This week, I’m briefly sharing the story of one woman, Esther Gilbert, LCSW, who faced prejudice for being a mother when she first joined Philadelphia’s lesbian community. Today, Esther is a clinical social worker and lives with her spouse in Mt. Airy.
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A cartoon (uncredited) in the May 1980 issue of Harrisburg Area Women’s News. Caption: ‘But Mom—how can you be gay—you don’t even like disco music!’
When she moved to Philadelphia from Buffalo in 1977, Esther Gilbert had a 2-year-old daughter. She found solace in Sisterspace, a lesbian feminist community group, and vividly remembers being impressed by the sheer number of lesbian women at the first meeting she attended.
She also remembers being rebuffed by someone at a dance at St. Mary’s, after she told them that she would have to go home in half an hour to relieve the babysitter.
“They called us breeders,” she remembers.
Kids were seen as symbols of patriarchal oppression and a reminder of heterosexual relationships. They weren’t always welcome at events. But Esther was not the only mother, and together they created a group called Children and Youth. They got together for kid-friendly activities. After a while, Esther joined the core team of Sisterspace as a representative of Children and Youth. She pushed for issues like childcare during meetings and greater subsidies for dances for women who were less well-off.
By the time she moved out to the suburbs, Esther says that the group didn’t exist anymore, because it didn’t need to. The children had grown up, and Sisterspace had become much more accepting of children.