Stephen Fry: Shamelessly Bourgeois

When asked his response to those in the LGBT community who considered marriage an “antiquated, oppressive” institution, to be overthrown rather than joined, Fry said he was aware of how the campaign for marriage equality in Britain had taken on a “very distinctive, anti-bourgeois, anti-patriarchal sort of attitude” and become tied to a “great raft of issues that you could feel was all somehow opposed to the status quo and the establishment”.

[This is garbled, Fry namechecks the GLF and - bizarrely - the distinctly non-radical Campaign For Homosexual Equality, and meant lesbians and gay men who oppose marriage, obvs. 'The great raft of issues' embraced include 'feminism... Ban The Bomb'! 16 mins in].

However, “the fact that gay people have revealed themselves, some of them like myself, to be shamelessly bourgeois – I apologise to those who thought I’ve sold out but I’m afraid I never really bought in.”

Gaurdian online on this Australian TV interview for ABC News.

He also retells his favourite story - told by a friend of a friend, a royal courtier, no less - about Her Maj The Queen enthusiastically signing in the same-sex marriage bill.

Though I stand to be corrected by Mr Fry's infinite wisdom and inside knowledge, again, this is utter nonsense, she did not literally sign it, but it's clearly a comforting delusion for this arselicker by appointment to the House Of Windsor.

David McLellan: Ardent Gay Stalinst

Andrew Burgin, Facebook.

As well as working at Housmans bookshop he was one of the original Gay Liberation Front members in the 1970s, and also co-founded Gay Switchboard, a phone line service that provided advice and support for people coming out - both groups had offices at 5 Caledonian Road, and both were groundbreaking in the work that they did.

Max had a strong personality with a cheeky and provocative streak - a unique and outspoken man who couldn't fail to make an impression on those he met. Truly he was one of a kind. (via Housmans)

Michael Mason: 1947-2015

Michael Mason, who has died aged 67, was the news editor of Gay News who went on to co-found and edit the pioneering London paper Capital Gay and was a leading figure in the campaign for homosexual law reform.

As the product of a leading public school and Oxford, Michael Mason was not the first upper-middle-class man to find that his sexual preferences tended towards his own sex. But whereas most contemporaries discreetly pursued their predilections behind a respectable facade, Mason was baffled that there might be anything to be ashamed of. He took delight in declaring his club as the Sadie Maisie, whose dress code was not jacket-and-tie, but denim, leather or rubber...

From the Daily Telegraph obituary by Simon Edge. 

The beginning of a fitting tribute to a man who was part of the Gay Liberation Front, news editor on Gay News, and went on to publish Capital Gay, a weekly London newspaper that worked on the assumption its readers had hearts and brains.

Here are some similarly fulsome tributes paid by the gay media of today...

I jest, of course.

Michael Mason, missed in so many ways.

x

Photo Of The Week: The Last Week In June 1970 That Is

Two men ‘flip the bird’ at the Central Park crowd that’s formed as they compete in the kissing contest during New York’s inaugural Gay Pride celebration on 28 June 1970.

From Jean-Pierre Laffont's Photographer's Paradise: Turbulent America 1960-1990 via Guardian Online.

Sarah Dunant: In Defence Of The 1970s

When it comes to sexual history we are still learning. I spend most of my working life immersed in what is considered one of the most artistically and intellectually creative periods of history - the Italian Renaissance. In matters of sex, though, it was a primordial swamp. Rape was a last ditch form of courtship, men in their 30s, 40s and 50s regularly married girls of 14 or 15, surplus girls were shoved into convents, incest was not uncommon, men of good breeding fathered scores of illegitimate children, while their wives - or the ones who got caught - might well have been murdered and homosexuals were mutilated or burnt at the stake. Sex between women was so unthinkable there was no word for it.

Shocking and fascinating, what is perhaps more surprising is that much of the detail of what we know now, we've learned only recently. We are back to the impact of the '70s. Because it was that decade which saw the emergence of historians, academics and cultural thinkers who - having turned their back on the accepted canon of dead white male history - chose instead issues of gender and sexuality, going back into the archives and records to uncover a new past.

You can read the '71 GLF manifesto here.

So where does this leave the '70s for those of us who lived through them? How far should we be applauding the achievements or doing penance for the faults? How about both at the same time? Agreeing that terrible sexual behaviour (hardly new to the 70s) took place, some possibly encouraged by a sense of freedom, but exactly that same freedom and openness changed society's attitudes, making us more tolerant of some things and less tolerant in others. Surely, something to be celebrated.

BBC News magazine - also a BBC Radio 4 A Point Of View talk. 

Blaming the 70s has become quite 'a thing' recently, hasn't it?

Fagburn say: Bring back blaming the 60s!

Gay Liberation Front: Manifesto

The Gay Liberation Front Manifesto was a revolution in consciousness when it was published in London in 1971, and it remains revolutionary today. It offers a radical critique of sexism and what we now call homophobia; as well as a pioneering agenda for social and personal transformation...

Peter Tatchell chooses the 1971 Gay Liberation Front Manifesto for The Guardian series A Book That Changed Me.
Best line: "I did not write the manifesto, but..."
The Guardian helpfully provide a link to the revised 1978 edition.
D'oh!

You can read the original GLF manifesto here.

PS Peter Tatchell Irony Klaxon!!!

#Mugabe started out as a good leader but has become corrupted. He's gone from being a liberation hero to a tyrant. #Zimbabwe #Harare #Africa
— Peter Tatchell (@PeterTatchell) August 6, 2013

Bette Bourne: The Movie!

Bette Bourne & Mark Ravenhill talk about their new documentary from Jeremy Jeffs on Vimeo.

It's Bette's 70s, basically,
The Gay Liberation Front, radical drag, The Brixton Fairies commune, The Bloolips, Quentin Crisp...
Sounds amazing, doesn't it?
But you can't watch it.
Nothing personal, but they need to raise a bit more money to finish the thing.
Maybe you could help them out?

The GLF: 40 Years On

"Saturday's gay pride parade in London celebrates 40 years since the formation of the Gay Liberation Front in Britain," Peter Tatchell writes in The Guardian Online today.
"This was a watershed moment in British queer history. For the first time, thousands of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people stopped hiding in the closet and suffering in silence. I was one of them. We came out and marched in the streets, proclaiming gay pride and demanding our freedom..."

(The above photo - “Jackie Hormona” holding GLF banner" Anti-war rally, Bryant Park, NYC 1970 - was taken by gay anarchist John Lauritsen. Respec'!)