LGBTQ+ History

lgbtq-history

Fears of attacks like these, fears of rape, fears of loss of economic security, fears of forced public outings and fears of arbitrary arrest are common place for LGBT people in Uganda where the witch hunts for them continue till this day. And things will only get worse as we move into the Ugandan election period - it’s no secret that dehumanizing the LGBTI community will score easy political points to the candidates. 

Queer Youth Uganda (QYU) is an LGBTI Youth Organization that currently works in 13 different cities in Uganda to advocate and protect the rights of marginalized sexual and gender identity groups. One of their many objectives is to provide safe housing for those whose lives are at risk and cannot afford it themselves. So far they have relocated 56 of their members members, 15 of them have been arrested, and three are on trial. 

QYU is currently raising money to pay for the resources to uphold their safe houses for the coming year. Please please donate some money if you can and spread the word about the fundraiser. This is a life and death situation for many in the Ugandan LGBTI community. 

DONATE TO THE FUNDRAISER HERE.

LEARN MORE ABOUT QYU.

Please donate and share/reblog!!

lgbtq-history

Has your relationship been blessed by the Rabbit Deity? No? That’s what I thought.

According to a folk tale from What the Master Would Not Discuss by Yuan Mei from the 17th century, Hu Tianbao (胡天保)  fell in love with the imperial inspector of the Fujian Province. Hu Tianbao reluctantly confessed his affections toward the imperial inspector after he was caught spying on him through a bathroom wall. Consequently, Hu Tianbao was sentenced to death by beating. A month after later he is said to have appeared in a dream of another man in his village in which he claimed that the underworld officials decided to “correct” the injustice by appointing him the god and safe-guarder of homosexual affairs. And thus, a temple was built in Hu Tianbao’s honour in his home village.

In late imperial China “rabbits” was a derogatory term for homosexuals, which is why Hu Tianbao is referred to as the rabbit deity (Tu'er Shen, 兔兒神).

There has been a debate about whether or not Hu Tianbao was fictional. Professor Szonyi asserts that Hu Tianbao was nothing but an invention by Yuan. It is very possible that aspects of the story are fictitious, but the existence of the 18th century underground cult of Hu Tianbao certainly isn’t. The cult has been thoroughly documented in official Qing Dynasty records from their attempts to expunge the cult. Later official records suggest that it was still active in the late 19th century. Nevertheless, considering that the evidence is solely from the point of view of the officials who tried to suppress the practice and not from the its followers, the lifespan of the cult remains inconclusive.

The Rabbit Deity’s first temple may be long gone and the Chinese government may have been successful in the cult’s crackdown, but the good news is that there is still hope for you and your relationship! A Taoist priest, Lu Wei-ming (盧威明), founded a new Rabbit Temple in the Yonghe district of Taiwan and would be happy to help you out.

Sources: (x), (x), (x), (x).

lgbtq-history

The idea of “romantic friendship”, love between young women, was considered the norm and even encouraged because it was believed to “constitute the richness, consolation, and joy of their lives.” In western society, this long-standing tradition that can be traced back to the Renaissance came to an abrupt end in the latter part of the 19th century; when sexologists began to suggest that love between women was abnormal. Interestingly, this coincided with increasing militancy of 19th-century feminists who were agitating together for not only suffrage but also for more opportunities in education and the job market. More than other phenomenon, education may be said to have been responsible for what eventually became referred to as lesbianism.

How does the math add up?

• As historian Lillian Faderman eloquently puts it “there was no male measuring sticks around to distract, define, or detract” at all women’s colleges, allowing them to form a peer culture unfettered by parental and societal dictates, to create their own hierarchy  of values, and to become their own heroes and leaders. 
  
  
• Although romantic friendships were still common outside of women’s colleges, sheltered from the “real world”, these passions were encouraged to be explored in academic settings as females could now meet each other in larger numbers. To add to this, colleges afforded them the leisure and the time necessary to cultivate those relationships. At colleges, romantic friendship was now called “smashes”, “crushes”, and “spoons”.
  
  
• By the time they it was time for them to leave and face a hostile world that was not yet prepared to receive them, sex solidarity became a necessity. They were not welcomed by men whom perceived it to be their own territory. They had to rely on each other for support and encouragement. These “crushes” are believed to have developed into life long friendships or love-relationships.  
  
  
• Conservative criticism against higher education for females argued that women became “masculinized” and rendered them attractive to one another:
  
• They were right in some aspects. Statistics corroborate that females who attended college were far less likely to marry than their uneducated counterparts: while only 10% of American women in general remained single between 1880-1990, about 50% of American college women remained single at that time. 
  
  
• This could be partially attributed to that most men feared educated females and would not take them as wives.
  
  
• However, this statistic may also be explained by that many pioneering females with ambition understood that marriage would seldom be feasible for them; running a home and raising children would prevent them from pursuing other goals as there were few husbands who could be expected to sacrifice their historically entrenched prerogatives to revolutionary female notions. 

= By the end of the century, ambitious women of the middle class who loved other females had the opportunity to escape from marriage. No longer economically constrained to give up their female lovers they began to resist social pressure toward marriage. For the first time in American history, large numbers of women could build lives with other women. They shared vast excitement and a sense of mission about their mutual roles of creating new possibilities for women. In same-sex households (”Boston Marriages”) they banded together against a world in that was still largely hostile to the opening of education and professions to women. Exactly how unlikely is it that such excitements would lead to passionate relationships at the time when there was not yet widespread stigma against female sex-relationships?

Source: Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers - a History of Lesbian Life in 20th-Century America by Lillian Faderman

I’m going to be away and (probably) not have good interconnection for 3 weeks but I’ve prepared a small queue for the blog - just a heads up! :)

Hey everyone, 

I’ve been away on vacation for the past two weeks so I haven’t spent much time online. Consequently, I’m really behind on messages but I’m doing my best to get back on track so just hang in there!

Ma Rain - Prove It On Me Blues

Notable lyrics:

Went out last night a crowd of my friends,

They must’ve been women, ‘cause I don’t like no men…

They say I did it, ‘nobody caught me,

They sure got to prove it on me

…

It’s true I wear a collar and a tie

George Hannah - The Boy in the Boat

Notable lyrics:

When you see two men walking hand in hand.

Just look ‘em over and try to understand. 

They’ll go to these parties have their lights down low. 

Only those parties were women can go. 

You think I’m lying, just ask Tack Anne. 

Took many a broad from many a man.

Bessie Jackson/Lucille Bogan - B.D. (Bulldyke) Women’s Blues

Notable lyrics:

Comin’ a time, BD Women, they ain’t goin’ to need no men.

Oh, the way they treat us is a low down and dirty thing.

Capturing the complex attitudes regarding female homosexual relations in music is no easy task. In 1920s Harlem, Blues echoed the era’s and the sophisticated Harlemites sentiments on wlw relations.

The blues songs sought to be obvious about the lesbianism, titillate their listeners, and reach a wide audience through humour: 

I know women that don’t like men.

The way they do is a crying sin.

It’s dirty but good, oh yes, it’s just dirty but good.

_______________________________________________________________________

 As you can see/hear, these artists were successful in their endeavours. Presenting lesbian stereotypes allowed the listeners recognize the situations and sexual daring, to either find them affirming (if wlw) or provocative and humorous. In fact, Historians describe one lesbian song “BD’s Dream” as one of the most heard songs in rent parties in the 1920s and 1930s.

Source: Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers by Lillian Faderman, and (x).