Word: schatz
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Organizing for the march entailed presenting himself publicly as an interested party, and Schatz remembers the first awkward announcement. He was taking Government 133. "The Politics of Women's Liberation," and wanted to tack up a poster announcing the march. After posting it on the bulletin board one day before a lecture, Ethel Klein, assistant professor of Government and professor of the course, suggested he announce it to the class. "I thought to myself, 'What!, before all these people?'" But he did, and all went well...
...Schatz's name began to circulate as an openly gay student who was willing to make his name public for the sake of organizing for gay rights, other privately gay students timidly sought him out as a confidante. In the next four years, Schatz became a folk hero and a sign of a change in the political climate. "We all owe Ben a great deal of gratitude," one gay graduate who asked that his name not be identified, says, adding. "He is a symbol for the politically aware generation...
...everyone is so grateful; after Schatz's name appeared in a Boston Globe article on gays at Harvard, he received an anonymous letter threatening his life and attacking homosexuality in bitter and violent language. Schatz was shaken, but only temporarily: "I also got two fan letters this week; one death threat to two fan letters; that's not a bad record," he says...
...assembling the political machinery necessary, Schatz quickly learned he could not press GSA into service. "I knew if I wanted to be political, I had to be outside of GSA." So he founded GOOD and asked Gaye Williams '83, president of RLA, to serve as co-chair, making the start of gay and lesbian political unity...
Williams, who was out of town and unavailable for comment, is mentioned frequently with admiration by gays and lesbians at Harvard. "She is a one-woman network." Schatz says of Williams, who is also president of the Black Students Association. Williams pressured GOOD and GSA into considering feminist issues in meetings and into including a discussion of feminism and lesbianism at the GLAD days. Laurie Knight '83-2, a member of GSA and RLA, points out that this year for the first time GSA's membership is "approaching parity" between men and women. "Much of the huge torrent of activity...