William A. Percy Foundation for Social and Historical Studies no. 1 UpdateFall 2019 INSIDE THIS ISSUE — Charley Shively wright, and author – the two men have been vocal free speech ad- • Palm Springs and Boston Prize for Gay vocates, with Jim having Residential Fellowships served as director of the Liberation and Boston Coalition for • Update on our Analysis of Freedom of Expression. Prisoner Data Activism Robert Chatelle, Harvard ’63, is a com- • Insiders’ Bookstore Project In January, the William A. Percy puter programmer and Bob Chatelle • New Research Project on Foundation announced Bob Chatelle writer who has served on and Jim D’Entremont as recipients of the executive board of the National Prison Sex the the first annual Writers Union • Questions and Answers Charley Shively (UAW Local 1981 Prize for Gay Lib- / AFL-CIO). As about Kids and Sex: What Does eration. chairperson of the Science Say? Through their union’s Political journalism and Issues Commit- organizing, Bob tee, he dealt with Baran, the first daycare worker wrong- and Jim – founders a range of free fully imprisoned in the nationwide of the National expression issues moral panic of the 1980s. He and/or Center for Reason pertinent to pub- his partner James D’Entremont visited and Justice (NCRJ) lishing and higher Baran at the Massachusetts Treatment – have brought education. In Center weekly for seven years until attention to falsely 1990, he became a 2006, when Baran was released after accused people founding mem- winning his bid for a new trial. During whose trials were Charley Shively as a graduate student ber of the Boston that time, Bob Chatelle founded the in American history the early 1960s often tinged by ho- Coalition for National Center for Reason and Justice mophobia. In a number of prominent Freedom of Expression (BCFE). An (NCRJ). The non-profit organization cases, their work has helped win the affiliate of the National Campaign for was at that time chiefly dedicated to release and exoneration of the unjustly Freedom of Expression, the BCFE was reversing false convictions, including convicted. In the late 1990s, both men a response by artists, writers, and arts many carrying a taint of homophobia. became advocates for Bernard Baran, administrators to predominantly ho- The organization has helped secure the first daycare worker wrongfully mophobic, right-wing attacks on artists the release of a number of wrongfully imprisoned in the nationwide mor- and cultural institutions. In 1997, Bob convicted individuals, and has provid- al panic in the 1980s over “Satanic Chatelle became active on behalf of ed advocacy and support for Abuse,” with Baran’s conviction finally persons falsely accused and con- others who remain in pris- being vacated by the Massachusetts victed of “Satanic Ritual Abuse,” on, both the unjustly in- Appeals Court in 2009. particularly caregivers convict- carcerated innocent and In addition, Bob has been active in ed of crimes against children. the overpunished guilty. union organizing, and together with Beginning in 1998, he became Jim Mr. Chatelle his partner Jim – journalist, play- the principal advocate for Bernard D’Entremont continues to serve as the NCRJ’s executive director, supporters of Paul Shanley, a former and is currently an active member of priest wrongfully convicted of child Who was Boston’s Sex Offender Policy Reform rape in a trial whose flaws and biases Initiative (SOPRI). are documented in his coverage of the Charley Shively? James D’Entremont is a journal- case for The Guide. v ist, fiction writer, and playwright. He As scholar and activist, poet and is a returned Peace Corps Volunteer muse, Charley Shively (1937-2017) (Tunisia 1967-’69) and formerly the was a major figure of the post-Stone- artistic director of Boston’s Harlequin New Research wall gay liberation movement. Theatre Company. Through the 1990s, Growing up dirt-poor in rural Ohio, he was a spokesperson for the Boston Project on Charley ended up earning a PhD Coalition for Freedom of Expression, in history at Harvard, and spent his and eventually its executive director. Prison Sex career teaching first at Boston State From 1991 to 2001, he organized University and later at the University annual Banned Books Week reading Utilizing our list of prisoner contacts of Massachusetts, Boston. vigils featuring banned literary works from the Insiders’ Bookstore, the Wil- Starting in the early 1970s, Char- read aloud by a succession of readers liam A. Percy Foundation is soliciting ley was a guiding light behind the around the clock. From 1996 to 2008, qualitative information from inmates influential gay liberation broadsheet he wrote news articles, criticism, and (both gay and straight) who receive Fag Rag. Over the course of lead features as a staff writer for The books concerning their observation of two books on poet Guide, a Boston-based, internationally and attitudes toward gay sex in prison. Walt Whitman, circulated liberationist LGBT month- GLBT persons are disproportionately Shively exca- ly. His articles on anti-gay censorship incarcerated in the U.S.: the National vated the erot- and the American Christian Right Inmate Survey estimates that 9.3% of ically suffused have also appeared in Index on Censor- males in prison are gay or bi-sexual, friendships ship, the Journal of Gay, Lesbian, and and 42.1% of female prisoners. Over- Whitman Charley Bisexual Identity, and other publica- all, sexual minorities are three times had with Shively tions. In 1998, he joined his partner more likely to be incarcerated than the working-class Robert Chatelle’s campaign to free general population. Participation in men and youths, camaraderie to the late Bernard Baran, a gay daycare underground economies of drugs and which America’s post-Civil War worker whose homophobia-ridden sex work, sting operations in public urbanization gave new scope and trial resulted in three concurrent life parks, HIV criminalization laws, and vitality, and in which Whitman sentences. He continues to be active famously descried solidarities that Artwork drawn by Texas inmate Billy Thomas in the National Center for Reason and in appreciation for reading materials from might redeem America’s violent Justice, the organization built around the Foundation’s Insiders’ Book Club. Thomas depicts the struggles faced by prisoners who birth-pangs and bind a young, di- the Baran case. Through the NCRJ, he try to express themselves erotically – and the verse nation now carrying a beacon has become one of the most steadfast problem of prison rape, exacerbated by prison onto the world stage. authorities’ ban on gay relationships As one who never forgot his roots, Charley grounded his sexual radicalism not only in his imme- diate identification with the down- trodden, but in his deep readings of history and theory, particularly 19th century anarchist thought. The Charley Shively Prize, which includes a $1,000 honorarium, will be awarded to someone who exemplifies in his or her scholarship and activism Charley’s intellectual mettle, radical savoir-faire, and incorruptible boldness. William A. Percy Foundation for Social and Historical Studies. v 2 William A. Percy Foundation Update • Fall 2019 discriminatory enforcement of sex of- fense laws all play their part in putting sexual and gender minorities at greater risk of entanglement with the criminal justice system. Lurid media portrayals of prison suggest an environment of hyper- masculinity in which gay men are especially vulnerable to brutal gang rapes and exploitation by larger and stronger inmates. However, over time, studies are fairly consistent in showing that only about 1-2% of male inmates Overall, sexual minorities are three times more likely to be incarcerated than the general population. admit ever being raped by other into solitary confinement for extended condoms were banned in 98% of their inmates. The Prison Rape Elimination periods, transferred to separate units prisons. Act of 2003 (PREA) does not seem to to break up the relationship, or even Prison officials in the US acknowl- have changed that rate much, but what see their parole denied based on this edge that voluntary gay sex is going it has accomplished is a crackdown disciplinary infraction. But despite on, but refuse to protect public health on all sex in prison, even when com- the risks and intensified surveillance, by allowing condoms or adopting pletely voluntary. Even before PREA, the human spirit finds a way: 67% of the more permissive policies of many correctional officers wrote far more over 1000 GLBT prisoners in the US foreign penal systems, including Can- disciplinary reports for consensual sex surveyed by Black & Pink (https:// ada’s. Our new study aims to refute the and “prostitution” than for suspected www.blackandpink.org/coming-out- contention that gay sex is “disruptive” rape. Crowded prisons offer minimal of-concrete-closets) say they have had to prison discipline and creates conflict privacy, and those caught may be sent consensual sex in prison, even though by providing information about inmate William A. Percy Foundation Update • Fall 2019 3 attitudes toward the phenomenon, Public Library, Rancho Mirage Public renewal if more time is requested in which are mostly tolerant, as long Library, and College of the Desert writing for completion of the proj- as the sex is discreet. The success of Library can be supplemented by the ect. Send a CV and letter (up to three conjugal visitation programs (allowed library of the University of California pages) to Professor Thomas K. Hub- in only five states) in reducing prison at Riverside, which is an hour away by bard ([email protected]), describing the violence suggests that a more lenient bus. proposed project, its social science or regime toward gay sex might actually There are many libraries in the Los public policy implications, the extent improve prison discipline. Some evi- Angeles area (which is two to three of the work that has been done so far, dence from our surveys also indicates hours away by car, bus and train): ONE and a timetable for the project’s com- that voluntary gay sex in prison may National LGBT Archives at USC, the pletion.