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Tender Resistance and the Violent Times of the AIDS Crisis

  • Poster reading "Good Health for Gay Men worth hanging on to" with a black and white image of two masculine figures hugging in a window sill
    Image courtesy of ArQuives (previously known as the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives)
  • Image courtesy of ArQuives (previously known as the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives)
  • Poster that reads "Condoms and Confidence... the perfect combination. Always Use Safe Sex" with a black and white image of a man lying in bed with white linen sheets
    Image courtesy of ArQuives (previously known as the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives)
  • Image courtesy of ArQuives (previously known as the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives)
  • Poster that reads "Take Control...of your life. Regular tests help" with a black and white image of a man in a vest holding his genitals.
    Image courtesy of ArQuives (previously known as the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives)
  • Image courtesy of ArQuives (previously known as the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives)

Within the archival collections of The ArQuives are ephemera and objects that document queer history, especially those primarily produced in or concerning Canada. Such queer archives preserve personal papers, photographs, periodicals, posters, and pins in order to, as scholar Ann Cvetkovich describes, “sustain a queer future by reminding us of our queer pasts” (35). Walking amongst collected t-shirts, trophies, tapes, toys, and titles, we were drawn to a magenta poster cabinet. We found a series of three (3) posters produced by the AIDS Committee Winnipeg Gay/Lesbian Resource Centre atop of Folder 95 in the 1991-1992 drawer. Each poster features a photograph alongside a slogan with six square informational panels on the backside. In what follows, we look closer to consider their form, tenderness, and context.

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Histories of Racialized Power Inequality in Interracial Gay Relationships

Discovering what is archived about the lives of non-indigenous queer racialized Canadians was our particular interest. Through our visit to The Arquives (previously known as the Canadian Gay and Lesbian Archives) in Toronto, we noted many ethnic or racialized queer experiences categorized by country. As a comparison, we wanted to analyze how accessible such artifacts were digitally. The Arquives’ digital archives were unfortunately a scarce database for such artifacts when searching by racialized countries’ names. We then extended our search to include ethnic or racial identity categorizations such as, for e.g. “south asian,” “black man,” etc.,  to analyze what artifacts would be presented. Upon searching for the term ‘negro,’ we found the above advertisement from a Canadian newspaper published in the 1960s.

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“Get StreetWise:” Community Safety and The Toronto Gay Patrol

By Hannah Barrie and Jungsim Ko

The Gay Street Patrol, later renamed the Toronto Gay Patrol (TGP), originally formed in the summer of 1981 after the bathhouse raids in Toronto (Demers 32). Five members of the Legal Coordination Committee of the Right to Privacy Committee, an advocacy group created in the aftermath of the bathhouse raids, met on April 4, 1981 to form the Gay Street Patrol (Hooper 232). These men, Elan Rosenquist, Findlay, Paul Rapsey, Allan Clapp, and John Burt, formed the group with six main goals. They sought to:

  • patrol streets and laneways where violence was known to occur;
  • come to the aid of any victims;
  • follow a non-violent policy;
  • assist police in making arrests;
  • assist and aid in delivering medical care;
  • assist victims in the process of laying a criminal charge (232-233).

A large poster with accompanying flyers advertising the Toronto Gay Patrol, from the ArQuives (previously known as the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives), 1984. (ArQuives)
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Marching and Mourning Together: Matthew Shepard, Barretta Williams, and Uniting in the Face of Violence Against 2SLGBTQ+ People

On the evening of Friday October 8th, 1999, the Chicago Anti-Bashing Network (CABN) sponsored a march to commemorate ‘GLBT murder victims’ throughout the U.S., and specifically to mark the one-year anniversary of the brutal murder of Matthew Shepard. Though it was not the only march honouring Matthew Shepard that week in Chicago (“Symbol of Violence”), it was significant in its explicit focus on violence against the broader 2SLGBTQ+ community, specifically violence against trans women (“Violence march Friday”).

Outlines — a prominent LGBT newspaper in Chicago in the late 1980s and through the 1990s — published the following article written by Tracy Baims, the founder of Outlines, about the march (article courtesy of the Arquives):

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