Dyke March 2005

I was asked by the Center for Lesbian Visibility to speak at the Dyke March this evening on the corner of San Vicente and Santa Monica.

Ivy Bottini, Brigitte Tolson, Robin Tyler, Anne Marie Williams, Linda Fusco (promoter of HERE Thursdays) & I were all invited to speak before the actual march. The section of street between San Vicente and La Cienege was entirely shut down so that we could march after the rally.

The crowd was a little slow to arrive and I initially thought that it was going to be a tiny event, but there's something to be said for West Hollywood traffic the day before Pride...by the time I took the stage hundreds of lesbian women and their supports had filled the street.

While, I had never heard of Ivy Bottini before tonight, I have to say that I love her, she is a super vivacious elder who is passionate, witty and progressive. She has a spirit that just radiates.

My speech follows:

Good evening, ladies:

My name is Marquita Thomas, head of Out&About – a social, networking and activist organization for lesbians of color. We are the producers of Serafemme, the queer women of color music festival taking place July 3rd at the One National Gay & Lesbian Archives.

I would like to thank the mayor of West Hollywood and the City of West Hollywood for bringing back the dyke march and for addressing the need for lesbian visibility.

I am happy to see so many of you participating in tonight’s event.

When I was a child, there were almost no ethnic dolls so I, and every other ethnic girl my age, had a room full of dolls who looked nothing like us. The psychological impact of this was that many of us felt neglected and we wanted to look like our dolls, we wanted to swing our blond hair and change our eye color not recognizing that each of us was just as we needed to be.

Before just a few years ago, ethnic people were only placed in commercials during specified months when their visibility was deemed necessary, in my case it was February - Black History Month. On March 1st, all commercials with people who looked me were put on a shelf somewhere unti the next February. The psychological impact of this was that many of us felt neglected and we wondered why advertisers felt we weren’t worth the advertising dollars or that we didn’t buy cars, diamonds or even toothpaste.

For many lesbians of color today, ethnic visibility is still an on-going issue but so too is our desire for lesbian visibility. When discussing the issue of lesbian visibility, certain names get recycled: Ellen, Melissa, k.d., Martina and so forth, all amazing, accomplished women in their own right yet so too were Audre Lourde, June Jordan, Gloria Anzaldua, Merle Woo and other Latin, Asian and Native American lesbian trailblazers who came before them. Unfortunately the list of go-to lesbians does not include women who look like me nor do they represent our Latin, Asian or Native American sisters. The result of this is not just that we feel neglected but also that we find it difficult to identify as lesbians when the most highly visible lesbians do not look like us. To rectify this, we create our own organizations, not to exclude the larger lesbian community, but rather to address our unique community issues and cultures amongst women who can best relate to us.

If lesbian visibility is our common goal we must all work together to make it happen and not just during the dyke marches during Pride. We must recognize that each woman standing next to us is our sister in the struggle regardless of race, religion or femme/butch identification. Each and every one of our efforts towards lesbian visibility must as diverse as the lesbian community, we must support each other not just today but every day and we must reach out to each other often. We cannot achieve any goal without understanding. So as we stand here, shoulder to shoulder about to march through West Hollywood, our common bond evident in the event’s title, I ask that our solidarity not end when the march does.

Thank you.