Talk:Jean O'Leary

Early Transphobia
Perhaps some mention might be made of Ms. O'Leary's early opposition to the participation of transgender and cross dressing people in the early gay liberation movement:
 * Stonewall_riots

Specifically:
 * ...feminist activist Jean O'Leary protested what she perceived as the mocking of women by cross-dressers and drag queens in attendance. During a speech by O'Leary, in which she claimed that drag queens made fun of women for entertainment value and profit, Sylvia Rivera and Lee Brewster jumped on the stage and shouted "You go to bars because of what drag queens did for you, and these bitches tell us to quit being ourselves!" Both the drag queens and lesbian feminists in attendance left in disgust.


 * O'Leary also worked in the early 1970s to exclude trans people from gay rights issues because she felt that rights for trans people would be too difficult to attain. Sylvia Rivera left gay activism in the 1970s to work on issues for transgender people and cross-dressers. The initial disagreements between participants in the movements, however, often evolved after further reflection. O'Leary later regretted her stance against the drag queens attending in 1973: "Looking back, I find this so embarrassing because my views have changed so much since then. I would never pick on a transvestite now." "It was horrible. How could I work to exclude transvestites and at the same time criticize the feminists who were doing their best back in those days to exclude lesbians?" [footnotes deleted]

Dick Kimball (talk) 19:41, 11 June 2013 (UTC)


 * This is for another matter: She was NOT a ..."Catholic nun or sister".. as this claims, if she left before final vows. In Catholicism, one is not a nun or sister until AFTER they have done their final vows. The article states that she left the convent before making her final vows and, therefore, was a novitiate and not a 'sister' or nun. Please make this correction. 98.123.126.45 (talk) 17:48, 7 June 2023 (UTC)