi of the leaflet: 'What to do when you meet a homosexual. In addn to the high profile of the group the range of polil activi associated wh the Summer Offensive Melbourne, members participated other monstratns throughout 1980, marchg unr the 'Young Gays are Proud' banner42 for workers' rights (May Day), women's rights (prottg at a Right To Life monstratn), nuclear disarmament, peace and the environment (an anti-uranium prott on Friday 3 October 1980 the Treasury Garns, 43 and for Gay Equaly (as part of the Homosexual Law Reform Campaign of 1980). While the participatn of Young Gays the diverse polil movements reflected a loose alnist exprsn of left polics that many ways characteris dissint activism of the perd, the volvement of the group such a diverse range of polil provis a historil pot of parison to the suatn of queer youth groups and polil activy today.

'alhol and s effects, and s relatnship wh the gay muny', 'gays and the law, ' 'sado-masochism' and 'sexism and lbian separatism') and the group tried to support the tablishment of smaller Young Gay Support Groups to let people relax more smaller group settgs, although, while a uple started, they 'didn't proceed a great al'. Tenured) and muny paci the broad terdisciplary field of Atralian sexuali studi, as well as the tablishment of premiere llectns such as that held by the Atralian Lbian and Gay Archiv, means that there are now more rourc than ever before available for vtigatg the important qutns that emanate om a history of queer youth and tn Atralia.

Siarly, Calr dited the proceeds for his booklet to the Natnal Network of Young Lbians and Gay Men, but the middle of the 1980s and the first years of the Grid/Aids73 panmic mt have provid a starkly different ntext for anizg around issu of youth and homosexual sex. The rmal teachg and learng work happeng among members of Young Gays – om their implicly tnal work of facilatg their own llective discsns around their experienc of sexuali society to their explic tnal work of velopg and providg rourc to schools – monstrat the way which the experienc of the young people part om straightforward terpretatns of tn which largely nsir to be a synonym for schoolg and school-based learng. As the se of Young Gays mak clear, the activist llective to foc as an exemplary learng space, not only the sense that those young people who participated the group learned thgs through their volvement , but also the ntemporary ntext where the Young Gays episo speaks stctive ways to ntemporary velopments the fields of queer youth servic and tn.

*BEAR-MAGAZINE.COM* AUSTRALIAN LGBT HISTORY

Young Gays: towards a history of youth, queer sexuali and tn Atralia - No 87 May 2011 - La Trobe Journal .

TOP