[PREV - LESBIAN_SEPRATIST_RADIO] [TOP]
LESBIAN_RADIO_REACTIONS
December 23, 2014
February 19, 2015
February 19, 2019
During one of the (many, LESBIAN_SEPRATIST_RADIO
interminable) on-air fundraising
events at WBAI, I heard Larry
Josephson comment that when he Larry Josephson was an an interesting
talked to people around New York member of the WBAI crew-- his take
he often heard the complaint was that WBAI was a *free speech*
that WBAI didn't broadcast station, not a left wing station--
anything except crazy stuff like it was supposed to provide access to
those lesbian feminists. marginalized voices.
Josephson's point was that they He once took the trouble to record
were talking about a *single* an interview with members of the
program" out of a week of American Nazi party, on the
programming. And yet... something general principle that it's easy
about this one show stuck in to support freedom for your
people's minds as the epitome of friends, but respecting the right of
craziness, symptomatic of the free speech of even some Nazis was
problem with the whole station. the real test of integrity.
WBAI, in recent years, has
I don't remember where Josephson went resolved the tension
with this point, but I would guess he between "free speech
wanted to remind people that there was radio" and "left wing
all sorts of stuff on the air at that radio" by leaning left.
station, and Josephson being Josephson The Pacifica radio slogan
he was probably making the same point has shifted to from "free
that I would: it was a virtue of WBAI speech radio" to "peace
that they would put some "crazy and freedom radio".
extremists" on the air-- certainly no
one else would.
It could be, of course, that the central
trouble is that "crazy" doesn't go over quite
as well when it's done in a female voice.
But then, I must say that at the time when I
was listening to these folks, they struck me (And not outrageous in a
as pretty outrageous good way-- and I think that
usage was a few years in
In those days, the reverse gender bias the future, anyway).
seemed transparently hypocritical: sexism
justified in the name of anti-sexism.
The separatists movements of that
You could argue that it was a era haven't aged well-- and at
tactical error for WBAI as an present I think a lot of people
institution to put that show have forgotten they existed.
on the air.
I went looking for
Providing access for marginalized voices printed references
is one thing, but marginalizing yourself documenting this
in the process doesn't do any good. part of the scene...
LEATHER_MENACE
The sub-culture of lesbian sepratists may have given
rise to the stereotype about feminists as man-hating
lesbians-- or maybe it just reinforced an existing
stereotype.
You wouldn't think that the lesbian seperatists were
ubiquitous enough to even have any kind of widespread
influence, but something about them seemed to stick
in people's heads. They were arguably a more extreme
form of an attitude underlying feminist thought at
the time.
Later, in the early-80s I heard one woman
comment sarcastically "You know, *some* of
us like to fraternize with the enemy!"
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