Title
Listening Post 8: Peter and Robin
Transcription
[ROUGH TRANSCRIPTION, NEEDS EDITING BEFORE PUBLIC]
[Speaker 1] Gay Soc can be traced back to Michaelmas term, 1975. But, yes, on Daily Info, for the 25th of October 1975 appears a notice, "anyone interested in helping establish Gay Soc in Oxford, please drop a line to box 16." Monday 10th November there appears this notice: "Gay Soc, homosexual social group for women and men students, first meeting 8:30, Wednesday 12th at 5 Fifefield road."
The first recorded Gay Soc party was held on November 22nd in Magdalen College, Oscar Wilde's old college. So in 1982, Gay Soc was only 7 years old. I realise now its still kind of, sort of a pioneering age.
Gay Soc meeting were sometimes wine and cheese parties at the Macmillan room in Pembroke and sometime speaker meetings. I was trying to remember, we had political meetings. So we had representatives of gay groups, within the main political parties, even the Conservative Group [for] Homosexual Equality - which was a very valiant sort of banner to wave in those days. [unclear] social worker, literary meetings. We had some academics as well, we had discussions on Christianity and homosexuality. So Norman Pittenger, one of the first theologians to engage in non-condemnatory manner, gave a talk and a couple of the college chaplains attended. There was quite a lot on gay health issues, especially sexually transmitted diseases. So, we had some quite serioues discussions.
In 1982 the gay pub was the Red Lion in Gloucester Green. It wasn't gay exclusive, it was gay friendly. Thirty-five years ago it was utterly different. It was all red leather seats, tables with brass veneers and sort of a 1970s taste free zone and everything.
So thats where we used to adjourn for a drink after a Gay Soc meeting. Again it wasnt as if we were very overt, I mean yes some of us might have been camper than the others, [unclear] of blokes together. But slightly fay blokes might have been a bit obvious. It wasnt like we were deliberately drawing attention to ourselves.
[Second speaker] But, by the time I came onto the scene it was the Jolly Farmer.
[First speaker] Well, interim, there was something called the Apollo. Which was down St Aldates Road across from the police station, it didn't last very long. Then it was the Jolly Farmer, and that was the gay pub. And it was a gay pub. In the end we used to go there for our drinks.
Clubs, there was the Coven where the ice rink now stands. It was a dive and it was a bit on the sleazy side, but it was our space in the 1980s. That really was a kind of a little sort of refuge where you really could be entirely yourself. Basically, I may be a gay man, I am a crap dancer. But discos were the places to find people. We needed that gay space, where we were grudgingly tolerated if you will. So it was, as you have gathered from I was saying before, to have my Wednesday and my Saturday nights looking for safety valve [?], that mattered.
[Speaker 2] In fact, if you like, the permissiveness of society was, seemed in some way going the other way. Whatever the state of the law, we've got AIDS and HIV and public response to that which generates a lot of hostility. So, you know, you're not that optimistic about things getting better really.
[Speaker 1] I mean certianly, the idea of LGBT month, the rainbow flag flying from colleges. My 19 year old self would have keeled over in a faint seeing all of this. I think he would have been thrilled to bits.
[Speaker 1] Gay Soc can be traced back to Michaelmas term, 1975. But, yes, on Daily Info, for the 25th of October 1975 appears a notice, "anyone interested in helping establish Gay Soc in Oxford, please drop a line to box 16." Monday 10th November there appears this notice: "Gay Soc, homosexual social group for women and men students, first meeting 8:30, Wednesday 12th at 5 Fifefield road."
The first recorded Gay Soc party was held on November 22nd in Magdalen College, Oscar Wilde's old college. So in 1982, Gay Soc was only 7 years old. I realise now its still kind of, sort of a pioneering age.
Gay Soc meeting were sometimes wine and cheese parties at the Macmillan room in Pembroke and sometime speaker meetings. I was trying to remember, we had political meetings. So we had representatives of gay groups, within the main political parties, even the Conservative Group [for] Homosexual Equality - which was a very valiant sort of banner to wave in those days. [unclear] social worker, literary meetings. We had some academics as well, we had discussions on Christianity and homosexuality. So Norman Pittenger, one of the first theologians to engage in non-condemnatory manner, gave a talk and a couple of the college chaplains attended. There was quite a lot on gay health issues, especially sexually transmitted diseases. So, we had some quite serioues discussions.
In 1982 the gay pub was the Red Lion in Gloucester Green. It wasn't gay exclusive, it was gay friendly. Thirty-five years ago it was utterly different. It was all red leather seats, tables with brass veneers and sort of a 1970s taste free zone and everything.
So thats where we used to adjourn for a drink after a Gay Soc meeting. Again it wasnt as if we were very overt, I mean yes some of us might have been camper than the others, [unclear] of blokes together. But slightly fay blokes might have been a bit obvious. It wasnt like we were deliberately drawing attention to ourselves.
[Second speaker] But, by the time I came onto the scene it was the Jolly Farmer.
[First speaker] Well, interim, there was something called the Apollo. Which was down St Aldates Road across from the police station, it didn't last very long. Then it was the Jolly Farmer, and that was the gay pub. And it was a gay pub. In the end we used to go there for our drinks.
Clubs, there was the Coven where the ice rink now stands. It was a dive and it was a bit on the sleazy side, but it was our space in the 1980s. That really was a kind of a little sort of refuge where you really could be entirely yourself. Basically, I may be a gay man, I am a crap dancer. But discos were the places to find people. We needed that gay space, where we were grudgingly tolerated if you will. So it was, as you have gathered from I was saying before, to have my Wednesday and my Saturday nights looking for safety valve [?], that mattered.
[Speaker 2] In fact, if you like, the permissiveness of society was, seemed in some way going the other way. Whatever the state of the law, we've got AIDS and HIV and public response to that which generates a lot of hostility. So, you know, you're not that optimistic about things getting better really.
[Speaker 1] I mean certianly, the idea of LGBT month, the rainbow flag flying from colleges. My 19 year old self would have keeled over in a faint seeing all of this. I think he would have been thrilled to bits.
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