Dyke Nite GNV
by dykes, for dykes <3
Introducing our second Dyke Nite: ASS-Trology and Tar-HOE!Join us on September 6 at The How Bazar for a night of juke, Baltimore club, ghetto tech, and house that’s gonna make you shake ya rump alll night long 😈Doors at 9:30, party starts at 10.Masks are highly encouraged + provided. Several air purifiers will also be running.We’ve got the amazing SABU coming back to kill it AGAIN, and DJ Asexual coming from Tallahassee to spin for you, so you already know we’re gonna be turnt all the way UP⚡️BUT THAT’S NOT ALL! Wanna know the tea about your love life, career, or just wanna be read for filth? We have tarot readings by one of Beyond The Binary’s founders and head dyke of operations @afrotarot__ as well as AMAZING astrology readings from @raesworld.inc — a sapphic astrologer visiting us ALLL the way from Atlanta! They will both be reading from 10-12!NO CIS MEN. NO STRAIGHTS! ALL TRANS-INCLUSIVE SPACE. NO TYPE OF DISCRIMINATION WHATSOEVER IS ALLOWED. ZERO-TOLERANCE!
Read more about our space agreements below.
About
Dyke Nite Gainesville Artwork by AL
Gainesville Dyke Nite started out of a desire to have more dyke-centered/sapphic spaces in our area, especially those that center BIPOC.Beyond The Binary is a queer, radical, Black-led, COVID-conscious community.The Handkerchief is a DIY, COVID-safer space for our queer community in Gainesville.Lesbian spaces are getting more and more scarce. It’s important for us to keep curating these spaces where we can see each other and connect. We must care for each other as fascism continues to fester. The systems in place are designed to oppress and disconnect us.What does it mean then to work outside of these systems to care for one another?How do we care for each other? Queer people have been doing this for generations.No one is free until all of us are free. We must do all we can to further the liberation of all people. We must care for one another, protect one another, and celebrate our existence.When dykes get together, there is no limit to what we can do.
Queer History
Queer people have long resisted mistreatment and oppression from those in power.We must remember our queer ancestors.During the beginning of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the state refused to acknowledge and provide resources for the growing number of AIDS cases. The government has blood on its hands for its negligence and homophobia, which worsened health outcomes for many queer elders that should still be with us. We honor the queer elders who were taken from us by a violent state that refused to protect them and by a culture that refused to accept them.When the state failed our community, lesbians stepped up. From helping run treatment clinics when other healthcare options weren’t available to donating blood when gay men were banned from doing so, lesbian solidarity efforts during the AIDS epidemic were some of the only sources of care that folks were offered.It is in our nature to show up for one another and care for each other in revolutionary ways. Especially during the ongoing COVID pandemic, this history teaches us that we refuse to accept anyone as disposable and we create networks of care to keep each other safe.We can learn so much from the dykes and other rad queers who came before us.
Documenting our stories is essential when revisionist history attempts to erase us from the narrative.Below you'll find some of our favorite accounts of queer history.
The first drag queen: William Dorsey Swann is the earliest documented person to call himself a queen and host drag balls with his friends in the 1880s. These were raided numerous times by the police.
Having spaces to convene as out and proud dykes has a history of being criminalized. Famous Blues musician Ma Rainey is arrested in 1925 for hosting a “lesbian party,” only to be bailed out by her lesbian lover and fellow Blues artist Bessie Smith.
The Compton Cafeteria riot in August 1966 sparked transgender activism in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District.
Stonewall was a violent anti-police riot in 1966. Resisting the police has always been an essential aspect of our history.
Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera founded S.T.A.R. (Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries) in 1970, which advocated for bodily autonomy, in addition to free clothing, education, food, healthcare, housing, and transportation.
The Combahee River Collective, a Black feminist lesbian socialist organization publishes the Combahee River Collective Statement in 1977: "We realize that the liberation of all oppressed peoples necessitates the destruction of the political-economic systems of capitalism and imperialism as well as patriarchy. "
Emily Gwen developed the Lesbian flag as we know it today in 2018, which is inclusive of butch women, trans women and other gender non-conforming people. Source: Olive @digital.olive
This history fosters a solidarity with the most marginalized amongst us, encourages our resistance by any means to honor the legacies of our ancestors, and pushes us as queer folks to practice abolitionist values so we can work towards a collective future free from prisons and police.
"It seems obvious that the study of history is a necessary element of continued war against the present world...History is a weapon." - Ehn Nothing, Queens Against Society.
Want to learn more? Here are some resources we think you'll enjoy
The Queer Zine Archive Project was first launched in November 2003 in an effort to preserve queer zines and make them available to other queers, researchers, historians, punks, and anyone else who has an interest DIY publishing and underground queer communities.
The Queer Oral History Hub is a digital history hub for the research and study of gay, lesbian, queer, and trans oral histories.
Read Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries: Survival, Revolt, and Queer Antagonist Struggle, which has firsthand accounts from Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera.
Learn more about the Compton Cafeteria riot by watching "Screaming Queens," a documentary by transgender historian Susan Stryker.
Watch "How Black Queer Culture Shaped History," a TED Talk by Channing Gerard Joseph, who gives us more background on William Dorsey Swann.
Read "Stonewall Means Riot Right Now: What the Queer Uprisings of 1969 Share with the George Floyd Protests of 2020," which draws connections between movements.
Consume any of Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha's writing/books. We especially love Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice.
We Are Everywhere: Lesbians in the Archive explores the relationship between lesbians, archives, and lesbian objects in archives.
Documentaries covering the AIDS epidemic: How to Survive a Plague, And The Band Played On
Take Action
When dykes get together, there is no limit to what we can do.It is not enough to call ourselves queer. When we say "queer," we mean queer as a sociopolitical identity that aligns us with others in a struggle for collective liberation.
"Our freedom is interdependent and complimentary with another in that the flourishing of one allows the flourishing of the other. In the same way, if someone’s freedom is threatened, then all our freedoms are threatened. Our freedom then relies on the freedom of others in order for it to be affirmed. - Bandilang Itim, Interlinking our Struggles in Gender and Queer Issues.
Everyone has something to bring to the revolution! Whether it's time, labor, money, ideas, supplies, emotional support, care work - whatever - we are stronger together.Below we've curated some existing actions you can plug into in our area and beyond. Many of these are dyke-led or queer-led!
Gainesville based
Gainesville Books to Prisoners - Volunteer & donation-based, serving all incarcerated folks in Florida.
Mutual Aid Yard Sales - Gainesville-based autonomous entity organizing yard sales benefitting community members.
Gainesville Food Not Bombs - Serving tasty freegan meals Fridays @ 6:30 pm. For a world without hunger, homelessness or cops.
GNV Free Store - Created with those most marginalized in mind, but all are welcome. Once a month "pop-up" store where everything is FREE.
Beyond!
Central Florida Queers For Palestine - Group organizing for collective liberation. From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free!
Kaon City Medics (Clearwater Harm Redux) - BIPOC + User-led harm reduction by friendly decepticon medics.
Queer Expression St. Pete - A completely grassroots volunteer collective that provides multigenerational community spaces for Queer and Trans folks.
Alyssa Rodriguez Center for Gender Justice - strengthens movements for gender justice across prison walls, fights gender-based violence, and eliminates barriers to political participation for incarcerated survivors and other grassroots advocates.
Call To Action - Mutual aid party raising funds for the Miami trans community.
Black & Pink National - A prison abolitionist organization dedicated to abolishing the criminal punishment system and liberating LGBTQIA2S+ people and people living with HIV/AIDS who are affected by that system through advocacy, support, and organizing.
"We must create space wherein it is possible for desire to flourish... We must become bodies in revolt. We need to delve into and indulge in power... We must live beyond measure and love and desire in ways most devastating. We must come to understand the feeling of social war. We can learn to be a threat, we can become the queerest of insurrections." - Mary Nardini Gang, Toward the queerest insurrection
Safer Space Agreement
We have the following safer space agreement posted at the door at our events. We require any person attending our events to read and verbally agree to it before entering the party.
We aim to be a safer space for the dykes attending our events. This is an event by dykes, for dykes. This is a trans-inclusive space! Protect and support the dolls!No cis men allowed. No straights allowed.Absolutely no racism, transphobia, ableism, xenophobia, or overall bigotry/hatefulness is allowed.Consent is mandatory. Always ask before physical interactions and get a definitive “yes.”If you feel your safety has been compromised at any moment, please let an organizer dyke know.Stay safe and don’t forget to drink water! Check in on each other.Honor the space and the people. We take care of each other.
This safer space agreement is inspired by the work of Dayanna Peek, creator of Florida-founded The Sapphic Party.
COVID-19 Info
This event has a “masks encouraged" policy. There will be free masks of different sizes, fits and colors available to everyone. There will also be air purifiers inside the space, as well as fans to encourage air flow. We invite our community to practice community care by masking up inside the space.We hope our “masks encouraged” policy will invite people who might not normally mask to do so for this event. We keep each other safe!No LGBTQIA+ event is truly accessible without COVID mitigations. We honor our queer elders, especially those who are no longer with us, when we protect and care for each other. We honor them by taking precautions against a harmful disease. We honor each other when we refuse to leave anyone behind, especially our disabled dykes.We are lovingly calling you in. We need each other. Our solidarity, our community is powerful. It is transformative, liberating, and revolutionary. Lesbian spaces are getting more and more scarce. It’s important for us to keep curating these spaces where we can see each other and connect. It’s important for these spaces to be as inclusive and accessible as possible.In the future, we hope to have masks required Dyke Nites in order to prioritize the safety, well-being, and joy of our disabled comrades.We hope you continue to join us.Thank you for being here. <3
In Gainesville and want FREE masks and COVID-19 tests? Reach out to Gainesville Air Collective, our local mask bloc!
Contact
Dyke Night Gainesville is co-hosted by Beyond The Binary and The Handkerchief.
You can reach either group by messaging them on Instagram. We'd love to hear your ideas, feedback and dreams for Dyke Nite Gainesville!