The official logo for the International Year of Lesbian and Gay Action on a poster and on the front page of GEM.

I recently came across the February 1984 issue of Gay East Midlands and noticed that we’d put the International Year of Lesbian and Gay Action on our cover. Since I don’t actually remember anything about this International Year I flicked through the paper to remind myself. But there was nothing. Not a mention: not even another image.

Having now Googled the International Year of Lesbian and Gay Action I think I can confidently say that ‘nothing’ seems to summarise the whole thing. The lack of information would suggest that the whole thing was a bit of a non-event.

In the UK, 1984 seemed to be the Year of Lesbian and Gay Inaction. For example, that year’s national Lesbian and Gay Pride march was so poorly attended that questions were raised about its future (although, thankfully, its fortunes turned around massively the following year). It seems we were not alone in this.

Activists in New York sought to organise a march on the United Nations building. Inspired by the National March on Washington in 1979, which had drawn hundreds of thousands, they sought similar numbers in New York. Meetings were held, a resource book was published and invitations were sent out around the globe. On September 30th approximately 200 people ended up in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza at the UN headquarters following a march from Greenwich Village. Needless to say, it wasn’t what they had been hoping for.

So what exactly was the International Year of Lesbian and Gay Action? Where did it come from and what was it supposed to be about?

The idea emerged from a 1983 conference of the International Gay Association (as it was called then). The conference proclaimed 1984 to be the International Year of Lesbian and Gay Action, “for lesbians and gays to get together – to learn, exchange ideas, to communicate, to unite, to fight, to play, to love: to increase our visibility and determination toward our goal of liberation.”

My guess is that it failed because the aims were too vague and also because we were still struggling to come to terms with the emergence of AIDS and the intense homophobia it unleashed. (Such was the intensity of this homophobia that it was directed at lesbians as much as gay men, despite the former being in one of the lowest risk groups).

Of course we all live and learn from our mistakes and it’s obvious that LGBT people managed to re-group and find a much more powerful voice as the years went on. However, from an LGBT history perspective, it is a shame that so little is recorded about the International Year of Lesbian and Gay Action. It may not have produced world-shattering results but, like any event, I’m sure it changed a few lives.

Artwork for the button for the March on the UN Building. Image from The Cahokian blog.

Acknowledgement: The information about the New York march and the images of the button and resource book have been taken from The Cahokian blog.