The curious case of Pride vs the Lesbians: Part 1
In which it's all inclusion and aroha, but not for lesbians.
Inclusion and aroha
The following dialogue is a word-for-word transcript of an excerpt from the 2021 Out in the City interviews published by Pride NZ (from about 59.30 to 1:04).
Scene: 27th March 2021, outside the Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington City. Inside, the annual Out in the City event (previously the Lesbian and Gay Fair) is taking place. A small group of women who were banned from the event sit at a stall with a sign saying Lesbian Action for Visibility in Aotearoa (LAVA) and a large map of Wellington showing places of significance to lesbians. They are the target of a loud, angry group of protesters, some carrying placards, including ones that read ‘Fuck TERF Cunts’ and ‘Queer rights, TERFs fuck off’.
Anti-Lava Crowd
[Chanting]
TERFs go home, TERFs go home, TERFs go home...
Mixed voices from anti-LAVA crowd
We don’t like you.
We hate you.
Just go home, please.
LAVA Lesbian #1
[To interviewer]
Talk to us about what is happening here.
Interviewer
What’s happening here?
LAVA Lesbian #1
Well, these people, as you can see, these people, you can see the signs, they’re using abusive language. You can hear them. We’re lesbians and we’re here for lesbian visibility and this is what happens.
LAVA Lesbian #2
We are just for lesbian visibility and they are right in our faces threatening us. Who’s the inclusive ones? They are exclusive.
LAVA Lesbian #1
Who’s unsafe? We’re being told we are making them unsafe.
LAVA Lesbian #2
We’re the unsafe ones. We’re 75 and older and they are threatening us.
LAVA Lesbian #1
It’s not okay. It’s not okay. We’re harming nobody. We’ve got a history of lesbianism in the Wellington area for people to look at. That’s all we’re doing.
LAVA Lesbian #2
We are lesbian feminists who lived the fight…
LAVA Lesbian #1
…yes, back in the day…
LAVA Lesbian #2
…for LGBT rights, right the way through, and this is the way we’re treated.
Mixed voices from anti-LAVA crowd
We don’t want you here.
TERFs go home.
Go home, stay home.
Anti-LAVA Crowd
[Chanting]
Pack your shit and go, Pack your shit and go. Pack your shit and go...
Male voice #1
Well, these people are TERFs. They’re anti-trans feminists. They think transwomen are not women. They’re just misinformed bigots and we’re trying to protest them because we think they should not be at our venue, because this is for Pride; for people who are oppressed, not them. They think they’re oppressed but they’re not. That’s how I would describe it.
Female voice #1
They’re just the feminists, the feminists that don’t believe in trans rights, that’s it. And they’re being idiots and saying trans people cause cancer and shit.
Interviewer
Why do you think they’re here today?
Female voice #1
Because they hate us for no reason, ‘cause they don’t understand.
Mixed voices from anti-LAVA crowd
We hate you.
Fuck you.
We don’t like you.
We don’t like you.
Go away.
Get the fuck out of here.
Male voice #2
So what they’re doing, these TERFs, which are the feminists who are against trans people, they are [inaudible] us which is illegal because we’re minors. And they’re telling us we shouldn’t be queer, and we shouldn’t be part of this community. And what we are is, we’re protesting them, so they can go home and leave us to have our parade, all-inclusive!
We think they’re here because this is an explicitly trans-supportive event and they’re older generations and they think that trans people aren’t real, that we’re predators, and what they’re doing is trying to dissuade us. They’re handing out propaganda to try and change the opinion of us and the public and it’s really, really sad.
Anti-LAVA Crowd
[Singing]
Te Aroha. Te Aroha. Te Whakapono. Me te rangimarie. Tatou Tatou e.
Te Aroha. Te Aroha. Te Whakapono. Me te rangimarie. Tatou Tatou e.
(Love, Hope, Peace for us all).
Context
LAVA had applied to hold a stall at the Out in the City event. At the stall they would display a large map of Wellington that members had created. The map showed places of social, historical and cultural significance to lesbians. Although the event organiser, the Wellington Pride Festival Board (WPF), had encouraged members of the rainbow community to apply to hold stalls at their ‘all-inclusive’ event, it had turned LAVA down, citing LAVA’s alleged trans-exclusionary views.
While LAVA does not believe males can be either women or lesbians, and has other concerns about extreme gender ideology, it had made it clear its stall would be showcasing the map, an expression of lesbian pride. It would not be promoting LAVA’s views on gender issues. LAVA and its members, by the way, have publicly stated that they support transgender people’s human rights. LAVA members also have a long history of involvement in the rainbow community. LAVA members have helped organise previous Wellington pride events including Out in the City’s forerunner, the Lesbian and Gay Fair.
After being refused a place inside the official venue, LAVA members decided to run a stall outside. The stall was held both to protest their exclusion, and to do as they originally intended, display their map. LAVA hoped the map might inspire young lesbians. But, as evidenced in the transcript, the mere presence of these lesbians, even outside the event, was intolerable to this iteration of Pride.
The Human Rights Review Tribunal case
LAVA is taking Wellington Pride Festival Board to court.
The Human Rights Act 1993 (HRA) prohibits discrimination based on political beliefs. The Wellington Pride Festival Board explicitly told LAVA it was refused a stall because of their so-called trans-exclusionary messages. These included LAVA’s “no to self-id” stance and previous slogans used by LAVA: “female is not a feeling”, “biology is a fact”, “ban puberty blockers”, “woman=adult human female”, and “protect women’s rights + safety + statistics”. LAVA argues that these views constitute political beliefs and WPF, therefore, discriminated against LAVA members.
Perceived breaches of the Human Rights Act are heard by the Human Rights Review Tribunal. Two rounds of mediation between LAVA and Wellington Pride failed and so now LAVA’s complaint proceeds to a Tribunal hearing. The case will probably be heard around mid-2025.
It’s an important case—for lesbians, for women, for rainbow people who really do believe in inclusion and tolerance, for people who want the freedom to define their sexuality—one that involves consenting and enthusiastic adults—without being called harmful, hateful bigots, and for people who want to prevent discrimination based on political opinion.
I’ll be writing more about the Curious Case of Pride vs the Lesbians. Unconfirmed topics include: the sad and seemingly inextricable schism in rainbow communities; anti-lesbianism; the history of lesbians in Pride; Women’s right to do stuff without men (including sex); links to the Maya Forstater case in the UK (she was sacked for her gender critical beliefs); the ins and outs of the legal arguments; the particular impacts on lesbians of gender ideology, or just whatever takes my fancy. Stay tuned!
Donate to LAVA’s Human Rights Review Tribunal Case
Sources and media coverage
Out in the City interviews [audio], 27 March 2021, Pride NZ
Human Rights Act 1993, Section 21: Prohibited grounds of discrimination.
LAVA website: Provides more information about LAVA’s beliefs and the case.
LAVA’s statement on trans rights
”Everyone, including “transgender” people, has human rights as stated by the United Nations Declaration. “Trans rights” activists seek to claim extra rights that others don’t have, for example, to be able to keep secret a previous identity, or to be able to prescribe how language is used.”
Marg Curnow’s letter to the Post (reproduced on the LAVA site)
Marg Curnow, one of the LAVA plaintiffs states in a letter published in The Post.
“I am neither frightened of, nor bigoted against people who believe themselves to be the opposite sex. They are entitled to the same human rights as every other human on the planet and deserve the same legal protection of those rights.”
I read a study that looked at young adults and compared and contrasted the difference between boys coming out as gay and young women coming out as lesbian. It found that (on average) males declare a sexual identity around 16-18 years old, but females are between 22 and 24 before they come out. This was listed as a leading cause of the incredible increase in a trans identity for women (as opposed to men). Boys recognise they are gay, not women, but women get sidetracked into "being trans" when in reality they are lesbians who are being diverted from their same sex attraction.
Thank you, beautiful lesbians, for speaking up for lesbians and our herstory, culture, and feminist politics. Bio-phobia (an irrational fear of nature, including of one's own biological sex) and bio-phobes have all but dismantled our culture, politics, gatherings, herstory, and our rights. Many of us are up there in age, are no longer able to be physically active, or have died. It gives me hope, what you are doing. We need to be doing such actions all over the world.
If only I could even *find* feminist lesbians, or simply bio-realist feminists, to do this work with in my own city of 200,000 in California.
I'm working on it, though.
Thanks again <3.