Content area
Full Text
It's time to get out of the beds, out of the bars, and into the streets. It's time to seize the power of dyke love, dyke vision, dyke anger, dyke intelligence, dyke strategy. It's time to organize and incite. It's time to get together and fight. We're invisible sister and it's not safe -- not in our homes, not in the streets, not on the job, not in the courts. Where are the out lesbian leaders? It's time for a fierce lesbian movement and that's you: the role model, the vision, the desire.
We need you. Because we're not waiting for the rapture. We are the apocalypse. We'll be your dream and their nightmare.
New York Lesbian Avenger Manifesto, Summer 1993
Each New York City Lesbian Avenger meeting opens with these words: "The Lesbian Avengers is a direct action group focused on issues vital to lesbian visibility and survival." They remind the members of the Avengers' purpose: to make it safe for lesbians to remain open about their identity and survive. This, as many of us know, is no easy feat in most parts of this country or this world.
For an organization begun almost four years ago, rumors abound regarding the origin of the Avengers. Some believe it as an offshoot of ACT - UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) without a focus on AIDS; others thought it was a separatist move borne out of frustration with WAC (Women's Action Coalition). In a June 1995 interview Maxine Wolfe, one of the six founders, disagreed, saying "That's nonsense. We wanted an organization for lesbians to focus on issues affecting lesbians."
In the spring of 1992 the Lesbian Avengers were born in an East Village apartment in New York City. Six political activists (Ana Maria Simo, Anne - Christine D'Adesky, Maxine Wolfe, Marie Honan, Ann MaGuire, and Sarah Schulman) met to discuss starting a lesbian direct action group, characterized by bold yet humorous actions. "People are always saying that lesbians don't have a sense of humor," said Maxine Wolfe. "We wanted to prove them wrong." The group debated whether their first action should be parachuting into Whitney Houston's wedding or fighting against the defeat of the anti - "Rainbow (multicultural) curriculum" measure in New York City's...