Brody's Scribbles... Gay Liberation Front: Manifesto. Have We Made Progress Since 1971? (Part 12)

By Tim Trent (Dartmouth, England) MAR 16 | Today we move into the next major part of the Gay Liberation Front 1971 Manifesto. It's the section that seeks to explain the history of oppression.

WHY We're Oppressed:

Gay people are oppressed. As we've just shown, we face the prejudice, hostility and violence of straight society, and the opportunities open to us in work and leisure are restricted, compared with those of straight people. Shouldn't we demand reforms that will give us tolerance and equality? certainly we should-in a liberal-democratic society, legal equality and protection from attack are the very least we should ask for. They are our civil rights.

But gay liberation does not just mean reforms. It means a revolutionary change in our whole society. Is this really necessary? Isn't it hard enough for us to win reforms within the present society, and how will we engage the support of straight people if we get ourselves branded as revolutionaries?

Reforms may makes things better for a while; changes in the law can make straight people a little less hostile, a little more tolerant-but reform cannot change the deep-down attitude of straight people that homosexuality is at best inferior to their own way of life, at worst a sickening perversion. It will take more than reforms to change this attitude, because it is rooted in our society's most basic institution-the Patriarchal Family.

We've all been brought up to believe that the family is the source of our happiness and comfort. But look at the family more closely. Within the small family unit, in which the dominant man and submissive woman bring up their children in their own image, all our attitudes towards sexuality are learned at a very early age. Almost before we can talk, certainly before we can think for ourselves, we are taught that there are certain attributes that are 'feminine' and other that are 'masculine', and that they are God-given and unchangeable. Beliefs learned so young are very hard to change; but in fact these are false beliefs. What we are taught about the differences between man and woman is propaganda, not truth.

The truth is that there are no proven systematic differences between male and female, apart from the obvious biological ones. Male and female genitals and reproductive systems are different, and so are certain other physical characteristics, but all differences of temperament, aptitudes and so on, are the result of upbringing and social pressures. They are not inborn.

Human beings could be much more various than our constricted patterns of 'masculine' and 'feminine' permit-we should be free to develop with greater individuality. But as things are at present, there are only these two stereotyped roles into which everyone is supposed to fit, and most people-including gay people too-are apt to be alarmed when they hear these stereotypes or gender roles attacked, fearing that children 'won't know how to grow up if they have no one to identify with', or that 'everyone will be the same', i.e. that there will be either utter chaos or total conformity. There would in fact be a greater variety of models and more freedom for experimentation, but there is no reason to suppose this will lead to chaos.

By our very existence as gay people, we challenge these roles. it can easily be seen that homosexuals don't fit into the stereotypes of masculine and feminine, and this is one of the main reasons why we become the object of suspicion, since everyone is taught that these and only these two roles are appropriate.

Our entire society is build around the patriarchal family and its enshrinement of these masculine and feminine roles. Religion, popular morality art, literature and sport all reinforce these stereotypes. In other words, this society is a sexist society, in which one's biological sex determines almost all of what one does and how one does it; a situation in which men are privileged, and women are mere adjuncts of men and objects for their use, both sexually and otherwise.

Since all children are taught so young that boys should be aggressive and adventurous, girls passive and pliant, most children do tend to behave in these ways as they get older, and to believe that other people should do so too.

So sexism does not just oppose gay people, but all women as well. It is assumed that because women bear children they should and must rear them, and be simultaneously excluded from all other spheres of achievement.

However, as the indoctrination of the small child with these attitudes is not always entirely successful (if it were, there would be no gay people for a start), the ideas taken in by the young child almost unconsciously must be reinforced in the older child and teenager by a consciously expressed male chauvinism: the ideological expression of masculine superiority. Male chauvinism is not hatred of women, but male chauvinists accept women only on the basis that they are in fact lesser beings. It is an expression of male power and male privilege, and while it's quite possible for a gay man to be a male chauvinist, his very existence does also challenge male chauvinism in so far as he rejects his male supremacist role over women, and perhaps particularly if he rejects 'masculine' qualities.

It is because of the patriarchal family that reforms are not enough. Freedom for gay people will never be permanently won until everyone is freed from sexist role-playing and the straightjacket of sexist rules about our sexuality. And we will not be freed from these so long as each succeeding generation is brought up in the same old sexist way in the Patriarchal family.

But why can't we just change the way in which children are brought up without attempting to transform the whole fabric of society?

Because sexism is not just an accident - it is an essential part of our present society, and cannot be changed without the whole society changing with it. In the first place, our society is dominated at every level by men, who have an interest in preserving the status quo; secondly, the present system of work and production depends on the existence of the patriarchal family. Conservative sociologists have pointed out that the small family unit of two parents and their children is essential in our contemporary advanced industrial family where work is minutely subdivided and highly regulated-in other words, for the majority very boring. A man would not work at the assembly line if he had no wife and family to support; he would not give himself fully to his work without the supportive and reassuring little group ready to follow him about and gear itself to his needs, to put up with his ill temper when he is frustrated or put down by the boss at work.

Were it not also for the captive wife, educated by advertising and everything she reads into believing that she needs ever more new goodies for the home, for her own beautification and for the childrens' well-being, our economic system could not function properly, depending as it does on people buying far more manufactured goods than they need. The housewife, obsessed with the ownership of as many material goods as possible, is the agent of this high level of spending. None of these goods will ever satisfy her, since there is always something better to be had, and the surplus of these pseudo 'necessities' goes hand in hand with the absence of genuinely necessary goods and services, such as adequate housing and schools

The ethic and ideology of our culture has been conveniently summed up by the enemy. Here is a quotation, intended quite seriously, from an American psychiatric primer. The author, Dr. Fred Brown, states:

Our values in Western civilisation are founded upon the sanctity of the family, the right to property, and the worthwhileness of 'getting ahead ' The family can be established on/y through heterosexual intercourse, and this gives the woman a high value. (Note the way in which woman is appraised as a form of property.} Property acquisition and worldly success are viewed as distinctly masculine aims. The individual who is outwardly masculine but appears to fall into the feminine class by reason . . . of his preference for other men denies these values of our civilisation. In denying them he belittles those goals which carry weight and much emotional co/ouring in our society and thereby earns the hostility of those to whom these values are of great importance.

We agree with his description of our society and its values-but we reach a different conclusion. We gay men and women do deny these values of our civilisation. We believe that the society Dr. Brown describes is an evil society. We believe that work in an advanced industrial society could be organised on more humane lines, with each job more varied and more pleasurable, and that the way society is at present organised operates in the interests of a small ruling group of straight men who claim most of the status and money, and not in the interests of the people as a whole. We also believe that our economic resources could be used in a much more valuable and constructive way than they are at the moment-but that will not happen until the present pattern of male dominance in our society changes too.

That is why any reforms we might painfully exact from our rulers would only be fragile and vulnerable; that is why we, along with the women's movement, must fight for something more than reform. We must aim at the abolition of the family, so that the sexist, male supremacist system can no longer be nurtured there.

A long statement and a potentially fine statement. How much detail do we need to look at? Let's see. I'm going to make a précis:

Gay people are oppressed. But gay liberation does not just mean reforms. Reforms may makes things better for a while.

We've all been brought up to believe that the family is the source of our happiness and comfort. The truth is that there are no proven systematic differences between male and female, apart from the obvious biological ones. Human beings could be much more various than our constricted patterns of 'masculine' and 'feminine' permit-we should be free to develop with greater individuality. By our very existence as gay people, we challenge these roles. it can easily be seen that homosexuals don't fit into the stereotypes of masculine and feminine.

Our entire society is build around the patriarchal family and its enshrinement of these masculine and feminine roles. All children are taught so young that boys should be aggressive and adventurous, girls passive and pliant. Sexism does not just oppose gay people, but all women as well.

The indoctrination of the small child with these attitudes is not always entirely successful, the ideas taken in by the young child almost unconsciously must be reinforced in the older child and teenager by a consciously expressed male chauvinism. It is because of the patriarchal family that reforms are not enough.

Why can't we just change the way in which children are brought up?

Because sexism is not just an accident - it is an essential part of our present society, and cannot be changed without the whole society changing with it. Were it not also for the captive wife, educated by advertising and everything she reads into believing that she needs ever more new goodies for the home, for her own beautification and for the children's' well-being, our economic system could not function properly.

The ethic and ideology of our culture has been conveniently summed up by the enemy. Our values in Western civilisation are founded upon the sanctity of the family, the right to property, and the worthwhileness of 'getting ahead ' The family can be established on/y through heterosexual intercourse, and this gives the woman a high value. We agree with his description of our society and its values-but we reach a different conclusion. That is why any reforms we might painfully exact from our rulers would only be fragile and vulnerable.

We must aim at the abolition of the family, so that the sexist, male supremacist system can no longer be nurtured there.

I've used an old technique. I've grabbed the opening clause or two from each of their paragraphs. The sense remains the same. Go and check if you don't believe me.

I was doing fine until this part: "We must aim at the abolition of the family, so that the sexist, male supremacist system can no longer be nurtured there." There is a technical term for rhetoric like this. That term is rubbish.

Until that point in the manifesto I was reading quietly, noting whether we'd made progress, noting where we had not, and, generally, finding myself in broad agreement. Until that point.

That short sentence is just pseudo-revolutionary psychobabble, of course. It's a tub thumper all right. I can see someone on stage getting all too carried away, like Wolfie Smith:

"Home rule for Tooting!"

Sorry. I got carried away. I simply see that last part as a stupid attempt for pathetic notoriety.

We've made progress, though, despite this foolishness. I speak to many parents. Anecdotally there are many parents today who are willing to say, who have said, to their children:

"Some people fall for girls, some for boys. If you come home with a girlfriend or a boyfriend, we will love you just the same, and we hope we will like them. But the most important thing for us is that you are happy."

Schools in the UK teach at primary level that differences are important and are to be embraced. Parents may mind if their kids are LGBT, but the real ones love their kids just as much.

In the USA there are oases of hope, mostly in the coastal areas (in which I include The Great Lakes) and big cities. UK and USA alike rural areas are less accepting, but it's probably only a matter of unfamiliarity. Israel and Europe are excellent, Australia is becoming evangelised, but is, generally, accepting. New Zealand is, of course, still in the 1950s, just like The Isle of Wight, but, like the IoW, NZ is a safe place to be gay.