reclaimingthelesbiantag:Betty Friedan, author of The Feminine Mystique and then-president of the Nat
reclaimingthelesbiantag:Betty Friedan, author of The Feminine Mystique and then-president of the National Organization for Women, famously coined the term ‘lavender menace’ in reference to lesbian feminists within the women’s lib movement. Friedan was worried that lesbians would ‘take over’ the movement, going so far as to discriminate against lesbians within NOW.The term was used tongue-in-cheek by lesbian feminists to protest the exclusion of lesbians at the Second Congress to Unite Women. There, they wore t-shirts bearing the phrase ‘Lavender Menace’ as they handed out the Woman-Identified Woman leaflet that you can find here.The colour lavender has long been associated with gays and lesbians in the United States. During the McCarthy era - also known as the red scare - a period known as ‘the lavender scare’ began, in which hundreds of gay and lesbian federal employees were threatened and fired for being homosexual. The theory seems to originally have been that gay and lesbian people were at higher risk for blackmail by communist spies. The discriminatory practice continued until the mid-nineties, by which point thousands of gay and lesbian workers had been fired from their jobs. If you’d like to read more about the protest at the Second Congress to Unite Women, I would recommend reading Tales of the Lavender Menace, which you can read a sample of here. -- source link
#women's history#queer history