At the end of the nineteenth century, when more and more artists refused to be put in the
closet
, censorship sought mostly to control the public exposition of homophile art.
For years, American museums that preserved John Sargent’s homoerotic watercolors refused to show them. In this same country, at the end of the twentieth century, works sanctioned by both critics and the market, such as those by Robert Mapplethorpe, were shown with great difficulty. In the end, it is rather symbolic that French photographers Pierre and Gilles were forced to remove certain photos judged to be pornographic in order for a retrospective of their work to be shown in the United States.
—
Karim Ressouni-Demigneux
Grand-Carteret, John.
Derrière “Lui”: L’homosexualité en Allemagne
. Followed by
Iconographie d’un scandale, les caricatures politiques et l’affaire Eulenburg.
By James Steakley. Lille: Cahiers GayKitschCamp, 1992.
Gundersheimer, Werner. “Clarity and Ambiguity in Renaissance Gesture: the Case of Borso d’Este,”
The Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies
23, no.1 (1993).
Manca, Jospeh. “Sacred vs. Profane: Images of Sexual Vice in Renaissance Art,”
Studies in Iconography
13 (1989).
Meyer, Richard.
Outlaw Representation: Censorship and Homosexuality in Twentieth-Century American Art
. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2002.
Réau, Louis.
Iconographie de l’art Chrétien
. Vol 3. Paris: Presses universitaires de France 1955-1959.
The San Francisco Lesbian and Gay History Project. “‘She Even Chewed Tobacco’: A Pictorial Narrative of Passing Women in America.” In
Hidden from History: Reclaiming the Gay and Lesbian Past
. By George Chauncey, Martin Duberman, Martha Vicinus. New York: Meridian, 1989.
Saslow, James.
Ganymede in the Renaissance: Homosexuality in Art and Society
. New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1986.
Tamagne, Florence.
Mauvais Genre?
Paris: La Martinière, 2001.
Further Reading:
Merrick, Jeffery, and Bryant T. Ragan, Jr, eds.
Homosexuality in Modern France
. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Steakley, James, Gert Hekma, and Harry Dosterhuis,
Gay Men and the Sexual History of the Political Left
. New York: Haworth Press, 1995.
Schiller, Gertrud.
Iconography of Christian Art
. Vol 1 & 2. Second edition. Greenwich, CT: New York Graphic Society, 1971–72.
Steakley, James. “Iconography of Scandal: Political Cartoons and the Eulenberg Affair,”
Studies in Visual Communication
9, no. 2 (Spring 1983).
Tamagne, Florence.
A History of Homosexuality in Europe
, New York: Algora 2004.
—Caricature; Censorship; Cinema; Comic Books; Dance; Literature; Media; Music; Publicity; Song.
ASHAMED.
See
Shame
ASSOCIATIONS
The first true association for gay rights that was not simply a cultural circle or meeting place was organized by German doctor Magnus
Hirschfeld
. Born in the city of Kolberg in 1868, Hirschfeld specialized in nervous and psychiatric disorders after his studies in medicine. He became involved in the fight against anti-homosexual legislation (the Prussian penal code, then Paragraph 175 in Germany) by dealing with the question from a medical perspective: if the homosexual falls under the jurisdiction of medicine and psychiatry, he cannot be “responsible” before the law, and therefore he is not a
criminal
. Oscar
Wilde
’s sensational trial in Britain in 1895 served to highlight this question with more acuity. Shortly thereafter, in 1897, Hirschfeld founded the Scientific-Humanitarian Committee, the WhK (Wissenschaftlich-humanitäre Komitee), an association which aimed to undertake research to defend the rights of homosexuals in light of Paragraph 175. The committee’s actions were sufficient to initiate parliamentary debate in Germany over the legislation. However, the rise of the Nazi party brutally ended the WhK’s activities, and Magnus Hirschfeld fled to France, living out his days in Nice.
France prior to World War II had an important gay “scene,” but its expression was mostly cultural: everyone read Proust and
Gide
, but there were no organized demonstrations or demands for the recognition of homosexuals. One short-lived publication, however, sought to oppose homophobia:
Inversions
(which later became
L’Amitié
)
,
established in November 1924, sought to “tell inverts that they are normal and healthy beings.” In March of 1927, however, its publishers were sentenced to three months’ imprisonment for the “affront to public decency.”
During this period, the ability and willingness among gays and lesbians to discreetly organize themselves came about mainly in European countries and in the United States. In the years between wars, American gays and lesbians organized dances and “salons.” In particular, a spirit of freedom blew through New York City, where Greenwich Village became a much frequented neighborhood for homosexuals. Between 1950 and 1960, many gay bars opened in the city, and in 1967, activist Craig Rodwell opened the world’s first gay bookstore, the Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop, which served as a center for gay discussions and initiatives. After the historic
Stonewall
riots of June 1969, a good number of gay rights associations were formed, in particular the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF), which is still active to this day. As a result, the gay movement in the US entered a phase of politics and protest.
After World War II, gay associations in France were limited to a discreet group named Arcadie, united around the monthly periodical created by André Baudry in 1954. Arcadie allowed many gays to congregate, but their discussions were confined within an association that was moralizing and overly cautious. The association’s official name was Clespala (Club littéraire et scientifique de pays latins, Literary and Scientific Club of Latin Countries). It was not until after the social upheaval of May 1968 that more proactive gay associations appeared in France. In 1971, on the heels of the growing
feminist
movement, the Front homosexual d’action révolutionnaire (FHAR; Homosexual Revolutionary Action Front) saw the light of day; despite its fleeting existence, it had a long-lasting effect on the French gay movement. Unlike Arcadie, FHAR was not simply a social club, nor was it clandestine; its members were openly gay and lesbian, and its goals were explicitly political.
Following in the footsteps of FHAR, gay groups began to expand in the main cities of France under the banner of Groupes de libération homosexuelle (GLH; Groups for Homosexual Liberation). Despite this commonality, each group was very diverse, politicized, and more focused on how the oppression of gays and lesbians had been characterized by society rather than on the fight against oppression itself. If the development of a “gay argument” was desirable and necessary, it nonetheless masked the inability of these associations to actively oppose homophobic repression and to work toward the decriminalization of homosexuality. Also, apart from ideological quarrels, the essential differences between gay associations and their lesbian counterparts slowed down organized efforts to fight homophobia. GLH were mostly male, whereas lesbians tended to organize themselves in associations representing multiple ideals (e.g., feminism).
This acknowledgment of impotence pushed some gay militants to create organizations that allowed each interest group to retain its ideological specificity, while working toward collective action. The task was an arduous one given the divisions and the general wariness among groups. Eventually, the Parisian GLH split up into three distinct groups: Politique et Quotidien, Groupe de base, and 14 décembre (the date of the split). Arcadie, in a slow state of collapse, refused to get mixed up in “this agitation,” which it feared. The task was not made any easier by the anti-homosexual hostility, whether implied or outright, expressed by various political parties, unions, associations, or cities. Abroad, however, there was a will among gays to organize themselves. In England in 1978, the International Gay Association (IGA) was founded (later known as ILGA, with the addition of lesbians). This first international initiative for gay “liberation” had ramifications for the French gay movement.
The Marseille GLH, one of the few groups having registered for association status under the 1901 law in France (under the humorous name CORPS [body], Centre ouvert de recherché populaire sur la sexualité, the Open Centre for Popular Research on Sexuality), took the initiative to organize the Université d’été homosexuelle (UEH; Homosexual Summer School) in 1979. Some 400 gay and lesbian activists took part; Marseille, where the “school” took place, was relatively welcoming toward one of “the city’s numerous communities,” as stated by the mayor at the time. It was during this first Marseille UEH that the idea of a mixed association structure centered on the fight against the
discrimination
of homosexuals was launched, and groups that were formerly at odds with one another were invited to join. The initiative, supported by influential figures such as Jacques Fortin, Hervé Liffran, Mélanie Badaire, and Geneviève Pastre, was named the Comité d’urgence anti-répression homosexuelle (CUARH; Homosexual Anti-Repression Emergency Committee). A letter dated July 28, 1979, addressed to various gay and lesbian groups in France, stated the following: “The CUARH is a structure for the coordination of homosexual groups who wish to join it in order to launch campaigns and take initiatives with regard to significant cases. The CUARH will also work toward democratic rights and freedoms for homosexuals (campaign against homophobia, suppression of files, suppression of Article 16 from the civil service, reformation of the penal code, etc.). The CUARH will need to develop ties in order to lead eventual common campaigns with anti-oppression groups, and political, union, and democratic organizations.”
At the same time in France, gay media specializing in analysis and commentary started to appear:
Gai-Pied
,
Masques
,
Vlasta
, and
Lesbian Magazine
served to publicize the fights taken up by the gay rights groups. Initially known as a group that coordinated activities among others, CUARH progressively became active on its own by way of its magazine
Homophonies,
launched in November 1980 and sold on newsstands from 1982 until its final issue in February of 1987. The magazine’s editorial board became somewhat of a pseudo-autonomous militant group, and its particular place within CUARH made it the driving force behind various mobilization campaigns.
The changing vocabulary, iconography, and media bear witness to the changes and difficulties faced by the gay rights movement in the 1980s. It is important to note that the new term “homophobia” began cropping up more and more, on one hand as a means to avoid the wordiness of the expression “anti-gay racism,” and on another to avoid debate raised by the characterization of the oppression of gays and lesbians as “racist.”
From its foundation, CUARH led a determined fight for the repeal of discriminatory aspects of the penal code in France. This battle was aimed at specific homophobic articles which, among other issues, established a difference in the “age of consent”: while heterosexual relations were legal at the age of fifteen, gay relations remained illegal below the age of eighteen (and prior to that, twenty-one, before President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing lowered it). These articles had been originally introduced by the Vichy government in 1942 and reaffirmed in 1945 after liberation. In 1960, a parliamentary amendment by Member of Parliament Paul
Mirguet
added homosexuality to a list of “social scourges” along with alcoholism and prostitution (in 1968, a short-lived gay publication entitled
Scourge of Society
started). According to the French Minister of Justice, 6,487 individuals were prosecuted between 1958 and 1975 as a result of parliamentary law. In June of 1978, Senator Henri Caillavet proposed the repeal of anti-homosexual articles to the Senate, who accepted it, but the National Assembly, under the leadership of MP Jean Foyer, rejected the proposal in April 1980. In protest, on June 21, 1980 CUARH organized a demonstration of nearly 1,000 supporters who marched to the National Assembly.
The approaching presidential elections in 1981 gave CUARH the opportunity to launch a pro-gay rights media campaign, which included a national petition against the discriminatory laws. Not only did the petition gather signatures from many artists including Dalida, Yves Montand, Costa-Gavras, and François Truffaut, but it was also signed by politicians such as Robert Badinter, Huguette Bouchardeau, Raymond Forni, Gisèle Halimi, and Brice Lalonde. The mobilization campaign allowed CUARH to compel various organizations to publicly state their position on the issue, the most important of which was the Socialist Party, whose candidate François Mitterrand, declared: “Homosexuality must not be a basis for any form of inequality or discrimination.”
As a finale to its campaign, after having gathered over 6,000 signatures on its petition, CUARH organized a national march in Paris on April 4, 1981, in which 10,000 people participated. It was the largest autonomous gay demonstration of the time, to which previous demonstrations could not compare. Its success led CUARH to organize a yearly national march in June; on Saturday, June 19, 1982, the first “real” French Gay Pride demonstration, the Marche nationale homosexuelle et lesbienne (National Gay and Lesbian March), took place. The term “Gay Pride” would only come into regular use in France a few years later (at the first Parisian demonstration commemorating Stonewall in June 1977). The change in political power brought about by François Mitterrand’s election paved the way for Minister of Justice Robert Badinter to prepare the amendment of the penal code. As a result, the discriminatory subsection of Article 331 was abrogated by the law of August 4, 1982—the age of consent for homosexuals was lowered to be the same as for heterosexuals.
CUARH also mobilized responses to cases in which individuals had lost their jobs because of their homosexuality, such as Jacques Odon, who was fired from his job at Rouen’s City Hall, and Jean Rossignol, a dormitory monitor from Marseille who was fired by the Ministry of National Education in 1978. However, the most prominent cases were those where homosexuality was both the only and official reason for firing; CUARH invoked the German term of
Berufsverbot
(prohibition to practice on the grounds of a criminal record or membership in a particular group). Such was the case of Eliane Morissens, a Belgian teacher who had participated on a television show where she stated she was a lesbian; her employer’s response, the Province of Hainaut, was swift: she was automatically “retired.”