Audio Interview, Ramona Santorelli, December 28, 2012

  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I'm just telling you,
  • this is not even part of the--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Today is December 28th, Friday.
  • And I'm here with Ramona Santorelli who is probably
  • most well known in Rochester as the woman
  • who kind of organized and spearheaded the Topfree
  • Seven in 1986.
  • But I want to go back because you weren't born in Rochester.
  • You were born in--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Brooklyn.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: --Brooklyn.
  • And were you out when you were in Brooklyn?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: No, no, I didn't come out
  • till I came here to Rochester, St. John Fisher College.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And you came on a basketball scholarship.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And then you left St. John Fisher
  • to go to Fordham.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yep, played Division one.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Played Division one.
  • And tell me a little bit about your basketball
  • coach at Fordham.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: My coach was out, actually, Kathy Mosolino.
  • She was a great coach, great role model for me
  • and the rest of the players there.
  • I was going through a funny, particular time.
  • It was changing time for me.
  • I think I was mulling over my sexuality.
  • I was confused.
  • I was lonely because I was in the Bronx,
  • and I had made friends in Rochester at the time.
  • All my other high school buddies were off to other colleges.
  • And my coach challenged Fordham to Title IX and she won.
  • What she found out is that she was
  • getting paid less than the assistant coaches of the men.
  • And we were also getting booted out of every gym.
  • And it was a bad time.
  • And we were playing high-ranking teams
  • like Tennessee, Alabama, Texas A&M.
  • We were playing a lot of really, really big schools at the time.
  • Baylor, you know, all the schools that you know of,
  • you hear of now.
  • And she took us to the regionals.
  • And the following year, at the end of the year
  • she challenged them.
  • And they must have pressured her so much
  • after that, that she quit the job.
  • Consequently, I left and came back to Fisher
  • with my tail between my legs.
  • I didn't play my senior year, which I regret terribly.
  • And I was shy fifteen credits in the transferring.
  • So all my friends left Fisher, and I went off
  • exploring the South.
  • I was a sociology major, and I wanted
  • to see how far this country had come as far as racism.
  • So I chose Mississippi as a place
  • to volunteer my services and--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Good place.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: --yeah and I contacted
  • a lot of the Catholic schools.
  • I didn't know about how obscure Catholicism was in Mississippi,
  • but off I went.
  • And I did some basketball camps to make some money,
  • and off I went.
  • I took my car and drove along.
  • I went to Bay St. Louis.
  • They taught me how to dance on the pier.
  • It was great.
  • And then I ended up in Mississippi.
  • And when I went to the first church in Mississippi,
  • it looked like my shed in my back yard.
  • It was really small, and it was hilarious.
  • And I traveled all the way through till they hooked me up
  • with someone in Iowa.
  • They told me to call this principal in Iowa.
  • And so I drove my car to--
  • I went all through Mississippi, traveled
  • and met all these different, really great people,
  • and drove my car to Cincinnati, and left my car
  • with a friend, an old basketball colleague, coach.
  • And they flew me to Omaha.
  • And then five nuns drove me through to Earling, Iowa,
  • a little German Catholic town.
  • And there I stayed for six months
  • and was a phys ed teacher and a basketball coach.
  • And I even taught catechism, believe it or not.
  • BARBARA: Oh my god.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: And I was twenty-two years old.
  • I had a riot.
  • It was a riot.
  • It was it was great.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Now did you find an answer to your question
  • in Mississippi?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, thank you for bringing me back
  • to full circle.
  • While I was there it was really interesting.
  • I remember very clearly mulling over my sexuality.
  • And they thought I was mulling over-- they thought I
  • was contemplating the convent.
  • I was nowhere near that.
  • (laughter)
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Similar callings.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, yes, yes,
  • EVELYN BAILEY: God and women.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes.
  • I had already been out, though.
  • I already had my first experience with, actually my--
  • it was my best friend from high school.
  • She went to Cornell University.
  • I went to Fischer.
  • And we went cross country after I left Fordham.
  • And we did the little back rubs, talking.
  • She had a crush on a straight couple.
  • And she told me about it, and I asked thousands of questions.
  • After Brooklyn, we moved to Long Island, by the way.
  • So when we came back after eight weeks of traveling,
  • I said to my father, without even asking Ann, I said,
  • "Dad, I'm going over to Ann's house."
  • He goes, "but you were with her for eight weeks."
  • I said, "she's home alone."
  • I didn't even consult her.
  • Drove over to her house, rang the doorbell,
  • Ann answered the door.
  • "Mom, Ramona locked herself out."
  • We didn't even consult each other,
  • went up the stairs, that was it.
  • It was just one of those things that we just,
  • eight weeks of, I guess, foreplay.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Did you find an answer, though,
  • to the question how far civil rights had come in the south
  • in Mississippi?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Oh, thank you, thank you, that question.
  • Interestingly enough, yes and no.
  • You know, the people I was meeting with
  • were mostly white women, white men, you know,
  • priests and nuns.
  • Although I did meet one particular set of nuns.
  • They were called the School Sisters of St. Francis,
  • and they had a radical background.
  • And they were protesting for labor rights for mining,
  • the people in the mines.
  • And they were really, really active.
  • And there was one nun who was dead set
  • against me staying there.
  • And another nun who was just, you
  • know, the good nun, bad nun.
  • The other nun was just so really attentive to me.
  • And so we sat for hours and spoke.
  • And the other one was busy, just, you know,
  • posters, and mailings, and calling on the phone.
  • And the other one was sat with me for hours
  • and really philosophize about life.
  • And she gave me a lot of things that I still remember.
  • One was that visiting people were the most important thing
  • in life.
  • Isn't that sweet?
  • She said just visiting people, just being present.
  • And I've always remembered that.
  • It doesn't matter how big or small your life is.
  • As long as you sit and visit with people,
  • it's the greatest gift you can give.
  • That's what she gave to me.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: So when you came back to Rochester, finally.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah.
  • My final-- well I went back to New York after that.
  • And my father was head of a restaurant in Manhattan,
  • which I was always very proud of, in the Tribeca area,
  • down near Robert De Niro, six blocks from the World Trade
  • Center.
  • And I, you know, traipsed up and, you know, down
  • on the east side, the west side, the lower east side
  • and west side.
  • I was a really into Manhattan at the time.
  • And I decided to come back because a friend of mine, John,
  • was talking to me on the phone.
  • He said, "you know, why don't you come up here?
  • I'm living with this woman, Sally.
  • I know you're going to like her, but I think
  • you should stay away from her."
  • So I ended up coming up to Rochester and visiting.
  • And sure enough, I got together with Sally.
  • And we booted John out of the apartment.
  • And Sally and I ended up living together.
  • And, you know, that became my introduction
  • to the Rochester community, really.
  • I actually met Susan Plunkett in 1978
  • while I was at Fisher, by the way.
  • She'd back it up.
  • I went to Snake Sisters on my own.
  • I was living on Brunswick Street off of Park Avenue.
  • And one Sunday, I went in on a brunch,
  • and Plunkett was as cheerful and cordial to me
  • as she could possibly be.
  • She was really friendly, as Susan is, and made
  • me feel really at home.
  • And we always remember that encounter.
  • But it wasn't until I came back after that trip from Iowa--
  • actually Barbara is sitting here with me.
  • I went to the gay rights rally in.
  • Washington, DC.
  • And I went along--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: In 1983, no.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I think it was '81?
  • '81.
  • And I was friends with this guy named John.
  • He was straight, he loved me, he was very attracted to me,
  • and I wasn't.
  • But he was a friend, but nonetheless, we were friendly.
  • And I went on the bus with him.
  • I don't know what the bus was, but they
  • were very, very serious.
  • And, you know, we went down on this bus.
  • And I met lots of different people.
  • But I don't remember meeting anybody from Rochester.
  • On the way back I went, they told me--
  • I met some women, though.
  • And they said, come on the bus with us.
  • Well, I got on the bus with all the women.
  • They were all exhausted.
  • And I find out from Barbara that that bus that went down,
  • they were partying like crazy.
  • On the way back they were all exhausted, falling asleep.
  • So, I missed the boat on both ends.
  • But a couple of years later, after I was introduced
  • to the community, meeting Barbara, and Joe Cummings,
  • and all kinds of people, we were looking through Barbara
  • [Chance?] pictures.
  • And lo and behold, in the pictures,
  • we see me in the front of her pictures,
  • passing by, in her pictures.
  • And Barbara [Chance?] ended up being my lover in the early
  • '80s, as most people know that know us.
  • And it was just fascinating that Barbara was spotting me.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: She came across--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: It was like Where's Waldo.
  • Where's Ramona in the photos?
  • So anyway, so that's how it happened.
  • I think I was introduced to the community in '81, John, Jackie,
  • Joe, Jill, remember all the Js, Joni, Joan.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Was Snake Sisters still--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes.
  • Oh yeah.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Tell me a little bit
  • about Snake Sisters and also The Riverview.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Sure, sure, I remember both very well.
  • Although I seemed to be the youngster at the time,
  • you know, mostly at The Riverview I was the youngster.
  • But Snake Sisters was fairly, I think it was early,
  • mid-'70s when it opened.
  • And like I said, I went in in '78.
  • I remember meeting on Sundays, and they
  • would have, remember, they would have Leo Warner, a brunch,
  • and, you know, people singing.
  • And it was great.
  • I loved it.
  • I loved it.
  • We had a real sense of community.
  • Christine Galvin was the owner.
  • And she kept the sense of community,
  • which I think we kind of lack now, which
  • I'll talk about as we go along.
  • It was really, a really nice place for women to gather.
  • And it was all women, always all women.
  • But I remember women gatherings, you know.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: There were never men.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Right, exactly.
  • And, you know, I met so many still
  • long-lasting relationships, like yourself, Evelyn,
  • And we would go to Riverview.
  • That bar I was introduced to by Sally and a few of the others.
  • They all took me out to-- they took me
  • on a tour of the gay bars when I first got here
  • and when they first introduced me in '81.
  • We went to Riverview.
  • We went to across the street to, what
  • was the one on Monroe Avenue?
  • Oh, come on.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Rosie's?
  • BARBARA: The pub?
  • Not Rosie's?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: No, the Avenue Pub.
  • No. no.
  • Rosie's wasn't--
  • BARBARA: Friar's.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Friar's.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Friar's.
  • I don't think Rosie's existed yet.
  • BARBARA: No.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: No.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: You know, oh, what's the name of the--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Forty (unintelligible)?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: On Charlotte Street.
  • Oh, come on, Barbara.
  • O.K. Corral, remember O.K. Corral?
  • Alan Street, you know?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Alan Street.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, we all know Alan Street.
  • And we went on a huge tour of all the gay bars.
  • I was fascinated, you know, that there were so many
  • and that the community seemed really tight.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: There were fifteen.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: At the time?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Gay bars.
  • BARBARA: Really?
  • Wow.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Yes.
  • Now there's only two, but The Riverview is an institution,
  • was an institution.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, yes.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And many, many women.
  • For many women that was their only social outlet.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, yeah, I could see that.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Was it also a political outlet?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I think so.
  • I think underground people met there to organize.
  • I did.
  • You know, there were all kinds of shenanigans going on
  • at The Riverview.
  • BARBARA: Who was that woman named Patty?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Patty Evans?
  • BARBARA: Yeah.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Yeah.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I remember John,
  • the moment I was talking about, the straight male friend
  • of mine.
  • He was very upset when I ended up with Sally.
  • And he had the audacity to come to that bar and make a scene.
  • And you should have seen those women rally around
  • me and escort his ass out, sorry, escort his ass out
  • of that bar.
  • He did not come, he couldn't come near me.
  • You know, he was never going to do anything physical.
  • I never believed that about John.
  • He was the nicest, gentlest man.
  • But he was upset.
  • He was hoping that I would turn a corner.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Turn a corner, yeah.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: And I was turning
  • another corner (laughter).
  • EVELYN BAILEY: So, Ramona, there's some kind of a thread
  • here because you were connected to people,
  • like the coach at Fordham, who were bucking
  • the system, who were constantly confronting the,
  • quote unquote, "powers that be," the status quo.
  • When did your political activism begin?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Probably, I think my political activism
  • started in third grade.
  • Seriously, I challenged a third grade teacher who I thought
  • was very, very unfair teaching methods.
  • She favored boys.
  • Her methods were appalling to me.
  • I didn't have that word, but I felt it.
  • And I remember we had what you called lunch and recess.
  • And I had about an hour to organize.
  • And I got forty-five out of--
  • I'll never forget this-- forty-five out
  • of fifty-two signatures.
  • I wrote a petition up.
  • And I had everybody sign this petition to challenge her
  • and ask her to change her methods.
  • I don't think I had those words, but, you know,
  • I wrote something up.
  • And I handed it to her at the end when
  • she came back from her break.
  • And I remember her turning beet red.
  • And the seven people got rewarded
  • for not signing the petition.
  • And the rest of us were, quote unquote, "punished"
  • and, you know, couldn't do anything.
  • But the funny part about that is that I
  • got a report card from her that I have actually
  • framed upstairs.
  • And it says, Ramona is very disrespectful and insolent.
  • She has no regard for authority whatsoever (laughter)..
  • And here's the other funny part, I had a 100 percent attendance.
  • I was there every day, never missed a day (laughs),
  • I loved going to school.
  • I loved it.
  • So I think that was the beginning of my--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Of your sense of injustice.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, exact, that's a good word.
  • And then, also, I noticed that there were only altar boys.
  • And I couldn't understand why they couldn't have altar girls.
  • And I remember questioning that in the school.
  • They had a fit about that because the boys got so much
  • advantage to being altar boys.
  • They had trips.
  • They had parties.
  • They were always getting pulled out of class
  • and going here and there.
  • And then I started playing basketball.
  • And this is when that started to tilt, too,
  • because I noticed that the boys had cheerleaders and the girls
  • didn't.
  • You know, they had a huge, huge crowds and, you know,
  • cheerleaders.
  • And we get there and we maybe have
  • a parent in the audience or someone, you know, sitting,
  • not even a teacher.
  • And I started to really see the injustice, you know,
  • that it was very clear to me that there
  • was an imbalance in the gender.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And so when you came to Rochester,
  • and it was 1976.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: '76 began it.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Six, '78.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Well, at Fisher
  • I challenged the athletic, not the athletic director,
  • my basketball coach.
  • I had come on a--
  • I put this in quotes-- "scholarship"
  • because it was Division Two at the time,
  • and they gave you a package.
  • And when I got there, the coach, I'm sorry,
  • and the dean pulled me in to talk to me.
  • I had taken a bus from Long Island.
  • And they said to me, "well Ramona,
  • you know, since you're here and maybe you want to get in shape
  • and you want to play volleyball.: I said,
  • "I don't play volleyball."
  • "Well, it would be good for you to get to know the girls."
  • "No, I don't play volleyball," I said.
  • "I just play basketball.
  • I'm going to have enough trouble keeping my academics up."
  • So they couldn't talk me into volleyball.
  • I said, I'm going to play basketball.
  • And so the dean says, "you took a bus up here, right?"
  • I said, "yeah."
  • He said, "how about we fly you home
  • and your father, wink wink, can pay us back
  • when he gets around to it."
  • My father never paid him back.
  • They flew me back.
  • I thought I was high on the hog.
  • I was like, oh my god, Rochester.
  • Yeah, it was a great move.
  • And he recruited a lot of people year.
  • There was a very-- it was a big recruiting year, '76,
  • for Fisher.
  • So, of sixteen women, you know, embarked on Fisher, you know,
  • to think that we were all going to start.
  • And it was, you know, like, almost a cat fight
  • because we were all fighting for a position.
  • I hurt my knee the first year before the season even started.
  • But, you know, I felt like I was, you know,--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Well, you were certainly there.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I was recruited.
  • I forgot where I was going with this.
  • What was I--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Your option.
  • Your activism.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Oh, yeah, right.
  • So then the following year, I get a notice
  • that we owe so much money for the tuition.
  • I called my father.
  • I said, "Dad, what's going on?"
  • And he said, "I don't know."
  • He goes, "I copied verbatim the last thing."
  • So I went to the coach.
  • He says, "oh we've made changes.
  • Your father made changes in the thing."
  • So I knew there was a discrepancy there.
  • So they tried to reduce my, quote unquote, "scholarship."
  • So I challenged it and won because my father never
  • changed anything.
  • And all of a sudden, the other players started piping in, Sue
  • Maroney, who was a very famous ballplayer there,
  • Kathy [Fraswell ?] a bunch of players started coming knocking
  • on the door.
  • "Hey, what happened to my scholarship?"
  • Diane [Mukis ?] they were saying, "what happened?"
  • What happened is, the people that were recruited into Fisher
  • were recruited for one sport, asked them to play two.
  • Then they would drop a sport because they
  • couldn't handle it.
  • And then they would say, oh well, you dropped the sport,
  • so we're going to cut your scholarship in half.
  • We're gonna cut your money in half because you're not
  • playing two sports.
  • You get it?
  • Because they signed a contract.
  • So, you know, people like Sue Maroney were highly insulted.
  • And I think they got their money back,
  • Diane [Mukis ?] a bunch of them that stopped playing two
  • sports.
  • But that was another little check for me
  • that I felt like, you know,--
  • I ended up making The Pioneer.
  • They interviewed me.
  • [Kaylor ?] was not happy with me,
  • but I ended up transferring to Fordham.
  • And I think that's why, when I came back,
  • I didn't want to play my senior year there
  • because I felt like I, you know, had
  • went against the establishment at Fisher.
  • So I was on the down low there.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: But then you stayed on here in Rochester.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes.
  • Well, like we said, we went back up.
  • We went to Iowa, came back, went to, you know, the gay pride.
  • And I ended up settling here in Rochester
  • for a couple of years.
  • I wasn't as active.
  • I was more into socializing.
  • You know, going here to The Riverview,
  • going here, going to Alan Street, dance and dance
  • and dance and dance, and doing our thing.
  • I never was a drinker or, you know, a big pot smoker.
  • Although I was introduced to pot.
  • It was like, those were the days.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Everybody is.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Everybody was.
  • And I was an athlete.
  • And what ended up happening is, I got an offer to coach
  • at Queens College.
  • And so I assistant coached, and I went back to New York,
  • lived in Brooklyn with my aunt and uncle,
  • and commuted from Brooklyn to Queens College everyday.
  • It was quite a trek.
  • And I coached, and before that I coached in Fredonia State
  • University.
  • Here while I was in Rochester, I lived in Fredonia for a season.
  • And my basketball career was moving along.
  • And I was doing camps.
  • And, you know, then I started getting more and more involved
  • with--
  • Well, we'll get to the Topfree now, right?
  • Get into the Topfree?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: But were you were involved with Women Against
  • Violence Against Women?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, peripherally I was involved.
  • What I would do is, yeah, WAVAW.
  • Barbara, because she's sitting here,
  • and a couple of other friends, we would go out and we pasted,
  • a lot of times, against whatever, whoever.
  • We were pasting maybe the--
  • We'd go up onto the, remember the billboards,
  • Barbara, the Black Velvet billboards?
  • I epoxy glued, well I don't know if we should say this,
  • but epoxy glued the Monroe Theater.
  • They had to call in a locksmith, but we epoxy glued
  • all the locks.
  • I couldn't stand that theater.
  • I still can't.
  • I don't know why they're keeping it.
  • But it's historical, I know.
  • But anyway, you know, little shenanigans like that.
  • We were totally campaigning against violence
  • against women and rape.
  • And, you know, trying to raise awareness in the city.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And were you involved with the Rape Crisis?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I worked at, the domestic violence program
  • is more (unintelligible) I worked
  • at ABW for a couple of years.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And then you catapulted yourself
  • into this action at Cobb's Hill Park.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes and it kind of
  • coincided with my activism with the Pride Parades
  • because first it was the Topfree.
  • And then I remember I used to go to New York
  • and go to the Pride Parades for over ten years
  • while I was in Rochester.
  • I'd go every year, go down at the end of June
  • like you're supposed to.
  • End of June is, you know, Stonewall.
  • And I would march in the parade and take off my shirt.
  • And Gail [Neison?] and I went down there with it.
  • One year we took off our shirts and danced the whole way down,
  • you know, like, exhausted.
  • And people were taking pictures.
  • And it wasn't legal yet.
  • And that was '86.
  • And then I kept thinking, why don't we
  • have a parade in Rochester, you know?
  • But you want me to talk about the Topfree first?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Yeah.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: OK.
  • In '85 I lived off of Park Avenue, Girton Place.
  • And there's a park behind this, the Museum and Science Center.
  • And that year I was introduced to the Schloss's house.
  • They had a sauna and whirlpool.
  • And I was introduced to Naturism through Cathy Riley.
  • I would have never gone there if it wasn't for Cathy.
  • I really trusted her judgment.
  • She said, come during the winter.
  • And so Barbara and I would trek over in the snow,
  • you know, and said who we were.
  • And we'd get in, you know, and give them a donation
  • and make sure there was no men around.
  • And we'd go in and swim and go in the sauna and whirlpool.
  • And Cathy kept talking about we should protest,
  • talking about the possibility that they're
  • protesting that we can't take off our shirts in public.
  • And I thought that was the most ridiculous thing I've ever
  • heard, I really did.
  • I thought that is just not something
  • that I'm interested in, had no connection to me.
  • I had no passion for it.
  • I was too busy doing things for raising awareness
  • for world hunger.
  • I did, remember, I did a couple of shows
  • that we haven't talked about yet in '85 and '86, right Barbara?
  • The Lesbian Variety Fashion Show and the Amazon Utopia Show
  • which were pretty, in their small right,
  • successes in the community.
  • And I couldn't put the two together.
  • I just couldn't validate it.
  • It didn't seem like something that I would rally behind.
  • But nonetheless, I kept going to the Schloss's.
  • Barbara and I kept going.
  • We kept hearing in the background,
  • we should be doing something about
  • that we can't take off our shirts in public.
  • And I kept thinking, what are they talking about?
  • I just couldn't do it.
  • So anyway, that June, I started in the winter,
  • and that June of '85, right?
  • It was '85.
  • I was in the park, lying on my stomach.
  • And, you know, at one point, I took off my shirt
  • because I was really hot.
  • I'm lying down on my stomach, and I must have passed out.
  • And all of a sudden, I got a tap.
  • And I look up, and this man's standing over me.
  • And he says, "ma'am you're going to have to put your shirt on."
  • I happened to pick my head up, and I saw a person over there.
  • And I said, you tell the person over there to put his shirt on.
  • I'll gladly put my shirt on.
  • He goes, "you're a woman."
  • I said, man.
  • I said, nice observation.
  • Back I went down.
  • He said, "I'm gonna have to get the authorities."
  • Go right ahead.
  • So he went and got his, you know,
  • the white shirts of the Museum of Science Center.
  • Now I had two men standing over me.
  • He said, "under the New York State penal law,
  • if you do not put your shirt on now,
  • you're going to be arrested."
  • I said, well, "I have to think about this," you know.
  • I had no witnesses.
  • Nobody was backing me up.
  • And so I thought about it, and I thought
  • as I slowly put my shirt on.
  • And I said, "this won't be the first time."
  • I don't know, I think the expression is not
  • to be the last time.
  • But I think it was like a foreshadowing.
  • And I stood up and walked over to the guy.
  • And I said, you know, "I'm being thrown out of this park
  • because of exactly what you're doing."
  • He goes, "why?"
  • I said, "I had my shirt off, and I was lying down bathing
  • like you are."
  • And I walked out storming and went
  • to the Schloss's and talked to Mary Lou and Cathy.
  • And next thing you know, we started organizing.
  • The whole winter, we started talking about it.
  • Was it, yeah, it was '85.
  • So we started talking about it, the whole winter,
  • started plotting.
  • What would we do?
  • What would we do?
  • And then we would, you know, come back again
  • a couple of weeks later.
  • We'd talk about it.
  • As it got closer to the spring, Mary Lou
  • hadn't committed to it.
  • And until Mary Lou committed, then I knew I was--
  • I just had a feeling about Mary Lou.
  • Mary Lou was just the person that, yeah, she always
  • was a rock in this movement.
  • And once she said yes, we started--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: You were there.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: --forging ahead with a plan.
  • And so we started calling it the Topless Picnic.
  • Well, where we were going to do it?
  • We were thinking of this, that, this,
  • and ended up at Cobb's Hill.
  • And I think it was a week before the Topless Picnic.
  • We were going to set out a press release.
  • And it kept bothering me.
  • The word kept bothering me.
  • I kept thinking, what is wrong with this word?
  • And then I soon made the connection
  • that it had too much connotation to pornography
  • and topless bars.
  • And so I thought, free, top free.
  • And I told [Morely ?] I said, "[Morely ?] how about Topfree
  • Picnic?"
  • And he looked, and he goes, "brilliant!"
  • And so we put it on the press releases.
  • And we started referring it to as the Topfree
  • Picnic because men take off their shirts and women
  • doffed their shirts, you know, doffed their blouses,
  • I should say, bared their breasts.
  • You know, the whole slew of ridiculous comments and sayings
  • to call what women do when--
  • And men do take off their shirts.
  • And shirtless, clearly, is the genderless phrase.
  • But we chose Topfree.
  • And the media still to this day has yet to catch on.
  • Twenty years later we had, you know, what's his name?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: They are slow.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: What's his name?
  • BARBARA: Rush Limbaugh?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: No, no, Barbara.
  • I'm forgetting his name.
  • You know, from CMF.
  • He used to be on CMF.
  • Come on.
  • Oh my god, he even talks about me all the time.
  • It's terrible I don't even remember his name.
  • CMF guy.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: I know who you mean.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Barbara, that local guy?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Yeah, I know who you mean, too.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: God, it's terrible.
  • BARBARA: Senior moment.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah we're having a senior moment.
  • All of us.
  • Well, anyway, we'll get to it.
  • They called me, and they asked me
  • if I would speak for the 20th anniversary because no one,
  • Mary Lou wouldn't do it, no one would come forth.
  • And I thought, you know what, this is not
  • going to turn out right.
  • This is going to be a zoo if I don't represent.
  • So I wrote out a very, I thought,
  • a very thoughtful and cohesive and comprehensive speech.
  • [Morely ?] said it was the most elegant speech,
  • on the top three that he's ever heard me give.
  • And do you think the media picked up one word?
  • Not one word.
  • They didn't even televise it.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Brother Wease?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Brother Wease, thank you.
  • Thank you.
  • Brother Wease.
  • OK, so that went by, but to the Topfree.
  • We had our little gathering up in Cobb's Hill.
  • I just spoke about this with a man who
  • just did a documentary about--
  • He interviewed me.
  • He's doing a documentary about someone in New York
  • right now who's going around shirtless
  • in New York calling herself Harvey the Topless Paparrazi.
  • She's hysterical.
  • She's 46 years old, white, white, white, white hair.
  • And she has a camera over her neck.
  • And she's taking pictures.
  • She takes all these pictures of all these actors and actresses
  • and says, I'm the Topless, Harvey the Topless.
  • And she draws a mustache on herself.
  • She's hysterical.
  • And he just showed me the doc--
  • He just sent me the documentary.
  • And I'm in it.
  • He interviewed me because she tells the cops, it's legal.
  • And she said for twenty years this law has been
  • in existence and nobody knows.
  • So anyway, so that's going on right now simultaneously.
  • Yeah.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Now, were you arrested?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, thank you.
  • So we had a little agreement with the police.
  • They wanted me to do it on Thursday rather than Saturday.
  • I said, no that was the whole point.
  • We wanted to be arrested and bring it to the courts
  • and make a splash in the media.
  • And so seven of us chose to keep our shirts off.
  • And we were arrested and taken to Highland,
  • at the time, Highland Station.
  • We were issued citations.
  • They're merely like a parking ticket, by the way.
  • And we were to appear in court, which we
  • did in front of Hermann Walls.
  • And he ruled in our favor.
  • Well of course, the district district attorney, you know--
  • BARBARA: Howard Rome?
  • Yeah, what did do?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Howard Rowan.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I'm having another senior moment.
  • Not contested--
  • BARBARA: Appealed it?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Thank you, appealed it.
  • And so that was going through the court system.
  • Well, next two years we start doing things
  • like going to Tennessee Valley park.
  • We had a picnic.
  • Sheriffs came down, drove out, didn't bother us,
  • two years in a row.
  • The third year after that '86 case,
  • we decided to go to the lake.
  • We thought, what better place to go and swim, you know?
  • And we always chose June 21st because of the Summer Solstice.
  • We figured that was the beginning of the summer,
  • so we thought it was significant.
  • So a bunch of us went down.
  • By that time we had gay momentum.
  • People knew who we were.
  • I was riding my bike around the city with my shirt off.
  • I was also riding with a roommate of mine.
  • He was involved with--
  • Barbara, what is it?
  • Who was he involved with?
  • Was it the fairies?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Radical Fairies.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: The Radical Fairies, it was hysterical.
  • He had these angel wings on.
  • And I had suspenders on, and he wore a skirt,
  • and we rode around the city, all over the place.
  • And people would stare at him and forget me.
  • And that was the whole point.
  • It was hysterical.
  • And we have a lot of pictures about that.
  • And then one year, one time, Susan David and I
  • rode our bikes from Girton to Wilmer Street, which
  • wasn't a far ride on Oxford.
  • And we got stopped, and I had, you know,
  • coached Susan David to say, if they stop us,
  • we're going to give them an alias name.
  • She goes, oh, OK.
  • So when they stop us they said, you know, put your shirts on.
  • We said, we're not going to.
  • And he said, what's your name, he says to me.
  • I said, Ann.
  • Ann who?
  • I said, Arkie.
  • So he says to Susan, what's your name?
  • Susan.
  • Susan what?
  • Susan David.
  • I'm like, oh, god, you know, she just blew my cover.
  • Everybody laughed about this because I gave him my address
  • and he said, oh 23 Girton.
  • Well, Ramona Santorelli lives at 23 Girton.
  • Hm, I wonder if Ann Arkie and Ramona Santorelli--
  • It was such a dumb thing for me to do, but it was still fun.
  • And so we--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Did you get another citation?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: We did not.
  • We did not.
  • But we got a warning.
  • And I was told by the lawyer that picked up
  • our Topfree ten, which I'll get to,
  • said that if we had gotten arrested,
  • it wouldn't have been good for the case to go, you know,
  • through the court system.
  • We would have had another case.
  • And it might have been cited as, what did they say, hostile,
  • or there were all kinds of words that they describe
  • for, you know, disobeying the law when there's already
  • something in the system.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Harass.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, thank you, whatever the words are.
  • No they're harassing us, but I'm saying they call it--
  • if I disobeyed the law again, you know what I mean?
  • Anyway, so the third picnic that we
  • were talking about down at the lake, we started swimming.
  • We had a great time.
  • Tierney came there, a woman named Tierney.
  • She was breastfeeding her three-year-old, which everyone
  • thought was outrageous.
  • But she breastfed until her children didn't
  • want to be breastfed anymore.
  • That was one of the naturist things.
  • They were really into, you know, breastfeeding.
  • And by the way, that's why Mary Lou, you know,
  • chose to be part of this is because it was an oversight
  • by the legislatures.
  • For several years it was illegal to breastfeed
  • in public in New York State.
  • Come on, now.
  • So we put that in.
  • Tierney, you know, was breastfeeding.
  • And what happened is we're having a great time,
  • nobody was bothering us, and all of a sudden,
  • I swear this is what happened, I look over and there were cops.
  • I'm sorry, cops coming, police officers
  • coming over the hill this way on the land.
  • And all of a sudden there were boats coming this way.
  • There were Sheriff boats coming this way.
  • We were being--
  • It was like we had done something, like we had,
  • you know, murdered somebody.
  • It was crazy.
  • They were all converging on us.
  • And I knelt down at the water, and I waded in
  • to see what was going to happen.
  • They were going up to each of the women
  • and asking us to put our shirts on.
  • And several refused, and several put their shirts on because
  • of reasons that they couldn't do the legal system.
  • And they finally came down to me and said, "Ramona, I
  • know who you are."
  • And it was a woman.
  • She said, "I really appreciate what you're doing.
  • But it's my obligations, my duty,
  • to ask you to put your shirt on."
  • I said, "I can't put my shirt on.
  • I'm not going to.
  • I don't even have a shirt," I told them.
  • So they put us in a paddy wagon, ten of us.
  • And it was a scene because they didn't
  • know what, the Irondequoit police didn't
  • know what to do with us.
  • So they called the city police, and they brought us
  • to the park.
  • And they left us in a paddy wagon in ninety degree weather,
  • running with no air condition.
  • And we were locked in the paddy wagon.
  • I got claustrophobic.
  • It was quite a scene.
  • Took us downtown, brought us in.
  • Several of us did not have any shirts on.
  • They would not release us until the men that were waiting
  • for us gave up their shirts.
  • And we had to put them on.
  • That's how we got out (Bailey laughs).
  • Can you believe that?
  • Yeah, so the men who were in the hallway without their shirts,
  • so they can get us, so that we can walk out with our shirts.
  • So now we had two cases going through the court system.
  • And that's how it ended up.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Who was the attorney?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: My attorney at the time?
  • That's a good question.
  • I see her face, and I have her picture,
  • and I don't remember her name.
  • I'll have to get her name, I'm sorry.
  • I don't remember her name.
  • It wasn't
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Ellen?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: No, no, no, no.
  • Ellen Yakin, no, no, no.
  • We wanted her to represent us under the Fourteenth Amendment.
  • We didn't want to be under the First Amendment
  • because the First Amendment, you know, fueled pornographers.
  • And we got the whole gist of this from the '86 case.
  • Well nonetheless, the '86 case and the '89 case
  • were traveling through the highest court in New York
  • state.
  • They ended up taking the '86 case because that's
  • the first case that got there.
  • And Mary Lou Schloss was representing herself
  • so she'd have leeway in the legal system.
  • And out of the blue, Harold Price Ferring from New York,
  • from Manhattan, called and asked if he could represent me
  • pro bono.
  • So he did.
  • And we ended up on Donohue again.
  • We were on Donahue in '86.
  • And in '91 we were on Donahue.
  • And he came on the show with us.
  • And I remember my relatives in New York,
  • they were all Italian in New York at that time, they really
  • raised an eyebrow.
  • Like whoa, he's the establishment,
  • classy establishment, white man, gray hair, well-spoken,
  • you know.
  • And they were like, woo, who's this man?
  • And so it suddenly got more attention.
  • And when he represented us he was brilliant.
  • And we won the case.
  • And I tell Barbara this and everybody, the reason
  • why it's The People vs. Santorelli
  • and not Schloss is because it's SA not SC.
  • And that's how it came down.
  • So The People vs. Santorelli has been used, apparently, a lot,
  • I've been hearing.
  • All through the state, and other states
  • are pulling out this case, and including this woman, Holly,
  • who I've made friends with in New York who's doing
  • this activism in Manhattan.
  • All over the Boroughs, actually.
  • She's in the Bronx, she's in Brooklyn.
  • BARBARA: On the subways.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, she is on the subway.
  • She's amazing, taking her shirt off.
  • And she's getting arrested.
  • And they're bringing her into court,
  • and they have to throw it out because it's legal.
  • They sent her to a mental institution.
  • They carried her away on a gurney to a mental institution,
  • yes, because she refused to put a shirt back on in Manhattan.
  • Yep.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Oh, my gosh.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: So that's the long and the short of--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: It's too bad when Manhattan
  • got flooded this past Sandy, some of the police officers
  • minds didn't get flooded too.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: I mean, you would think
  • they would be up on the law, minimally.
  • I mean--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Well, one of the men, obviously a gay man,
  • in the documentary that we just, Barbara I saw last night,
  • he said, "it's really scary when you're
  • being confronted by police who clearly don't know the law.
  • And it's legal.
  • And you're being arrested for it."
  • I mean, that's a scary position to be in.
  • She kept saying to them, it's legal, it's legal.
  • So anyway, that's the long and the short of it.
  • When I'm interviewed in person I'll
  • get into why I chose to be involved because initially I
  • told you I wasn't interested at all.
  • And, you know, what ends up unraveling, ironically,
  • after I got jolted by those police, those security guards,
  • in the Museum and Science Center,
  • and then I was all stormy, and, you know,
  • I'm going to get back.
  • And then what started unraveling,
  • I started hearing Mary Lou say that it
  • was illegal to breastfeed in public.
  • And I thought, oh that's weird, you know.
  • And then all of a sudden, I started making connections
  • because, as I was taking off my shirt,
  • I was getting all this attention.
  • I thought, well this is kind of, you know, it made you feel
  • shame and guilt. And I started making the feminist connections
  • to body image.
  • And suddenly, I started connecting
  • that women aren't feeling good about their bodies
  • because we're not fitting the perfect body type
  • that's portrayed in media and the silicone breasts.
  • I found that the breast augmentation still
  • is the number one leading cosmetic surgery in the United
  • States.
  • Breast enlargement, can you imagine?
  • And so what ended up happening was like an onion.
  • Everything kept peeling, you know.
  • I kept peeling it, the onion, and layers
  • and layers and layers.
  • And suddenly, I started thinking, oh my god, this
  • has everything to do with a woman's right to choose.
  • I found out that in the '20s it was illegal for women
  • to appear in public exposing their arms and their legs.
  • It was considered sexual.
  • And I started learning that breasts
  • were secondary sexual characteristics, not primary.
  • And I started seeing men having, you know,
  • protrusions just like women.
  • I started realizing that women had different sizes and shapes,
  • that we weren't this perfect size.
  • And I started realizing that this
  • is what needed to be shown, you know,
  • that we're not all the perfect, you know, pornographic look.
  • And then I started realizing that what happened is,
  • this is about male dominance and control,
  • that we can appear in a topless bar and get paid for that,
  • or we can appear in pornography.
  • But not if we want to just choose to do it,
  • you know, at a beach or a park or riding our bikes
  • or after a basketball game.
  • The list goes on and on for women
  • to freely do what they want to do.
  • And so that started--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Dominance and control
  • is the name of the game.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Absolutely.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And it has been ever
  • since the goddess was tried to be buried, you know, replaced--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: And buried right.
  • Yes, indeed.
  • Yes, indeed.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: I mean, there takes a certain amount,
  • I think, of courage, anger, and determination
  • to go ahead and do what you've done.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, good words.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: It just doesn't happen.
  • You know, there's a whole history
  • behind that and a process that you went through.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, and we went on Donahue in '86.
  • My voicemail-- we didn't have cell phones at the time--
  • was off the hook.
  • Ask Barbara.
  • CNN, "Good Morning America," "Donahue," you know,
  • radio stations--
  • it was off the hook.
  • And we end up flying to New York to do "The Donahue Show."
  • He was a big wig, but I was very nervous
  • and I didn't have all my facts in order.
  • In '91, I came fully prepared and I
  • thought I represented myself and the movement
  • much, much better than I did in '86 because I had learned
  • so much about what I was doing.
  • and now I can clearly articulate more of the issues
  • that I had a say in '86 because I was fired up, as you say,
  • fueled by anger and humiliation, really.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Were you involved with the "New Women's Times?"
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Peripherally, too.
  • I was never really--
  • I mean I think I wrote a couple of things in there,
  • admitted some poetry.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Black Rose?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: I also did a benefit
  • for "New Women's Times--" the lesbian variety fashion show.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Right.
  • You did two with them.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes.
  • Amazon Utopia and Lesbian Fashion Show
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And were those at--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: They were at the old Jazzberry's.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Jazzberry's.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, (unintelligible) That's right.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Do you remember what year those were?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah '85 was the Lesbian Friday Fashion Show
  • and '86 was the Amazon Utopia.
  • In '85, somehow I managed to get it in lights.
  • The bank downtown-- I don't know what the bank's called.
  • I don't even know if it's a bank anymore--
  • but it's a huge building.
  • And they used to have those things that they put up
  • at different events.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Strobe?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Different events.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Yeah.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: And I remember getting it on there--
  • the Lesbian Variety Fashion Show,
  • benefit for world hunger at Jazzberry's whenever it was.
  • May such and such.
  • Wasn't that great?
  • I don't know how that happened, but I got it up there.
  • Yep, I remember that one.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And the Amazon utopia,
  • was that for world hunger too?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, I think it did.
  • "Newman's Times" benefit.
  • I think I did a couple of things for that.
  • I think we raised about $1100.
  • I think it was $1200 and the other one was $1100.
  • You You know it was a considerable amount of money
  • in those days considering we did two shows.
  • The Amazon Utopia was sort of like a kick off
  • for the variety show.
  • I was trying to bring back the spirit of a time
  • when Amazons ruled the earth.
  • I was trying to be inclusive and, at the time,
  • I was working at the Boys and Girls Club,
  • so I invited many of the boys to come and do break dancing.
  • And the first show, they didn't realize we were all lesbians
  • and they freaked out and left.
  • Yeah, so that was kind of a little faux pas on my part
  • because I didn't tell them.
  • I didn't intentionally not tell them, I just invited them.
  • I was like, come on.
  • I was trying to be inclusive and that was the point of the show.
  • I had men in the show-- straight men, gay men, you know.
  • We had two kinds of things going on in Amazon Utopia.
  • And I call it Amazon U-flop-ia because a lot of things
  • I didn't care for.
  • The variety show was, I thought, was way more successful.
  • We had a lot more fun.
  • But I want to talk about the women's community
  • and what it was like for me in the '80s.
  • I always felt a real strong sense of community here.
  • We always had women's events, you know.
  • Jazzberry's was a huge place to gather.
  • Michigan Womyn's Music Festival-- all the festivals--
  • I use to go to.
  • The smaller ones as well.
  • And there was always a sense of this really powerful
  • connection-- the strong community that we had--
  • that has really dispelled.
  • And I have some theories about it.
  • Some of it I think is capitalism and the, you know,
  • strong force of the patriarchy.
  • Everybody, as we get older, you know,
  • we're forced to get in our own homes and pay our bills,
  • and now we're separated.
  • And also-- and this is a good thing too--
  • I think the AA movement and people stopped drinking,
  • I think that was a huge movement in stopping people
  • from going and closing down some of the bars, which
  • is not a bad thing I'm saying.
  • But nonetheless, there's a different feel
  • and we don't have that--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Feminism is not a part
  • of this culture any longer.
  • We have blended to the point where we're not distinguished.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, that's what I'm getting at.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And that's why, for me, doing this documentary
  • is so important.
  • Once you have the history of a community, the gay community
  • specifically, you have it in front of you.
  • You can't forget it.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Right and I'm so happy you're doing this.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And it's documented.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Absolutely.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Feminism, where did I read--
  • there was two or three waves of feminism.
  • And I think, initially, when women
  • wanted to be able to do what men wanted to do,
  • there was incredible energy behind that.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: And then come the backlash.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: But now, women can do what men can do.
  • You have Ann Mulcahey, you have Ursula Burns,
  • you have corporate leaders who are women who may not
  • be allowed into this golf club or that golf club,
  • but they stand with the other magnets, you know.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: But as I used to say in the domestic violence
  • program, men and women will never be equal until rape ends,
  • and that is the responsibility of men.
  • I worked in the domestic violence program
  • for twenty-one years facilitating
  • for men who batter women.
  • And I never let them get away with that.
  • Oh, women have a lot.
  • They're equal these days.
  • They go on and on.
  • And I always raise that issue and it's
  • being raised in India right now.
  • You know about all that in India?
  • And it took a woman from India-- a feminist--
  • to say this, we need to look at how
  • we are raising our young boys in this culture--
  • in her culture-- not this country.
  • You think you would be saying this in this country
  • after what happened in Newtown and how it happened in Webster
  • and what's happening in all the mass shootings.
  • The thread that binds them together is that behind the gun
  • are young males or men.
  • You don't see young women.
  • The big debate is gun control or mental illness.
  • Well, I'm all for both.
  • I understand the issues, but no one will address gender.
  • No one.
  • They won't talk about it because they'll say it's male bashing.
  • I've heard that argument.
  • It's male bashing.
  • Oh, well, women are mass murderers.
  • Well, when?
  • I got my oil changed.
  • I go to my mechanic and a couple of men stood around.
  • They were all older men.
  • "Well, I remember in eighteen such and such--"
  • I said, "really?
  • Are you really saying this?"
  • He talked about a woman who rented a boarding house
  • and she was killing people.
  • I said, "really?
  • In eighteen so and so?
  • You can't even remember the date." (laughs).
  • It outrages me.
  • I'm really very upset about it.
  • And back to the feminism is where are we?
  • It's like we're were being drowned by--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: We're in an assimilation phase.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: But it's over our heads.
  • It's like we're drowning in it.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Yes, but I think you'll
  • see in future generations it come back because history
  • always repeats itself.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Back to the Topfree Look
  • at this these women in New York all over the place.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And the other thing
  • is feminism is not any more a bad word.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, that's true.
  • Just like lesbian.
  • Our president says lesbian.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Even among women it's not a bad word.
  • I do think, however, that--
  • I've said this to people in our own community--
  • you have got to remain vigilant, because it would not
  • take a great deal to undo the laws and the freedoms
  • that we have.
  • I mean look at the power of the NRA.
  • Look at the sheer, unadulterated power and control.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, that's true.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Now, if those men didn't
  • need women to cook for them, and clean for them,
  • and wipe their asses, where do you think they would be?
  • Where do you think we would be?
  • We wouldn't exist.
  • They'd wipe us all out because we're unnecessary.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Oh I can go on and on about women
  • being unnecessary.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: But, Ramona, somewhere your sense
  • of injustice was--
  • you were taught it, you were shown it, you grew up in it.
  • I'm Italian and there was always in my family the sense,
  • especially with my grandmother, the man
  • sits at the head of the table and he eats first,
  • but I have the power.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: My family the women
  • did all the cooking, the prepping, the cleaning,
  • and the men sat there and ate and drank and were
  • gaudy and loud and catered to.
  • Yes, absolutely.
  • Till this day.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: But wasn't there a sense--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Of injustice.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: No, of your mother,
  • your grandmother saying, I let him think he is the boss
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Cause we had a matriarchy.
  • You're right, my grandmother was the matriarch.
  • You're right.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And so they knew how to co-opt (Santorelli
  • laughs) the Italian man and--
  • SANTORELLI'S DAUGHTER: make him feel he was boss.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Because the family was
  • surrounded by my grandmother.
  • You're right.
  • In some ways that's true.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And that's not necessarily
  • true for all ethnicities, but it's
  • true in the African-American community.
  • And when women in the African-American community
  • get upset, the men listen and they do come around.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: You're absolutely right.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: But I think there are
  • such overriding issues of economics,
  • fear for one's life--
  • I mean, do I feel safe here in Rochester?
  • I don't know.
  • I could walk out your door and be shot down.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: No guarantee anywhere.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And when you have with that kind of fear
  • and that kind of uncertainty, the injustice, the sense
  • of pride, the sense of wrongfulness
  • goes by the wayside because self-preservation takes over,
  • and you do what you have to do to survive.
  • And--
  • SANTORELLI'S DAUGHTER: This is supposed
  • to be one of the most violent cities, Rochester.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Really?
  • SANTORELLI'S DAUGHTER: Mm- hm.
  • Right, mom?
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Well, it was the murder capital of New York
  • state, but there's a reason for that though.
  • When Genesee hospital closed, they
  • had a really powerful, really equipped unit
  • to triage the emergency.
  • And they were saving lots of people's lives
  • from gunshot wounds and things like that.
  • When they closed--
  • Carolyn told me this-- the doctor's
  • said that murder rates are going to go up, you watch.
  • And so they did.
  • And then we became the murder capital of New York state.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Well, I also think
  • when they decommissioned Rochester
  • site and these other mental institutions.
  • Those institutions basically kept people on their meds.
  • And so long as they were on the meds, they were manageable.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: You're correct in that.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And they were OK.
  • You let them out into the community
  • with no one to say, well, here's your little cup
  • of pills and your water.
  • And they forget, you know, they choose not to,
  • they don't have the money to.
  • They don't, you know--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: But you know what?
  • Women are mentally ill, but they're
  • not behind machine guns and assault rifles
  • plowing people down.
  • And I keep using that argument to people
  • because they keep saying--
  • I understand the mental illness topic issue.
  • I really get that and I agree with it.
  • However, there's, you know, something much deeper going on
  • in this culture that is silent.
  • It's not being addressed.
  • and yes, a man is crazy for going into a movie theater
  • and plowing people-- yes, a madman plowed down,
  • you know, innocent children.
  • Children and firemen, you know, and the mother is probably
  • one of the biggest taboo, and that Adam ass did that, right?
  • So you think about all these men who are sick.
  • You know that Belcher football guy
  • who grilled ten rounds into his ex-girlfriend.
  • Ten rounds with a handgun and then turned it on himself.
  • How many hand guns have been used to murder women?
  • We're really kind of like, oh, whatever, it's another woman.
  • And think about it.
  • How many women are doing that?
  • Most women that are on death row are there because--
  • you know this-- is because they defended themselves
  • against an abuser.
  • That's a fact, but they don't want to talk about that.
  • "They" meaning the establishment.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: The public doesn't
  • want to hear it because then they would
  • have to do something about it.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yes, exactly.
  • That's my point.
  • You're going to have to address it.
  • War, you're going to have to address.
  • Competition, you're going to have to address.
  • Address male dominance and power and control.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Ramona, let me say
  • I want to thank you for your time.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: OK, we're running out of time.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: No, but I don't know that this is really
  • a part of the documentary.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: What is part of the documentary though,
  • make sure you get in is my activism.
  • I like to get that in about the gay pride parades because Gail
  • and I were were on that--
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Planning committee.
  • Me
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Yeah, and also we
  • were on the roof of that car, and we were waiting for people
  • to turn.
  • We didn't know where everybody was.
  • We were dressed in our gowns, which I thought of.
  • I don't know why I thought of that.
  • I just thought it was really funny.
  • Just lesbian, instead of just married.
  • I had no connection to the marriage equality thing
  • at the time but, I remember waiting.
  • We were the first to start the parade.
  • And Laurie Matoga was driving the car,
  • and we were like, where is everybody?
  • And all of a sudden, you all turned the corner
  • and when you saw us, there was this huge uproar
  • that still fills my heart every time I recall it.
  • It was like (roaring).
  • And there was nobody else downtown,
  • but nonetheless, we saw each other
  • and we made this huge connection.
  • And it was just like we saw each other and that was it.
  • We started that parade and I'll never
  • ever forget that feeling of that first gay pride parade.
  • And then the other ones was I was
  • a homo coming queen, which I thought was pretty funny.
  • I went to married gay fairy high school
  • with Marge Booker as my date.
  • Remember that one?
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Yeah.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: And then I was the gay '90s are back
  • and I'm tickled pink.
  • I had tassels on my nipples and carried a plaque.
  • Those things need to be talked about because those were times
  • that I thought more I was being political.
  • It was a political message along with it being a sense of humor,
  • but also, you know, taking pride.
  • I hope that can be the documentary.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Well, you'll have a chance to say all of that.
  • Because, let me say, from my perspective,
  • you have been really one of the few women
  • in the forefront of women's rights
  • and women's lib for many, many, many years.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: That's nice of you, Evelyn.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: Well, it's not nice.
  • It's true.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Well, it's nice of you to knowledge it.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And because--
  • now, don't push-- your unassuming.
  • You don't do this out of a desire
  • to have accolades or have people look at you.
  • You do it because your heart says
  • this is the right thing to do.
  • And your experience has told you,
  • you cannot walk away from this battle.
  • You can't walk away and leave it alone.
  • You have to intervene where you can.
  • And that takes a great deal of courage,
  • a great deal of integrity.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Thank you, Evelyn.
  • Thank you for acknowledging that.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: The gay community here in Rochester
  • owes you a debt of gratitude--
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: Aw, shucks (laughs).
  • EVELYN BAILEY: For all that you've done.
  • For all that you've done.
  • So thank you.
  • RAMONA SANTORELLI: All right.
  • EVELYN BAILEY: And--