#greenham common

[earhartsease]

sudden flashback to my friend Meryl who was a Greenham Woman (one of the many women who camped for years around Greenham Common air base in England in the 70s and early 80s to protest the presence of nuclear weapons) - her telling us about getting arrested with a bunch of other women breaking through a fence, and they're all piled in the back of a police van, and one of them says "hey, how many policemen does it take to tile a bathroom?" and another woman yelled "depends how thinly you slice them!"

anyway, those women fucking ruled

[stadtfunk]

Visiting the Former RAF Greenham Common

Date: October 19, 2020 Following on from my trip to Hack Green Nuclear Bunker in Cheshire, I headed back south, down to Greenham Common.

Growing up in the 1980s, there were regular news pieces reporting on the base and the Women’s Peace Camp outside. In my later years, it’s been a place that I’ve wanted to visit, but, you know, never actually got round to doing it.

That all changed yesterday.

First off, I registered for the control tower tour. My guide was a former US base veteran called Dan. He had so much to tell but we were only limited to 30 minutes and there’s a lot to pack in during that 30 minutes.

Dan was fascinating to listen to and I’ve recommended him as a guest for the Cold War Conversations podcast because I’d love to hear more about his times at Greenham and his role.

After the tour, I had a good wander round what was the base, including visiting the GAMA silos where the ground launched missiles and their vehicles were stored. The thing that struck me was that if, in the 1980s, you’d told me I’d one day stand on the runway at Greenham, I probably would’ve laughed at you.

Greenham Common was a major part of my childhood and on here I’m remaining impartial to the presence of the cruise missiles and the peace camp outside. I’m not going to get into a debate into the rights and wrongs.

There is still something incredibly naughty about photographing these sites. Perhaps it’s because there are still old M.O.D. signs up, or because I know the significance of the sites I’m standing at.

It is quite an overwhelming feeling, standing and seeing history.

I’m definitely going to have to revisit with my bike and ride the whole of the common. I’m sure there are bits that I’ve missed.

Here’s a selection of YouTube videos which might interest you. I’ve tried to maintain the balance of both sides.

[enteresc]

Dalos György: Beszélgetés Márkus Piroskával, London, 1993, május 25

Dalos György 1993 tavaszán Londonba érkezett Berlinből, azzal a céllal, hogy interjút készítsen velem. Párizsba is ment Körösi Zsuzsával, és Amszterdamba Veres Júliával interjút készíteni. Az volt a terve, hogy egy cikket ír, amiben összegzi a három interjút. 20 évvel korábban, 1973-ban mind a hárman részt vettünk Magyarországon az ’abortusz-akcióban’. Dalos György ezzel kapcsolatban készítette…

[hanssloane]

Greenham Common Peace Banner

Seen at Radical Landscapes

William Morris Gallery

Walthamstow

London

[carbone14]

"Full victory - nothing else"

Le Général Eisenhower en discussion avec le Lieutenant Wallace C. Strobel du 502nd PIR de la 101st Airborne Division avant le décollage pour la Normandie – Opération Albany – Opération Overlord – base aérienne de la RAF de Greenham common – Angleterre – 20 h 30 – 5 juin 1944

©Library of Congress – LC-USZ62-25600

La photo montre le général Eisenhower discutant avec des parachutistes de la Compagnie E (easy Company) du 502e Régiment d'infanterie parachutiste de la 101e Division aéroportée sur la base aérienne de la RAF de Greenham Common.

Les personnages identifiés sont les suivants :

Le Sergent Fred Lindsey tenant un carnet de croquis, derrière et à gauche du dos d'Eisenhower (Source : Chad Lindsey, 2014)

Russell Wilmarth, derrière le menton d'Eisenhower (Source : Alan Offen, 2009)

Le lieutenant Wallace C. Strobel avec une étiquette '23' (Source : Dwight David Eisenhower - The Centennial, CMH Pub 71-40)

Ralph 'Bud' Thomas ou Arthur L. Wegener, à gauche de Strobel (Source : Eileen Thomas Hayes, 2012 et Sandra Edwards, 2021)

Probablement le caporal Donald E. Kruger, au premier rang, à l'extrême droite, portant un sac musette sur la poitrine (Source : Alice Kruger Bruns et Jason Bezis, 2013)

Joseph Burdette May Jr. (1920-1995), au-dessus du pouce d'Eisenhower (Source : Ashley Barnes, 2018)

[nocternalrandomness]

USAF OV-10A Bronco landing at RAF Greenham Common - 24 June 1977

[bratprincedyke]

Watch the trailer here

“REBEL DYKES is a rabble-rousing documentary set in 1980s post-punk London. The unheard story of a community of dykes who met doing art, music, politics and sex, and how they went on to change their world.”

The film covers a whole host of women’s stories in a mix of animation, visuals from archives including never before seen personal archives and oral histories told by former Rebel Dykes themselves, from women’s peace camps at Greenham common to the BDSM nightlife at chain reaction, from sex toys to battling street violence, homelessness, homophobia and transphobia to section 28, the aids crisis, publishing and the feminist sex wars. Honestly it is a great accessible introduction to understanding how lesbian culture and politics has evolved since the 80’s.

Some of the Dykes features include Photographer Del La Grace Volcano, Drag King Karen Fisch, Writer Roz Kaveny and so many others

Directed by Harri Shanahan & Siân A. Williams, Produced by Siobhan Fahey

It is available to rent for £3.49 here (including Q&A) or here for £3.50

(It’s also available on Amazon prime but tbh I’m not gonna promote that I’d only buy it there as a last resort if nothing else works)

As a lot of work from marginalised dykes went into making this documentary it is not widely available for free, however keep an eye out for local viewings or any platforms showing it for free for a limited time (around pride month/lgbtq+ history month etc) I will update this if I find any!

I would also highly encourage sharing it with your friends if you do buy it! And reblogging this post!

[bigglesworld]

Boeing PT-13D Kaydet E75. At Greenham Common EGVI. In 1981

[agelessphotography]

Arrest during anti-nuclear protest, Greenham Common airbase, Berkshire, Tom Stoddart, 1983

[hlficlibrary]

HL Fic Library 🟠 1980's Fics

Remember to leave kudos and a comment on the fics you enjoyed to show your appreciation! You can find the library's other recs here.

⭐ We Were Such Fools by kiddle / @bluejeanlouis (M, 98k)

Rule #1: The Rewind Machine cannot be used to change the past, only to experience it. History will reset itself to the original timeline every 24 hours.

On his fiftieth birthday, two things are consuming Harry’s mind: what he’s going to make the kids for dinner tonight, and the fact that his marriage is crumbling at his feet.

So, when his best friend gifts him the trip of a lifetime, Harry chooses to venture off to the summer that set his life on its course—all the way back in 1987, California.

It only took him one summer to fall in love with his husband the first time around. How hard could starting all over really be?

⭐ modern love by prettyoddnjh (T, 72k)

It's August 9th, 1985. "Shout" by Tears for Fears is the top song on the Billboard charts, Back to the Future has been the #1 film in the country for five weeks straight, and Harry has just moved to what he thinks is probably the shittiest town in the Midwest.

Louis has been wasting away in East Chicago for over five years, Harry is the most exciting thing that's ever happened to him, and both of them are hiding a dangerous secret from their best friend: they're, like, totally sprung on each other.

⭐ The World Turned Upside Down by dogslpdi / @dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram (E, 71k)

In September 1984, Harry Styles starts at Manchester Polytechnic with two goals: to take pictures and to join the Lesbian and Gay Society. He’s never paid much attention to the news, but everyone he meets in Manchester supports the miners. He realises how right they are when he meets Louis Tomlinson, a striking miner who flirts with him. A month later they are both at the founding meeting of Manchester Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners, trying to bring down the government. Through letters and visits they build a relationship, in a world very much not of their own choosing.

Manchester and Doncaster in the 1980s are grim, hopeful and alive. Niall is president of the Young Labour club, Nick Grimshaw is in love with the singer of an up and coming band, Fizzy wants to know more about the women of Greenham Common and Harry and Louis are brave.

A Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners/Pride AU.

⭐ Among Lavender Fields by @homosociallyyours (E, 70k)

At twenty-one, Louis Tomlinson is more than ready to shed the girl next door image that's been with her since her entry into film in her childhood, but with a mother and father steeped in Hollywood tradition it's felt impossible. Meanwhile, Harry Styles is a young, struggling musician new to London, friendless yet eager for the next phase of her life to begin.

When French director Marie Coutard casts the two of them in her film, it's a chance for both to break away from the people they've been. Together, they struggle through an acting process that's new and unfamiliar for both of them, learning more than they could've imagined about themselves along the way. As they spend long days picking lavender and long nights sharing the things they've never been able to tell anyone else, their love blooms.

Will the flower fade, or will the love they make among lavender fields be one they carry with them to the end?

⭐ HL 80s nyc verse (series) by superglass (M, 51k)

He expects his usual warm welcome from Sue, always drying off a glass or cleaning the taps with a dirty rag. Instead, to his shock, a man is behind the bar, pouring a Whiskey Sour for a regular Harry always sees at this time of night. He’s no doubt his age; he can tell by the smoothness of his skin, the muscles in his biceps, the way his hair is swept back in a style not unlike a young James Dean, exemplifying the cut of his cheekbones and the sharpness at his jaw.

As he approaches the bar, quietly since he’s not wearing his shoes, he blurts it out— “Where’s Sue? Is she alright? She’s not dead, is she?”

The barkeep, wide-eyed at first but quickly growing amused, smiles at him, eyeing his dress, tousled wet hair and smudged makeup with a curl in his lip. “Darling,” he says, completely ignoring his question, “a leather jacket with a dress like that? Are you mad?”

or In the midst of the AIDS crisis, Harry meets Louis after coming home from a drag ball. 80s NYC au.

⭐ what this world is about by isntrio / @bloubird (E, 34k)

An eighties American high school AU; there are first times, football games, and feelings.

Alternatively titled: the beginning.

⭐ What Happened to 'Never Say Die'? by kiddle / @bluejeanlouis (T, 28k)

The ‘80s were one of the best decades to be a teenager in America. Just ask anyone who's seen a John Hughes movie. Louis would beg to differ. At least today he would, while he was stuck cleaning out his family's basement - part of his grounding after a senior prank gone wrong. But when he finds a box containing details of the biggest unsolved crime in Luna Hills, he and his friends decide to sneak out for one last adventure before they're all off to college. That is, as long as the mayor, who also happens to be Louis' mother, doesn't stop them before they discover the truth.

Or, a coming of age American AU inspired by classic ‘80s movies like The Goonies and Stand By Me where everyone has a secret and no one wants to get caught.

⭐ Never Meant to Be So Bad to You by harriblou (M, 27k)

Louis hated Harry and his stupid confidence and his handsome face and his deep voice and his stupid jeans and his stupid smile and his stupid existence. He hated Harry, always had and always will. They’d never gotten along and Louis wasn’t sure how it started, but he knows that Harry was put onto this earth to bug the hell out of Louis. Being trapped inside of an arcade with him was hell and it hadn't been a full minute.

or the 80's Arcade AU that no one asked for about how louis and harry hate each other (not really) and have an intense rivalry over video games. featuring liam niall and zayn as the friends who help them sort themselves out.

⭐ Lean On My Shoulder (I See Myself With You) by Jennifer_Kaid / @poetsreprieve (E, 19k)

Speaking of the views, there was someone on his balcony. The sun was still setting, making this person look even more ethereal. They seemed to be at content at being alone. Harry watched as they watered the plants, they certainly didn't look like they were amongst the help.

Curiosity got the best of him and he decided to invade this stranger's quiet time; the Prince could be selfish sometimes.

"When you love something, you help them grow."

⭐ enter exit (enter) by @louisandthealien (M, 17k)

When he’s finally in the hotel, crammed into the tiny phone booth, all he can do is stare at the faded paper sign glaring down at him from the wall.

1 Minute = 11.82 USD Mexico --> United States

He has less than a minute to break his boyfriend’s heart, and it’s going to cost him twelve bucks to do it.

There’s sand under his fingernails as he dials the number.

⭐ after hours by @muldxr (E, 16k)

Harry moves like lightning as he slides the books off the shelves into the open, waiting abyss of his bag. Then, as Louis clears the other end of the exhibit just as quickly, he moves on to the display case next to it and the one after that. One flimsy book practically flies open as he picks it up, the paper held together by feeble strings on the spine. He leaves it behind. Not worth selling.

Or, a crime au set in 1980s Chicago.

⭐ honey, honey by resurrectdead / @artxghoul (E, 13k)

It just feels weird to not be able to tell his own mum about how nervous yet over the fucking moon happy he is right now, because this tape isn’t for neither Niall nor Liam. It’s for, well.It’s for Harry bloody Styles. The boy that makes his insides feel like sunshine.

Or: It’s 1988, and Louis has to make a mixtape for Harry

⭐ Haunting Beauty by 4ureyesonly28 / @evilovesyou (G, 6k)

It’s 1988. Harry has just finished his first year of teaching English and looks forward to a relaxed break. Louis is a poltergeist and has different plans for Harry’s summer.

⭐ the sound of my heart needs the sound of another heart by momentofclarity / @gaycousinlarry (G, 2k)

In the summer of '83, Louis is fifteen years old and in love.

⭐ Glad to be Gay by Stria / @nooradeservedbetter (T, 2k)

It's the same old story all over the world When a boy meets a boy and a girl meets a girl We all come together cos we're happy to say It's a natural fact that it's good to be gay

[Or, it's the 80s. Harry and Louis are together.]

[there-are-4-lights]

Great documentary about the Greenham Common camp! The original title is "Women Against The Bomb"

[usafphantom2]

RAF F-4 XT597 at Greenham Common 1983

@IL_wheels via X

[marxalittle]

The rule about reading lists is: I have to have read all the books and think they communicate things of value well.

Here's a current version of a reading list, notionally attached in my mind to a broader queer history and social history syllabus. I'm working my way through a couple texts on Latin American queer experience/history in N and S America currently, and also trying to work out if Outlaw Culture or Black Looks is a better fit, and if both, what to pair them with (I find author centered texts work well as paired readings as they tend to feature the author's thinking about/perspective on some immediate events or phenomena; and contrasting that with another author speaking about similar things can be illuminating).

The list is in no specific order (other than the pairings) and well never be complete.

The Straight State: sexuality and citizenship in twentieth-century America (Canaday, 2009)

The Women's House of Detention (Ryan, 2022)

Times Square Red, Times Square Blue (Delaney, 1999) : paired with/read against Gentrification of the Mind: witness to a lost imagination (Schulman, 2012)

Foundlings: lesbian and gay historical emotion before Stonewall (Nealon, 2001)

How to Survive a Plague (France, 2016) : paired with Let the Record Show (Schulman, 2022) : read against And the Band Played On (Shilts, 1988) [read France, Schulman FIRST]

There's a Disco Ball Between Us: a theory of Black gay life (Allen, 2021)

Common Women, Uncommon Practices: the queer feminisms of Greenham (Roseneil, 2000)

Beyond Shame: reclaiming the abandoned history of radical gay sexuality (Moore, 2004)

Territories of Desire in Queer Culture (Alderson and Anderson, 2000)

Lessons From the Damned (Stoller, 1998) : paired with Illness as Metaphor/AIDS and its Metaphors (double bound) (Sontag, 1990)

Queer Street: rise and fall of an American culture 1947-1985; excursions in the mind of the life (McCourt, 2004)

Forging Gay Identities: organizing sexulaity in San Francisco 1950-1994 (Armstrong, 2002)

[dangerousthingobservation]

XT597 A&AEE Boscombe Down at Greenham Common 1983 in markings celebrating the 25th anniversary of the F4 Phantom.

[probablyasocialecologist]

To point out that right-wing culture warriors conflate academic freedom and free speech is, in a sense, to give them too much credit. In practice they subscribe to ‘free speech’ and ‘academic freedom’ only when, and to whichever ideological ends, it suits them. The new Higher Education Act was given royal assent just nine days after the passage of the Public Order Act, which eviscerates the right to peaceful protest in the UK – just in time to empower the Metropolitan Police to arrest six members of the anti-monarchy group Republic on the morning of the coronation, with little outcry from the free speech brigade. Rishi Sunak has defended the police and their new powers, saying that people have the right ‘to go about their day-to-day lives without facing serious disruption’. ‘Serious disruption’ – a phrase that appears 94 times in the Public Order Act – now legally includes many of the mildest tactics used by activist groups from the women of Greenham Common to Extinction Rebellion, including locking on, blocking roads and blockading oil terminals. It also includes, according to the Metropolitan Police, carrying rape alarms, for which three women’s safety volunteers were arrested ahead of the coronation.

Right-wing newspapers unironically celebrated Sunak’s appointment of a free speech tsar as another volley in his war on ‘woke nonsense’ – a campaign, as Sunak described it last year, against objectionable viewpoints that have ‘permeated public life’: that biology doesn’t determine gender, that language is malleable, that Britain must own up to its colonial past. You can seek to eradicate such viewpoints from universities. You can also believe that universities should become no-holds-barred venues for free and open debate. But it takes a certain mental flexibility to think that the one can be a way of achieving the other.

Does the right contradict itself? Very well then it contradicts itself. The new Higher Education Act appears on its face to be in conflict with the ‘Prevent duty’ created by the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015, sponsored by Theresa May when she was home secretary. The government guidance on Prevent says that universities should prohibit visiting speakers who are likely to express ‘extremist views that risk drawing people into terrorism or are shared by terrorist groups’, even where the expression of such views is legal. In 2020 the Department of Education issued guidance on implementing the statutory curriculum which included the requirement that ‘schools should not under any circumstances use resources produced by organisations that take extreme political stances on matters,’ and listed as an example of an ‘extreme’ stance the ‘desire to abolish … capitalism’. Under a new speaker vetting scheme introduced by Jacob Rees-Mogg last year, eight people have been disinvited from speaking at government events, including Dan Kaszeta, a chemical weapons expert, and Kate Devlin, who studies the interaction between humans and technology. Both were told their invitations had been rescinded because they had criticised the Tories on social media.

The Higher Education Act makes universities and student unions that are derelict in their duty to uphold free speech liable to investigations and fines by the free speech tsar, as well as to civil claims brought by anyone who feels they have suffered ‘adverse consequences’ because of a university or student union’s ‘action or inaction’. It’s not clear just what this covers, but here are some possibilities, ordered from the certainly actionable to the potentially so: a student union voting to no-platform fascists; a university failing to quash student protest at a visit from, say, a war criminal; a student group putting out a statement condemning a professor for being transphobic; faculty changing a syllabus in response to student complaints about its racist content; students peacefully protesting outside a lecture; a geography department voting not to hire a climate change denier. It isn’t difficult to imagine how these could be framed as violations of the new law; it is for this reason that its opponents worried, as the bill made its way through Parliament, about the vexatious claims it seems bound to generate. In a letter sent last year to the secretary of state for education, Gillian Keegan, the president of the Union of Jewish Students, warned that the bill could ‘foreseeably allow a range of extremists, including Holocaust deniers, legal recourse to obtain compensation if they are denied a platform’. ‘Adverse consequences’ is an extremely low bar: anyone who has been picketed or called names on Twitter might feel they have grounds to make a legal claim. Traditionally, it has been thought that a commitment to free expression required universities not to intervene when students protest or when faculty members publicly criticise other academics or politicians. But the new law threatens to redefine such non-intervention as itself a failure to promote free speech.

[wellbelesbian]

Seven Sentence Sunday

thanks for tagging me @youarenevertooold @artsyunderstudy @alexalexinii and @forabeatofadrum! there aren't many hours left of this sunday and i didn't think i would post anything as i'm super sick with a cold, but i ended up writing a little bit of Keris's POV for a bonus kerixie chapter of my COTTA fic. there's a while to wait before it will be published though!

"I've had to fight for my rights myself. I was at Greenham Common protesting American warheads and fought with the police there, and you know what? It was the most alive I ever felt! That's why the women are running the show, because we actually know what we're doing. And I know especially well. I bet those gay people know what they're doing too, they've been fighting plenty. So if people are going to laugh at you, I suggest you grow a pair and stand up for yourself like we've all been doing!"

i have... thoughts on how the Pride movie approached Lesbians Against Pit Closures, and many of the lesbian characters in general, which i will cover under the cut.

so. the film had a tendency to treat the lesbians as annoying and preachy, and make their attempts at independence seem at best laughable or at worst needlessly divisive. i never liked that, and reading the book on the real events only made it worse.

as the book explains, LGSM could be a loud, politically divided, male dominated group that many women felt they couldn't speak up in. LAPC was necessary for those who felt silenced in the original group or never joined to begin with due to a discomfort with men. the two groups eventually operated alongside one another and you could be a member of both if you were a gay woman, but there were plenty of women who were only a member of one or the other.

and this isn't to criticise LGSM. as i said, they still welcomed women and worked alongside LAPC. many of the men from LGSM stood picketing alongside LAPC when a bar stopped running women's only nights. LAPC twinned with a different village in the north of England, so the existence of the two groups overall helped more people and spread their reach further. the distaste the men have for the idea of a women's group in the movie was nowhere near as strong as it appears to have been in real life.

and we know many lesbians did indeed feel unwelcome around men. they reported being uniquely disliked by the straight men of Onllwyn. while the miners soon got accustomed to the gay men, having at least some common ground with them, they had no interest in lesbians. a sort of "you're not like me, or available to me, so why are you here?" vibe. eventually this attitude seemed to fade and disappear, but by then some women had given up trying to befriend them and had stopped visiting.

however, a lot of the women in Onllwyn were very happy to see the lesbians, as many were queer themselves. some of the lesbians of the group reported having relationships of varying degrees with the Welsh women, and one of the women interviewed in the book was sixteen at the time and came out later in life, being accepted due to LGSM's role in her family's life. today, the village seems very welcoming to lesbians, but that wasn't always the case.

the lesbians also brought with them politics and feminism. while many Welsh women were already politically active (see above when i mentioned Greenham Common, a real protest staged by women of all classes and sexualities before the strikes, and of course they were involved in the miner's strikes), the lesbians fanned that flame and introduced them to new concepts and issues.

Trixie and Keris are my tributes to those two kinds of women. the lesbians of London who got political and struck out on their own, and the lesbians of Wales who only realised they were gay once LGSM arrived and shook up their lives.

anyway. this wound up being longer than i intended.

i'll not tag anyone as it's late, but if anyone wants to share a wip and hasn't been tagged yet, consider this your tag!