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LEATHER_MENACE


                                                             December 23, 2014
                                                             February 19, 2015
                                                             February 20, 2019

In the Internet Archive, there's a copy of "The Body Politic"
from April 1982, with the Gayle Rubin piece "the leather menace",
where she discusses these  conflicts:

    "The experience of being a feminist
    sadomasochist in 1980 is similar to
    that of being a communist homosexual
    in 1950. When left ideology condemned
    homosexuality as bourgeois decadence,
    many homosexuals were forced out of
    progressive political organizations. 
    A few of them founded the Mattachine
    Society. Now that large parts of the
    feminist movement have similarly
    defined S/M as an evil product of
    patriarchy, it has become increasingly
    difficult for those of us who are
    feminists to maintain our membership
    in the women's community."

    "In 1980, the National Organization of
    Women passed a misleadingly labelled
    resolution on 'lesbian and gay rights.'"

      ...

    "The resolution denied that these were
    issues of sexual or affectional
    preference and declared NOW's
    intention to disassociate itself from
    any gay or lesbian group that did not
    accept these definitions of sexual
    preference. When there was an attempt
    ten years ago to purge NOW of lesbian
    members, NOW was not stampeded into
    denying the legitimacy of gay
    rights. The campaign against the
    leather menace has succeeded where the
    attack on the lavender menace
    failed. It has put NOW on record as
    opposing sexual freedom and the civil
    rights of erotic minorities."










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