queer revolution

[miriam_e]

One of my favorite radio programs, All in the Mind, usually compered by the very hot Natasha Mitchell aired the first of two parts of a piece from Chicago Public Radio's This American Life. It discusses how psychiatry changed the definition of being homosexual from a disease to simply something different. It is well worth listening to, and the audio will be online for the next 4 weeks.

81 Words: the inside story of psychiatry and homosexuality [Part 1 of 2]
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/allinthemind/default.htm
The transcript is up there and will remain there permanently.

For those of us in Australia the radio program is broadcast on ABC Radio National Australia, Saturday 1pm, and repeated Monday 1pm. Next week, the second part.

I like how one of the central characters was a lesbian librarian who convinced a gay, male, closetted psychiatrist to make the big step of speaking up at a conference while wearing an elaborate disguise. If you wrote this kind of stuff in a fiction piece nobody would believe it. Real life is pretty damn insane. I still don't get how some people can think that love can be wrong.

Comments

[annie-lyne.livejournal.com]

I should listen again to RN more often. I used to listen to it all Saturday/Sunday afternoons, when I was living by myself.

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

I would choose having a girlfriend to listening to RN any day. :)
Of course, the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive...

[greylock.livejournal.com]

I heard part of that while unpacking my shopping on Saturday afternoon.
It was quite interesting.

81 words

[(Anonymous)]

Just read the transcript! Fascinating story.
Cheers, MFG.

[sharpblonde.livejournal.com]

I want the other half... That felt like a tease...

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

:) heheheh
It will be at the All in the Mind page after this weekend. I hope in part 2 they tell us more about Barbara Geddings. They barely touched on her, but without her things might not have changed for perhaps decades more.

I just did a search on the net for info about her. You'd think that being a lesbian activist with an important part to play at a pivotal time in history there might be plenty about her. Nope. All I can find is 2 sentences -- an obituary notice -- in a London, UK newsletter LGBT History Month bulletin 32 for Feruary 2007
http://www.lgbthistorymonth.org.uk/documents/bulletins/bulletin32.doc

Goodbye to Barbara Geddings, a gay and lesbian rights campaigner for over half a century. The world is a poorer place without her.

Makes me sad. I need to find out more and put a page on Wikipedia about her I think.