Elsie Locke: biography launched

Looking for Answers: A life of Elsie Locke by Maureen Birchfield was launched in Christchurch on Wednesday last week (October 7). There have also been launches in Auckland and Wellington. Elsie Locke was, as the press release from the University of Canterbury Press puts it, “an influential writer and activist”. A member of the Communist Party (CPNZ)* from 1933 until 1956, Elsie was also a member of the CP’s National Committee and a columnist in it’s various newspapers. She was editor of the CP’s Working Women magazine (1935–36), which was wound-up in order to launch Woman Today, a broader feminist magazine which continued until 1939. Elsie was also a founder of what became the Family Planning Association. Elsie was one of several leading communists who resigned from the CP, in protest at the party’s support for Russia’s crushing of the Hungarian Uprising – others included Connie and Albert Birchfield, parents of Elsie’s biographer, and Sid and Nellie Scott. However, unlike the Birchfields and the Scotts, Elsie’s husband Jack Locke remained a member of the CP and its successors until his death in 1996. It’s fair to say that it was Elsie’s achievements after leaving the CP that earned her most recognition. The fact that she was an ex-communist also made her more acceptable to establishment liberals who have honoured her with an with Elsie Locke Park in 1997, and this year a bronze bust as one of 12 Christchurch “Local Heroes”. From the 1950s, Elsie was a leading figure in the peace and anti-nuclear movements. And while Jack worked at the Belfast freezing works, Elsie worked at home, being a not so traditional house wife and mother, while writing children’s stories for the School Journal and a series of historical novels for children. The first being the much loved classic The Runaway Settlers (1965), based on the true story of a single mother who flees domestic violence in Australia and settles in Lyttleton Harbour. As many readers will know, among Elsie’s four children are Green Party MP Keith Locke (who, in the 1970s was a leader of the Trotskyist Socialist Action League) and Maire Leadbeater who is also a prominent peace activist, a former Auckland City Councillor, and campaigner for human rights in East Timor and Indonesia. Until their deaths Elsie and Jack (who died in 1996) lived at their small grapevine covered cottage it what is known as the Avon Loop on the banks of the Avon river in the eastern side of inner city Christchurch. From 1972 they were founding members of a remarkable community organisation called the Avon Loop Protection / Planning Association. Following Elsie’s death on April 8 2001, Maureen Birchfield, who’d recently published a biography of her mother, Elsie’s friend and comrade Connie Birchfield, was asked by the Locke family to write their mother’s story. The result is a big book (560 large pages) for a big life. Although I’m only half way through I can already recommend it as a interesting and entertaining read. *The CPNZ was the forerunner of Socialist Worker, publishers of UNITYblog.

Above: Jack and Elsei Locke on the front step of their home in the 1980s. This and the Working Woman cover were scanned from the book.

Vanguard Films 30 years: A better world is possible

SPECIAL FILM SCREENINGS
 2nd – 12th SEPTEMBER 2009
 $8 / $6 
 THE FILM ARCHIVE
 Corner Taranaki & Ghuznee Streets
, Wellington 

The Film Archive is proud to present a special two-week anniversary season dedicated to the Wellington-based independent production company Vanguard Films. The company celebrates 30 years this month. Each session will be introduced by a member of Vanguard Films. Vanguard Films have made some of the most important and difficult documentaries about modern New Zealand life. Tackling subject matter that is largely ignored by the mainstream – workers’ struggles, anti-war activism, the neo-liberal economic agenda, and health care – Vanguard members have sought to illuminate the margins of society, the challenges of ordinary people, and the deeply traumatic social changes of the past 30 years. These works are required viewing for anyone who seeks a real understanding of modern New Zealand society. Saturday 5 September, 7pm Kasama, 1988, 90 minutes | Green Guerillas, 1995, 30 mins A documentary on the underground revolutionary movement in the Philippines Kasama was shot over eight months while Rod Prosser was living with the guerillas of the New People's Army (NPA) in the Bicol region. The Green Guerillas was made for German television focusing on the armed struggle of a local clan of indigenous people, the Mandaya, together with the national-democratic movement, to save a tract of ancient rain forest on the island of Mindanao. Wednesday 9 September, 7pm 
Rebels in Retrospect, 1991, M, 74 minutes | The Terrorist, 1993, M, 28 mins Prominent members of the Progressive Youth Movement (PYM) reflect on their involvement with the group during the era of the Holyoake government and Vietnam war in Rebels in Retrospect while The Terrorist is a short film dedicated to Rachel Bennett (1967-1991).

 Thursday 10 September, 7pm 
Someone Else’s Country, NZ, 1996, 100 minutes This feature documentary tells the story of how the new right elite took power and exercised it relentlessly to turn New Zealand into their version of the model free-market state during the 1980s.

 Friday 11 September, 7pm 
 Primary Health Care, 1990, 28 mins | Backroom Troubles, 1997, 50 mins A short documentary looking at the struggle of the townships and suburbs, Eketahuna, Newtown (Wellington) and Urenui (North Taranaki) to gain primary health care for their population in Primary Health Care - the Experience of Four Communities. Backroom Troubles frames the stories of several New Zealand women who had abortions when it was illegal, between 1930 and 1979.

 Saturday 12 September, 4:30pm
 Sedition, NZ, 2005, 140 mins
 This hard-hitting documentary tells the story of conscientious objectors and anti-war campaigners fined and imprisoned in New Zealand for the duration of World War II. 

Saturday 12 September, 7:30pm
 The Intruder, 1999, PG, 16 mins / Taking the Waewae Express, 2008, M-Drug use & offensive language, 93 mins Two dramas - When the habit of loving becomes all habit and no love, it is time for the intruder (NZ, 1999, PG, 16 mins) to enter their midst. Taking the Waewae Express (NZ, 2008, M-drug use & offensive lang, 93 mins) follows the blame, bitterness, love and loyalty when Wiremu's younger brother dies in a car accident. 

More information available at: http://www.filmarchive.org.nz/news/news.html Short previews and trailers can be viewed at:
http://www.youtube.com/user/VanguardFilmsNZ

Marxism Alive 2009 conference video, Part 1

Several dozen activists attended Socialist Worker's Marxism Alive conference on June 27. It was broadest gathering of the Left in Auckland in recent memory. Over the course of the day-long educational forum, the panel speakers and participants contributed to a penetrating analysis of trends and charted moves to unify the Left. A series of video highlights from key debates will be posted on UNITYblogNZ over the coming days.

Is National the new natural party of government? Will Labour return to social democracy?

Daphna Whitmore, Workers Party

Sarita Divis, Alliance Party

Grant Brookes, Socialist Worker

Mates & Lovers - A History of Gay New Zealand

Why you should read 'Mates & Lovers'

by David Herkt
from GayNZ.com
29 June 2008

In Oamaru's Public Gardens, 120 years ago, in 1888, 40-year-old Joseph Fletcher said to 20-year-old Jacob Crawford "All right, you young bugger, we'll have a fuck too'. Crawford said 'Alright, put it up my bloody arse, Joe."

A year later, in 1889, Robert Gant, a photographer resident in the Wairarapa, was taking photographs of himself and his friends dressed in drag enacting women's tea-parties, the Chinese porcelain tea pot forever poised, unpouring, above the cup.

Continue

Mates & Lovers - A History of Gay New Zealand

Why you should read 'Mates & Lovers'

by David Herkt

from GayNZ.com

29 June 2008

In Oamaru's Public Gardens, 120 years ago, in 1888, 40-year-old Joseph Fletcher said to 20-year-old Jacob Crawford "All right, you young bugger, we'll have a fuck too'. Crawford said 'Alright, put it up my bloody arse, Joe."

A year later, in 1889, Robert Gant, a photographer resident in the Wairarapa, was taking photographs of himself and his friends dressed in drag enacting women's tea-parties, the Chinese porcelain tea pot forever poised, unpouring, above the cup.

In 1923, a 17-year-old Eric McCormick confided to his diary that he'd slept with a 'sexual maniac' - a man who shared his room after a party. The man had undressed in front of McCormick who had begun to shiver uncontrollably. "God," he wrote, "I nearly went mad with my suppressed feeling."

In the late 1930s, 15-year-old Simon Sydney began going to the Ward Baths in Rotorua four times a week. "I had four years of utter sexual pleasure with hundreds of randy men," he said later.

In 1941 a shop assistant, Victor Andrews picked up a soldier, Terence Moore, caught the ferry across a blacked-out wartime Auckland Harbour to Devonport, went to the Devonport Domain where they drank beer, kissed, and had sex and talked until 3 o'clock in the morning.

In 1971, the Silver Star overnight express train had an Auckland gay service crew who changed over with the Wellington gay service crew at Ohakune. They'd exchange information about passengers whose cabin doors were open for those 'similarly inclined'. 'Every mile was a smile on that train,' Rangi Woon, a train steward recalled.

These are just a few of the many people and glimpses of human lives from the past that that stud Chris Brickell's ground-breaking Mates and Lovers: A History of Gay New Zealand.

The book is the first real telling of the story of New Zealand's gay men from the colonial era to liberation, law-reform and after. It is a history which opens up hidden lives and experiences to scrutiny. For any gay male, it reveals more than we have ever been privileged to know about what happened before us. It enables us to see our individual stories as part of a greater cultural, legal and social narrative.

The 432 glossy-paged book is also copiously and sumptuously illustrated with around 500 photographs. Brickell's searches through public and private archives have brought to light for the first time innumerable glimpses of past gay lives. It is a breath-taking achievement.

These images form a rich, readable narrative of their own. They are vivid, sharp revelations of a history that we did not know existed. They range from depictions of masculine intimacy and gestures that seem to be interpretable in a gay context – men photographed knee-to-knee in studios, arms around each others shoulders or sprawled against each other in more candid shots – to more explicit images – erotic poses, drag parties, male holiday-makers camping in more senses than one, and men kissing.

Brickell's revelation of New Zealand's gay history in these selected images is paralleled by the style of his writing. Flashes and snapshotted incidents gleaned from court-files, newspaper reports, diaries, letters, interviews, and oral history testimonies form the basis of Brickell's construction of the New Zealand gay story – a story that has largely been hidden.

The status of same-sex desire for much of New Zealand's history – illegal and socially proscribed – has always meant that its stories were seldom public. When they were recorded it was often in the context of a court-case. Brickell's research-skills has unearthed and selected a multitude of other layers and brought them to our attention.

In the Mates and Lovers gay men struggle with their desires, stand up for their existence as sexual beings in the most brave and unexpected ways, and experienced fulfillments that we previously considered impossible.

For many gay men, the time prior to Homosexual Law Reform in 1986 seems a dark era. It seemed gay men were forced to live closeted and unsatisfied lives. Brickell's compelling narrative demonstrates otherwise. None of us can ever escape from our time and our situation in the context of our society will always shape our lives. But Brickell amply shows that the world of men and same-sex desire in New Zealand's past was not the grim, despairing, bleak world it is so often presumed to be.

Mates and Lovers chronicles the indomitable spirit of human beings in a world whose apparently arbitrary restrictions might shape behaviours and emotions but cannot destroy them.

The book's broad overview can sometimes feel unsatisfying simply because Brickell's necessary selection of incidents from human lives inevitably leaves us wanting more. What happened then? What did they do afterwards? But the book is groundbreaking because it opens up the field to future study.

Brickell's revelation of the extent of the archive is almost mouthwatering in its richness. Caches of diaries are becoming available in libraries. Photographic collections are previewed. Brickell's work in this book is the equivalent of a first explorer. He maps and outlines a new bright territory that will be our pleasurable future to experience in greater detail.

The book's faults are few. Occasionally Brickell will stray into an arid academic discourse. The photographic captions could often be enlarged. Brickell is not good on how gay culture from the rest of the world reached and impacted upon New Zealand's gay men. And Brickell's recounting of the last twenty or thirty years of gay life suffers by comparison to his earlier researches.

But ultimately, Chris Brickell's Mates and Lovers is that rare thing. It is a book against which all subsequent work on the subject of New Zealand gay lives will be measured. It is a significant achievement. It is a pleasure for viewer or reader. It is a necessary book whose images and words will enrich contemporary gay lives, linking them to their precursors, in the unending story of same-sex desire and its manifestations.