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Prejudice and Pride: LGBT Activist Stories from Manchester and Beyond Explores Some Aspects of LGBT Activist History

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Prejudice and Pride: LGBT Activist Stories from Manchester and Beyond Explores Some Aspects of LGBT Activist History ‘It’s fascinating and moving to discover and identify those LGBT people in less happy times, who fought for the freedoms LGBT people now enjoy in the UK. This book will make you look back pre with gratitude and astonishment for what has been achieved.’ - Sir Ian McKellen j LGBT activist and civil rights history from the 1960s to the 2000s udice has had a huge impact on our social and political landscape in the UK, yet much of this history remains hidden. Prejudice and Pride: LGBT Activist Stories from Manchester prejudice and Beyond explores some aspects of LGBT activist history. It covers educational activism, youth work activism and the and history of the LGBT Centre in Manchester. and Through personal stories of activists, heard and recorded by young people from LGBT Youth North West, we explore pride the wibbly wobbly nature of people’s histories. We reveal pride how they interlink in surprising and creative ways to form the current landscape of both prejudice and pride. Prejudice and Pride also contains exercises for interpreting and ideas for collecting activist histories within youth work. ‘The struggle for LGBT equality is a long and continuing one. If you read one book about LGBT activists and activism read this one...accessible, passionate and empowering.’ - Claire Mooney Prejudice and Pride LGBT Activist Stories from Manchester and Beyond 1 2 Prejudice and Pride LGBT Activist Stories from Manchester and Beyond LGBT Youth North West edited by Clíodhna Devlin hammeron press 3 Copyright PREJUDICE AND PRIDE: LGBT Prejudice and Pride: LGBT Activist ACTIVIST STORIES FROM Stories from Manchester and Beyond MANCHESTER AND BEYOND selected by LGBT Youth North West and edited by Clíodhna Devlin © LGBT Youth North West for 1. Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans* selection and Clíodhna Devlin editorial History 2. Public History. 3. Social and matter © Individual authors, 2015 Community History. creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0 ISBN-13: 978-0-9564507-8-4 ISBN-10: 9780956450784 This work is Open Access, which Every reasonable attempt has been means that you are free to copy, made to identify owners of copyright. distribute, display, and perform If, for whatever reason, something the work as long as you clearly has not been credited correctly, we attribute the work to the authors, apologise, hope that you will accept that you do not use this work this apology, and are happy for us to for commercial gain in any form use your empowering work for the whatsoever, and that you in no greater good! Errors or omissions will way alter, transform, or build upon be corrected in subsequent editions. the work outside of its normal use in academic scholarship without Cover design and layout express permission of the authors by Tamzin Forster and the publisher of this volume. www.tamzinforster.co.uk For any reuse or distribution, you Typeset by Tamzin Forster in must make clear to others the Misproject by Misprinted Type license terms of this work. Eduardo Recife Crash Waves Lead To Skinny by First published in 2015 by Skydog HammerOn Press Handwriting Dakota by http://www.hammeronpress.net Altsys Metamorphosis League Gothic by The League of British Library Cataloguing in Moveable Type Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library 4 how you might want to use this book… You can read this book on your own or in a group, dip in and out, read from cover to cover, go off and do more research in the topics that interest you, pass it on to friends and family, or buy more copies for folk who you think might want or need it. If you are new to the idea of activism, or taking action against things you don’t agree with, then we hope this book will inspire you. If you already are an activist then we hope it will give you the courage and strength to continue your important work. There are activities in the book you can engage with if you want to, or share with others. If you are an educator (youth worker, teacher, parent etc), then please pass on the ideas and information in this book. If you come across a quote in the book and you want to know more about who said it, there are short biographies about each person at the back of the book. Here are some common words that will come up in the book: Trans*: Someone whose gender is not the same as it was presumed to be at their birth, or their genderLesbian: does A notwoman fi t with who Western is physically society’s and/ ideas emotionally of ‘man’ or ‘woman’. This includesattracted people to who other are women. transgender, transsexual, transvestites, or non-gendered people. Cis-gendered: SomeoneGay: whoseA man whogender is physically matches theand/ one emotionally it was presumed to be at their birth e.g. Someoneattracted tofeels other like men a woman (although inside sometimes and was presumedwomen who to be female from birth.have same sex attraction also refer to themselves as gay). Bisexual: Someone who can be physically and/ emotionally attracted to either men or women. Heterosexual: Someone who is physically and/ emotionally attracted to someone of another gender e.g. A woman attracted to a man, or a man attracted to a woman. (This is also known as ‘straight’.) Trans*: Someone whose gender is not the same as it was presumed to be at their birth, or their gender does not fi t with Western society’s ideas of ‘man’ or ‘woman’. This includes people who are transgender, transsexual, transvestites, or non-gendered people. 5 Cis-gendered: someone whose gender matches the one it was presumed to be at their birth e.g. someone who feels like a woman inside and was presumed to be female from birth. 6 in memory of… In memory of two activists who dedicated their lives to campaigning, educating and empowering themselves and others to support the LGBT Community, in Manchester and beyond. Gemma Godden remembers her wife, Jaye Bloomfield (1969-2013) Jaye was born in Ipswich and her activism started young - in the ’80s she was kettled by the police at Anti-Nazi demonstrations in London. Jaye always stood up for what she believed in. Her fi rst visit to Manchester was as an LGBT union representative for Jaye Bloomfi eld the PCS union. She was proud of her union involvement. She moved to Manchester in 2002 for the LGBT scene (as well as the music). I met Jaye in 2004 at the re-launch of Manchester City Council’s LG employee group. We got involved in the Core Group and successfully campaigned for the group to become an LGBT employee group. We also pushed for all the equalities documents across the different departments of the council to recognise and meet the needs of LGBT people. Jaye brought her design skills and sense of humour to the role - she designed the posters, updated the intranet site and worked hard to push things forward. I researched and had facts and fi gures to back up proposals - Jaye had the passion and confi dence to put points across verbally. We made a good team. Jaye was outspoken - she said what was on her mind and was honest to the point of bluntness. She used humour often and brought a lot of laughter. I remember once when a man shouted “lesbians!” as we walked down the street holding hands – Jaye pointed at him and shouted “heterosexual!” She then had to explain what heterosexual was to him. He shuffl ed off looking a bit embarrassed. 7 in memory of… From 2004 to 2008 we organised launch events for LGBT History Month, arranged for trans* and bisexual speakers to attend our meetings and attempted to make the meetings more accessible to LGBT women, people with disabilities and Black and Minority Ethnicity (BME) people. Jaye always believed in standing up for your rights – at our wedding she thanked all the activists whose work had allowed us to get civilly partnered as she knew that without them we wouldn’t have had that beautiful and important day. A song that she loved and which sums up Jaye’s attitude is ‘Raise’ by Bocca Juniors: “Raise your voice, you’ll be spoiled for choice, just stay quiet and you won’t.” The day before Jaye died she told a friend to get her union involved as she was having problems at work “If you don’t do something, nuffi ng will change.” The friend did get the union involved and it resulted in improvements for her. I would love Jaye’s legacy to be that she encouraged people to stand up for their rights and to work together to make things better. 8 in memory of… carole woddis fondly remembers paul patrick (1950-2008) Paul Patrick was passionate, voluble, big-hearted, an inspired and inspiring teacher and one of the country’s leading activists on LGBT issues. Above all, he was a human rights campaigner, prepared to challenge all forms of oppression wherever he found them, especially in Paul Patrick schools where his impatience with the status quo was vented particularly towards bullying and homophobia. As a staunch and lifelong trade unionist his infl uence on his own union, the NUT, helped bring about a sea of change in their attitudes and put them at the forefront of equality for LGBT teachers. Paul came out in 1969, a courageous act bearing in mind it was only two years after the partial decriminalisation of homosexuality in 1967. In 1974, shortly after starting his teaching career, he helped found the London Gay Teachers Group.
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