From Geoff, past president of The Campaign Against Moral
Persecution in Western Australia:
My wonderful friends at The Mail Crew have asked me to write something to add
to the comments of others who have contributed to this section of their
website. I am proud and happy to do so because I have enormous respect for
the gang and what they are doing for young gay people.
I grew up in an era when the term “gay” had no homosexual connotation. Yet I
have been gay since I was four years old when I became aware of an attraction
to other males, an attraction that has remained with me. It was not something
I ever mentioned to anyone for fear of being considered “dirty” but it never went
away all though my childhood and adolescence.
In these days of step-by-step liberation of gay and lesbian people - slow though
it appears - it is hard for most people to imagine the world in which I grew up.
No one mentioned homosexuality, there were no role models, same-sex activity
for men was totally illegal and harsh laws were in place for those who were
caught. Few books mentioned the subject, certainly not those available to me,
for a strong censorship existed to keep out of Australia books governments did
not like. There was no television. The subject of homosexuality was not
mentioned in films. We did not exist to all intents and purposes.
Yet when I was an adult, several things happened. First I discovered the works
of John Rechy during a visit to London in 1966. In 1969 the Stonewall riots took
place, and under their impetus, the gay liberation movement began. Where I
live the first gay organisation, The Campaign Against Moral Persecution (CAMP-
WA) was started in 1971, and began the movement for law reform. (In 2002 I
was present when the state legislature finally passed measures giving full
equality to gays and lesbians under State law.) I was still too scared to join
CAMP although I attended the first public meeting on law reform it called.
However, I was busy doing many other things and did not become fully involved
in its work until seven years later. Subsequently I served the organisation in a
number of roles — secretary, newsletter editor, vice-president and president —
before moving on to other things.
In the intervening years, I had lived overseas, fallen in love for the first time
and on my return, had come out to friends and family. I began to build up a
library of gay books. I found and read gay newspapers and magazines. I
established a network of gay and lesbian friends who have become my other
family. I trained as a counsellor for our Gay and Lesbian Counselling Service and
spent ten years as a volunteer telephone counsellor. I deepened my gay
consciousness considerably through all this activity.
The coming of the Internet in the 1990s has done much more to enable me to
participate in the gay movement in a wider way. As soon as I was connected, I
did a search for ‘gay’. I found so many sites. I looked for gay stories and found
many. I was amazed at the stories, not only by their content but also by the
opportunity I had to make contact with their authors. And one thing I discovered
was that so many otherwise-good stories had serious deficiencies in their
writing — spelling, grammar, structure and even sometimes of fact — that irked
me and spoiled my enjoyment of them.
Finally I wrote to one of those authors to volunteer my services to be a copy
editor. My offer was accepted, and today I edit work for some of the writers
whose work you can find on this site. I am not much of a storyteller, certainly
not a creator of fiction. My skills as a writer lie in non-fiction, but I feel I have a
knowledge of how to write correctly that I can put in the service of these fine
storytellers to make their work appeal even more to readers of gay fiction.
It is one contribution I feel I can continue to make to our gay liberation
movement as my physical capacity to be as active as I was when I was younger
declines with age. Another is as a member of B-Legits, my Union’s support
committee for glbti teachers.
If I have a message to young gay people it is this: expand your knowledge
about the movement for equality for homosexual people everywhere, and start
by reading widely, especially on the Internet. Join in by whatever means you
feel capable, as the boys of The Mail Crew have done. Make friends with other
gay people who can support you in good and not-so-good moments.
We are everywhere and we are not alone!
Geoff D. in Western Australia