Commune Living
1972
“Quite a lot of people in GLF and gay people ended up living in groups, I guess from a belief that gay people needed to make new living arrangements. We had a strong Marxist analysis, that capitalism relied on atomised families and allowed no place for gay people. I think we were subsequently proved wrong by the way gay people have so successfully been incorporated into society, there was no Pink Pound then. For instance The Nightingale started off as a group of gay people organising themselves out of a small premises on Camphill, it was pretty discreet. There were other pubs but they certainly did not advertise themselves as gay, you had to find out. We were pretty sure there couldn’t be a Pink Pound, as gay people represented such a challenge to capitalism that the whole system would collapse if enough gay people pulled out.”
Contributed by: Malcolm Gibb, 58