Historical Context for Teachers
Important note: These sources and learning activities include references to homophobia and transphobia in schools and governments, including that from parents, teachers, politicians, administrators, and other students. Content and historical language in this collection reflect perspectives during the time periods when they occurred. Teachers must be mindful that for 2SLGBTQIA+ learners, experiences of prejudice are ongoing. Preparing the class to engage thoughtfully with the past must include consideration of how to address prejudiced, stereotypical, or otherwise problematic language in historical documents and current contexts. This collection’s specific sources and student tasks center queer and trans joy in response to the homophobia and transphobia often highlighted in schools as well as exacerbated by some governments, family members, teachers, politicians, administrators, and other students.
We invite teachers to consider current, 2SLGBTQIA+ inclusion practices and language often used in schools and schooling when talking or teaching about Queer and trans communities (e.g., 2SLGBTQIA+ terminology lists, saying things like “queer and trans kids are so brave,” and only thinking about 2SLGBTQIA+ communities through the context of risk, queerphobia, and transphobia). What might it look like to shift our teaching so that desire, pleasure, and joy become our main framework for gender and sexuality education, rather than risk and concern? (see also: LJ Slovin’s book Fierce, Fabulous & Fluid, 2024).
Early Queer Spaces in New Brunswick
The gay liberation movement was a social and political movement in the West from the 1960s to the 1980s. Although these days it often gets equated to the gay rights movement, it is quite distinct and sometimes even contradicts the gay rights movement. The core principles of the gay liberation movement were to be out (to be openly queer) and to act radically and joyfully, in defiance of the state and its laws and attitudes. Although the beginning of this era is marked by the Stonewall riots in 1969, these principles had been discussed in activist circles across North America and Europe well before that time. Some groups within the gay liberation movement were anti-capitalist, anti-racist, and against core societal institutions such as the nuclear family and the construct of gender.
Key to this movement was local organizing, community spaces, and mutual aid. In New Brunswick, all three main cities had some form of collective that held these principles. They eventually consolidated into the New Brunswick Coalition for Human Rights Reform, the activists shifting their focus to legal and political advocacy once more permanent queer spaces became self-sustaining in the province.
There were a few organizations operating in New Brunswick during the 70s and 80s. Although they were quite locally based, each operating out of the three main cities, they often collaborated to organize dances and other events. People often came from all over the province to attend their events.
Gay Friends of Fredericton (GFF) was the first Gay Rights group to form in New Brunswick, founded in 1974 by Keith Sly. This group was short-lived as Sly ended up relocating to Toronto, however, Fredericton Lesbians and Gays (also known by its acronym FLAG), picked up were GFF left off in 1979 by activists Hal Hinds, Allison Brewer, Francis Young and Claude Olivier. As part of various forms of community outreach, FLAG started a monthly newsletter known as the “FLAG Mag”. Members of FLAG also helped to staff a phone line known as a “Gayline” that people could call and ask for resources and support in coming out.
GFF & FLAG as well as Lesbian and Gay Organisation - Saint John (LAGO-SJ) and Gais et Lesbiennes de Moncton (GLM) members would rent community centers and halls to hold monthly dances. Due to a lack of queer spaces, people from around New Brunswick would travel between the three major cities to dance and find community.
The first gay bar in Fredericton was Dance Trax which opened in July 1985. Gay bars and previously other spaces like tea rooms have played an important role in providing a space for queer people to socialize and bringing community together around the world for centuries.
Rexton in 1995 was the twelfth Two Spirit Gathering. They started with the 1983 Manitoba Gathering with a call for all two spirt people in Canada to come together for a powwow. It's been in Michigan, San Francisco, Kansas, Seattle, and Portland. The Rexton gathering had 97 people and a real drum group for the first time instead of tapes. And was the longest one, a whole week. Registration was $75. Events included a no-talent show and singing. (Taken from the website of the Wabanaki Two Spirit Alliance)
Newsletters and Public Awareness Campaigns
In addition to the FLAG Mag, there were other publications that reported on queer issues and dedicated themselves to gay liberation. One of these publications was the Body Politic. It was a monthly, national publication dedicated to gay liberation. It helped to connect queer groups and report on various events and challenges queer people in Canada were facing. It was started in 1971 by an independent collective in Toronto under Jerald Moldenhauer, the owner of Glad Day Books (Canada’s first Gay bookstore). Another member of the collective, Ed Jackson, from Fredericton was a writer and one of the key founders.
As the AIDS crisis developed in New Brunswick, the organization AIDS NB was established, dedicated to improving the public understanding of the disease. More about this organization is available in the oral history recording in the set.
Historically, queer archives have been a target of governments, which makes record keeping a both vital and unexpectedly dangerous job. James Fraser (b.1946 , Chatham, New Brunswick d.1985) began his career as an archivist at the Provincial Archives of New Brunswick. Like so many other queer New Brunswickers in the 1970s, he relocated to Toronto and went on to have an impact as a queer activist and played a role in starting the Canadian Gay Archives, now the ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2S+ Archives.
Fighting Government Suppression
Even though the amendments to the criminal code in 1969 had partially decriminalized consensual relationships between same-sex partners over the age of 21, which helped to encourage more people to join the gay liberation movement, queer people still faced discrimination and biases from society at large.
In 1992, the Provincial Human Rights Legislation was amended to include sexual orientation. Previously, a person could be fired by their employer for being queer or refused housing and no law was there to help protect them.
For years, queer activists in Fredericton had been asking Fredericton City Council to proclaim a Pride Week and acknowledge various LGBT events. In 1995, Mayor Brad Woodside had refused to read out a pride week proclamation. Queer activists, Allison Brewer and Kim Hill took the case to the New Brunswick Human Rights Commission and won in 1998. Woodside was forced to read the proclamation by the commission, switching off his microphone and mumbling it so quietly that no one in the City Council Chambers could hear him. Following the proclamation, a pride flag was raised outside of Fredericton City Hall for the first time.
Throughout the cold war, the Canadian government ran a campaign known now as the “Purge”, to fire or avoid hiring queer people in government services. This was based partially on the very flawed ideology that these individuals would be more at risk of Soviet blackmail, and so suspected homosexuals would be interrogated, intimidated, and harassed at their workplaces.
One such survivor, Diane Doiron, was raised in Pointe Sapin, New Brunswick. At the age of 20, they enrolled in the Navy in February 1985. After their basic training they were sent to Canadian Forces Station Selbourne in Nova Scotia where they were involved with the US Navy and tracked Soviet submarines. During their time at CFS Shelbourne, Doiron was interrogated multiple times about their sexuality. They were dismissed from the Navy on December 23rd, 1987 on the basis of their sexuality after their one month stay in a psychiatric ward at CFB Halifax.
Following their dismissal from the Navy, they went on to have a successful career as a photojournalist, working for the Chronicle Herald. On November 28th, 2017, Doiron along with other purge survivors attended the apology by the Prime Minister of Canada at the House of Commons in Ottawa, Ontario. Doiron laid the first wreath in New Brunswick on behalf of 2SLGBTQIA+ Veterans during the Remembrance Day Ceremony in November 2018.
Conclusion
Queer liberation was a direct opposition to state violence, community safety organizing, and a public awareness project all in one. With limited resources and the looming threat of a government crackdown at any time, these organizations ran because of the many brave volunteers who dedicated their lives to serving their communities.
Additional Resources
1981: The Moncton Gay Picnic
The Purge
