Activism Comes in Waves by Elaine Hutton
Talk given in FiLia workshop, Saturday, 16 October, 2021
In Not Dead Yet, I chose two areas to focus on - fighting male violence against women, and working with and supporting young women.
Rape Crisis
Tyneside Rape Crisis Centre was set up by a collective of over 30 women in the late 1970s. The newly formed northern (UK) centres became a campaign group – Feminists against Sexual Terrorism - we used to meet regularly, and, for a time at least, changed attitudes to rape by challenging the myths, that women ask for it, lead men on, dress in ways which invite it. Sadly, in the intervening 45 years, we have gone backwards.
One of the reasons we got our message through was that the feminist movement was extremely powerful at the time. All over the UK, we had a shared vision – of overthrowing patriarchal rule and challenging heterosexuality. We were fuelled by anger and outrage as we uncovered the extent of male violence against women and girls, so our Centres were run with a firm feminist perspective. Also, the women in the Newcastle collective were a friendship group – we socialised together, and a lot of us became lesbians so we took our radical feminism forward into other areas. We attended national conferences together and comforted each other when our relationships broke up, so we were a cohesive group.
One incident comes to mind. A community initiative between a town in Norway and Newcastle- upon-Tyne was announced – Vikings on a ship would sail across to ‘rape and pillage.’ (Yes, really!) We mounted a letter-writing campaign against this and the council announced it was ‘just a joke.’ So the Viking ship was met by a contingent of women with shears and scissors, and placards reading ‘Castrate Rapists. Just a joke’. The incident made national and international news. So our serious purpose was combined with gleeful irreverence (not unlike the team of dinosaurs today making a mockery of politicians accusing women of being dinosaurs because we want to keep our hard-won rights). We named male violence for what it was – ‘sexual terrorism’ - and did not allow public bodies to get away with viewing rape as a joke. Over the years, the Service offered to women who contacted us improved markedly, and this Centre is still running, 43 years on. But, like others, it has been absorbed by ‘professionalism’, and is susceptible to current ideology.
Girlswork
‘Girlswork’, as it became known, was a political term in the 1970/80s Youth Service. It meant reclaiming space and entitlement for young women. The youth service throughout the UK was funded by local councils, but it had had become 'boyswork'; soft policing of boys with young women disregarded or pushed aside. Women youth workers, predominantly lesbians, drew attention to this during second wave feminism, and fought for better provision for girls, while setting up ‘girls only nights’ in their clubs if they had the power to do so. They also unearthed the history of work with girls and young women from the Suffragette movement, and showed how it had been wiped out, mainly by the fact that the Girls’ Club movement amalgamated with men.
I worked in one of the 12 Girls Projects established in London during the 1980s. Underlying all the work we did with girls was the aim of enabling them to develop their independence. We devised many programmes – making videos, Activities weeks, trips away. Girls worked in groups. Nothing was barred in discussions, so they could start to think about their futures, and what they wanted to do with their lives. Some girls disclosed abuse at times and we were in a position to support them. As youth workers we didn’t hide our lesbianism, were positive about it to young women, and a number of projects, including ours, set up young lesbian groups.
The series of photos (shown at Filia talk) illustrates various events that our Project undertook in 1985 and thereabouts, which I write about in some detail in my chapter. The poster, ‘It’s really good being a girl,’ was up in most youth centres throughout the UK when Girlswork was thriving. It was the result of a project by Leah Thorn and Carola Adams and a group of young women in the West Midlands in 1981. Such projects were common at the time. The other photos were taken on trips to Oaklands Women’s Centre, or during a Girls’ Activities Week in October half-term, 1985. They show girls canoeing, wind-surfing, learning self-defence moves, rope-climbing, chopping wood, horse-riding, absorbed in carpentry, and dancing together at the social we organised. The photos speak for themselves. The young women are engrossed in what they’re doing, trying out new experiences and enjoying each others’ company. In these projects, the underlying aim was to give girls a sustained experience of an all-women environment. So we always had women tutors, women bus drivers, women musicians, and all workers and volunteers were women.
Now, the youth service as it was has virtually disappeared. And from our work in Bristol - I’m part of a group working with parents trying to challenge the trans take-over of schools - I know how difficult it is. Many youth groups are GBT groups where ‘lesbian’ is a banned word, or they groom young women into transing. And so-called ‘Girls’ Groups’ welcome men aged up to 21 who are claiming to be women. So we are constantly fighting against policy capture, and for safeguarding of young women and girls.
But in First Wave feminism, the large number of women running girls’ clubs were mainly volunteers, or as we’d say now, activists. Funding can give advantages as I’ve described, but also exert control. Now, when the ideology has changed, and women and girls are seen as dispensable, and are under such attack, we are vulnerable.
And yet, to end on a note of hope, I termed my chapter, Activism comes in Waves. As well as demonstrations, writing and theorising, we need to take up the mantle of practical hard work – the slog of influencing public bodies (which we’re doing), and/or setting up on our own, free of official restraints. And younger lesbians are stepping up, to recreate lesbian feminist culture, which gives some hope for renewing work with girls and young women in the future. We need to get the next generation of girls on their bikes, in their canoes, and on the route to sanity, independence, freedom and sisterhood!
Girls absorbed in carpentry, and learning self-defence moves
Poster - It's really good being a girl
Girls at social, and canoeing and windsurfing