JANUARY 1977

an entire evening of either of, them not as powerful as their duo performance.

The uniqueness of this concert, being presented by, performed by, and aimed at women gave me a new experience. I experienced for the first time what it feels like not to be the half of the audience being talked to, and I felt this to be the case. In much of today's male-oriented rock and folk music, the musician is always telling the MEN in the audience about their loves and desires, as if the women weren't there. Never-the-less two wrongs don't make a right and I felt Holly and Meg's mess-

·

cert that of jealousy of what these women were doing wondering why men have not yet been able to pull something of this nature offparticularly gay men, as our struggle somewhat parallels the women's movement. Perhaps we will be able one day, and perhaps one day Oven, Olivia, Holly and Meg won't be a specialized group and their goal will be recognized by all.

My jealousy aside, I still find that such an event can take place in this day and age to be a very reassuring thought. A relaxed concert with people singing with a consciousness

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would have been more effective had more of it been directed to the male half of the race that so desperately needs to be educated.

I have to admit to one more feeling that I got from the con-

methods, is surely a positive step. I hope it continues and I hope it broadens the consciousness of our human community.

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POLEMICS

By David B. Akers

I loved my friend, but I did not like the mask of archetypal Four years ago, I had one warrior he increasingly took on. really close friend. He was one The lure of the general, of the of the last, hold-out radicals: at mythic, of the doomed, heroic one time, he ran guns for a figure, grew too rigid it did not bunch of locals who called let him out, it did not let the themselves SDS; by 1972, he world, or me, in. The mask was alone, acting against degenerated to "Dog-soldier," recruiting offices and rubber and he died, inside. factories. He was a romantic, he Mythologizing life is a natural worshipped Che; he bore an function of every-day conanti-authoritarian grudge, a sciousness. But raising the notion that the military-industrial myths to full view is the function complex was out to kill his of artist, performer, psychiatrist, liberty. I loved him, for all of priest, prostitute--whether to those things, but I did not share prop up myth, or rip it away. his taste for self-destruction, each dons a mask. The full-time which was also a part of those wearing of a myth-mask is a things. In the isolation of a PCP ritual act, and allows nothing crazy spell, he threw himself which does not satisfy the ritual. against the state one last time. (The next time someone throws He was jailed in a state hospital. a raging Elizabeth Taylor, from Upon his release, he retreated into dreams of Che, and he took to the woods.

He is not gay. But there are some things there which can be transposed into the gay experience. Few gay people ever throw bricks. Yet, each time kiss a man goodnight in public, I put my body on the line. To be gay requires at times the resolve of Guevara, and perhaps the wilderness skills, as well.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf," try coming back with less than a good George, and the scene comes down. Come back instead with Elmer Fudd, or worse yet, with a direct response, and you may get your throat slit.) In the process of playing his Che, my friend destroyed his own liberty as effectively as did the state.

Being gay, or straight, ought to be incidental, but the dayNone of this ought to disin-after-day politics of such modes tegrate into an apology for raises the risk of becoming gay. neurotic gay people; nor is it an at the expense of being real. apology for my friend. Much of Here lies the acid test of gay exwhat was done in the name of perience, and there is neither the "movement" was done on a easy success, nor easy failure. symbolic level, all the thrill of a real revolution, etc., etc. And so

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