WEBVTT
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And I'll say, today is Tuesday, March 26th, 2013.
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This is Rose Norman in Huntsville, Alabama interviewing
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Mandy Carter in Durham, North Carolina by phone,
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for the Southern Lesbian Feminist Herstory Project.
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And I probably ought to make sure that,
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I think that's going to be okay without playing it back.
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You want to just, the first question I had
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had to do with the biographical intro that we're using.
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Do you think that I could just get
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that off of your bio when you send that?
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Well, you can but I can also,
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I mean, I'm looking right at it.
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So what I hear you saying though,
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is that I'm looking at that paragraph you wrote, Rose,
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and so, are you going to use that,
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or you want me to just send?
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I can either field that information now
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or send you my bio and you can,
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did you want me to type that up,
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or you're gonna do it on your own?
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I wasn't sure how that--
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Oh, I'll do that on my own.
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This is pretty much the boilerplate we're using.
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I mean, I filled in what I knew,
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but this may not be the way you want to say it.
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I just picked this up online.
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Right, okay, well two things.
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One, I'll just, the ones that are really quick, I can do,
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but when I send you my bio, let's do this.
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Let me send you my, I'll email you my bio
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after we get done with this call,
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and then once you see it, Rose,
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if you have any additional questions for me, let me know.
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That might be a much easier way to do it,
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if that's okay with you.
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So I was born November 2nd, 1948 in Albany, New York.
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And I think the most important part
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to know about that is that in my bio, I also say,
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I was a ward of the state of New York
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for the first 18 years of my life because my mother
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got up one day after I was born, left and never came back.
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So me, my brother Rodney and sister Dolores
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were in orphanages in Albany, New York.
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And then we got divided and split up,
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but I was in two orphanages and one foster home
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for the first 18 years of my life
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as a ward of the state of New York.
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So I was in Albany Children's Home,
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Schenectady Children's Home, and then
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between a foster home in Chatham Center, New York.
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So that's the first 18 years.
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I must say, the reason that was pivotal
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as to why I got involved in what I'm doing now, Rose,
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is that in Schenectady, children,
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so they mainstreamed us into the main
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regular school system there.
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So I went to Mount Pleasant High School
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in Schenectady, New York, graduated 1966.
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And a history teacher of ours brought
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someone in from this group called
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the American Friends Service Committee.
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And that one 40-minute class literally changed my life,
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because I had never of the Quakers,
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never heard of the AFSC.
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But he talked about Quakers and power of one
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and equality and justice for all,
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but they had a high school work camp.
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And they said if anyone wanted to go,
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I raised my hand, I went, and then
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the rest is history, (mumbles) a really short form.
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But that is the key reason that I do what I do now,
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because of that class with the Quakers and the AFSC.
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That's great.
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And they were talking about,
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I guess I want to know what it was
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that bent your ear, what it was that grabbed you about that?
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Well, let's remember that I,
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it's funny, because right now, we're looking
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at the demographics of the country,
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and one of them that's interesting is that
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post World War II Baby Boomers,
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that were born after WW II, so between 1946 and 1955,
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that's that huge Baby Boomer, 79 million people right now,
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that generation, what was going on at that time?
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The Civil Rights movement was huge.
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Now, we're in upstate New York
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and we're very much aware of what's happening down South,
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but I think that when the gentleman, he was just a young kid
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from the local, now have you heard of
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the American Friends Service Committee?
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Are you familiar with them at all?
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Yes, I do know about that.
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Okay, yeah, well they had a New York branch,
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and so when he came into our social studies class,
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it's a history class, he was talking about the fact
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that the American Friends Service Committee
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and the Quakers as an institution,
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they were down South as the white allies,
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trying to figure out how they could help
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in the Civil Rights movement.
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So against that backdrop, he was saying
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they're down there, what's going on,
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remember this is '64, '65, '66, and said
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that one of the tenants of Quakerism,
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which is a long tradition, was this concept
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of the power of one that every single person
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had the potential to impact change.
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To hear that, number one, secondly he was talking about
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this broader concept that if your fundamental
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philosophies around equality and justice for all,
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that means that at any particular time,
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at any particular point, whatever particular issue
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or issues are involved, that you really see
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kind of a broader kind of a pattern.
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And I didn't quite get that at that time,
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but when he said that, it really struck me,
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because remember, what happened on November 22nd, 1963?
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Kennedy was assassinated; everyone knows exactly
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where they were at that moment in time,
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in terms of what was going on
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with the president being assassinated
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against the backdrop of what was happening
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down South, with the Civil Rights movement.
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Rose, at the time, they were still doing
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these air raid drills, where these sirens go off
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and you duck under your desk,
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or you run home as quick as you can.
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And then also the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.
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I distinctly remember, as young as I was,
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on the radio, they were saying last rites on the radio
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because of the potential for a missile strike
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to hit New York City, would impact Albany
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and Schenectady were not that far away.
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So all that's rolling around in this young kids mind
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and then someone comes in and talks about
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this power of one and equality and justice for all.
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But it was the third thing he said
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at the end of his presentation, he said,
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and by the way, we have an AFSC high school work camp
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in the Pocono Mountains, who would like to go?
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I raised my hand and I got permission
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from the Schenectady Children's Home to go.
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It was going to that summer, that one week
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in the Pocono Mountains that really just sort of went from
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hearing great ideas, sounds great, to spending a week
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in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania.
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They were bringing people up and in as resource people,
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we read about Gandhi, read about nonviolence,
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and then there was this young, white folk-singing couple,
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Guy and Candie Carawan, from the Highlander Center.
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Never heard of them, never heard of the group, but they came
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and I was just fixated on just what they were doing.
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They were singing, but they were recording
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songs of the Civil Rights movement.
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So what was just something (mumbles) made real
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by two people, white, young folk singers
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coming to our one week session, and then he talked about
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the School for the Study of Nonviolence
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with Joan Baez and Ira Sandperl,
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which I ultimately ended up going to.
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So I guess what I was saying is
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that at the moment, I had no idea
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what the impact was, but when I look back
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and ask, what was the turning point, or what was the moment
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that really sent me in this direction?
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That would be it.
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And also in our school, we had an NAACP chapter,
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but it was a white guy, a white young student.
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I thought well, isn't that for Black people?
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Anyway, so just a bit more background
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because that's the grounding of which I then
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moved onto a much longer span of time with this stuff.
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I ended up going to the institute, blah-de-blah-blah,
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got arrested during the Vietnam War, went to jail
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and then got my first job at the
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War Resisters League in San Francisco, 1969.
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But in '68, went to the Poor People's Campaign
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in Washington D.C., '68 went to the Institute session,
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'69 got my job at WRL and
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that's where I am now, here in Durham.
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Well, that's a great story, I'm gonna transcribe
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that story, I mean that'd be a good beginning to the,
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I will edit these notes, it won't just be
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a straight, literal transcript.
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Yeah, understood, but that would just help you
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kind of get the, a little of the journey,
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because when you read it as a text it's one thing,
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but when I tell it, it's just,
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I just don't know how to describe it.
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But that, you know what I was
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just thinking of, Rose, though?
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That wasn't the thing I was thinking of,
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can I just ask you, how old are you?
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Just, I don't know if I'm being disrespectful or not, but.
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(laughing) 63, I'm 63.
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Okay, you know what I'm saying?
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That was our generation, when I say our generation,
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of that 60's generation.
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Not everyone was involved but
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that was, to be a anti,
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a lot of us were too young
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for the Civil Rights movement, but King,
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when he gave that moment,
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not that speech that he gave in '63
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at the March on Washington, but when he gave
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that speech, April 4th, 1967 at the Riverside Church
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in New York, when he talked about,
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we have to challenge what we're doing in Vietnam.
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And that speech he gave, when he said,
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how can you ask Black men to go thousands of miles away
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to another country of color, Vietnam,
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and basically kill or be killed in the name of democracy,
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when they didn't have it when they left this country
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and they didn't have it when they got back.
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And so I'm not sure if he hadn't given that speech
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that a lot of us who were just
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a little too young for the Civil Rights movement
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then smack dab in the middle of that Vietnam War thing,
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and then (stammering) a lot of Vietnam War,
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I was working in San Francisco, it was so male dominated.
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And then you had feminists start toughening up
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and talking about nonviolence
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and feminism, is more about just Vietnam.
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And then feminists who didn't
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want to have lesbians involved.
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So lesbians, and then lesbian feminists,
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it was like, okay, we'll go where we need to go
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to get this stuff done.
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But then you had people like, oh my God, Barbara Deming.
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Lesbian, feminist, and (mumbles), just incredible
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and it unrolled before our eyes.
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And so there's a lot of the South here part of that,
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and then we'll still here.
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That's the key, we're still here.
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Well, let me just for dates...
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When that quaker guy came to your class,
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is this after Kennedy's assassination?
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Yeah, because Kennedy was assassinated in '63.
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It was '64 or '65, it must have been my senior year,
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so it would be '66, '65, '66,
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but it was after the Kennedy assassination, yes.
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'65, '66, so that would've been
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when you went to that Quaker...
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Yeah, the high school work camp.
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Work camp; that would've been the
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summer of '66 maybe, after graduation?
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I'm trying to figure out the timeline because
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it would either have been '65, '66
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because I graduated in May of '66, but I didn't hear about,
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and when Guy and Candie Carawan talked about the Institute,
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that didn't even start until '66.
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So it had to have been either they
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had heard about she was starting it,
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because the Institute started in 1966
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in Carmel Valley, and they told me about it.
256
00:11:54.290 --> 00:11:56.843
So it was either in my junior year of 1965
257
00:11:56.843 --> 00:11:59.720
or my senior year, either one of those.
258
00:11:59.720 --> 00:12:01.970
I'd have to almost get the exact time,
259
00:12:01.970 --> 00:12:04.880
it was either '65 or '66, for sure.
260
00:12:04.880 --> 00:12:06.270
It's not real important but I just,
261
00:12:06.270 --> 00:12:08.800
whenever I can (papers shuffling) get dates.
262
00:12:08.800 --> 00:12:10.070
No, no it's good.
263
00:12:10.070 --> 00:12:11.070
And I'm still trying to figure out
264
00:12:11.070 --> 00:12:13.640
that timeframe for myself because
265
00:12:13.640 --> 00:12:16.130
because after I graduated high school,
266
00:12:16.130 --> 00:12:18.380
one of the things at the homes that they would do,
267
00:12:18.380 --> 00:12:19.840
this was extraordinary, they would pay
268
00:12:19.840 --> 00:12:24.170
for my entire college education, if I stayed in college.
269
00:12:24.170 --> 00:12:28.200
Well, I tried to do that, but I had already heard about
270
00:12:28.200 --> 00:12:29.920
the Quakers and what was going on
271
00:12:29.920 --> 00:12:32.645
with the movement or whatever,
272
00:12:32.645 --> 00:12:34.153
and I dropped out and they said,
273
00:12:34.153 --> 00:12:36.600
you had to stay in school, they didn't pay for my education.
274
00:12:36.600 --> 00:12:40.110
So I dropped out and ended up going
275
00:12:40.110 --> 00:12:41.470
to San Francisco ultimately.
276
00:12:41.470 --> 00:12:44.470
But I spent the summer of '67 in New York,
277
00:12:44.470 --> 00:12:46.210
so I think it might've been '66, actually,
278
00:12:46.210 --> 00:12:48.851
Rose, because after I graduated I went to
279
00:12:48.851 --> 00:12:52.760
Hudson Valley Community College, then I decided
280
00:12:52.760 --> 00:12:54.230
I didn't want to do that, dropped out,
281
00:12:54.230 --> 00:12:57.040
then I spent the summer of '67 down in New York City.
282
00:12:57.040 --> 00:12:59.592
So I think '66 is the right year.
283
00:12:59.592 --> 00:13:03.367
Okay, so summer of '67, you're out of school,
284
00:13:03.367 --> 00:13:05.480
you've dropped out of that community college,
285
00:13:05.480 --> 00:13:07.046
and you're in New York City?
286
00:13:07.046 --> 00:13:08.993
Yes, down in New York City
287
00:13:08.993 --> 00:13:11.530
and long story short, I ran out of money
288
00:13:11.530 --> 00:13:13.240
and ended up sleeping in the park,
289
00:13:13.240 --> 00:13:14.770
but that was like, the hippie thing
290
00:13:14.770 --> 00:13:15.883
was going on then.
291
00:13:17.838 --> 00:13:20.040
And it brought me one of those, who knew moments,
292
00:13:20.040 --> 00:13:22.138
I'm sure you had one, (mumbles).
293
00:13:22.138 --> 00:13:24.000
I ran out of money, I was working on the West Side
294
00:13:24.000 --> 00:13:26.040
and there was this sign in the window,
295
00:13:26.040 --> 00:13:27.940
free lunch, come on in!
296
00:13:27.940 --> 00:13:31.410
I went in and it was a place
297
00:13:31.410 --> 00:13:34.623
run by Timothy Leary (laughing) LSD.
298
00:13:35.720 --> 00:13:37.870
And I got a job there for the summer,
299
00:13:37.870 --> 00:13:39.190
sleeping on the couch in the back.
300
00:13:39.190 --> 00:13:41.220
They said, as long as you are willing to
301
00:13:41.220 --> 00:13:42.930
answer that phone between the hours of
302
00:13:42.930 --> 00:13:45.200
eight at night and eight in the morning
303
00:13:45.200 --> 00:13:46.760
when people are having bad trips,
304
00:13:46.760 --> 00:13:48.080
and you tell them how to come down
305
00:13:48.080 --> 00:13:49.690
from it, you can stay here.
306
00:13:49.690 --> 00:13:51.467
And I did, it was great.
307
00:13:52.333 --> 00:13:54.842
And then at the end of the summer,
308
00:13:54.842 --> 00:13:57.600
everyone was (mumbles) well let's hitchhike
309
00:13:57.600 --> 00:13:59.880
out the San Francisco, because that's where it's happening.
310
00:13:59.880 --> 00:14:03.867
And that was a big year, going to San Francisco,
311
00:14:03.867 --> 00:14:05.870
and Haight-Ashbury and three of us
312
00:14:05.870 --> 00:14:07.430
hitchhiked out across the country
313
00:14:07.430 --> 00:14:10.960
and got to San Francisco, one of those,
314
00:14:10.960 --> 00:14:13.023
another one of those who knew moments.
315
00:14:14.690 --> 00:14:16.660
Anyone who got into San Francisco,
316
00:14:16.660 --> 00:14:18.460
they went to the Haight-Ashbury Switchboard
317
00:14:18.460 --> 00:14:21.010
for a place to stay, right?
318
00:14:21.010 --> 00:14:23.530
So three of us go down to the Haight-Ashbury Switchboard
319
00:14:23.530 --> 00:14:26.853
and get the phone number of a guy named Vincent O'Connor.
320
00:14:27.730 --> 00:14:30.210
Of all the people in the world we would've gotten
321
00:14:30.210 --> 00:14:32.060
a place to stay, Vincent O'Connor
322
00:14:32.060 --> 00:14:33.860
turned out to be a draft resister
323
00:14:34.700 --> 00:14:37.460
working with the Catholic Peace Fellowship
324
00:14:37.460 --> 00:14:39.490
and because we all three stayed there,
325
00:14:39.490 --> 00:14:42.510
ultimately he said, you two have to go, she can stay,
326
00:14:42.510 --> 00:14:44.790
because I was interested in nonviolence,
327
00:14:44.790 --> 00:14:47.150
in what was going on and volunteered
328
00:14:47.150 --> 00:14:49.801
at the Catholic Peace Fellowship in San Francisco
329
00:14:49.801 --> 00:14:52.190
and boom, got the opportunity to go down to
330
00:14:52.190 --> 00:14:54.128
the Institute for the Study of Nonviolence
331
00:14:54.128 --> 00:14:57.420
with Ira Sandperl and Baez.
332
00:14:57.420 --> 00:14:59.740
And they were talking about doing a CD action
333
00:14:59.740 --> 00:15:02.640
at the Oakland Induction Center;
334
00:15:02.640 --> 00:15:04.590
who wants to be involved, who wants to go?
335
00:15:04.590 --> 00:15:05.423
I went.
336
00:15:06.450 --> 00:15:09.650
It's almost too weird, but yeah,
337
00:15:09.650 --> 00:15:12.730
I went and in jail, it was like
338
00:15:12.730 --> 00:15:14.200
a hundred women got arrested
339
00:15:14.200 --> 00:15:17.710
at the Oakland Induction Center, December, 1967.
340
00:15:17.710 --> 00:15:20.699
Jane Schulman came over and said,
341
00:15:20.699 --> 00:15:22.330
Mandy, have you ever heard of a group
342
00:15:22.330 --> 00:15:23.507
called the War Resisters League?
343
00:15:23.507 --> 00:15:25.100
And I said no, I never heard of it.
344
00:15:25.100 --> 00:15:27.553
Well, we'd like to invite you to one of our potlucks.
345
00:15:27.553 --> 00:15:29.820
(Rose chuckles)
346
00:15:29.820 --> 00:15:33.810
I went, that led to stuffing envelopes and mailings,
347
00:15:33.810 --> 00:15:35.490
to going on a couple of trips
348
00:15:35.490 --> 00:15:37.750
to listen to people talk about WRL.
349
00:15:37.750 --> 00:15:40.640
And a gentleman by the name of Randy Keeler
350
00:15:40.640 --> 00:15:42.690
who was at the office with Jane Schulman
351
00:15:42.690 --> 00:15:45.930
was doing draft resistance, went to jail
352
00:15:45.930 --> 00:15:48.280
and said, we have an empty spot, who'd like to fill it?
353
00:15:48.280 --> 00:15:51.059
I did; Rose, that is literally how I got my job
354
00:15:51.059 --> 00:15:54.410
at the War Resisters League in San Francisco in 1969.
355
00:15:57.170 --> 00:15:59.840
Gosh, things were really lining up for you there.
356
00:15:59.840 --> 00:16:02.290
Oh man, I don't believe in pre-destination,
357
00:16:02.290 --> 00:16:05.580
but it makes you wonder; the likelihood
358
00:16:05.580 --> 00:16:08.273
of going into that place on the West Side and
359
00:16:08.273 --> 00:16:11.250
going to places, the Haight-Ashbury Switchboard
360
00:16:11.250 --> 00:16:12.500
and getting with Vincent O'Connor,
361
00:16:12.500 --> 00:16:14.893
getting to the Institute and blah-de-blah-blah.
362
00:16:16.330 --> 00:16:20.340
Well, I want to go back one thing I'm a little vague;
363
00:16:20.340 --> 00:16:25.100
there was the Poconos work camp, the Quaker work camp,
364
00:16:25.100 --> 00:16:29.070
and then there was another place that you went after that?
365
00:16:29.070 --> 00:16:31.730
I don't think I quite have that straight.
366
00:16:31.730 --> 00:16:34.390
Oh well, let me do the...
367
00:16:35.980 --> 00:16:37.600
How it went.
368
00:16:37.600 --> 00:16:40.823
So I graduated high school in 1966,
369
00:16:42.520 --> 00:16:44.690
and technically, not even technically,
370
00:16:44.690 --> 00:16:47.510
legally in the state of New York, at that time,
371
00:16:47.510 --> 00:16:50.050
and (mumbles) too across the country,
372
00:16:50.050 --> 00:16:55.019
at the age of 18, you aged out of the welfare system.
373
00:16:55.019 --> 00:16:58.620
So if you're not adopted, either you're in a foster home,
374
00:16:58.620 --> 00:17:00.970
or you're in an orphanage, the way the law reads
375
00:17:00.970 --> 00:17:03.375
that once you turn 18 years old,
376
00:17:03.375 --> 00:17:07.890
you no longer are a ward of the state, you are on your own.
377
00:17:07.890 --> 00:17:10.060
And so when I was graduating from high school
378
00:17:10.060 --> 00:17:13.305
at the age of 17, the Schenectady Children's Home,
379
00:17:13.305 --> 00:17:15.960
the guy who ran it said, Mandy,
380
00:17:15.960 --> 00:17:17.530
you're one of the few who's ever gotten
381
00:17:17.530 --> 00:17:21.200
this far in high school, and I got a college prep
382
00:17:21.200 --> 00:17:23.130
because I wanted to be a doctor.
383
00:17:23.130 --> 00:17:26.060
He said, one thing that we think we'd like to do with you,
384
00:17:26.060 --> 00:17:28.980
because most guys were going off to Vietnam or
385
00:17:28.980 --> 00:17:31.540
women, they got out of the home,
386
00:17:31.540 --> 00:17:32.980
whatever, they went on with their life,
387
00:17:32.980 --> 00:17:36.510
but they said, we'd like to offer you this possibility.
388
00:17:36.510 --> 00:17:40.299
If you get in college, and I got into Hudson Valley
389
00:17:40.299 --> 00:17:43.120
Community College, we will pay for your entire education
390
00:17:43.120 --> 00:17:46.190
because this is what we'd like to do, invest in you,
391
00:17:46.190 --> 00:17:48.700
even though I'll turn 18, you see what I'm saying, Rose?
392
00:17:48.700 --> 00:17:50.250
They said the option (mumbles).
393
00:17:51.810 --> 00:17:53.850
And I started to do that, Rose, but I was living
394
00:17:53.850 --> 00:17:56.990
at the YWCA in Troy, New York because I was,
395
00:17:56.990 --> 00:17:58.800
the community college is part of
396
00:17:58.800 --> 00:18:02.160
the SUNY system, was there in Troy.
397
00:18:03.090 --> 00:18:04.743
But every day that I stayed there, I wasn't happy
398
00:18:04.743 --> 00:18:06.820
because I had lived in institutions
399
00:18:06.820 --> 00:18:08.670
all of my life, with the exception of
400
00:18:08.670 --> 00:18:11.470
that foster home experience for four years.
401
00:18:11.470 --> 00:18:13.560
And I felt like, what's different about this?
402
00:18:13.560 --> 00:18:16.840
I'm not happy, but also because of that class
403
00:18:16.840 --> 00:18:18.750
and hearing about what was going on
404
00:18:18.750 --> 00:18:20.380
with the nonviolence, and hearing
405
00:18:20.380 --> 00:18:21.810
what was happening in the South.
406
00:18:21.810 --> 00:18:25.106
And at this point, because I had done that
407
00:18:25.106 --> 00:18:27.190
AFSC high school work camp,
408
00:18:27.190 --> 00:18:28.940
had new resource people coming in,
409
00:18:28.940 --> 00:18:31.330
talking about nonviolence, reading about it,
410
00:18:31.330 --> 00:18:33.857
getting more information about the Quakers
411
00:18:33.857 --> 00:18:35.500
and the American Friends Service Committee.
412
00:18:35.500 --> 00:18:38.160
This was all rolling around in my mind.
413
00:18:38.160 --> 00:18:40.530
So when I decided, I don't wanna do this anymore,
414
00:18:40.530 --> 00:18:42.610
he said, well, you realize if you decide
415
00:18:42.610 --> 00:18:44.500
not to do this, then you are on your own.
416
00:18:44.500 --> 00:18:47.150
I said, I realize that, and that's when I said,
417
00:18:47.150 --> 00:18:49.028
that's when the break happened.
418
00:18:49.028 --> 00:18:50.470
I literally took a bus to New York City
419
00:18:50.470 --> 00:18:52.860
with $80 in my pocket, hoping I could
420
00:18:52.860 --> 00:18:55.150
get a job and start there.
421
00:18:55.150 --> 00:18:57.593
That's when I ran out of money, I didn't get a job,
422
00:18:57.593 --> 00:18:59.540
and that's when I happened to go by this place
423
00:18:59.540 --> 00:19:03.060
that Timothy Leary ran, and I spent the summer in '67.
424
00:19:03.060 --> 00:19:04.880
So that literally was...
425
00:19:07.020 --> 00:19:11.270
Graduate high school, Schenectady Children's Home,
426
00:19:11.270 --> 00:19:13.250
didn't work out to do school, then I
427
00:19:13.250 --> 00:19:15.774
hitchhiked down to New York City, did that,
428
00:19:15.774 --> 00:19:17.566
and then I got out to San Francisco.
429
00:19:17.566 --> 00:19:18.519
Does that help a little bit with the question
430
00:19:18.519 --> 00:19:21.570
you had about just the frame?
431
00:19:21.570 --> 00:19:24.190
Yes, so the American Friends Service Center
432
00:19:24.190 --> 00:19:26.943
work camp was the summer of '66,
433
00:19:28.170 --> 00:19:30.730
before you went to the community college?
434
00:19:30.730 --> 00:19:33.429
Yes, that's right.
So this is rolling
435
00:19:33.429 --> 00:19:35.734
around in you as you start
436
00:19:35.734 --> 00:19:37.170
with community college--
Oh, absolutely.
437
00:19:37.170 --> 00:19:39.590
But not just me, and again, whenever
438
00:19:39.590 --> 00:19:41.080
I share this I say, not just me.
439
00:19:41.080 --> 00:19:44.030
When you think about where this country was at that point
440
00:19:44.030 --> 00:19:47.626
and even though the Civil Rights movement
441
00:19:47.626 --> 00:19:49.553
was happening down South, and even though
442
00:19:49.553 --> 00:19:51.426
we're all (mumbles) in Upstate New York,
443
00:19:51.426 --> 00:19:53.408
it seemed like almost a world away.
444
00:19:53.408 --> 00:19:54.860
I don't know how to describe that.
445
00:19:54.860 --> 00:19:58.097
But because of the kind of change from the
446
00:19:58.097 --> 00:20:00.366
absolute focus on what was happening
447
00:20:00.366 --> 00:20:02.533
down South, '64, '65, '66.
448
00:20:03.828 --> 00:20:07.203
By '65, '66, more and more of what the news was
449
00:20:07.203 --> 00:20:10.330
what's happening down South, it was the war in Vietnam
450
00:20:10.330 --> 00:20:14.270
because after the assassination of Kennedy in '63,
451
00:20:14.270 --> 00:20:15.820
who came into presidency?
452
00:20:15.820 --> 00:20:19.310
Lyndon Johnson, and Johnson would still focus a bit
453
00:20:19.310 --> 00:20:21.970
on the Civil Rights movement, because remember,
454
00:20:21.970 --> 00:20:24.893
he was the one who signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
455
00:20:26.400 --> 00:20:29.090
I'm in high school, then we got
456
00:20:29.090 --> 00:20:34.090
the Voting Rights Act in 1965, I'm still in high school.
457
00:20:34.290 --> 00:20:35.633
And by the time the Voting Rights Act,
458
00:20:35.633 --> 00:20:37.920
but the other extraordinary thing
459
00:20:37.920 --> 00:20:41.914
that happened in '67, Rose, was in 1967, it was the
460
00:20:41.914 --> 00:20:46.377
Loving vs. Virginia case of ending, once and for all,
461
00:20:46.377 --> 00:20:49.233
the ban on interracial marriage in this country.
462
00:20:50.233 --> 00:20:52.330
And look what's happening today, by the way,
463
00:20:52.330 --> 00:20:54.235
what's happening in the US Supreme Court today?
464
00:20:54.235 --> 00:20:55.705
(chuckles)
465
00:20:55.705 --> 00:20:57.280
Wow, yes indeed.
466
00:20:57.280 --> 00:21:01.850
Yes, and so that's why I thought that the King speech,
467
00:21:01.850 --> 00:21:04.120
even though it didn't get as much high profile
468
00:21:04.120 --> 00:21:07.130
as his speech in the March on Washington in '63.
469
00:21:07.130 --> 00:21:09.524
When he gave that speech in 1967,
470
00:21:09.524 --> 00:21:12.220
that was almost a transformative moment,
471
00:21:12.220 --> 00:21:14.300
I think, for this entire country,
472
00:21:14.300 --> 00:21:16.160
because here's a Black man, who was leading
473
00:21:16.160 --> 00:21:18.490
the Civil Rights movement down South who said,
474
00:21:18.490 --> 00:21:21.690
we now have to talk about not only the war
475
00:21:21.690 --> 00:21:24.113
in Vietnam against the backdrop of Black men,
476
00:21:25.210 --> 00:21:27.505
but also before he got killed,
477
00:21:27.505 --> 00:21:31.416
also on April 4th, 1968, what was he talking about?
478
00:21:31.416 --> 00:21:34.670
He went on to economic justice issues, Rose,
479
00:21:34.670 --> 00:21:37.060
because he said if we fight for the right
480
00:21:37.060 --> 00:21:38.810
to go to a lunch counter and have a right
481
00:21:38.810 --> 00:21:41.270
to sit at that lunch counter and get a meal,
482
00:21:41.270 --> 00:21:42.880
do we have any money in our pocket
483
00:21:42.880 --> 00:21:45.310
to buy anything once we're there?
484
00:21:45.310 --> 00:21:48.690
That became the focus of his, with economic justice,
485
00:21:48.690 --> 00:21:51.453
thus the poor people's campaign of 1968.
486
00:21:53.050 --> 00:21:54.993
So it's like, my personal life and
487
00:21:54.993 --> 00:21:58.290
that whole generation of their lives at this point.
488
00:21:58.290 --> 00:22:00.378
And then what was happening with the
489
00:22:00.378 --> 00:22:03.673
sort of like Civil Rights, boom, right into Vietnam War
490
00:22:04.730 --> 00:22:08.060
Gosh, you ought to write a book
491
00:22:08.060 --> 00:22:10.837
about your life, this is so interesting.
492
00:22:10.837 --> 00:22:12.450
Very interesting, I'm glad to talk,
493
00:22:12.450 --> 00:22:15.345
well now they have this thing called Dragonfly,
494
00:22:15.345 --> 00:22:16.980
I think you can actually talk in it.
495
00:22:16.980 --> 00:22:19.333
I don't write, but anyway, but yeah.
496
00:22:19.333 --> 00:22:23.248
But that was all of us, Rose, I mean, I don't know,
497
00:22:23.248 --> 00:22:27.406
where were you November 22nd, 1963,
498
00:22:27.406 --> 00:22:29.540
when you heard the news about Kennedy?
499
00:22:29.540 --> 00:22:34.540
Oh, I was, yeah I was walking to PE class in Alabama.
500
00:22:38.716 --> 00:22:39.549
There you go.
501
00:22:40.867 --> 00:22:44.260
And by the way, you're in Alabama, you could never forget.
502
00:22:44.260 --> 00:22:46.506
It's funny you're talking about that,
503
00:22:46.506 --> 00:22:48.890
because we're doing, I was just at the UA Tuscaloosa,
504
00:22:48.890 --> 00:22:50.260
we're doing this big stuff around,
505
00:22:50.260 --> 00:22:52.110
this is a huge, big anniversary down there
506
00:22:52.110 --> 00:22:55.320
with then Governor, George Wallace standing
507
00:22:55.320 --> 00:22:57.440
in the doorway down in UA Tuscaloosa.
508
00:22:57.440 --> 00:23:00.223
What was it, June 11th, 1963?
509
00:23:01.400 --> 00:23:05.270
Amazing, and after the March on Washington,
510
00:23:05.270 --> 00:23:09.623
Birmingham, Alabama, 16th Street church bombed by the Klan.
511
00:23:14.060 --> 00:23:16.733
Yeah, I don't know, I think I was,
512
00:23:17.900 --> 00:23:22.900
I had a lot to overcome in terms of being ignorant of...
513
00:23:25.577 --> 00:23:27.643
I grew up in a county that was very,
514
00:23:29.791 --> 00:23:31.010
very, well, what's the word?
515
00:23:31.010 --> 00:23:33.960
Well, racist, and it was majority Black
516
00:23:34.920 --> 00:23:37.063
but of course the white people ran everything.
517
00:23:37.925 --> 00:23:41.706
A lot of civil rights activism.
518
00:23:41.706 --> 00:23:44.413
I mean, I was sort of watching and not understanding.
519
00:23:45.558 --> 00:23:48.430
And I'm making up for it now by (laughs)--
520
00:23:50.002 --> 00:23:50.960
No, no, but you know what fascinates me
521
00:23:50.960 --> 00:23:54.110
when you share that, it's so interesting because
522
00:23:54.110 --> 00:23:56.570
someone said the way we look at life is like
523
00:23:56.570 --> 00:23:58.470
we're all around a certain thing,
524
00:23:58.470 --> 00:24:00.160
they use an elephant, for example.
525
00:24:00.160 --> 00:24:01.860
And then you ask each person,
526
00:24:01.860 --> 00:24:03.530
well, what do you see, what's your reality?
527
00:24:03.530 --> 00:24:06.560
Well, what I see is a long trunk and two big tusks.
528
00:24:06.560 --> 00:24:08.950
No, no, no, that's not what this is,
529
00:24:08.950 --> 00:24:11.180
I'm looking at something that has a tail.
530
00:24:11.180 --> 00:24:14.210
But unless you then all kind of rise up above it all
531
00:24:14.210 --> 00:24:17.160
and realize you're looking at the exact same thing.
532
00:24:17.160 --> 00:24:19.010
But what you're looking at is your reality,
533
00:24:19.010 --> 00:24:20.210
and from where you are, because all
534
00:24:20.210 --> 00:24:22.400
you know is all you know, but when you start
535
00:24:22.400 --> 00:24:24.770
stitching these little stories together,
536
00:24:24.770 --> 00:24:27.410
you begin to think, oh, my gosh, because I know exactly
537
00:24:27.410 --> 00:24:30.420
where I was on November 22nd, and everyone does.
538
00:24:30.420 --> 00:24:33.840
And then you ask, where were you, what did it mean,
539
00:24:33.840 --> 00:24:36.420
what was going around you, you know what I mean?
540
00:24:36.420 --> 00:24:38.180
And you're living in the state of Alabama,
541
00:24:38.180 --> 00:24:42.207
which is the epicenter of whatever, but yet,
542
00:24:42.207 --> 00:24:45.059
how old you were and what was, I mean
543
00:24:45.059 --> 00:24:46.590
that's what I find fascinating, history.
544
00:24:46.590 --> 00:24:48.600
I love it for that reason.
545
00:24:48.600 --> 00:24:50.510
And then here we get to share these stories now
546
00:24:50.510 --> 00:24:53.571
because this is where we are, this is the...
547
00:24:53.571 --> 00:24:56.480
Just at a recent, I was just at UA Tuscaloosa,
548
00:24:56.480 --> 00:25:00.607
they had a sixth annual Southeast LGBTQ
549
00:25:00.607 --> 00:25:04.150
student leadership conference.
550
00:25:04.150 --> 00:25:06.260
And one of the demographics is that
551
00:25:06.260 --> 00:25:10.039
people who are between the ages of 18 and 23,
552
00:25:10.039 --> 00:25:13.620
80 million, and we have 79 million who are our age.
553
00:25:13.620 --> 00:25:15.250
I said, talk about needing an
554
00:25:15.250 --> 00:25:19.074
intergenerational conversation here, this is it.
555
00:25:19.074 --> 00:25:19.907
Yeah.
556
00:25:22.770 --> 00:25:23.670
Anyway.
557
00:25:23.670 --> 00:25:27.140
Okay, all this is really good because our early,
558
00:25:27.140 --> 00:25:29.120
our period starts in '68, we're just trying
559
00:25:29.120 --> 00:25:31.810
to contain it to '68 to '94, and of course,
560
00:25:31.810 --> 00:25:34.750
the women's movement and lesbian feminist activism in that.
561
00:25:34.750 --> 00:25:37.082
So let's shift over to that.
562
00:25:37.082 --> 00:25:39.520
I still want to know why you picked Durham,
563
00:25:39.520 --> 00:25:41.360
did you want to go to school, or?
564
00:25:41.360 --> 00:25:42.739
Oh, there's a practical reason,
565
00:25:42.739 --> 00:25:46.114
because that's where War Resisters League office was.
566
00:25:46.114 --> 00:25:48.887
Because when I was living in San Francisco,
567
00:25:48.887 --> 00:25:51.077
working at the War Resisters League in San Francisco,
568
00:25:51.077 --> 00:25:54.124
I said, when I decided to leave San Francisco, I said,
569
00:25:54.124 --> 00:25:56.420
I wanna go east of the Mississippi,
570
00:25:56.420 --> 00:25:58.160
because I was born and raised in Upstate New York,
571
00:25:58.160 --> 00:25:59.513
I missed the four seasons.
572
00:26:00.501 --> 00:26:04.090
And I said, is there a War Resisters League
573
00:26:04.090 --> 00:26:06.070
office anywhere east of the Mississippi?
574
00:26:06.070 --> 00:26:06.970
You know where it was?
575
00:26:06.970 --> 00:26:08.870
Durham, North Carolina; that's why I chose it,
576
00:26:08.870 --> 00:26:10.440
because they had a WRL here.
577
00:26:10.440 --> 00:26:12.410
I interviewed for a job and got a job
578
00:26:12.410 --> 00:26:15.270
at the War Resisters League southeast office
579
00:26:15.270 --> 00:26:18.890
in Durham, North Carolina, that's how I got here.
580
00:26:19.785 --> 00:26:20.623
And that was really kind of a hotbed of a lot of
581
00:26:20.623 --> 00:26:23.763
civil rights activism
Oh, my gosh, tons.
582
00:26:24.785 --> 00:26:25.618
Well, between Duke and then,
583
00:26:25.618 --> 00:26:27.840
the thing that struck me about Durham,
584
00:26:27.840 --> 00:26:28.883
have you ever been here at all?
585
00:26:28.883 --> 00:26:32.090
Have you ever been to North Carolina or in Durham?
586
00:26:32.090 --> 00:26:35.630
Yeah, I spent some time at the Duke University Library
587
00:26:35.630 --> 00:26:38.810
going through ALFA archives
Oh, yeah!
588
00:26:38.810 --> 00:26:41.760
Oh wow, yes, yes, they had their archives at,
589
00:26:41.760 --> 00:26:44.157
is it the Sallie Bingham?
Yes, at the Sallie Bingham,
590
00:26:44.157 --> 00:26:46.980
they have the Mab Seacrest archives are there,
591
00:26:46.980 --> 00:26:49.460
Minnie Bruce Pratt, I looked at all those.
592
00:26:49.460 --> 00:26:53.870
Oh yeah, Feminary and now SONG has all their stuff there,
593
00:26:53.870 --> 00:26:55.729
Ladyslipper has all their stuff there.
594
00:26:55.729 --> 00:26:56.562
Oh, I don't know that I looked
595
00:26:56.562 --> 00:26:58.751
at the SONG stuff when I was there,
596
00:26:58.751 --> 00:26:59.820
because that's really what I wanna,
597
00:26:59.820 --> 00:27:02.170
we're trying to write a chapter about SONG.
598
00:27:02.170 --> 00:27:05.690
And maybe I should ask you if I'm wrong, but
599
00:27:05.690 --> 00:27:08.860
it seems like, here SONG comes at the end of our period.
600
00:27:08.860 --> 00:27:10.790
And of course, historically, there's never
601
00:27:10.790 --> 00:27:13.260
any sort of beginnings and endings,
602
00:27:13.260 --> 00:27:14.360
there's all this transition going on,
603
00:27:14.360 --> 00:27:17.520
but it does seem that SONG coming where it does
604
00:27:17.520 --> 00:27:21.143
right before ALFA closed down.
605
00:27:21.143 --> 00:27:24.827
Yeah, (mumbles) how many years was that group,
606
00:27:24.827 --> 00:27:26.330
how long were y'all, how long did
607
00:27:26.330 --> 00:27:28.589
that group exist for, when did it start?
608
00:27:28.589 --> 00:27:31.300
I think it started in '72 or possibly,
609
00:27:31.300 --> 00:27:32.390
I need to go back and look at that,
610
00:27:32.390 --> 00:27:34.153
I don't have my timeline.
611
00:27:34.153 --> 00:27:35.270
It's either '72 or '74, because we're saying
612
00:27:35.270 --> 00:27:38.641
about 20 years on ALFA, which is a very long time.
613
00:27:38.641 --> 00:27:40.791
A whole lot of groups formed, Knoxville had
614
00:27:42.096 --> 00:27:44.200
a lesbian feminist alliance, too
615
00:27:44.200 --> 00:27:46.630
and it lasted not hardly at all,
616
00:27:46.630 --> 00:27:48.343
like two years or something.
617
00:27:48.343 --> 00:27:49.176
No, yours did for a long time.
618
00:27:49.176 --> 00:27:51.200
I think, weren't you one of the longest running ones?
619
00:27:51.200 --> 00:27:52.547
I think it was the longest running one,
620
00:27:52.547 --> 00:27:54.890
although I don't have the date on it.
621
00:27:54.890 --> 00:27:58.710
But here comes SONG right at the end of this period,
622
00:27:58.710 --> 00:28:03.110
and it's like there was a new way of looking at things.
623
00:28:03.110 --> 00:28:05.100
Maybe something like that transition you were talking about
624
00:28:05.100 --> 00:28:08.883
between civil rights activism and then economic rights.
625
00:28:11.440 --> 00:28:16.120
So okay, let's think about, well I want you to respond
626
00:28:16.120 --> 00:28:18.781
to the lesbian feminist activism question,
627
00:28:18.781 --> 00:28:23.781
whether you see yourself fitting that label
628
00:28:25.184 --> 00:28:26.370
or you want to expand it or how do you feel
629
00:28:26.370 --> 00:28:28.170
about the label lesbian feminist activism?
630
00:28:28.170 --> 00:28:31.080
Yeah, okay I'm looking at it right now.
631
00:28:31.080 --> 00:28:32.659
Well I would say personally for me,
632
00:28:32.659 --> 00:28:37.659
for me personally, I would say, how do I (mumbles)?
633
00:28:38.450 --> 00:28:42.334
Well one thing about being in San Francisco, certainly
634
00:28:42.334 --> 00:28:47.190
because I was there, once I got connected
635
00:28:47.190 --> 00:28:48.936
with the War Resisters League, I was still,
636
00:28:48.936 --> 00:28:51.660
that was my first movement job.
637
00:28:51.660 --> 00:28:54.010
And so the whole thing, that entire time
638
00:28:54.010 --> 00:28:55.810
was all around that war in Vietnam.
639
00:28:55.810 --> 00:28:58.556
And because San Francisco was literally
640
00:28:58.556 --> 00:29:01.760
across the bridge to where every single male
641
00:29:01.760 --> 00:29:03.290
who was going into Vietnam had
642
00:29:03.290 --> 00:29:05.910
to go through the Oakland Induction Center,
643
00:29:05.910 --> 00:29:08.350
which is why we had Durham, or one reason why
644
00:29:08.350 --> 00:29:10.330
the War Resisters League was in Durham is because
645
00:29:10.330 --> 00:29:12.960
we're only literally three or four miles away
646
00:29:12.960 --> 00:29:15.010
from every military post that's involved
647
00:29:15.010 --> 00:29:17.720
in every war in this country.
648
00:29:17.720 --> 00:29:19.470
Fort Bragg, Camp Lejeune, whatever.
649
00:29:19.470 --> 00:29:23.010
So WRL sets up where you're in the backyard basically
650
00:29:23.010 --> 00:29:25.360
of where the war machine happens.
651
00:29:25.360 --> 00:29:27.900
So but I was also a lesbian, and so
652
00:29:27.900 --> 00:29:30.530
when I joined the staff of WRL West,
653
00:29:30.530 --> 00:29:32.260
I knew that the staff in New York,
654
00:29:32.260 --> 00:29:33.800
there were so many gay men there,
655
00:29:33.800 --> 00:29:37.310
Igal Rodenko, Dave McReynolds.
656
00:29:37.310 --> 00:29:40.340
But Igal Rodenko wasn't just a gay man,
657
00:29:40.340 --> 00:29:45.040
he was on the 19, oh we just got done
658
00:29:45.040 --> 00:29:46.860
celebrating the 65th anniversary
659
00:29:46.860 --> 00:29:50.370
of the pre-'63 Freedom Ride.
660
00:29:50.370 --> 00:29:53.522
He was working with Bayard Rustin and some other men,
661
00:29:53.522 --> 00:29:56.240
not as a gay man, but as someone
662
00:29:56.240 --> 00:29:59.427
who believed in pacifism, who was gay.
663
00:29:59.427 --> 00:30:04.120
And I say that because when I was at WRL in San Francisco,
664
00:30:04.120 --> 00:30:06.480
I wasn't old enough to go that lesbian bar
665
00:30:06.480 --> 00:30:09.650
called Maud's, because you had to be 21.
666
00:30:09.650 --> 00:30:12.810
So not only was I active in the anti-war movement,
667
00:30:12.810 --> 00:30:15.840
but as a lesbian, the only place you could go
668
00:30:15.840 --> 00:30:18.380
as a lesbian were the lesbian bars, but when you went
669
00:30:18.380 --> 00:30:21.090
to the lesbian bars back in that day, Rose,
670
00:30:21.090 --> 00:30:24.140
that's where a lot of the beginnings of Harvey Milk
671
00:30:24.140 --> 00:30:27.331
and the kind of political activism of the queer movement,
672
00:30:27.331 --> 00:30:30.070
because there was no roots, no place to go except the bars.
673
00:30:30.070 --> 00:30:34.580
So the bars were, in essence, the kind of
674
00:30:34.580 --> 00:30:37.360
breeding grounds of activism,
675
00:30:37.360 --> 00:30:40.630
in terms of the queer liberation in San Francisco.
676
00:30:40.630 --> 00:30:42.230
So I was doing both.
677
00:30:42.230 --> 00:30:44.780
I had to wait to be 21 to go to the lesbian bars
678
00:30:44.780 --> 00:30:47.520
but I was hanging out with the lesbians there.
679
00:30:47.520 --> 00:30:49.413
So in a way, I would describe it as
680
00:30:49.413 --> 00:30:51.590
sort of like Barbara Deming,
681
00:30:51.590 --> 00:30:54.084
and Mab Seacrest, and Suzanne Pharr.
682
00:30:54.084 --> 00:30:56.170
I'm a lesbian, but my world is more defined
683
00:30:56.170 --> 00:30:57.480
than just being a lesbian.
684
00:30:57.480 --> 00:31:00.130
I care about domestic violence,
685
00:31:00.130 --> 00:31:02.163
I care about the Klan, I care about.
686
00:31:02.163 --> 00:31:05.380
And so when you think about SONG,
687
00:31:05.380 --> 00:31:07.260
when you think about the six individuals
688
00:31:07.260 --> 00:31:09.702
who ended up forming that organization
689
00:31:09.702 --> 00:31:12.870
out of the 1993 Creating Change conference,
690
00:31:12.870 --> 00:31:14.320
where Mab Seacrest gave one of
691
00:31:14.320 --> 00:31:17.140
the most amazing speeches about why
692
00:31:17.140 --> 00:31:21.140
as an LGB, I don't know if we had the T at that point,
693
00:31:21.140 --> 00:31:23.490
we have to care about NAFTA,
694
00:31:23.490 --> 00:31:25.000
we have to care about the fact
695
00:31:25.000 --> 00:31:27.960
that President Clinton, at that time,
696
00:31:27.960 --> 00:31:29.605
because that trade agreement,
697
00:31:29.605 --> 00:31:33.351
between Mexico and the United States,
698
00:31:33.351 --> 00:31:36.540
in terms of economically what it was gonna do to people.
699
00:31:37.390 --> 00:31:38.223
People at Creating Change said,
700
00:31:38.223 --> 00:31:40.150
well, why are we talking about NAFTA?
701
00:31:40.150 --> 00:31:43.120
What does that got to do with being gay?
702
00:31:43.120 --> 00:31:45.760
Well, we did a workshop, Rose.
703
00:31:45.760 --> 00:31:48.230
It was Suzanne Pharr, what was she doing?
704
00:31:48.230 --> 00:31:49.790
Domestic violence out of the
705
00:31:49.790 --> 00:31:51.840
Women's Project in Little Rock, Arkansas.
706
00:31:55.132 --> 00:31:56.680
I don't know if you know her, but Joan Garner,
707
00:31:56.680 --> 00:31:58.890
who was working with the Fund for Southern Community,
708
00:31:58.890 --> 00:32:02.090
who was funding progressive organizing in the South.
709
00:32:02.090 --> 00:32:04.075
Pat Hussein, out, Black lesbian, organizing
710
00:32:04.075 --> 00:32:07.140
around issues in the South, in Atlanta,
711
00:32:07.140 --> 00:32:09.600
not just around being gay.
712
00:32:09.600 --> 00:32:11.510
Do you know Pat Hussein, or Joan Garner?
713
00:32:11.510 --> 00:32:13.010
They're both Atlanta.
714
00:32:13.010 --> 00:32:14.460
I don't know Joan Garner.
715
00:32:14.460 --> 00:32:16.850
Pat Hussein is, like you, is difficult to get a hold of,
716
00:32:16.850 --> 00:32:19.011
and she was recently interviewed so we've
717
00:32:19.011 --> 00:32:22.884
arranged to get permission use those interviews,
718
00:32:22.884 --> 00:32:25.720
but Joan Garner
(rapid talking)
719
00:32:25.720 --> 00:32:27.224
but I think if you keep trying,
720
00:32:27.224 --> 00:32:30.180
she's in a good place right now.
721
00:32:30.180 --> 00:32:33.560
We were at the Creating Change conference in Atlanta
722
00:32:33.560 --> 00:32:35.840
and she's really in a good space, she's doing well.
723
00:32:35.840 --> 00:32:37.830
So I don't know, when's the last time
724
00:32:37.830 --> 00:32:40.030
you contacted her, do you know how long ago?
725
00:32:41.609 --> 00:32:43.000
Lorraine contacted...
726
00:32:44.490 --> 00:32:46.340
Well Lorraine was at that (mumbling),
727
00:32:47.227 --> 00:32:52.227
a whole bunch of interviews in, I think it was last fall.
728
00:32:53.200 --> 00:32:55.230
That was when Lorraine talked to her,
729
00:32:55.230 --> 00:32:58.330
but I don't know that she's actually turned us down.
730
00:32:58.330 --> 00:33:00.050
No I think, in fact, I told her,
731
00:33:00.050 --> 00:33:02.923
I said Pat, we really should do this.
732
00:33:02.923 --> 00:33:04.641
I will give you her phone number,
733
00:33:04.641 --> 00:33:05.739
I'll be more than glad to call her
734
00:33:05.739 --> 00:33:06.860
and tell her be in direct contact with you.
735
00:33:06.860 --> 00:33:08.740
I know she'd love to do this with you, Rose.
736
00:33:08.740 --> 00:33:11.314
Well, great, give me her phone number!
737
00:33:11.314 --> 00:33:14.459
(stammering) I'll get my Rolodex.
738
00:33:14.459 --> 00:33:15.833
In fact, can you hang on one second?
739
00:33:15.833 --> 00:33:17.269
I need another thing of water
740
00:33:17.269 --> 00:33:18.320
and I'll get my Rolodex and then
741
00:33:18.320 --> 00:33:20.965
I'll finish answering that question, okay?
742
00:33:20.965 --> 00:33:21.819
Okay.
743
00:33:21.819 --> 00:33:22.872
Okay, hang on.
744
00:33:22.872 --> 00:33:24.854
(telephone receiver clicking)
745
00:33:24.854 --> 00:33:25.954
Okay, I'm back, sorry.
746
00:33:27.670 --> 00:33:28.690
I think I pulled the wrong one,
747
00:33:28.690 --> 00:33:30.080
I'll see if I can find that.
748
00:33:30.080 --> 00:33:33.017
I certainly have her address too, just in case.
749
00:33:33.017 --> 00:33:34.713
She's also on Facebook too, by the way.
750
00:33:38.443 --> 00:33:41.050
So what I was saying is that, so this might get to,
751
00:33:41.050 --> 00:33:43.020
so anyway, (stammering) so for me, personally,
752
00:33:43.020 --> 00:33:45.712
I don't mind using the term, I'm a lesbian feminist.
753
00:33:45.712 --> 00:33:48.253
I don't mind it; I wouldn't certainly,
754
00:33:49.130 --> 00:33:50.840
if I had to qualify it I would say,
755
00:33:50.840 --> 00:33:51.673
well what am I?
756
00:33:51.673 --> 00:33:55.423
I'm a southern, Black, lesbian social justice activist.
757
00:34:00.646 --> 00:34:01.940
But I don't use it like,
758
00:34:01.940 --> 00:34:04.273
Barbara Smith would say, good friend of mine,
759
00:34:05.300 --> 00:34:08.233
well I would consider myself a Black, lesbian feminist.
760
00:34:09.131 --> 00:34:10.150
And that would probably be really true
761
00:34:10.150 --> 00:34:11.633
and accurate for Barbara.
762
00:34:12.520 --> 00:34:13.930
I probably would say I'm an out, Black
763
00:34:13.930 --> 00:34:16.170
lesbian social justice activist.
764
00:34:16.170 --> 00:34:17.890
But feminism is certainly part of it,
765
00:34:17.890 --> 00:34:20.880
but I wouldn't tag it that way, does that make sense?
766
00:34:20.880 --> 00:34:22.207
Yeah, I see.
767
00:34:22.207 --> 00:34:23.800
And I think that can, you put that in there and
768
00:34:23.800 --> 00:34:27.830
a lot of people have different, seems to me like
769
00:34:27.830 --> 00:34:30.923
they have different reactions to that label.
770
00:34:31.830 --> 00:34:34.910
Yeah, maybe it's almost by default,
771
00:34:34.910 --> 00:34:36.880
just by who I am or whatever,
772
00:34:36.880 --> 00:34:38.120
but some people want to make sure
773
00:34:38.120 --> 00:34:40.047
that they stretch that, so.
774
00:34:41.389 --> 00:34:43.410
But you know what I find interesting?
775
00:34:43.410 --> 00:34:44.691
I have to tell you, maybe it's just,
776
00:34:44.691 --> 00:34:45.716
remember I said all you know is
777
00:34:45.716 --> 00:34:47.767
all you know, what's around you at the time?
778
00:34:47.767 --> 00:34:50.550
In San Francisco, this huge world, besides the stuff
779
00:34:50.550 --> 00:34:53.210
we were doing in terms of the anti-Vietnam organizing,
780
00:34:53.210 --> 00:34:55.620
was just how male-dominated that whole thing was,
781
00:34:55.620 --> 00:34:56.980
because when the draft resistance,
782
00:34:56.980 --> 00:34:59.582
you know, we had the draft at that time.
783
00:34:59.582 --> 00:35:03.154
And so we had all these men, no disrespect,
784
00:35:03.154 --> 00:35:05.530
but you go to meeting after meeting,
785
00:35:05.530 --> 00:35:07.280
men, men, men, men, men, and I thought
786
00:35:07.280 --> 00:35:09.080
one of the best meetings, when someone
787
00:35:09.080 --> 00:35:11.370
really tagged it about what was wrong.
788
00:35:11.370 --> 00:35:14.341
We were at a meeting down in Palo Alto and they had a
789
00:35:14.341 --> 00:35:16.980
what was called the resistance,
790
00:35:16.980 --> 00:35:19.300
which was happening all across the country.
791
00:35:19.300 --> 00:35:21.885
We're sitting in a meeting, men and women,
792
00:35:21.885 --> 00:35:22.780
and someone said, well we need people
793
00:35:22.780 --> 00:35:26.090
to sign up for something, and let's pass that sheet around.
794
00:35:26.090 --> 00:35:28.256
Well it got to a women, a friend of mine,
795
00:35:28.256 --> 00:35:29.700
and she looked and said,
796
00:35:29.700 --> 00:35:32.034
there's nothing but penises on this list.
797
00:35:32.034 --> 00:35:32.995
(laughing)
798
00:35:32.995 --> 00:35:35.540
And I thought, that just tagged, that just marked it,
799
00:35:35.540 --> 00:35:37.559
there's nothing but penises on this list.
800
00:35:37.559 --> 00:35:41.100
And a lot of women who were so active in that movement,
801
00:35:41.100 --> 00:35:43.193
not just lesbians, but feminist women
802
00:35:43.193 --> 00:35:46.930
were saying, well where's our voice, what do we get to do?
803
00:35:46.930 --> 00:35:49.040
Well, this great group out of Boston,
804
00:35:49.040 --> 00:35:53.370
was called Resist, R-E-S-I-S-T.
805
00:35:53.370 --> 00:35:56.287
They wanted to figure out, how could we complement
806
00:35:56.287 --> 00:36:00.380
the draft resistance movement that was all men
807
00:36:00.380 --> 00:36:02.070
by people who couldn't be drafted
808
00:36:02.070 --> 00:36:05.960
because they were either women or too old or whatever,
809
00:36:05.960 --> 00:36:08.620
and that became a point of where we could feel like
810
00:36:08.620 --> 00:36:10.680
we could have an equal voice and an
811
00:36:10.680 --> 00:36:13.820
equal role or equal visibility.
812
00:36:13.820 --> 00:36:16.850
And remember, one of the first people who signed
813
00:36:16.850 --> 00:36:20.027
that was Dr. Benjamin Spock, the baby doctor.
814
00:36:20.027 --> 00:36:22.310
And look what happened, see what I'm saying?
815
00:36:22.310 --> 00:36:24.230
It was like, oh, finally!
816
00:36:24.230 --> 00:36:26.330
That all of us could figure out a way
817
00:36:26.330 --> 00:36:28.160
that we could have a role in terms of
818
00:36:28.160 --> 00:36:31.023
how we ended that war, protest the war in Vietnam.
819
00:36:32.710 --> 00:36:35.180
But for women, a lot of women said,
820
00:36:35.180 --> 00:36:37.620
and also people, Barbara Deming maybe could point you,
821
00:36:37.620 --> 00:36:39.990
said it's more than just this particular war in Vietnam.
822
00:36:39.990 --> 00:36:42.010
What's going on here?
823
00:36:42.010 --> 00:36:43.900
The rapes, the women that were
824
00:36:43.900 --> 00:36:45.740
in these clubs with all these guys.
825
00:36:45.740 --> 00:36:47.570
You looked at what was happening
826
00:36:47.570 --> 00:36:50.260
to the women of Vietnam, with the soldiers,
827
00:36:50.260 --> 00:36:53.580
that there's more than just the killing
828
00:36:53.580 --> 00:36:54.750
of men and women, each other,
829
00:36:54.750 --> 00:36:56.910
talked about all the other surrounding things
830
00:36:56.910 --> 00:36:59.500
that happen when a war happens in your country.
831
00:36:59.500 --> 00:37:01.750
And she began to fine tune it,
832
00:37:01.750 --> 00:37:04.353
started to understand some of the bigger reality.
833
00:37:05.440 --> 00:37:08.150
People like Suzanne Pharr, who talked about
834
00:37:08.150 --> 00:37:12.218
that great book she wrote, Homophobia, A Weapon of Sexism.
835
00:37:12.218 --> 00:37:13.860
You see what I mean, Rose?
836
00:37:13.860 --> 00:37:16.570
So you've got more of a dissecting and a bigger, bigger
837
00:37:16.570 --> 00:37:18.520
picture of what the hell was happening.
838
00:37:20.820 --> 00:37:24.450
And so for WRL, that was, has always been opposed
839
00:37:24.450 --> 00:37:27.699
at every single war, started by three women.
840
00:37:27.699 --> 00:37:29.576
Three women!
841
00:37:29.576 --> 00:37:31.192
Who were they?
842
00:37:31.192 --> 00:37:33.410
I knew you were gonna ask me that.
843
00:37:33.410 --> 00:37:34.517
I can look it up, that's okay.
844
00:37:34.517 --> 00:37:38.650
You can look it up, but if you go to War Resisters League,
845
00:37:38.650 --> 00:37:40.980
what is it warresistersleague.org?
846
00:37:40.980 --> 00:37:43.283
Three founding women, Jesse Wallace Hughan.
847
00:37:44.322 --> 00:37:45.657
Anyway, but that was interesting too,
848
00:37:45.657 --> 00:37:47.730
was that it was three women who started
849
00:37:47.730 --> 00:37:48.793
that legacy as well.
850
00:37:50.276 --> 00:37:52.537
So do you suppose that Palo Alto meeting,
851
00:37:52.537 --> 00:37:55.170
one of Lorraine's questions was when
852
00:37:55.170 --> 00:37:56.350
did you realize you wanted to do work
853
00:37:56.350 --> 00:37:59.050
on sexual orientation, along with race or class?
854
00:37:59.050 --> 00:38:02.935
Was that, where was your feminist consciousness raising?
855
00:38:02.935 --> 00:38:05.456
Well actually, I think, what I was gonna say,
856
00:38:05.456 --> 00:38:06.947
I mean, that was already happening already
857
00:38:06.947 --> 00:38:09.690
because for the War Resisters League, I think
858
00:38:09.690 --> 00:38:12.199
was one of the few leagues that actually hired,
859
00:38:12.199 --> 00:38:13.032
I mean, had women on staff.
860
00:38:13.032 --> 00:38:13.910
Everything was really male,
861
00:38:13.910 --> 00:38:15.760
it was like, men, men, men, men, men.
862
00:38:16.739 --> 00:38:19.594
We even began the movement with gay men, men, men, men, men.
863
00:38:19.594 --> 00:38:20.980
I mean, there was a interesting parallel,
864
00:38:20.980 --> 00:38:23.290
we had a movement called the gay movement.
865
00:38:23.290 --> 00:38:26.600
We had to end up adding the L for lesbian
866
00:38:26.600 --> 00:38:28.750
but for WRL, all I'm saying,
867
00:38:28.750 --> 00:38:31.287
that moment in Palo Alto, it was just one of those
868
00:38:31.287 --> 00:38:34.552
a-ha moments like, yeah, that really said it all.
869
00:38:34.552 --> 00:38:37.800
But a lot of that feminism was really whirling
870
00:38:37.800 --> 00:38:40.502
around the WRL because the War Resisters League,
871
00:38:40.502 --> 00:38:43.790
even when I joined it back in 1969 on staff,
872
00:38:43.790 --> 00:38:46.840
you had some very strong, powerful women
873
00:38:46.840 --> 00:38:49.420
in the War Resisters League out of New York.
874
00:38:49.420 --> 00:38:52.900
I mean, these women, they were my role models of,
875
00:38:52.900 --> 00:38:55.160
we can be women, we're strong, we're feisty,
876
00:38:55.160 --> 00:38:57.374
we're started by three women.
877
00:38:57.374 --> 00:38:59.950
But never a meeting would happen without
878
00:38:59.950 --> 00:39:01.340
equal voices in the room because,
879
00:39:01.340 --> 00:39:03.680
you know what the key word was, Rose?
880
00:39:03.680 --> 00:39:04.513
Intentional.
881
00:39:05.470 --> 00:39:07.980
That, to me has been, if I've learned
882
00:39:07.980 --> 00:39:10.430
nothing else over all these years,
883
00:39:10.430 --> 00:39:12.540
if you're intentional, when SONG started,
884
00:39:12.540 --> 00:39:16.470
it was intentional to have three Black, three white.
885
00:39:16.470 --> 00:39:18.990
It was intentional, about intentional intersections
886
00:39:18.990 --> 00:39:22.300
of why we understand about those isms.
887
00:39:22.300 --> 00:39:24.010
And I think that where we are now,
888
00:39:24.010 --> 00:39:26.000
and I look back against the backdrop
889
00:39:26.000 --> 00:39:28.030
of all the groups we've had and what we've done
890
00:39:28.030 --> 00:39:30.000
and the journeys we've been on.
891
00:39:30.000 --> 00:39:33.025
That work, to me, is the essence of what is
892
00:39:33.025 --> 00:39:35.457
and needs to be right now.
893
00:39:36.614 --> 00:39:39.840
And so I think one reason why SONG has carried on for 20,
894
00:39:39.840 --> 00:39:41.620
we had no clue, believe me, Rose,
895
00:39:41.620 --> 00:39:43.573
when the six of us got together and thought,
896
00:39:43.573 --> 00:39:45.900
well, what do we want to do?
897
00:39:45.900 --> 00:39:46.900
Well, it came out of the fact
898
00:39:46.900 --> 00:39:49.560
that, if you don't mind me sharing this really quick story--
899
00:39:49.560 --> 00:39:50.483
Sure, go ahead.
900
00:39:51.635 --> 00:39:54.160
Are you familiar with the National Gay and Lesbian Task
901
00:39:54.160 --> 00:39:56.536
Force or the Creating Change conference we do every year?
902
00:39:56.536 --> 00:39:57.545
Yes.
903
00:39:57.545 --> 00:40:00.370
Okay, well in this particular year, in 1993,
904
00:40:00.370 --> 00:40:03.277
Ivy Young, Black lesbian working with the task force,
905
00:40:03.277 --> 00:40:05.300
whatever talk that they were gonna do,
906
00:40:05.300 --> 00:40:07.170
it fell through, and she knew we had
907
00:40:07.170 --> 00:40:08.220
some good stuff in Durham.
908
00:40:08.220 --> 00:40:11.010
She called and said, Mandy, we just lost the site,
909
00:40:11.010 --> 00:40:13.860
can we bring the conference to Durham, North Carolina?
910
00:40:13.860 --> 00:40:15.470
And she said, that would be good because it's
911
00:40:15.470 --> 00:40:18.120
the first time it's ever happened in the South.
912
00:40:18.120 --> 00:40:22.608
Yes, absolutely, we have a great community here, fantastic.
913
00:40:22.608 --> 00:40:26.610
I had moved here in 1982, this conference
914
00:40:26.610 --> 00:40:28.724
didn't happen until 1993, so I knew
915
00:40:28.724 --> 00:40:31.080
what we around us, what we pulled together.
916
00:40:31.080 --> 00:40:34.113
So here are the phone calls we started getting, Rose,
917
00:40:34.113 --> 00:40:36.341
from people coming to the conference, and this is the tone,
918
00:40:36.341 --> 00:40:39.034
(speaks indignantly) well is there an airport down there?
919
00:40:39.034 --> 00:40:41.250
(Rose laughs heartily) Yeah, Raleigh-Durham is like,
920
00:40:41.250 --> 00:40:42.430
20 minutes from where we're gonna
921
00:40:42.430 --> 00:40:43.993
be meeting in Downtown Durham.
922
00:40:45.030 --> 00:40:47.400
Well why are we holding it in North Carolina?
923
00:40:47.400 --> 00:40:50.100
Isn't that where Jesse Helms is from?
924
00:40:50.100 --> 00:40:51.410
We're holding it in North Carolina
925
00:40:51.410 --> 00:40:54.123
precisely because that's where Jesse Helms is from.
926
00:40:55.000 --> 00:40:56.830
Well are we gonna be able to get
927
00:40:56.830 --> 00:40:58.820
regular food, and what are grits anyway?
928
00:40:58.820 --> 00:41:02.783
Do you see the tone, do you hear what I'm saying?
929
00:41:02.783 --> 00:41:03.616
This is what we were getting.
930
00:41:03.616 --> 00:41:04.449
My God, what did you think?
931
00:41:04.449 --> 00:41:07.241
And then finally, I always throw this in jokingly,
932
00:41:07.241 --> 00:41:10.320
are the streets paved down there?
933
00:41:10.320 --> 00:41:12.170
I mean, am I lying?
934
00:41:12.170 --> 00:41:15.460
The anti-Southern bias was unbelievable.
935
00:41:15.460 --> 00:41:17.280
And so we thought, well maybe a few of us
936
00:41:17.280 --> 00:41:19.190
who know each other, let's do a workshop
937
00:41:19.190 --> 00:41:20.580
on what it means to be living and
938
00:41:20.580 --> 00:41:24.570
organizing in the South as lesbians.
939
00:41:24.570 --> 00:41:25.640
So who'd we get?
940
00:41:25.640 --> 00:41:26.940
Suzanne Pharr (chuckling),
941
00:41:27.870 --> 00:41:30.913
Mab Seacrest, who's doing anti-Klan organizing,
942
00:41:31.925 --> 00:41:35.200
Pat Hussein, who's down in Atlanta, Georgia, Joan Garner.
943
00:41:35.200 --> 00:41:39.700
And then we ended up adding Pam McMichael later,
944
00:41:39.700 --> 00:41:43.130
who's doing organizing around labor stuff in Kentucky.
945
00:41:43.130 --> 00:41:45.870
That one workshop and Mab's speech,
946
00:41:45.870 --> 00:41:47.510
which I think is printed somewhere,
947
00:41:47.510 --> 00:41:49.858
I know I could find for you and send it to you,
948
00:41:49.858 --> 00:41:52.850
and (mumbles), who gave a speech about
949
00:41:52.850 --> 00:41:55.623
why we have to be beyond just queer stuff.
950
00:41:55.623 --> 00:41:58.620
That was the kernel of the dream of what now
951
00:41:58.620 --> 00:42:01.090
is still going on with SONG all these years later,
952
00:42:01.090 --> 00:42:03.210
because we were intentional but because of
953
00:42:03.210 --> 00:42:06.647
that backlash around being in the South, what?
954
00:42:07.671 --> 00:42:11.588
Cool, I like that, that's a great connection.
955
00:42:13.271 --> 00:42:16.984
That's it, that's--
That's the beginning.
956
00:42:16.984 --> 00:42:20.473
And intentional, we were intentional.
957
00:42:22.415 --> 00:42:27.220
So SONG, you get the idea for SONG because there's...
958
00:42:29.610 --> 00:42:33.420
Because you're doing a workshop on doing activism
959
00:42:33.420 --> 00:42:35.313
in the South.
In the South, right.
960
00:42:35.313 --> 00:42:38.720
Then you've got all these leaders in Southern activism.
961
00:42:38.720 --> 00:42:41.670
And this Joan Garner, I have not heard her name,
962
00:42:41.670 --> 00:42:43.730
I need to get in touch with her, I think.
963
00:42:43.730 --> 00:42:46.840
Yeah, do; and I can also, I'll get you her information.
964
00:42:46.840 --> 00:42:49.461
She's now, she actually ran for (stammering),
965
00:42:49.461 --> 00:42:51.630
I think she's either on City Council,
966
00:42:51.630 --> 00:42:54.420
or some kind of elected position down
967
00:42:54.420 --> 00:42:55.740
where she lives, down in Atlanta.
968
00:42:55.740 --> 00:42:57.453
She's also on Facebook as well.
969
00:42:58.440 --> 00:43:00.540
But at the time, I don't know, are you familiar
970
00:43:00.540 --> 00:43:02.633
with Funds for Southern Communities at all?
971
00:43:02.633 --> 00:43:03.936
No.
972
00:43:03.936 --> 00:43:06.950
They fund activist groups in the South,
973
00:43:06.950 --> 00:43:08.200
and that's who they are but you
974
00:43:08.200 --> 00:43:11.150
could google that or whatever.
975
00:43:11.150 --> 00:43:13.050
But that's where Joan was at the time,
976
00:43:13.050 --> 00:43:17.423
now she's a elected official in Atlanta.
977
00:43:18.370 --> 00:43:20.470
But at the time, that's what she was doing.
978
00:43:20.470 --> 00:43:23.473
So really, I mean the essence was, we knew who was around,
979
00:43:23.473 --> 00:43:26.220
that people were gonna come to Creating Change,
980
00:43:26.220 --> 00:43:29.080
and Mab was already tapped to do this keynote.
981
00:43:29.080 --> 00:43:31.980
And so it was almost a culmination
982
00:43:31.980 --> 00:43:34.580
of all those little things, but what really
983
00:43:34.580 --> 00:43:36.360
what made SONG, and the reason
984
00:43:36.360 --> 00:43:37.690
why we came up with this name
985
00:43:37.690 --> 00:43:40.120
and the reason why we ended up coming up
986
00:43:40.120 --> 00:43:43.400
with our original purpose; the thing you have here,
987
00:43:43.400 --> 00:43:45.140
that was the more recent update
988
00:43:45.140 --> 00:43:47.123
of the statement of purpose.
989
00:43:47.123 --> 00:43:50.160
Our original one that came out of our forming
990
00:43:50.160 --> 00:43:52.640
with Mab and me and Suzanne
991
00:43:52.640 --> 00:43:57.490
and Joan, and the sixth, Pat, was building
992
00:43:57.490 --> 00:44:01.150
transformative models of organizing in the South
993
00:44:01.150 --> 00:44:06.150
that would connect race, class, culture, gender,
994
00:44:06.720 --> 00:44:09.933
sexual orientation, and I think we added gender identity.
995
00:44:11.250 --> 00:44:13.320
And I think the key word's transformative
996
00:44:13.320 --> 00:44:16.723
models of organizing and with the intentional
997
00:44:16.723 --> 00:44:19.720
thing around the isms was to show
998
00:44:19.720 --> 00:44:21.934
that it wasn't just about being a Southerner,
999
00:44:21.934 --> 00:44:25.830
it wasn't just about being gay or Lesbian or whatever.
1000
00:44:25.830 --> 00:44:27.940
And then if you took all that and then
1001
00:44:27.940 --> 00:44:31.360
looked at the world around you
1002
00:44:31.360 --> 00:44:32.930
or what you're organizing around,
1003
00:44:32.930 --> 00:44:35.260
you could see the connections.
1004
00:44:35.260 --> 00:44:37.320
But I will tell you this, Rose,
1005
00:44:37.320 --> 00:44:38.700
I think one of the key things
1006
00:44:38.700 --> 00:44:40.090
that was most important for us
1007
00:44:40.090 --> 00:44:42.133
when we all met, the six of us,
1008
00:44:43.556 --> 00:44:46.020
when we were meeting, we were talking about
1009
00:44:46.020 --> 00:44:50.090
the work we were all doing at that time, and we were talking
1010
00:44:50.090 --> 00:44:52.700
about how do we take each piece
1011
00:44:52.700 --> 00:44:54.600
that we were talking about in what we're doing,
1012
00:44:54.600 --> 00:44:58.122
and trying to figure out how we could then say
1013
00:44:58.122 --> 00:45:01.400
it wasn't just about us, it wasn't just about being Lesbian,
1014
00:45:01.400 --> 00:45:03.400
it wasn't just about being a Southerner.
1015
00:45:04.252 --> 00:45:05.610
What would be the thing that you could
1016
00:45:05.610 --> 00:45:08.393
take anywhere, particularly in the South,
1017
00:45:09.260 --> 00:45:10.430
that would allow us to sit
1018
00:45:10.430 --> 00:45:13.772
at a number of different tables, right?
1019
00:45:13.772 --> 00:45:14.605
What would be the thing or things
1020
00:45:14.605 --> 00:45:16.250
that would allow us to sit at a number of different,
1021
00:45:16.250 --> 00:45:20.860
that were not ours, that were not gay, whatever.
1022
00:45:20.860 --> 00:45:22.870
And one of the first things we decided to do was
1023
00:45:22.870 --> 00:45:25.660
to try to figure out how we could work with
1024
00:45:25.660 --> 00:45:29.923
a non-gay issue that was around economic justice.
1025
00:45:31.010 --> 00:45:33.710
And one of the things that we worked on was the,
1026
00:45:33.710 --> 00:45:36.310
it came a little bit later in the years,
1027
00:45:36.310 --> 00:45:40.310
but it was this thing called the Immigrant Freedom Ride.
1028
00:45:40.310 --> 00:45:41.290
I don't know if you remember that at all,
1029
00:45:41.290 --> 00:45:44.280
but there was an immigrant workers Freedom Ride
1030
00:45:44.280 --> 00:45:46.250
around farm labor, across the country.
1031
00:45:46.250 --> 00:45:47.930
And you know, there's a lot of farm labor
1032
00:45:47.930 --> 00:45:49.503
in the South, as you know.
1033
00:45:50.920 --> 00:45:53.644
And so that was a particular intentional thing
1034
00:45:53.644 --> 00:45:56.610
of hooking up the African-American community
1035
00:45:56.610 --> 00:45:59.610
with our history of our Freedom Rides in the South
1036
00:45:59.610 --> 00:46:03.352
with the farm labor organizing that was Latina, Latino,
1037
00:46:03.352 --> 00:46:06.170
and figuring out how we would work with
1038
00:46:06.170 --> 00:46:09.160
that and not just as a gay thing with SONG.
1039
00:46:09.160 --> 00:46:11.760
So one of the stops was in Durham.
1040
00:46:11.760 --> 00:46:14.270
Another one was the Mount Olive Pickle Boycott,
1041
00:46:14.270 --> 00:46:16.580
out of Mount Olive, North Carolina,
1042
00:46:16.580 --> 00:46:18.203
and SONG was at that table.
1043
00:46:19.490 --> 00:46:21.650
So it was almost like we had to intentionally go
1044
00:46:21.650 --> 00:46:23.070
to someplace else that normally
1045
00:46:23.070 --> 00:46:24.920
we wouldn't be sitting at that table.
1046
00:46:24.920 --> 00:46:26.908
And those relationships, that work,
1047
00:46:26.908 --> 00:46:29.470
really probably for a lot of people said,
1048
00:46:29.470 --> 00:46:30.800
well maybe being gay isn't
1049
00:46:30.800 --> 00:46:34.060
just about being gay, it's about broader issues.
1050
00:46:34.060 --> 00:46:35.810
But also for a lot of groups,
1051
00:46:35.810 --> 00:46:38.813
like the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, you name it.
1052
00:46:38.813 --> 00:46:41.620
There's a lot of gay and lesbians in those organizations
1053
00:46:41.620 --> 00:46:44.550
but they wanted to find out, how can I
1054
00:46:44.550 --> 00:46:47.980
be real with who I am, continue the important work
1055
00:46:47.980 --> 00:46:51.030
that I do, but bring all of who I am
1056
00:46:51.030 --> 00:46:53.308
to the work that I do, bring all of me?
1057
00:46:53.308 --> 00:46:57.644
And I think that has just been such a touchstone for SONG.
1058
00:46:57.644 --> 00:47:01.271
So we work with the Farm Labor Organizing Committee.
1059
00:47:01.271 --> 00:47:04.091
We are in coalition right now with immigrant organizing
1060
00:47:04.091 --> 00:47:07.486
in Atlanta, Georgia and Alabama.
1061
00:47:07.486 --> 00:47:10.440
And so people see, we show up.
1062
00:47:10.440 --> 00:47:12.480
We're there, we're serious, we mean it.
1063
00:47:12.480 --> 00:47:13.760
We're here because of your issue
1064
00:47:13.760 --> 00:47:16.580
and we all understand about the justice issues
1065
00:47:16.580 --> 00:47:18.690
across all of those different levels
1066
00:47:18.690 --> 00:47:20.100
and SONG will continue to be
1067
00:47:20.100 --> 00:47:21.918
a constant partner in this effort.
1068
00:47:21.918 --> 00:47:24.130
We don't want you to join us,
1069
00:47:24.130 --> 00:47:25.130
we don't want you to be us.
1070
00:47:25.130 --> 00:47:29.827
We want to figure out how we, we, move all of us forward.
1071
00:47:29.827 --> 00:47:31.930
That's it.
1072
00:47:31.930 --> 00:47:33.470
That sounds very much like what
1073
00:47:33.470 --> 00:47:35.630
Bernice Reagon Johnson talked about
1074
00:47:35.630 --> 00:47:38.707
with coalition building in the 90's.
1075
00:47:38.707 --> 00:47:39.653
Dead on.
1076
00:47:40.913 --> 00:47:44.253
That's the future too, for me, in my opinion.
1077
00:47:48.400 --> 00:47:50.380
Well that is a great story.
1078
00:47:50.380 --> 00:47:54.300
And so the longevity, you think,
1079
00:47:54.300 --> 00:47:59.064
has to do with this fact that it's focused on
1080
00:47:59.064 --> 00:48:02.840
being at the table and being there?
1081
00:48:02.840 --> 00:48:05.610
Yeah, and there's a quote that I got
1082
00:48:05.610 --> 00:48:07.240
from my good friend, Randy Roma,
1083
00:48:07.240 --> 00:48:09.720
down in Little Rock, Arkansas,
1084
00:48:09.720 --> 00:48:11.364
one of the quotes is, are we about,
1085
00:48:11.364 --> 00:48:12.700
and that's, yeah I think this queer movement
1086
00:48:12.700 --> 00:48:13.720
right now, at this point,
1087
00:48:13.720 --> 00:48:18.270
are we about justice, or are we about just us?
1088
00:48:18.270 --> 00:48:20.760
We are right smack dab in the middle of that,
1089
00:48:20.760 --> 00:48:23.980
as far as I'm concerned, and I am so upset,
1090
00:48:23.980 --> 00:48:26.580
I cannot tell you how upset I am
1091
00:48:26.580 --> 00:48:28.820
with a movement that seems to be,
1092
00:48:28.820 --> 00:48:31.520
I shouldn't say all, I'll qualify it.
1093
00:48:31.520 --> 00:48:33.370
But I've heard more than one time, Rose,
1094
00:48:33.370 --> 00:48:34.320
I've heard this quote.
1095
00:48:34.320 --> 00:48:36.175
I've heard people say, well you know what?
1096
00:48:36.175 --> 00:48:38.597
We're almost getting everything we want.
1097
00:48:38.597 --> 00:48:42.270
You know, Don't Ask Don't Tell, thanks Bill Clinton.
1098
00:48:42.270 --> 00:48:44.297
DOMA, who knows what's going to happen with
1099
00:48:44.297 --> 00:48:45.970
the Supreme decision--
That was another
1100
00:48:45.970 --> 00:48:47.390
thanks, Bill Clinton.
1101
00:48:47.390 --> 00:48:50.520
Yeah, don't even get me started.
1102
00:48:50.520 --> 00:48:53.220
But the Employment Non-Discrimination Act,
1103
00:48:53.220 --> 00:48:55.750
if we put anywhere near even 1/4
1104
00:48:55.750 --> 00:48:57.180
of the energy and money we would put
1105
00:48:57.180 --> 00:48:59.500
in the Employment Non-Discrimination Act
1106
00:48:59.500 --> 00:49:01.890
for jobs, at the behest of marriage.
1107
00:49:01.890 --> 00:49:05.000
Well I've heard people say, I'm good,
1108
00:49:05.000 --> 00:49:05.833
and I've said, well what about
1109
00:49:05.833 --> 00:49:07.500
other issues, what about immigration?
1110
00:49:07.500 --> 00:49:08.333
What?
1111
00:49:08.333 --> 00:49:09.930
No one told me that was a gay issue.
1112
00:49:09.930 --> 00:49:13.834
I mean, that's penalty; no that's not a gay issue.
1113
00:49:13.834 --> 00:49:15.400
You know what I mean?
1114
00:49:15.400 --> 00:49:17.240
It's like people have been so focused
1115
00:49:17.240 --> 00:49:19.820
on just their gay stuff and the minute
1116
00:49:19.820 --> 00:49:21.050
you try and bring something in,
1117
00:49:21.050 --> 00:49:22.507
reproductive rights, that's not a gay,
1118
00:49:22.507 --> 00:49:24.680
in fact, you have a group of gay people
1119
00:49:24.680 --> 00:49:27.530
who are bent on, they're anti-choice.
1120
00:49:27.530 --> 00:49:29.952
And so as we move on, depending on
1121
00:49:29.952 --> 00:49:31.950
what's going with the court case,
1122
00:49:31.950 --> 00:49:34.250
but also what happened before this one?
1123
00:49:34.250 --> 00:49:35.950
The Voting Rights Act, my God!
1124
00:49:35.950 --> 00:49:37.170
We're gonna bring that up again?
1125
00:49:37.170 --> 00:49:39.454
And I've heard people say, well who cares about that?
1126
00:49:39.454 --> 00:49:41.283
We want to talk about marriage.
1127
00:49:42.400 --> 00:49:45.660
It's frustrating, and so SONG and other groups
1128
00:49:45.660 --> 00:49:47.780
are in this moment of asking, I'm looking online,
1129
00:49:47.780 --> 00:49:52.090
Facebook, there's tons of stuff on the Facebook right now.
1130
00:49:52.090 --> 00:49:56.160
Scot Nakagawa has this great piece about marriage equality.
1131
00:49:56.160 --> 00:49:57.701
Yeah, but what about the broader
1132
00:49:57.701 --> 00:50:00.540
big issue of equality and justice for all?
1133
00:50:00.540 --> 00:50:04.060
And Suzanne Pharr and I and a bunch of people
1134
00:50:04.060 --> 00:50:06.440
signed this great thing called Beyond Marriage.
1135
00:50:06.440 --> 00:50:09.780
Why is it that the only way you get access
1136
00:50:09.780 --> 00:50:13.770
to all these things, being married, gay or straight?
1137
00:50:13.770 --> 00:50:16.910
What if you never get married, what happens to us?
1138
00:50:16.910 --> 00:50:19.670
No, you should get this stuff just because.
1139
00:50:19.670 --> 00:50:22.550
So we're gonna have some interesting conversations, I think,
1140
00:50:22.550 --> 00:50:25.685
however the state goes, but it's been out there.
1141
00:50:25.685 --> 00:50:28.334
And it's gonna come to a head sooner or later,
1142
00:50:28.334 --> 00:50:31.573
because it is more than just about the queer thing.
1143
00:50:31.573 --> 00:50:35.143
I'm done with it, I just can't deal with it anymore.
1144
00:50:36.582 --> 00:50:40.020
I'm for marriage equality, great.
1145
00:50:40.020 --> 00:50:42.017
But I'd like to have a job (Rose chuckles).
1146
00:50:42.990 --> 00:50:45.790
Put energy into that, for goodness sake, get on with it.
1147
00:50:46.960 --> 00:50:49.778
Yeah well, this project is focused on
1148
00:50:49.778 --> 00:50:54.100
all the kinds of activism that lesbians were doing.
1149
00:50:54.100 --> 00:50:56.620
And what's happening, I've interviewed
1150
00:50:56.620 --> 00:50:58.780
a whole bunch of Gainesville women,
1151
00:50:58.780 --> 00:51:00.680
and we have a whole chapter about the
1152
00:51:00.680 --> 00:51:01.850
Gainesville Women's Health Center,
1153
00:51:01.850 --> 00:51:04.228
which was one of the first.
1154
00:51:04.228 --> 00:51:07.250
And what happened there was,
1155
00:51:07.250 --> 00:51:09.640
well they did a conference on women's health.
1156
00:51:09.640 --> 00:51:11.936
A national conference, in Gainesville,
1157
00:51:11.936 --> 00:51:16.030
about the year after they did their clinic.
1158
00:51:16.030 --> 00:51:20.330
And they had been having struggles with
1159
00:51:20.330 --> 00:51:24.067
lesbians and straight women working together at the clinic.
1160
00:51:24.067 --> 00:51:26.860
So they had a workshop on this
1161
00:51:26.860 --> 00:51:29.250
at their Women's Health Conference,
1162
00:51:29.250 --> 00:51:32.010
and it was so popular they had to have two sessions.
1163
00:51:32.010 --> 00:51:34.750
And then they started keeping meeting,
1164
00:51:34.750 --> 00:51:36.400
and of course by the time this was over,
1165
00:51:36.400 --> 00:51:38.250
they were all gay (raucous laughing).
1166
00:51:40.480 --> 00:51:41.721
When did this happen?
1167
00:51:41.721 --> 00:51:44.683
This is in the 70's.
1168
00:51:45.520 --> 00:51:47.200
Oh, my gosh, really?
1169
00:51:47.200 --> 00:51:51.390
Yeah, so working on women's health issues in the 70's
1170
00:51:51.390 --> 00:51:52.900
in Gainesville, Florida and working
1171
00:51:52.900 --> 00:51:54.080
with straight women and all this.
1172
00:51:54.080 --> 00:51:55.700
What would happen, in fact, one of them
1173
00:51:55.700 --> 00:51:57.649
told me, this was interesting.
1174
00:51:57.649 --> 00:52:00.700
I asked her if she identifies as a lesbian feminist,
1175
00:52:00.700 --> 00:52:03.865
she says, you know, I've been living with a woman
1176
00:52:03.865 --> 00:52:05.300
for 20 years, and I still identify
1177
00:52:05.300 --> 00:52:08.109
as a heterosexual who's chosen to be a lesbian.
1178
00:52:08.109 --> 00:52:09.966
(raucous laughing)
1179
00:52:09.966 --> 00:52:14.710
Now that's fascinating, isn't that (mumbles).
1180
00:52:14.710 --> 00:52:17.250
Wow, that's interesting.
Because you know, lesbians
1181
00:52:17.250 --> 00:52:19.780
had a great time and the straight women
1182
00:52:19.780 --> 00:52:22.480
were jealous, really, I think (chuckles).
1183
00:52:22.480 --> 00:52:23.824
I always wondered that too.
1184
00:52:23.824 --> 00:52:27.960
I always wonder, deep down whether or not this sort of,
1185
00:52:27.960 --> 00:52:29.953
I can't believe there's lesbians (mumbles),
1186
00:52:29.953 --> 00:52:31.400
I don't know, I don't want to go too far on this.
1187
00:52:31.400 --> 00:52:32.380
But you know what I mean?
1188
00:52:32.380 --> 00:52:34.780
What is that, what is that kind of a (grumbles).
1189
00:52:36.190 --> 00:52:38.480
But listen, remember the Lavender menace was now.
1190
00:52:38.480 --> 00:52:40.334
I mean, look at that drama
1191
00:52:40.334 --> 00:52:41.773
that went on, are you kidding me?
1192
00:52:42.947 --> 00:52:45.180
And that new show, the Makers movie
1193
00:52:45.180 --> 00:52:47.350
that was just on, it's so depressing to me.
1194
00:52:47.350 --> 00:52:49.110
I don't know, I guess I should've felt better about it
1195
00:52:49.110 --> 00:52:52.867
but when it talked about the 1977 World Conference on Women,
1196
00:52:52.867 --> 00:52:56.920
when NOW and Betty Friedan come out in favor of lesbians.
1197
00:52:56.920 --> 00:53:00.943
And the white wing used it against them, in 1977.
1198
00:53:00.943 --> 00:53:05.001
Oh wow, what movie are you talking about?
1199
00:53:05.001 --> 00:53:07.050
What's it called, The Makers, what's that?
1200
00:53:07.050 --> 00:53:08.947
The Makers, it was on PBS.
1201
00:53:08.947 --> 00:53:11.409
I didn't even know about it, I was interviewing
1202
00:53:11.409 --> 00:53:16.409
Billie Avery who was in, she was with the
1203
00:53:16.700 --> 00:53:17.660
Gainesville Women's Health Service,
1204
00:53:17.660 --> 00:53:19.360
what I was interviewing her about,
1205
00:53:20.616 --> 00:53:21.959
and she was telling me about that movie,
1206
00:53:21.959 --> 00:53:23.582
which is really a good movie, it's three hours long.
1207
00:53:23.582 --> 00:53:25.050
I mean, I could not watch it all at one time.
1208
00:53:25.050 --> 00:53:27.050
But it's a history of the Women's Movement,
1209
00:53:27.050 --> 00:53:30.200
on PBS, I'm sure you can get it somewhere.
1210
00:53:30.200 --> 00:53:31.390
I'll have to look it up.
1211
00:53:31.390 --> 00:53:33.358
Yeah I think it's called Makers.
1212
00:53:33.358 --> 00:53:35.660
Is it called M-A-K-E-R, The Makers?
1213
00:53:35.660 --> 00:53:37.380
The Makers, I believe that's it.
1214
00:53:37.380 --> 00:53:39.090
Wait a minute, let me look at the...
1215
00:53:39.090 --> 00:53:41.320
Yeah, please do, I'll google that.
1216
00:53:47.840 --> 00:53:50.230
It goes over a lot of that anti...
1217
00:53:52.047 --> 00:53:53.363
That anti-women's stuff.
1218
00:53:54.516 --> 00:53:56.766
(mumbling)
1219
00:54:07.654 --> 00:54:08.750
Oh, there it is Makers, just Makers.
1220
00:54:08.750 --> 00:54:10.220
It came on February 26,
1221
00:54:10.220 --> 00:54:13.710
Okay great, I just thought I'd write it down.
1222
00:54:13.710 --> 00:54:15.355
It's (mumbles) about the history.
1223
00:54:15.355 --> 00:54:19.293
It's a good show but whoa, reel in some of that
1224
00:54:19.293 --> 00:54:22.930
the bad stuff, like the ERA not passing and all.
1225
00:54:22.930 --> 00:54:23.763
Oh, yeah.
1226
00:54:25.550 --> 00:54:26.886
Can I ask you a real quick question?
1227
00:54:26.886 --> 00:54:29.253
It's still relevant with this interview.
1228
00:54:29.253 --> 00:54:32.256
I am struck, and maybe it's just me,
1229
00:54:32.256 --> 00:54:35.420
I am so struck right now over,
1230
00:54:35.420 --> 00:54:39.240
well remember how Women's Studies programs
1231
00:54:39.240 --> 00:54:41.718
started at college campuses, remember how,
1232
00:54:41.718 --> 00:54:43.890
now we have Women and Gender studies,
1233
00:54:43.890 --> 00:54:46.010
but I was thinking about the Women's Studies programs
1234
00:54:46.010 --> 00:54:50.483
going on, and now here at Duke, we have a great women's,
1235
00:54:52.310 --> 00:54:55.335
they're doing a three-part series on Women's feminist stuff.
1236
00:54:55.335 --> 00:54:58.160
And we're in these classrooms, Rose,
1237
00:54:58.160 --> 00:55:01.740
the kids know all about the reading of these people,
1238
00:55:01.740 --> 00:55:03.780
they have not bumped into the real, live people
1239
00:55:03.780 --> 00:55:06.120
that are living right here in Durham, so.
1240
00:55:06.120 --> 00:55:07.760
Kathy Rudy, who's a professor, said
1241
00:55:07.760 --> 00:55:09.560
what would be good, and we're partnering
1242
00:55:09.560 --> 00:55:11.140
with the Sallie Bingham Center,
1243
00:55:11.140 --> 00:55:12.677
what we need to do is,
1244
00:55:12.677 --> 00:55:13.877
you can read the book but why don't
1245
00:55:13.877 --> 00:55:16.180
you bring the people in who you're reading about,
1246
00:55:16.180 --> 00:55:17.420
because they're right here?
1247
00:55:17.420 --> 00:55:20.471
I mean, it's not intellectual, it's real life.
1248
00:55:20.471 --> 00:55:25.160
So I guess what I'm saying is that when people study,
1249
00:55:25.160 --> 00:55:26.773
when they study Women's Studies,
1250
00:55:27.700 --> 00:55:30.947
and they're going back to the 1970s, we're all still around.
1251
00:55:30.947 --> 00:55:32.631
(laughing)
1252
00:55:32.631 --> 00:55:34.540
So Sally Bingham, last year had this great
1253
00:55:34.540 --> 00:55:36.267
symposium, and she brought back women
1254
00:55:36.267 --> 00:55:39.140
who were active then and now
1255
00:55:39.140 --> 00:55:41.570
from the 70's, so they could look at us and say,
1256
00:55:41.570 --> 00:55:44.443
we're here, ask us what you want to know.
1257
00:55:44.443 --> 00:55:47.667
I mean, it's not like reading some intellectual kind of,
1258
00:55:47.667 --> 00:55:49.472
you know what I mean?
1259
00:55:49.472 --> 00:55:51.254
There's a difference between reading it
1260
00:55:51.254 --> 00:55:52.724
and seeing it and hearing it
1261
00:55:52.724 --> 00:55:55.153
from the people who were actually there.
1262
00:55:55.153 --> 00:55:56.840
Gainesville's University of Florida
1263
00:55:56.840 --> 00:55:58.740
has been doing a series called
1264
00:55:58.740 --> 00:56:01.770
Radical Women of Gainesville.
1265
00:56:01.770 --> 00:56:03.540
And they do these little panels where they bring
1266
00:56:03.540 --> 00:56:05.550
these people, Corky Culver's the person
1267
00:56:05.550 --> 00:56:07.680
that was my connection in Gainesville.
1268
00:56:07.680 --> 00:56:08.860
She was on one of these panels
1269
00:56:08.860 --> 00:56:10.560
and they video taped them.
1270
00:56:10.560 --> 00:56:13.070
But they don't have a huge crowd come to them,
1271
00:56:13.070 --> 00:56:15.240
but at least there are these women talking about,
1272
00:56:15.240 --> 00:56:16.570
and they're mostly not lesbian,
1273
00:56:16.570 --> 00:56:18.130
I think Corky's usually the one
1274
00:56:18.130 --> 00:56:19.230
that talks about that.
1275
00:56:21.459 --> 00:56:23.370
But they were women who were radicals,
1276
00:56:23.370 --> 00:56:26.050
who are still radical feminists.
1277
00:56:26.050 --> 00:56:28.610
Exactly, exactly, and I was gonna say to you,
1278
00:56:28.610 --> 00:56:31.950
what I found fascinating is that when I think about it,
1279
00:56:31.950 --> 00:56:34.190
and when the 70's, I mean that's a huge
1280
00:56:34.190 --> 00:56:35.970
pool of people, so we're all still around.
1281
00:56:35.970 --> 00:56:38.330
And in fact, now that we're doing this big anniversary
1282
00:56:38.330 --> 00:56:41.510
at the March on Washington, when we screen the film,
1283
00:56:41.510 --> 00:56:44.121
we always ask people who were there,
1284
00:56:44.121 --> 00:56:46.870
come and talk about what it was like, you were there,
1285
00:56:46.870 --> 00:56:48.220
and share what that's like.
1286
00:56:49.170 --> 00:56:50.853
And then all of us will,
1287
00:56:50.853 --> 00:56:51.740
because we have set the dates,
1288
00:56:51.740 --> 00:56:54.260
it's gonna be what, the 24th through the 28th of August.
1289
00:56:54.260 --> 00:56:56.050
Back in DC, the King Center's gonna do
1290
00:56:56.050 --> 00:56:57.963
this big 50th anniversary thing.
1291
00:56:58.800 --> 00:57:01.330
But they're focused on King, we'll be focused on Bayard
1292
00:57:01.330 --> 00:57:03.600
and all the other whatever.
1293
00:57:03.600 --> 00:57:05.710
But when you have living history right in front of you
1294
00:57:05.710 --> 00:57:09.539
and you're not aware of it or you're not accessing it,
1295
00:57:09.539 --> 00:57:11.530
because these students, they're at Duke,
1296
00:57:11.530 --> 00:57:13.814
they never venture off that damn campus.
1297
00:57:13.814 --> 00:57:16.180
And you're right in the heart of Durham with Duke.
1298
00:57:16.180 --> 00:57:18.140
Some of the major Civil Rights stuff
1299
00:57:18.140 --> 00:57:20.020
that happened in this community;
1300
00:57:20.020 --> 00:57:21.880
feminist stuff that happened in this community;
1301
00:57:21.880 --> 00:57:24.340
lesbian feminist stuff is two blocks away.
1302
00:57:24.340 --> 00:57:26.360
And they're not moving from that campus
1303
00:57:26.360 --> 00:57:28.283
so we have to almost bring it to them.
1304
00:57:29.410 --> 00:57:31.661
But with the series that Sallie Bingham is doing
1305
00:57:31.661 --> 00:57:34.304
and Kathy Rudy's class, it's really
1306
00:57:34.304 --> 00:57:36.880
opening up a lot of doors, it's just wonderful.
1307
00:57:36.880 --> 00:57:40.110
I see the young women and some of them said,
1308
00:57:40.110 --> 00:57:41.960
no we don't use the word feminist anymore,
1309
00:57:41.960 --> 00:57:43.860
everyone knows we just are (chuckles).
1310
00:57:45.501 --> 00:57:46.970
And when you can say you just are,
1311
00:57:46.970 --> 00:57:48.590
please remember those came before you
1312
00:57:48.590 --> 00:57:50.587
so you can just say, we just are.
1313
00:57:56.130 --> 00:57:58.700
Wow, I think we might have covered,
1314
00:57:58.700 --> 00:58:01.690
oh, did you know, one of Lorraine's questions,
1315
00:58:01.690 --> 00:58:04.880
did you know any of those SONG founders before?
1316
00:58:04.880 --> 00:58:07.230
You must've known Mab because she was--
1317
00:58:07.230 --> 00:58:09.430
Oh, knew them all, oh yeah, I knew them all.
1318
00:58:09.430 --> 00:58:11.020
And that was the reason why we were able
1319
00:58:11.020 --> 00:58:13.510
to bring the people together, that was it.
1320
00:58:13.510 --> 00:58:15.325
(stammering)
1321
00:58:15.325 --> 00:58:17.729
Yeah, the reason why we brought together
1322
00:58:17.729 --> 00:58:19.740
the people we did, because we knew each other.
1323
00:58:19.740 --> 00:58:21.590
And so we all were working in the South,
1324
00:58:21.590 --> 00:58:23.708
and when this kept on coming up
1325
00:58:23.708 --> 00:58:24.880
about this anti-Southern bias stuff,
1326
00:58:24.880 --> 00:58:27.109
and plus because we also wanted to,
1327
00:58:27.109 --> 00:58:29.650
probably for the first time if I remember,
1328
00:58:29.650 --> 00:58:33.336
interject into the usual LGBT stuff
1329
00:58:33.336 --> 00:58:38.336
around progressive work, issues, not just gay.
1330
00:58:42.320 --> 00:58:43.880
Yeah, so we already knew each other.
1331
00:58:43.880 --> 00:58:45.570
Then the question was, how do we go
1332
00:58:45.570 --> 00:58:48.650
from knowing each other to forming this thing called SONG?
1333
00:58:48.650 --> 00:58:50.870
And that came out of a five day retreat,
1334
00:58:50.870 --> 00:58:53.340
when we met, talked, what we wanna do,
1335
00:58:53.340 --> 00:58:55.000
what was gonna be the issue.
1336
00:58:55.000 --> 00:58:59.710
I must say probably two critical points in our growth,
1337
00:58:59.710 --> 00:59:01.030
is I'll use that term, and this
1338
00:59:01.030 --> 00:59:03.520
might've happened without it as well;
1339
00:59:03.520 --> 00:59:05.800
remember, we were three Black women, three white women
1340
00:59:05.800 --> 00:59:08.270
in the South, but at one point we said,
1341
00:59:08.270 --> 00:59:09.570
this is not the South anymore.
1342
00:59:09.570 --> 00:59:11.800
This is not the South, we're not reflecting
1343
00:59:11.800 --> 00:59:13.600
the real South in which we live.
1344
00:59:13.600 --> 00:59:16.960
It's not just Black, white anymore and it's not just women.
1345
00:59:16.960 --> 00:59:21.770
So we made a critical decision to, oh, also
1346
00:59:21.770 --> 00:59:24.150
remember intentionality of three Black, three white?
1347
00:59:24.150 --> 00:59:26.550
The other intentionality was co-directorships.
1348
00:59:26.550 --> 00:59:29.490
All we have are co-directorships, not just one.
1349
00:59:29.490 --> 00:59:34.110
So we had Pat Hussein living in Atlanta as a co-director
1350
00:59:34.110 --> 00:59:37.450
and Pam McMichael, white lesbian living in Kentucky.
1351
00:59:37.450 --> 00:59:40.320
So when we decided to shift up the dynamic,
1352
00:59:40.320 --> 00:59:42.110
we hired a Black, gay man,
1353
00:59:42.110 --> 00:59:44.260
Craig Washington in Atlanta, who took over
1354
00:59:44.260 --> 00:59:47.450
for Pat and Pam in Kentucky.
1355
00:59:47.450 --> 00:59:49.960
But then we said we also have to start looking for
1356
00:59:49.960 --> 00:59:53.913
non-Black, non-white people.
1357
00:59:54.750 --> 00:59:56.590
And at one point, we decided,
1358
00:59:56.590 --> 00:59:58.070
it's time for us to let this go.
1359
00:59:58.070 --> 01:00:01.230
Who can we else get in, keep the SONG thing going,
1360
01:00:01.230 --> 01:00:02.560
but who else can we get in?
1361
01:00:02.560 --> 01:00:07.560
And because the current co-director is Paulina Hernandez,
1362
01:00:07.840 --> 01:00:11.810
was at Highlander where Suzanne was the executive director
1363
01:00:11.810 --> 01:00:14.250
for five years, as was Caitlin Breedlove.
1364
01:00:14.250 --> 01:00:16.750
They became the new directors.
1365
01:00:16.750 --> 01:00:19.940
And so Suzanne's still in there, we're in the mix,
1366
01:00:19.940 --> 01:00:21.190
but you see what I'm saying, Rose?
1367
01:00:21.190 --> 01:00:23.860
I mean that intentionality, being very careful,
1368
01:00:23.860 --> 01:00:26.140
being very committed, being very serious
1369
01:00:26.140 --> 01:00:27.940
about the intentionality.
1370
01:00:27.940 --> 01:00:31.026
And I think another reason why the longevity factor,
1371
01:00:31.026 --> 01:00:32.690
we have so many (papers tearing)
1372
01:00:32.690 --> 01:00:34.163
we partner with in the South.
1373
01:00:35.680 --> 01:00:37.860
And I think the South is much more conducive to
1374
01:00:37.860 --> 01:00:41.180
how can we cooperate, not compete?
1375
01:00:41.180 --> 01:00:43.140
I have been organizing for so long
1376
01:00:43.140 --> 01:00:45.260
where you go, no we don't work with them,
1377
01:00:45.260 --> 01:00:47.490
no you can't look at our list, no you don't,
1378
01:00:47.490 --> 01:00:50.060
everything's always being so, we don't trust you.
1379
01:00:50.060 --> 01:00:52.610
Here it's like, what can we do together?
1380
01:00:52.610 --> 01:00:55.430
And I think that's another part of why the longevity.
1381
01:00:55.430 --> 01:00:58.265
We're just like, how can we be a part of?
1382
01:00:58.265 --> 01:01:01.578
I would say that.
1383
01:01:01.578 --> 01:01:04.499
That reminds me of, I've interviewed some people
1384
01:01:04.499 --> 01:01:06.994
about the National Lesbian Conference in '91
1385
01:01:06.994 --> 01:01:08.587
that was such a disaster (laughing).
1386
01:01:09.698 --> 01:01:12.930
Oh, my God who could ever forget that conference?
1387
01:01:12.930 --> 01:01:14.600
Oh, my lordy (laughing).
1388
01:01:14.600 --> 01:01:16.035
Were you there?
1389
01:01:16.035 --> 01:01:21.035
No, a friend of mine has the archives from it.
1390
01:01:23.000 --> 01:01:25.907
She was local, it was Gayle (mumbles),
1391
01:01:26.981 --> 01:01:28.570
she was the local disability person.
1392
01:01:28.570 --> 01:01:30.870
And when they packed up that thing
1393
01:01:30.870 --> 01:01:32.700
they left the office just full
1394
01:01:32.700 --> 01:01:36.560
of stuff she had to pack up, she didn't want to
1395
01:01:36.560 --> 01:01:38.262
throw it away.
What are they doing with it?
1396
01:01:38.262 --> 01:01:40.297
That should be archived, is it not being archived someplace?
1397
01:01:40.297 --> 01:01:42.740
Well, it is now, when I met with her
1398
01:01:42.740 --> 01:01:45.100
she was going through it and figuring out what to keep,
1399
01:01:45.100 --> 01:01:47.167
and then she will send it to Duke, so.
1400
01:01:47.167 --> 01:01:49.220
All right, good, good, good.
1401
01:01:49.220 --> 01:01:51.328
All of my stuff's there too because I've got,
1402
01:01:51.328 --> 01:01:52.961
listen, being in the heart of that,
1403
01:01:52.961 --> 01:01:54.030
all my stuff over there too.
1404
01:01:54.030 --> 01:01:56.177
But I have to tell you, despite the drama over that thing,
1405
01:01:56.177 --> 01:01:58.897
that was one of those moments I would call a moment,
1406
01:01:58.897 --> 01:02:01.150
was that lesbian conference.
1407
01:02:01.150 --> 01:02:02.550
Anyway, I'm sorry, go ahead.
1408
01:02:03.521 --> 01:02:06.474
Well, you know, you're talking about the longevity of SONG
1409
01:02:06.474 --> 01:02:11.474
and being intentional, and the NLC was doing that,
1410
01:02:13.440 --> 01:02:15.960
was trying really hard to be intentional
1411
01:02:15.960 --> 01:02:17.060
around a lot of things, but it just
1412
01:02:17.060 --> 01:02:19.627
backfired all over the place.
1413
01:02:19.627 --> 01:02:21.760
Well, if you want my two cents,
1414
01:02:21.760 --> 01:02:24.567
having been in the mix of all that, no disrespect.
1415
01:02:24.567 --> 01:02:27.093
(stammering)
1416
01:02:27.093 --> 01:02:28.860
This might be true for you,
1417
01:02:28.860 --> 01:02:30.600
sometimes things happen at the moment
1418
01:02:30.600 --> 01:02:33.048
but it takes a few years later to figure out
1419
01:02:33.048 --> 01:02:34.470
and go, oh, so that's what that was all about.
1420
01:02:34.470 --> 01:02:35.909
Well, that's what I would say
1421
01:02:35.909 --> 01:02:36.890
about the National Lesbian Conference.
1422
01:02:36.890 --> 01:02:38.680
From the very beginning and the perception
1423
01:02:38.680 --> 01:02:41.460
of the concept of it, to where we ended up
1424
01:02:41.460 --> 01:02:42.643
doing it in Atlanta.
1425
01:02:44.260 --> 01:02:48.240
This is me, and I'm gonna tell you straight from my heart,
1426
01:02:48.240 --> 01:02:49.730
I thought there was some lesbians
1427
01:02:49.730 --> 01:02:54.034
who were being so intentionally disruptive.
1428
01:02:54.034 --> 01:02:56.580
And even to this day, I have gone on my trips
1429
01:02:56.580 --> 01:02:59.290
and I see people that, I don't know how to describe this,
1430
01:02:59.290 --> 01:03:00.410
I don't know what it is.
1431
01:03:00.410 --> 01:03:02.910
It's almost like NOW, what is this negative thing
1432
01:03:02.910 --> 01:03:04.520
that happens with NOW?
1433
01:03:04.520 --> 01:03:05.960
There's so much drama in there,
1434
01:03:05.960 --> 01:03:09.560
and it's almost like, someone said maybe because as women
1435
01:03:09.560 --> 01:03:12.870
that we have been so traumatized ourself
1436
01:03:12.870 --> 01:03:15.980
that sometimes we don't know how to shut that off.
1437
01:03:15.980 --> 01:03:18.070
So we end up doing the exact same thing
1438
01:03:18.070 --> 01:03:19.990
to other people that's happened to us.
1439
01:03:19.990 --> 01:03:21.873
It's like a mother who batters,
1440
01:03:24.590 --> 01:03:27.020
someone who is a victim of battering,
1441
01:03:27.020 --> 01:03:28.490
but the person who's battering her,
1442
01:03:28.490 --> 01:03:29.853
had that happen to her.
1443
01:03:31.000 --> 01:03:34.630
And with NOW, I finally had to just kind of withdraw.
1444
01:03:34.630 --> 01:03:36.610
Deep battles over who's going to be the president,
1445
01:03:36.610 --> 01:03:37.900
who's going to be the vice president,
1446
01:03:37.900 --> 01:03:39.990
who's going to be these teams?
1447
01:03:39.990 --> 01:03:43.230
And you've been to a NOW national conference
1448
01:03:43.230 --> 01:03:44.270
lately, or have you been?
1449
01:03:44.270 --> 01:03:48.332
I have never had a good feeling about NOW, I don't know.
1450
01:03:48.332 --> 01:03:50.518
But I think, and part of that might be
1451
01:03:50.518 --> 01:03:52.360
I don't know if it's just me, and I'm telling you,
1452
01:03:52.360 --> 01:03:54.060
a lot of that played out against
1453
01:03:54.060 --> 01:03:55.220
the National Lesbian Conference.
1454
01:03:55.220 --> 01:03:58.469
We'd have these meetings, and there'd be one or two lesbians
1455
01:03:58.469 --> 01:04:00.578
who just, it seemed like their purpose in life
1456
01:04:00.578 --> 01:04:03.936
was just to be as disruptive as they could be.
1457
01:04:03.936 --> 01:04:04.907
And because there was (mumbles)
1458
01:04:04.907 --> 01:04:07.420
and everyone has a right to say, blah, blah, blah.
1459
01:04:07.420 --> 01:04:10.540
We're having something on a main stage,
1460
01:04:10.540 --> 01:04:12.260
a woman comes up out of nowhere, steps up
1461
01:04:12.260 --> 01:04:14.100
and says, we need to stop everything right now
1462
01:04:14.100 --> 01:04:16.770
because I just heard blah-de-blah, blah.
1463
01:04:16.770 --> 01:04:20.440
And how we got through it, I don't know.
1464
01:04:20.440 --> 01:04:25.440
And I don't know, I don't know how else to explain it
1465
01:04:26.550 --> 01:04:28.883
but I felt that there was almost a very,
1466
01:04:30.000 --> 01:04:33.810
a pattern of what can I do to mess this up?
1467
01:04:33.810 --> 01:04:35.710
I'm not trying to be not fair,
1468
01:04:35.710 --> 01:04:38.260
but I'm also saying, I've sat in too many meetings.
1469
01:04:39.800 --> 01:04:42.230
Under the guise of political correctness.
1470
01:04:42.230 --> 01:04:43.063
Go ahead.
1471
01:04:43.970 --> 01:04:45.690
Under the guise of political correctness,
1472
01:04:45.690 --> 01:04:47.000
this all comes--
1473
01:04:47.000 --> 01:04:48.630
That's it, exactly.
1474
01:04:48.630 --> 01:04:51.780
And because everyone bought into that,
1475
01:04:51.780 --> 01:04:53.990
everyone stopped everything (mumbles).
1476
01:04:53.990 --> 01:04:55.680
And finally someone said, you know what?
1477
01:04:55.680 --> 01:04:56.830
Enough.
1478
01:04:56.830 --> 01:04:58.550
And then this is what we ended up saying,
1479
01:04:58.550 --> 01:05:00.890
maybe people need to make a decision at this point,
1480
01:05:00.890 --> 01:05:03.940
if you decide you don't get along in this process,
1481
01:05:03.940 --> 01:05:05.630
the question you have to ask yourself,
1482
01:05:05.630 --> 01:05:07.502
do I remove myself, or do I continue to be
1483
01:05:07.502 --> 01:05:09.440
something that's gonna hold something up,
1484
01:05:09.440 --> 01:05:11.290
or do we figure out at some point,
1485
01:05:11.290 --> 01:05:14.203
consensus doesn't work anymore, and you move on?
1486
01:05:18.460 --> 01:05:20.810
I've seen that a couple of different...
1487
01:05:22.930 --> 01:05:23.763
Well, organizations.
1488
01:05:23.763 --> 01:05:27.040
One is the Atlanta Women's Feminist Chorus,
1489
01:05:27.040 --> 01:05:29.182
or Feminist Women's Chorus.
1490
01:05:29.182 --> 01:05:33.400
I've transcribed an interview with some of those people,
1491
01:05:33.400 --> 01:05:35.590
and they were talking about toward the end
1492
01:05:35.590 --> 01:05:39.281
why it didn't last, this no longer really exist,
1493
01:05:39.281 --> 01:05:40.531
and it ended in the 90's,
1494
01:05:42.116 --> 01:05:44.180
was that there was a toxic group
1495
01:05:45.053 --> 01:05:47.647
who finally had to (mumbles).
1496
01:05:49.291 --> 01:05:50.560
And similarly, at Woman Rights, which is
1497
01:05:50.560 --> 01:05:51.900
the organization that's working
1498
01:05:51.900 --> 01:05:53.573
to put this project together.
1499
01:05:54.574 --> 01:05:55.730
You know about Woman Rights, don't you?
1500
01:05:55.730 --> 01:05:56.563
Oh, yeah.
1501
01:05:56.563 --> 01:05:58.260
In fact, I want to go at some point in my life.
1502
01:05:58.260 --> 01:06:00.495
I might go next year when I have my year off.
1503
01:06:00.495 --> 01:06:01.760
I've never been able to get to it.
1504
01:06:01.760 --> 01:06:03.710
Yeah, I hope you do.
1505
01:06:03.710 --> 01:06:06.030
We will make it happen if you want to come.
1506
01:06:06.030 --> 01:06:08.801
Oh, definitely, definitely would like to do it.
1507
01:06:08.801 --> 01:06:09.634
Go ahead.
1508
01:06:09.634 --> 01:06:11.310
Back in the day, I think this happened in the 80's,
1509
01:06:11.310 --> 01:06:13.890
I only started attending in the 90s,
1510
01:06:13.890 --> 01:06:17.640
but there were these sort of tales?
1511
01:06:17.640 --> 01:06:20.094
We're at a point right now where the biggest issue is
1512
01:06:20.094 --> 01:06:23.193
that we don't have enough young people coming.
1513
01:06:24.130 --> 01:06:26.804
But there used to be all these issues
1514
01:06:26.804 --> 01:06:31.804
that would come up, and one that was told a lot
1515
01:06:32.110 --> 01:06:35.100
had to do with, about anti-racism.
1516
01:06:35.100 --> 01:06:37.300
We also don't have enough Black people come,
1517
01:06:38.703 --> 01:06:41.230
and from the beginning that's been a problem.
1518
01:06:41.230 --> 01:06:43.040
Here we are, so close to Atlanta
1519
01:06:43.040 --> 01:06:45.602
and there might be three Black women
1520
01:06:45.602 --> 01:06:48.900
at the whole conference, and there might be 80 people.
1521
01:06:48.900 --> 01:06:52.310
But there was people who would make
1522
01:06:52.310 --> 01:06:53.317
these little dramas around, somebody
1523
01:06:53.317 --> 01:06:56.310
gets up and gives a reading
1524
01:06:56.310 --> 01:06:59.600
and they decide that it's racist somehow or other,
1525
01:06:59.600 --> 01:07:02.027
and they make a fuss, and so
1526
01:07:03.032 --> 01:07:04.953
then we have all this processing.
1527
01:07:07.920 --> 01:07:09.593
I always wondered, so how did (stammering)
1528
01:07:09.593 --> 01:07:13.810
what happened, did the group shut down, or what happened?
1529
01:07:13.810 --> 01:07:16.533
Well, this is our 35th Woman Rights.
1530
01:07:16.533 --> 01:07:18.230
We have a never missed a year since 1978.
1531
01:07:18.230 --> 01:07:20.007
Wow, so do you know where
1532
01:07:20.007 --> 01:07:21.580
it's gonna be in 2014 at this point?
1533
01:07:21.580 --> 01:07:23.500
It's always the same place,
1534
01:07:23.500 --> 01:07:26.860
and I attribute that location to our longevity.
1535
01:07:26.860 --> 01:07:28.600
We never have to look for a place.
1536
01:07:28.600 --> 01:07:31.295
Oh, good, good, good, oh yeah.
1537
01:07:31.295 --> 01:07:34.030
It's in (mumbles) State Park,
1538
01:07:34.030 --> 01:07:37.049
which is about an hour south of Atlanta,
1539
01:07:37.049 --> 01:07:39.053
actually less than an hour, but.
1540
01:07:41.230 --> 01:07:42.473
How did we get onto that?
1541
01:07:42.473 --> 01:07:45.377
I think what happens is that time passes,
1542
01:07:45.377 --> 01:07:47.748
and then the people who were there
1543
01:07:47.748 --> 01:07:49.748
don't wanna do it again.
1544
01:07:51.494 --> 01:07:52.860
They don't want to have to deal with that again,
1545
01:07:52.860 --> 01:07:54.253
and maybe people go away,
1546
01:07:55.120 --> 01:07:57.493
like, Minnie Bruce Pratt doesn't come anymore.
1547
01:07:58.699 --> 01:08:00.250
I was gonna say, and this is what I wonder too, Rose,
1548
01:08:00.250 --> 01:08:02.470
and maybe this is one of those interesting
1549
01:08:02.470 --> 01:08:04.240
how do you make lemonade out of lemons?
1550
01:08:04.240 --> 01:08:07.190
I think another thing I've realized,
1551
01:08:07.190 --> 01:08:08.633
and I think a lot of people do,
1552
01:08:09.505 --> 01:08:10.470
there's this great quote, I don't organize,
1553
01:08:10.470 --> 01:08:12.144
if there's a need, fill it.
1554
01:08:12.144 --> 01:08:16.150
And this is happening on a lot of campuses right now
1555
01:08:16.150 --> 01:08:17.976
where you have gay student groups,
1556
01:08:17.976 --> 01:08:20.850
but you have people of color within those groups who say,
1557
01:08:20.850 --> 01:08:22.153
but I don't feel comfortable,
1558
01:08:22.153 --> 01:08:24.710
and they want to start a people of color group
1559
01:08:24.710 --> 01:08:25.820
and then they say, don't do that,
1560
01:08:25.820 --> 01:08:27.468
why do we have to be separate?
1561
01:08:27.468 --> 01:08:29.795
Well that's what's happening with Prides.
1562
01:08:29.795 --> 01:08:32.238
I mean, in a weird way, this kind of
1563
01:08:32.238 --> 01:08:33.410
gets to a bigger piece of it,
1564
01:08:33.410 --> 01:08:35.600
but you always had Prides, well the Prides
1565
01:08:35.600 --> 01:08:38.547
are predominantly white, no big whoop, that's okay.
1566
01:08:38.547 --> 01:08:41.740
But when we wanted to start doing Black pride,
1567
01:08:41.740 --> 01:08:44.990
to complement, not compete, the first reaction we got,
1568
01:08:44.990 --> 01:08:46.510
this was in DC, why do you need
1569
01:08:46.510 --> 01:08:48.450
a Black pride, we already have pride?
1570
01:08:48.450 --> 01:08:50.190
They missed the point.
1571
01:08:50.190 --> 01:08:52.740
The point was, we all want to be a part of your pride,
1572
01:08:52.740 --> 01:08:54.160
but we want to have something
1573
01:08:54.160 --> 01:08:56.660
that celebrates, honors, and acknowledges
1574
01:08:56.660 --> 01:08:58.448
the Blackness of who we are.
1575
01:08:58.448 --> 01:08:59.960
You could say the same about Latina, Latino,
1576
01:08:59.960 --> 01:09:02.810
naming whatever it is, but if you want to put it
1577
01:09:02.810 --> 01:09:05.810
in either or, and you don't put an and in there,
1578
01:09:05.810 --> 01:09:07.610
and you don't find some way in which
1579
01:09:08.471 --> 01:09:09.630
you can co-exist, that's when you get people
1580
01:09:09.630 --> 01:09:10.720
going against each other.
1581
01:09:10.720 --> 01:09:12.850
And then here's the real reality,
1582
01:09:12.850 --> 01:09:16.230
the demographics of this country are shifting dramatically.
1583
01:09:16.230 --> 01:09:19.020
California is now majority people of color.
1584
01:09:19.020 --> 01:09:21.070
Why am I going to a meeting, it's a gay meeting,
1585
01:09:21.070 --> 01:09:23.030
there's no people of color in that meeting?
1586
01:09:23.030 --> 01:09:24.207
See what I'm saying?
1587
01:09:24.207 --> 01:09:28.030
And now women are numerical majority in this country.
1588
01:09:28.030 --> 01:09:29.840
So at some point, I think each person
1589
01:09:29.840 --> 01:09:31.750
has to ask themselves, am I gonna sit here
1590
01:09:31.750 --> 01:09:34.745
and be dramatized or traumatized,
1591
01:09:34.745 --> 01:09:37.540
and I don't like it, I'll go start something else.
1592
01:09:37.540 --> 01:09:38.423
What's the point?
1593
01:09:39.332 --> 01:09:41.797
And to me, the more we start, some things last, some don't,
1594
01:09:41.797 --> 01:09:43.990
but what scares me, we're losing good people.
1595
01:09:43.990 --> 01:09:45.500
We're losing talented people because
1596
01:09:45.500 --> 01:09:48.050
they just can't deal with the drama anymore.
1597
01:09:48.050 --> 01:09:49.500
And where do they go?
1598
01:09:49.500 --> 01:09:50.670
So you try to create something
1599
01:09:50.670 --> 01:09:51.800
where it's a space for them,
1600
01:09:51.800 --> 01:09:53.462
whether it's one or two or something.
1601
01:09:53.462 --> 01:09:54.890
I just kind of think we have to figure out some way
1602
01:09:54.890 --> 01:09:57.300
in which you don't lose wonderful people.
1603
01:09:57.300 --> 01:09:58.833
But again, the intentionality;
1604
01:10:00.120 --> 01:10:02.210
for me, this would be my opinion,
1605
01:10:02.210 --> 01:10:03.860
if you start anything new at this point,
1606
01:10:03.860 --> 01:10:06.150
how can you start without starting automatically
1607
01:10:06.150 --> 01:10:08.840
with the diversity of what you'd like to get?
1608
01:10:08.840 --> 01:10:10.580
That was (mumbles), we didn't want
1609
01:10:10.580 --> 01:10:12.500
to start with all Black or all white.
1610
01:10:12.500 --> 01:10:14.640
These orgs do that and they say, well who's missing?
1611
01:10:14.640 --> 01:10:15.620
Oh, let's go ask them.
1612
01:10:15.620 --> 01:10:17.440
Well you've already started your group already.
1613
01:10:17.440 --> 01:10:20.292
Start from the get with what you want it to be,
1614
01:10:20.292 --> 01:10:21.620
what you want it to look like.
1615
01:10:21.620 --> 01:10:23.730
Then you might have a lot more success
1616
01:10:23.730 --> 01:10:26.429
in terms of where it could go.
1617
01:10:26.429 --> 01:10:29.469
And that's just, to me, practical,
1618
01:10:29.469 --> 01:10:32.950
from this point forward, whenever, if you're serious.
1619
01:10:32.950 --> 01:10:33.930
And then there's other times when
1620
01:10:33.930 --> 01:10:37.169
you need to be just by yourself, what's wrong with that?
1621
01:10:37.169 --> 01:10:40.009
It's complex, but I think if we're honest
1622
01:10:40.009 --> 01:10:42.840
and serious about trying to get all of us moving,
1623
01:10:42.840 --> 01:10:45.932
we, not the I, not my, but we,
1624
01:10:45.932 --> 01:10:49.690
how do we have a serious, honest conversation about how?
1625
01:10:49.690 --> 01:10:52.213
Or if you find out it ain't gonna work, then be honest about
1626
01:10:52.213 --> 01:10:56.330
that and get on with it, move on and not hold up stuff.
1627
01:10:56.330 --> 01:10:59.080
But I mean, I think we're in an amazing moment.
1628
01:10:59.080 --> 01:11:02.520
I think we are truly, this country, this world;
1629
01:11:02.520 --> 01:11:06.039
if anyone thought, on August 28th, 1963,
1630
01:11:06.039 --> 01:11:10.888
standing on that hot Lincoln Memorial and on the mall,
1631
01:11:10.888 --> 01:11:13.930
that 50 years later we would have a Black man,
1632
01:11:13.930 --> 01:11:15.970
who's the son of an interracial marriage,
1633
01:11:15.970 --> 01:11:19.780
who supports LGBT rights, in that White House,
1634
01:11:19.780 --> 01:11:23.460
people would say that it's not possible, it's not possible.
1635
01:11:23.460 --> 01:11:25.720
And look what's happening to Supreme Court,
1636
01:11:25.720 --> 01:11:30.038
it's just unbelievable, but yet we are in a moment.
1637
01:11:30.038 --> 01:11:32.915
I get chills about it, seriously.
1638
01:11:32.915 --> 01:11:35.607
So where do we go?
1639
01:11:35.607 --> 01:11:37.857
(chuckles)
1640
01:11:38.723 --> 01:11:40.058
Okay, this is good.
1641
01:11:40.058 --> 01:11:42.950
This is a lot of really good stuff here.
1642
01:11:42.950 --> 01:11:45.747
I want to sit down and transcribe it
1643
01:11:45.747 --> 01:11:48.193
and start editing and shaping it some.
1644
01:11:49.150 --> 01:11:52.593
I have got Suzanne Pharr lined up for Thursday this week.
1645
01:11:54.810 --> 01:11:58.072
And what I would like to do is go ahead and share
1646
01:11:58.072 --> 01:12:02.760
my transcript of this with her, as well as you,
1647
01:12:02.760 --> 01:12:06.530
before you have had a chance to respond, is that okay?
1648
01:12:06.530 --> 01:12:07.870
No, no, no problem, go ahead.
1649
01:12:07.870 --> 01:12:10.215
Knock yourself out, not a problem.
1650
01:12:10.215 --> 01:12:12.550
(laughs) okay, I mean we are,
1651
01:12:12.550 --> 01:12:16.020
the deadline we're looking at is to send this (mumbles)
1652
01:12:16.020 --> 01:12:19.810
everything we have, in May, and have them tell us.
1653
01:12:19.810 --> 01:12:21.360
And it's way more than one issue,
1654
01:12:21.360 --> 01:12:25.410
what we have already is enough for a double issue.
1655
01:12:25.410 --> 01:12:28.580
But they have to tell us if they'll
1656
01:12:28.580 --> 01:12:30.070
let us have a double issue.
1657
01:12:30.070 --> 01:12:32.130
So we're trying to get as much good stuff
1658
01:12:32.130 --> 01:12:34.883
as we can ready to send in May.
1659
01:12:34.883 --> 01:12:36.110
Our final deadline is November,
1660
01:12:36.110 --> 01:12:38.270
but until we know whether we're gonna do
1661
01:12:38.270 --> 01:12:39.913
one issue or a double issue,
1662
01:12:41.030 --> 01:12:45.140
we don't know what we would have to cut,
1663
01:12:45.140 --> 01:12:46.460
how long the interviews can be.
1664
01:12:46.460 --> 01:12:48.970
We're shooting for 1500 words
1665
01:12:48.970 --> 01:12:51.296
but they're tending to be 3000 words.
1666
01:12:51.296 --> 01:12:54.853
This interview's probably 10000 words right now,
1667
01:12:56.616 --> 01:12:57.449
but of course there's a lot,
1668
01:12:57.449 --> 01:12:59.350
like all my stuff that can go out, but.
1669
01:13:00.960 --> 01:13:03.500
So it won't be a literal transcript
1670
01:13:03.500 --> 01:13:06.233
like somebody who's, like a court reporter would do.
1671
01:13:08.104 --> 01:13:09.278
It'll be what I think we can use,
1672
01:13:09.278 --> 01:13:11.906
it'll be what I think we can use,
1673
01:13:11.906 --> 01:13:16.450
and it'll be edited and I'll have questions for you in it.
1674
01:13:16.450 --> 01:13:17.283
Great.
1675
01:13:17.283 --> 01:13:18.370
Okay.
1676
01:13:18.370 --> 01:13:21.763
Okay, well what I'll do is, I'm gonna,
1677
01:13:23.962 --> 01:13:25.522
when I get off this call, I'll forward you my bio,
1678
01:13:25.522 --> 01:13:29.770
I'll find Joan's email and Pat,
1679
01:13:29.770 --> 01:13:31.730
but they're both on Facebook as well.
1680
01:13:31.730 --> 01:13:33.300
And also their phone numbers and email,
1681
01:13:33.300 --> 01:13:35.357
so that should help you.
1682
01:13:35.357 --> 01:13:36.631
And then I'm in for the rest of the week,
1683
01:13:36.631 --> 01:13:38.935
so if anything else comes up, let me know.
1684
01:13:38.935 --> 01:13:41.078
But I really appreciate this call,
1685
01:13:41.078 --> 01:13:42.594
because I have to tell you, Rose,
1686
01:13:42.594 --> 01:13:46.085
one thing about interviews, and this might be true for you
1687
01:13:46.085 --> 01:13:47.627
(mumbles) but I'm so busy doing it,
1688
01:13:47.627 --> 01:13:49.620
I don't take time to stop and think about,
1689
01:13:49.620 --> 01:13:51.190
well what's it all meant?
1690
01:13:51.190 --> 01:13:52.520
So until people ask me these questions,
1691
01:13:52.520 --> 01:13:54.350
that's what I love with the questions
1692
01:13:54.350 --> 01:13:56.315
Lorraine had, and yours.
1693
01:13:56.315 --> 01:13:57.550
(stammering)
1694
01:13:57.550 --> 01:14:01.797
that's why interviewing and keeping record is so important.
1695
01:14:01.797 --> 01:14:03.600
And I realize the importance of that.
1696
01:14:03.600 --> 01:14:05.587
So thank you, you've got me jazzed now,
1697
01:14:05.587 --> 01:14:07.401
I'm up for the rest of the day now.
1698
01:14:07.401 --> 01:14:08.542
(laughing)
1699
01:14:08.542 --> 01:14:12.075
Anything else, are we good?
1700
01:14:12.075 --> 01:14:14.895
I think we're good, knock on wood (rhythmic knocks).
1701
01:14:14.895 --> 01:14:16.342
All right, thank you.
1702
01:14:16.342 --> 01:14:17.204
Okay, talk to you later.
1703
01:14:17.204 --> 01:14:18.640
Wait, and hopefully, oh and are the dates
1704
01:14:18.640 --> 01:14:20.891
always the same every year for Woman Rights (stammering)?
1705
01:14:20.891 --> 01:14:23.917
They aren't; we do meet twice a year now,
1706
01:14:23.917 --> 01:14:27.085
in May and then again in October.
1707
01:14:27.085 --> 01:14:30.540
And it's roughly, this year we're meeting kind of early,
1708
01:14:30.540 --> 01:14:32.730
May 12th through 19 is the whole conference,
1709
01:14:32.730 --> 01:14:34.410
pre-conference starts May 12th
1710
01:14:34.410 --> 01:14:37.416
because there's something called Mondo Homo in Atlanta.
1711
01:14:37.416 --> 01:14:40.830
We used to meet close to Memorial Day weekend,
1712
01:14:40.830 --> 01:14:43.120
it turns out that's conflicting with Mondo Homo
1713
01:14:43.120 --> 01:14:46.052
and we think that's why we're not getting young people.
1714
01:14:46.052 --> 01:14:47.720
Oh, I see, okay, all right.
1715
01:14:47.720 --> 01:14:49.723
Well for next year, I definitely,
1716
01:14:49.723 --> 01:14:51.296
like I said, next year, in fact,
1717
01:14:51.296 --> 01:14:52.129
one thing nice about taking a year off,
1718
01:14:52.129 --> 01:14:52.962
I get to do all the things I've never
1719
01:14:52.962 --> 01:14:56.230
been able to get to, like Michigan, Woman Rights.
1720
01:14:56.230 --> 01:14:58.370
And so I'll check it out, and then I'll be able to
1721
01:14:58.370 --> 01:15:00.090
kind of put it on my calendar
1722
01:15:00.090 --> 01:15:01.200
because I can go where I want,
1723
01:15:01.200 --> 01:15:03.740
when I want, which is nice for a change.
1724
01:15:03.740 --> 01:15:05.693
Actually, I have the May 2014 dates
1725
01:15:05.693 --> 01:15:10.115
because we were able to get those, I'll send those dates.
1726
01:15:10.115 --> 01:15:10.948
Oh, really, for next year?
1727
01:15:12.759 --> 01:15:15.640
So when is it, May what?
1728
01:15:15.640 --> 01:15:17.280
Oh, I have to look it up.
1729
01:15:17.280 --> 01:15:18.720
All right, well if you find it, either forward it
1730
01:15:18.720 --> 01:15:20.306
or whatever, because I'm starting to put
1731
01:15:20.306 --> 01:15:24.440
my 2014 calendar together now,
1732
01:15:24.440 --> 01:15:25.680
and so there's certain key things.
1733
01:15:25.680 --> 01:15:26.970
I wanna keep a lot of dates open
1734
01:15:26.970 --> 01:15:27.803
because that's the whole point,
1735
01:15:27.803 --> 01:15:29.774
don't have any things on the calendar.
1736
01:15:29.774 --> 01:15:31.100
But I definitely want to get to Woman Rights,
1737
01:15:31.100 --> 01:15:33.450
never done that, and I told Lorraine I would love to
1738
01:15:33.450 --> 01:15:36.150
and some other people, and Michigan I think, maybe.
1739
01:15:36.150 --> 01:15:38.570
Once in my life, at least once, I've never been there
1740
01:15:38.570 --> 01:15:39.910
and I wanna--
Me either!
1741
01:15:39.910 --> 01:15:42.010
Yeah, I want to go to Michigan too.
1742
01:15:42.010 --> 01:15:44.290
Anyway, okay, all right well, let me get
1743
01:15:44.290 --> 01:15:45.720
this other stuff down, I'll get it to you and
1744
01:15:45.720 --> 01:15:47.050
thank you, thank you, thank you, Rose,
1745
01:15:47.050 --> 01:15:47.883
I appreciate this.
1746
01:15:47.883 --> 01:15:49.150
Thank you too, great.
1747
01:15:49.150 --> 01:15:52.293
All right, bye bye.
All right, bye bye.