Green Thursday, radio program, February 20, 1975, source recording
- JOE LEARY: Chairperson, people, I just
- want to make a very short statement here and let
- some of you answer some of the questions that Derek has put.
- I was able to tell Frank Kameny last night that Ireland
- has hundreds of GAA groups.
- Unfortunately, in Ireland it stands for Gaelic Athletic
- Association.
- It's nice that we're meeting in this particular hall
- this morning because this particular hall has
- a very interesting stained glass window.
- The window reads, the College of James the Sixth in Edinburgh,
- founded 1582.
- I like to think that James came to Edinburgh sometimes
- for the reasons that we're here today.
- (laughter)
- (applause)
- I went down to London, perhaps, for the same sort of reasons,
- as well.
- (laughter)
- Of course, when he got to London,
- he was a signal success as James the First of England.
- It's very often forgotten that he
- was one of the great diplomats, the very great diplomats,
- of the late seventeenth century.
- Seventeenth?
- Sixteenth, and early seventeenth.
- When he went down there, he was gay
- and he didn't give a damn who cared.
- And when the Privy Council didn't like it,
- he told them just what they could do,
- that he was making George do anyway.
- On other occasions, he was very diplomatic.
- The theater, you will remember, had the female roles
- in those days played by young men who had not yet
- grown beards.
- So, he created the Shakespeare company,
- Gentlemen of the Bedchamber, and that
- explained their presence there.
- James' reign was followed by a rather sadder one.
- It was followed by Charles the First's reign,
- and Charles wasn't all that pro-gay.
- Francis Bacon, of course, died just before James did.
- Lord Audley, unhappily, didn't.
- Lord Audley survived into Charles the First's reign,
- and in the sixth year of that reign, was executed,
- and two of his homosexual lovers hanged.
- And the significance of that, for us in Ireland,
- is that Lord Audley, unfortunately,
- was also Earl of Castlehaven in the Irish peerage.
- And the Irish got uptight, at that time,
- when one of their peers had been executed, and brought
- in the first Irish statute, in the reign of Charles the First,
- making the detestable vice punishable with the pains
- of death.
- And it remained punishable with the pains of death
- right down to 1861.
- And then, of course, you have that marvelous act of 1861,
- which reduced the penalty to mere life imprisonment.
- It's still mere life imprisonment in both Northern
- Ireland and in Éire.
- That is the maximum penalty today in both Northern Ireland
- and Éire, a term of imprisonment of up to life imprisonment,
- if convicted for sodomy.
- The most mischievous bit of English legislation,
- from our point of view, is of course the amendment of 1885.
- Previous to that, the law covered sodomy and attempts
- of sodomy, and indecent assault. In other words, sodomy
- and coercion.
- That 1885 amendment outlawed all acts of gross indecency.
- Gross indecency to be defined, of course, by the courts.
- With the consequences that many of you know so well.
- Now, it still exists, and still applies
- in Ireland, North and South.
- We've asked the authorities in Northern Ireland
- to give us an assurance, such as SMG got a couple of years
- ago, that people in Northern Ireland,
- as United Kingdom citizens, would only be prosecuted
- if they would have been proceeded against in England,
- since the 1967 legislation there.
- And we were politely told to bugger off.
- No such assurance was forthcoming.
- And no such assurance has forthcome.
- And the interpretation of the law
- is very dicey in Northern Ireland,
- because they can proceed under imperial law,
- this 1861, 1885 act, or they can, if they so decide,
- proceed under the '67 act, as part of the United Kingdom.
- And then, of course, we haven't got Stormont anymore.
- And that's a mixed blessing.
- So we're depending on the love and support
- of all the people working for law reform in this country
- to help us included in the United Kingdom Bill.
- And that's, more or less, the situation
- as it stands at the present.
- Now, I'm not a person to say, do this for me, you know,
- and sit back and let you get on with it.
- We conspired three years ago in Northern Ireland
- to set up Belfast Gay Liberation Society.
- And we've gone on conspiring, because that's
- what we're doing, ever since.
- We have Sexual Liberation Movement in Dublin.
- We have Sexual Reform Movement in Coolrain.
- We have two counseling services, which
- are totally against the law.
- We have Cara-Friend in Belfast, and we have Gingerbread just
- starting in Dublin.
- This was the situation, more or less, when I spoke at Malvern.
- It was almost as terrifying as it is speaking here today.
- And the four of us who had come to Malvern
- went back, no longer satisfied with local organizations.
- We took the example of SMG and CHE.
- We went back to Ireland and we set up
- an Irish national organization, the Union for Sexual Freedoms
- in Ireland.
- Now there are two points about that organization
- that I make no apology for driving home here today.
- The Union for Sexual Freedoms in Ireland is a thirty-two-county,
- that is, a Northern Ireland and an Éire organization.
- It has to be if it's going to be truly national.
- And the other thing is, we are totally committed
- to the interests of our women.
- I heard women last night talking about oppression.
- Later on, I'd like to give you an example of the oppression
- of some of the Irish women.
- Speaking of oppression, in Ireland, North and South,
- we suffer from oppression in many guises.
- Legal oppression: the Minister of Home Affairs,
- one Bill Craig, of whom you may have heard, at one time
- was asked about homosexual law reform at a constituency
- meeting.
- And he said, "Northern Ireland is a God-fearing country.
- We don't need that legislation here.
- We have no homosexuals."
- (laughter)
- In spite of the fact that Northern Ireland
- has seventy thousand homosexuals.
- We have, of course, police oppression.
- The Union for Sexual Freedoms in Ireland
- fought its first legal case in the courts of Dublin
- three weeks ago.
- It was a tremendous experience for us,
- because we got the most anti-gay justice
- in the south of Ireland, Justice (unintelligible).
- And we took the line of embarrassing the police
- witnesses, asking them, "But what length
- was the boy's penis if they were standing fourteen inches apart
- and interfering with each other?"
- (laughter)
- And we got these people so embarrassed,
- that eventually the justice threw the case out.
- In fact, what he said was, "Dismissed!"
- (laughter)
- (applause)
- In England or Scotland, it would have been a very small victory.
- It was our first one, and therefore it's important to us.
- I won't talk about social oppression
- because I don't think it's all that different in England
- and Scotland, from Ireland.
- We're fighting one interesting case of social oppression
- at the moment, the Belfast Librarian.
- In spite of several very reasonable requests to stop,
- Gay News was refused point blank.
- He told us he had taken legal aid.
- We were meant to be impressed.
- Well, I checked with a couple of gays in the lower courts,
- knowing that he would have taken the legal aid there.
- I saw a copy of the legal aid.
- It's entirely neutral.
- I'm going along, I hope, with a member of the editorial staff
- of Gay News, to the full Education
- and Library Board on the thirtieth of this month, which
- is thirty-five people, most of whom are clerics,
- eight of whom are women, meeting in it's full power
- and glory to present a memorial.
- If you want to do something to help Northern Ireland gays,
- write to the chief officer of the Belfast Education
- and Library Board and, you know, say
- that you deplore oppression of Northern Ireland gays,
- and this is an example of it.
- Just that.
- It will cost (unintelligible) it'll take you two minutes,
- and help our cause.
- Sometimes, we can pin down one person.
- Sometimes it's more difficult. The Daily Mail
- was one of the papers, The Sunday Mail, sorry,
- was one of the papers that gave some coverage to the London
- Rally.
- But its Northern Ireland edition didn't.
- There wasn't a word, never mind a photograph,
- in its Northern Ireland edition.
- We got four lines in the Belfast Telegraph.
- And I think it was five and a half in the Sunday News,
- and that was it.
- It's a very old tactic to keep people ignorant.
- It stops keeps the thing back.
- I won't say anything about the Church.
- My views on the Church are well known.
- The saddest however, the saddest oppression of gays,
- as far as I'm concerned, is oppression by gays.
- (applause)
- And in Ireland, we suffer to one hell of an extent,
- from oppression by gays.
- You see, I rock the boat.
- I'm often accused of that.
- I'm expected to take this argument seriously,
- you and your people in USFI are rocking the boat.
- The bloody boat should have sunk years ago.
- (laughter)
- USFI is unique in one important aspect.
- I only discovered this last night.
- I haven't had time to check the information.
- I hope I'm right.
- We have four national officers.
- Two of them are women.
- But our chief national officer, the National Coordinator
- of USFI, is a woman.
- We didn't elect her because she was a woman.
- There was the usual business of nominations
- and all the rest of it.
- Our national coordinator is a woman
- because that woman was the best person for the job.
- She needs your love and support very much this weekend.
- Because she has met one hell of a lot of opposition
- from people who don't want their boats rocked.
- And not only that, but she's a woman goddamn it.
- And at the moment, one unaffiliated Irish
- gay organization is running a slur campaign
- because she's a woman.
- She has our love and support.
- I ask for your love and support for her.
- I had the courage to come and speak here
- today because after Malvern and after London,
- I know that a lot of Irish people,
- in spite of the outrages that are being perpetrated
- under an Irish flag, have the love and support
- of a great number of people.
- And that's what gives us in USFI the hope
- we're achieving something.
- We're a small number.
- We're going forward with whatever little courage,
- whatever little victory from time
- to time, feeling that you're behind us.
- On behalf of the national officers
- and all the people who are interested and sympathetic
- towards USFI, thank you very much.
- (applause)
- (pause in recording)
- CONFERENCE ATTENDEE: The question
- I think we'd like to put to you is,
- how as a member of the state legislature,
- do you think that working within the confines
- of that legislature, you can satisfy the needs of the people
- you represent, the gay community and women's rights as well?
- ELAINE NOBLE: Well, you also have
- got to remember that I represent my constituency of almost
- fifty thousand people within the district that I was elected
- was made up of a lot of senior citizens, people
- from thirty-eight nationalities.
- In other words, those people who elected me
- were not gays, but rather senior citizens.
- That may come as a shocker.
- But what I'm saying is that my constituency is not only gays.
- And let if you want to say women's, or women's
- rights, or feminist but rather, a community of people.
- In a very self-conscious effort in my district,
- and in our area of Boston, we've been trying for ten
- to twelve years to try and make a little microcosm of what
- we'd like to see society be.
- And in essence, you may very well
- see some of that happening in the district that I represent.
- In terms of the laws of Massachusetts,
- it's probably one of the most archaic states,
- where it's still a felony.
- And once I won my election, the head of a very old council,
- called the Governor's Council, said
- that they would like to deny me my seat
- because I was a practicing criminal.
- But as you know, the laws in Massachusetts
- don't include make any specific reference to women.
- So then I said, "Well the law isn't written for me.
- I'm a lesbian.
- I'm not included in that law."
- They hadn't thought of that.
- (laughter)
- So I'll be sworn in January first.
- People are going to say, "Is this
- going to be a difficult thing for you Elaine,
- representing your constituency?
- Are you just going to listen to gays?"
- And some male homosexuals say to me,
- "Are you just going to listen to the women?
- Just going to listen to the lesbian feminists?"
- And I think it's more of a problem of who are perceiving
- it rather than one for me.
- In terms of changing the very archaic laws,
- I'm cosponsoring all the bills and I'm
- sponsoring the civil rights bills for gays this year.
- And you've got to remember that when
- I was working three years as a lobbyist,
- I began to know the system very well.
- So, I built up a relationship between sixty members
- of the House and Senate, so that I'm not
- going up there by myself.
- I have a very close working relationship
- with the Black Caucus and just recently organized a Women's
- Caucus within the house.
- So, I've talked with our base for pressure, for change.
- And unfortunately, no matter how well we like each other,
- change comes about when you push people.
- When you apply pressure lightly, gently, but effective, steady
- pressure.
- I think it's going to be very difficult for the members
- of the House to not see their way through
- to make some reforms.
- Particularly since I'm now in their club.
- When they realized that I could win,
- they came around and asked me if I'd run as an independent.
- And I said, "No thanks, boys.
- I want in the club."
- And I (pause) I think we're going
- to see some interesting things.
- I can't predict if my presence in the house
- is going to make bring about more
- effective and rapid change.
- I think it will.
- I think it's going to be very difficult
- for the ignorant members of the House
- to continue to talk about "those people"
- when one of "those people" happens to be
- sitting on their committee.
- I think probably one thing I want
- to leave you with that I remembered
- when I was campaigning.
- A little old drunken man came out,
- and my friends who were with me have heard this before,
- because it will always stay in my mind, probably until I die.
- And he was wandering down the street, and when he realized,
- you know, I was the lesbian, rather than the straight woman
- who was running, and he said, "My god, if you get elected,
- every broad and pervert in the country will want in."
- And I said, "That's right."
- (laughter)
- (applause)
- But, I think what I would like to leave you with,
- if any of you are going to be running for office
- and thinking about change, your responsibility
- is to the people.
- My responsibility is certainly to you,
- but my immediate responsibility is
- to be as best a representative as I can be.
- If I do you any service, I do you a service
- by doing what I do, the best I can do it.
- And by that I mean being the best
- representative for my district and not just making myself--
- listening to one, even no matter how close that one is to me,
- and trying to be as open as possible.
- Therein, I am effective.
- And by people perceiving that I am effective and genuine
- in that way, they may--
- which I know many of them are already--
- willing to change the laws of Massachusetts.
- Do you have any questions?
- Because I always like to open it up even though
- it's gotten to the formal time.
- CONFERENCE ATTENDEE: Yeah, (unintelligible)
- can you talk about women in the United States?
- ELAINE NOBLE: What?
- CONFERENCE ATTENDEE: Could you speak more about women?
- ELAINE NOBLE: More about women in the United States?
- Well, I think that one of the things that's
- been most effective in the United States,
- even as Frank was mentioning getting involved
- in the gay movement in '62 and '63, one of the things
- that I think is we've had to take
- care of as lesbian feminists, is to get our straight sisters,
- or sisters who have other lifestyles, more involved
- in the women's movement.
- Many of us in '62 and '63 found it very difficult
- to even work within the gay movement.
- Many of us did not leave.
- And I'm not saying I left, but it was very difficult
- because, for instance, when I wanted
- to I thought I would make a good chair of a gay task force,
- a man said to me, "But that's a man's job."
- Well, I said, "Well maybe some of the women should--"
- (end of recording)