Episode 2 - Femi Otitoju with Fopé Ajanaku

Black and Gay, Back in the Day

Season 1 Episode 2 - “Femi Otitoju with Fopé Ajanaku”

Date: 11.10.2022

Season: 1

Episode: 2

Presenters: Marc Thompson

Contributors: Femi Otitoju, Fopé Ajanaku

Producers: Shivani Dave, Tash Walker

Assistant Producer: Abi McIntosh

Music: Kemi Oyolede

Artwork: Amaroun

[Advert]

[Music]

MT: ‘Welcome to Black and Gay, Back in the Day’. We’re bringing to life the archive of images of Black, LGBTQ+ life in Britain from the 1970s to the early ‘00s. I’m Marc Thompson, I’m an activist and health promotion specialist, and I’ve built this archive with the journalist and writer Jason Okundaye.

[Music]

MT: In this episode, we are looking at a photograph that shows the importance of activism in pushing for change. 

[Music fades, sounds of winding film and camera shutter]

MT: A black and white photo shows a crowd of people marching together, the foreground of the image shows 3 Black women all wearing glasses and coats. They look as though they are in the middle of chanting, all around there is a procession holding banners and flags, marching down a street lined with brick buildings. We know the group to be members of the Black, Lesbian and Gay Centre; they are marching against Section 28 in the late 1980s. 

[Music]

MT: Activism takes many forms. Though you might think of lobbying governments, marching through the streets, or even boycotts; these days, activism might look different to how it used to. Today, a number of activists are using their platforms are influencers, or writers and journalists, raising awareness of issues and calling for action, Fopé Ajanaku is one of those people.

[Music]

FA: I’m looking at this photo, I think the first thing that comes to my mind is this feeling of comfort, because you see that no matter the time, like Black women will always be out there doing stuff, right! I look at this photo and if it wasn't in black and white, this could've been taken 5 years ago, I could’ve done stuff with these women. And it makes me feel comforted of the familiarity of it because like I said, Black women will always be there behind the scenes, in front of the camera, making sure we get to the protest, making sure that we are having the right chants, that they are fun and sassy but also, just, it makes me feel sad that we will always have to do this. I don't know, I think I’m very excited to talk more about the context of this photo because I know this is a photo that during the Haringey Clause 28 campaign and I obviously know about Section 28, a lot of young queer people do, but I don't know enough about it, so i would love to learn more.

[Music]

FA: I’m Fopé, pronounced they/them, I’m an organiser/facilitator and I work with young people to harness their power to change the world. 

[Typing]

FA: Google ‘Section 28’, which seems obvious but I’m just going to see what I get. So, Wikipedia says Action 28 or Clause 28 was a legislative designation for a series of laws across Britain that prohibited the promotion of homosexuality by local authorities, introduced by Margaret Thatcher, it was in effect from 1988 to 2000 in Scotland, and from 1988 to 2003 in England and Wales, which is insane to me because I would have been in Year 3 when it ended. I don't think I have memory of this but it must have been something that my parents would've known about and teachers would have known about, and it means at least 3 years of my schooling was underneath this governance which is so wild to me. Ok, in my very quick research I've also found what I think is an actual copy of the Local Government Act from 1988, it says ‘2A. a local authority shall not. Intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality and, B. Promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship.’ which again is so interesting to me because there must have been teachers at my school who were probably having to hide so much of themselves and I didn’t even know.

[Music]

FA: Looking at this picture, I guess I’m thankful for all the work they've done but also thankful and excited to talk to someone who was actually there and doing this work. I know that Femi Otitoju was part of the Section 28 Protest Movement and she was also part of the BLG Centre, but I think she actually used to work for Haringey Council so I'm so excited to talk to her some more. 

[Music]

FA: Hi Femi! Lovely to meet you! How are you?

FO: I’m good, it's really good to meet you too. 

FA: It's amazing, it's amazing to be here with you and I’m very excited to chat with you. I think the first thing I want to ask is, what does it make you feel to look at this photo?

FO: It makes me feel really quite happy because it just reminds me that we can make a difference if we don't just lie down and let things happen to us, you know?

FA: Can I ask, what is the context of this photo?

FO: Well, the context of this photo is taking place in the London Borough of Haringey and what's going on here is a protest against something called Section 28. Now that’s a bit of what was then the local government act which was being passed to, in effect, stop people talking about being, they were saying at the time, being lesbian or gay or being in pretend family relationships in schools in Haringey.

FA: I was thinking when I looked at that photo, if it wasn't black and white, I feel like this could be from last year or 5 years ago, which I think is so interesting. I think it frustrates me, on one hand, that we still do this, but also I feel like that sense of community will always be there. Like when a community, specifically the Black community, or when the Black queer community has had enough, we will always come together to make some sort of statement and make a lot of noise which I think is reassuring to me as well.

FO: Yeah, I hope that's true, I do feel sometimes that  we get a bit fragmented and we focus too much on division when we should be focusing on unity, so I hope that's true. I think that looking back on pictures like this just reminds us that we should never get complacent. Because genuinely, I was working as a professional lesbian then basically, I had a job where I was paid to be working for the best interests of my community and yet, I thought that it was done, it was local government that had taken it on and we thought we’d sorted it, and then out of nowhere, this piece of legislation came careering at us. And the whole thing only took about a year and a bit, from the time we first heard about it, to the time it reached the statute. This picture reminds me that we need to be ever vigilant. 

FA: Can you talk a bit more about what it felt like in that year and a half, when the legislation came through, what was the strategy there?

FO: I think the strategy at the time, even though we didn't necessarily think of it as that, was fighting the hell out of everybody! LIke really over-emphasising how bad this could be, we were saying it's going to be terrible, no one’s going to be able to watch any Oscar Wilde plays, no teacher will ever be able to ever support any young lesbian or gay man, we’ll all get sacked; it's going to be hateful. The idea being that people would say ‘this is so appalling it can't possibly be allowed to be passed’, A: That didn’t work. But B: All our drama around what it would be like didn't come to fruition, but non the less, that was our first approach. I think the other, where there was a bit of a game plan,was to mobilise the community, to use their voice, with the local authority initially and then of course to government centrally.

FA: I would love to talk more about what it means to mobilise the community, a lot of the work I do with young people is based on the tradition of community organising, and I think a lot of that understanding of how important it is to have a community behind you is lost in activism today. I think a lot of people only see that you have big numbers at protests or you have the government, and I think a lot of people miss that you really need to have your neighbours, the people who look after your kids, the people who are at the church, I’m agnostic but I feel that the church communities like that are hugely important in making any significant change. So when you and your community were mobilising the community, what did that look like? And what were some of the things you did in order to make sure the community was always with you? 

FO: We didn’t use the phrase as much in the UK then, but as people of colour, we understood that it would be really difficult for us to mobilise alone. The reason why there was this Black presence around this particular issue, around Section 28 was because some people in the community had started saying that our Borough’s support of the lesbian and gay communities at that time was racist. They said it was racist because there weren't, that Black people, and we had a big Cypruit community, a big Greek community, that we didn't have homosexuality in those communities and so by supporting LGBT issues, the council was being racist. So we had this double thing that we were trying to sort out, ‘No wait a minute! First of all, are you saying our communities are more homophobic than white communities?’ ‘No!’ Secondly, we can't afford to just walk away from those because there's a lot of racism out there and we need our communities to support us against, and around, racism. So we can just wander away and say ‘Sorry I'm skipping off into the pink rainbow thing!’ We need these people with us. So that was our motivation: challenging the racism within the wider community but we were also challenging the homophobia within our own communities. I agree with you, it meant very much working with the people that we interacted with on a day to day basis. I think it's great, my job was to go round the community centres. At the big south asian community centre, they did lunch everyday, I spent a lot of time campaigning there. 

FA: That’s where I think real change always happens!

FO: Yeah! And they’re the people who can sell something.

FA: Yes!

FO: And I do think that campaigning is as much about sales as it is anything else. it's about selling yourself in the first instance, ‘I’m a good thing! Don’t you just love me! So why wouldn’t you love what I’m saying?’ and then it’s all about selling your concept or your idea so if I was training activists today; I never got trained actually, I didn't do any training. But if I was to support activists today, I think that I would say to them ‘you need to be a sales person!’.

FA: So much of this work as well, on the flip-side, is skilled. And I think for a long time a lot of us, also people who were racialised or gendered in a certain way, don't realise how much work campaigning is skilled work. So we’re doing so much of this labour without recognition, without pay, without sleep.

FO: We did all that, we did it without the internet.

FA: I don’t even want to think about how you did that!

[Music]

FA: Briefly earlier you said something I wanted to ask you about, the idea that’s about Black communities of could being more homophobic, and this is an idea that I think still persists today, and I  wanted to ask you, I  have my own opinion, but where do you think that idea comes from and why do you think it persists today even though there’s so many queer people of colour, as evidenced by history and as evidenced by now. 

FO: I think that idea that people of colour are more homophobic in the UK, let’s stay here for now, I think that comes from the idea that we are seen as being more religious and our religious communities have a higher profile than comparative communities amongst the white dominant population so I think it's faith perhaps that sometimes can be the cause of people’s assumptions around that. I think also, we do it ourselves a bit. You know when you're watching telly, maybe it's a game show or something, and you’re thinking, ‘Please be good!’

FA: It’s the fear!

FO: ‘Please don’t mess up!’ 

FA: It's so interesting because we are individuals, but you see a Black character and that representation hinges on whether you like the show or not. 

FO:That’s what happens in our communities, they’re like, ‘look, everyone’s watching us so dress decently when you go out and also don’t do that gay thing.’ 

[Both laugh]

FO: Because what they want is for us to speak nicely, dress well, certainly that's obviously from people I grew up with and around, what they wanted was for us to have a good education, become a lawyer or a doctor or an engineer, maybe an accountant. And to dress well, present well, speak well and just be a good thing because this society, as far as family and community was concerned, this society wants us to fail. And so they were so determined that we did everything as good as it could be, that did not include coming out as a lesbian, sorry! It’s not that they were more homophobic it's that they were so concerned that we should be accepted and succeed. 

FA:I think a lot of it’s fear and heavily based on the fear of the unknown and fear of, after you fought and scraped to live a ‘good, dignified life’ in the UK, you want your children to also have that, so seeing your child themselves even more at risk in a world or society that already wants them to fail, I think that would be very scary and I know my mum is a deep example of that.

[Music]

FA: I remember I went to Heaven many many years ago and this one visibly femme white person, whether they are a white gay person or white trans person, kept giving me looks the entire night and I didn’t get it until I was in the smoking area and my friend was like ‘they think you’re straight, they think you’re intruding on their space’ and it took me so long to be like ‘oh this isn’t our space, this is your space’. 

FO: Nothing has changed! I remember turning up with one other Black woman, the two of us going to this gay club, and the guy on the door said ‘it's not a soul night’. That’s a shame. I think that they got better, now something has happened again.

FA: I agree! I feel like there was a period, but I guess progress isn't linear, it’s cyclical, it ebbs and flows, so I think what we are seeing is a deep regression in the community and I think you mentioned at the beginning, it's very divisive at the moment and we’re  going to see real problems emerging now but also in the next 5 years. And also just organising groups of community; I think the queer community or the LGBTQ+ community is so divisive, people are arguing and having really deep discussions but the goal isn't freedom for all of us; it's power or maybe vengeance. I'm not the person to say, ‘you’re not allowed that’, but people are so angry and I don’t know where it’s going at the moment. I don't feel like there is a tangible community at the moment. 

FO: Or a tangible goal.

FA: Yeah, or a tangible goal. But it also could be that this country is just miserable, so everyone is miserable.

FO: A while ago, when I first heard about monkeypox, I felt this little feeling of fear, first of all that here we go, the government is going to start with the whole AIDS thing and it's going to be hateful, but then I thought, we really came together around AIDS, we really did. Maybe we can catch this with a bit more unity.

FA: Contradictory to what I just said, I think we have seen rallying around Monkeypox, I think there was a really big gap in terms of knowledge, no one knew what was happening, but I remember seeing loads of tweets from Black gay men specifically, I think Jason Okundaye, with what to do. And the amount of people getting vaccinations within 24 hours because of that was amazing to see. So I think there has definitely been a move to organised spaces to the online world. 

FO: That's exactly it, and that's what I meant, it’s really upsetting but it also gives us something around which we can coalesce, and that’s why pictures like this are so important, isn’t it? Because they remind us that when we work together, when we bring all our power to the front, we can actually achieve change. We resisted Section 28, it did make it into law, but we were also able to continue the campaign and get that rescinded and whoever, whichever wonderful person took that picture, I’d like to say thank you because that’s why it’s so important to have this stuff recorded and available for people to see. 

[Music]

FO: I think it's quite interesting to think about what makes an activist.

FA: I was going to say, do you consider yourself an activist? Because I’m not sure if I would use the word anymore.

FO: So I have embraced the word ‘activist’ for most of my grown-up life, both in the community sense and political sense but also just in a work-environment sense, if something has to happen, I will be the do-er and grab the thing that needs to be grabbed and physically try and make something happen there. I’m happy to see myself as an activist. Do you see yourself as an activist?

FA: I don’t know, I feel like, and I think this might be a generational thing and how the word has evolved and now means maybe something slightly different. We have people who call themselves activists who I wouldn’t necessarily say are doing the work, I think the word doesn’t make sense but it’s influencer-activists, I don’t understand how you can be an ethical influencer first of all, I don't understand how those two things can work in tandem, maybe it's the spreading of information but it's also building their own platform which I think goes against a lot of the work that you should be doing as an activist. So I think that maybe I’ve shied away from that word in past years, I used to do a lot of speeches and rallies of 500 people and go to Westminster, Whitehall and do lots of very stereotypically activist things, now I don't really do that anymore, I’ve shied away from words like activist to words like ‘organiser’ or ‘campaigner’ just because they fit to the specifics of what I’m doing.

FO: I have to ask, was that a conscious decision to move away from the platform?

FA: I worked for the NUS as Black students officer, which I used to call, I was basically ‘Head Girl’ for the entire country so I represented every Black, Asian, African, Caribbean, and ethnic minority student in higher education and further education and apprenticeships in the entirety of the UK which means I was representing hundreds of thousands of people. The role no longer exists for a myriad of reasons, I think because I had such a hard time in their role, the job literally is to end racism in education which is ridiculous.

FO: Within your term!

FA: Well, not within my term but you start your term and it's like what’s the goal, ‘end racism’ which you know you're never going to do so you already have the idea that, by the time I end this, I know I wouldn’t have not served what I want to do. Every week, have a call from a parent whose child had been harassed or get some frantic DM messages from someone on twitter being like ‘Hi, they threw bananas at me what do I do’ because there’s no structure in the university so getting on contact with me, a real misunderstanding of what the job was but that’s my job. And because I was a public figure, I was getting ‘at-ed’ all the time. I was getting emails, awful emails in my inbox all the time, really creative racist stuff which I thought was really hilarious. That kind of surveillance of you constantly does something to your mind. I feel like when you do a lot of this front-facing work from a young age, luckily I was still able to believe in it. 

FO:What is it you believe in? What is it you’re looking for now? 

FA: I still believe a better world is possible. 

FO: What would it look like?

FA: I don’t know what it looks like! We’re building something that doesn’t exist. It looks nothing like the world we have at the moment. I interviewed someone recently and she was like ‘I believe that freedom is inevitable’ and I was like, ‘Oh! I love that! I’m going to use that.’ It’s just this idea of the world being better, it is not something that might happen, it is something that will happen and that way of thinking bout it has really helped me come to terms with it, nothing we’re fighting for we are going to see in our lifetime and I accept that, we’re building a better world for our children, for our children’s children. So having that love in your community and the community that exists beyond you is what is me, I think. 

FO:That’s interesting because I think some things that we are fighting for, we are going to see in our lifetime.

FA: Really?

FO: Absolutely, for example, I have seen same-sex marriage, I have seen an equal age of consent, I have seen rape in marriages being seen as a crime. I believe that it is possible every single day that there will be change that will make things better but, worse than that, I don’t think that freedom is inevitable. 

FA:You don’t think it’s inevitable?

FO:I think that, there always needs to be us. 

FA: I believe that as well, I think the positions we occupy, this community occupy, will always be there. I don't think if we do the work, freedom will come. I believe that we will always do this work because it is integral for our community, for the love we have for one another, for the idea of this new world, I believe that is inevitable. 

FO: That works, that works for me.

[Music]

[Advert]

[Music]

FA: I don’t know, as much as I disagree with my mum, because I'm Nigerian and it’s part of the Nigerian spirit to be antagonistic and but also to be fighting.

FO: When I was saying earlier that we have shared culture and shared experience,that's where it comes from. My mother is so Urhobo, it’s untrue! And, in a way, that's partly what's given me the energy and the skills, my intellect and commitment, all of that comes from my mother and so much of it is about that expectation of doing really well is from my Nigerian background and it stood me in really good stead. 

FA: It has!

FO: She’s made me very culturally agile and that’s been very important in the selling part.

FA: I agree! I think it’s really interesting the way I think about my Nigerian identity, because I always say this to my friends. I have never loved or hated a nation as much as I do Nigeria. But I would die for Nigeria! Nigerian Independence Day, it’s like ‘yes!’ but also terrible things have happened in this country. But I love being NIgerian, I would not trade it for another day.

FO: This is why I never changed my name, even as a child living in Worthing in Sussex where nobody had ever heard my name before and I think I was called ‘Flem’ half way through school.

FA: I was called ‘floppy’! Floppy disc!

FO: Well, there you go! Some of my cousins changed their names but I would never change my name. I want that, when you hear me, you can’t always tell where I come from, people are like ‘Oh are you from the Caribbean?’ I want that to be up front because I think it's shaped me and it gave me, being different, it gave me confidence in being different and that gave me confidence to come out later on when I identified as a lesbian. Because we worked so hard to find our place here, I got used to working hard to find a place. So, that one experience of my cultural identity developed into something that I could use in other aspects of my identity. It’s nice to hear it from someone else. 

[Music]

FA: Hi Marc, how are you?

MT: I’m not too bad, how are you doing?

FA: I’m doing really well, thank you! 

MT: You met the wonderful Femi

FA: I did, it was so exciting, it was really lovely to meet someone who had shared experiences with me but from over 50 years ago. You think so much of your life is unique but someone else has had so many shared experiences and has this advice which was really lovely to me.

MT: What struck you and stuck with you about your conversation with Femi?

FA: I think it was the shared sense of identity and both of us being Nigerian and that having such a strong moral sense of justice and that being tied to our identity as Nigerians. And we had this really funny moment, no matter where we go, we’ll always find more Nigerians, we’re so community-minded because of that, and that then guides our own social justice politics which I've obviously thought about but i’ve never named it. So for it to be named, it’s like ‘Oh yeah, of course I’ve thought about community organising in these terms because I grew up in such a huge family across the world’ and like she said, ‘no matter where we go, whether it's London, Lagos or Alaska, you’ll always find another Nigerian.’ 

MT: So you’ve spoken about the diaspora connecting, which allows you to do that. What did you learn about Femi’s community organising that impressed you?

FA:I think what was really interesting, I would have been in primary school when Section 28 was repealed, so it’s something that I knew of but I didn’t know much about. So to hear from Femi, who was essentially in the trenches to fight against it was really interesting because, when you look at the photo of them protesting, that could've happened like 3 years ago, the community rallies together when something is directly affecting us, and to know they were doing it and that the work continues is really impressive. Also, Femi was like ‘I’m going to go inside the government to repel this’ was cool, very very cool.

MT: One of the things that’s always impressed me about Femi and their kind of engagement is when I look back on an archive, they are often the only Black person, only Black woman, how did that come up in your conversation?

FA: I think that’s interesting, so obviously I identify as non-binary and I use they/them pronouns, we had the discussion that even though I would not identity as a woman, the experience of that womanhood is so unique to us as Black femmes, I can’t opt out of it, so much for the experience she was talking about, of being raised in queer circles, not being sure whether we fit in the queer white spaces or spaces for people of colour, and feeling at odds with both of them, I also still feel the same experiences and we had this funny conversation or similarities. I remember I went clubbing and this guy was like ‘you're intruding on our space’ and Femi told exactly the same story from when she was younger. And it’s like everything's the same and it’s bad but also nothing changs! So it was really nice to know that no matter where we go, Black women, regardless if we identify as women, that experience of Black womanhood is similar to all of us. 

MT: Yeah, I remember I came across a line once: ‘If we want the problems of the world solved, we should just give them to Black women.’

FA: Honestly, you should, because we’ll get it done, we’ll get it done! And so much of Femi was saying, from whether it was being part of the Black Lesbian and Gay Group or being part of Haringey council, someone had to do it so we had to get it done, and so much of that you still see today in community organising, whether it's organising space for Black people, when you go, to who’s organising the DJ’’s, who’s organising these safe spaces, it’s Black women behind the social media accounts, it's just that the arena has changed and we’re all online now and we’re all tapping away. 

MT: Do you feel, or did you feel, that some of the battles and fights that Femi was fighting for, have they changed significantly?

FA: I think we’re still fighting just to be recognised in queer spaces but also in our own spaces whether it is Black spaces or Nigerian spaces because we are seeing a rise in deep conservatism in a lot of our communities, and so a lot of the things Femi was talking about, while they look different today, they still exist.

MT: And I recall in the 1980s, a period that many of us are currently reflecting on, that many of us fell into activism and it’s become a brand today, so where does activism sit with young people today?

FA: I think it's interesting and I think Femi and I touched on this and just on the identity of activism. Femi was very proud to be like ‘I am an activist and I’ve been an activist most of my career’ which I think is so amazing to know exactly which lane you’re in, because I struggle to know exactly what I’m doing or whether I’m worthy of the term ‘activist’. I think it’s such a broad term, I don’t know if it speaks to what I’m doing and also there’s a larger point that sometimes a lot of people my age or slightly older use it as a brand identity, so activism as a career isn’t necessarily towards building a better world. Because you need everything to be crap in order to make your point, and so you then start to question a lot of these activist-influencers and whether or not they're trying to build a better world or whether they’re relying on everything being quite awful in order for them to sell another book. I don’t think all of them do that but sometimes you have to ask, ‘are you for the community or are you for the clout?’ And that comes up a lot, so I think that’s probably why I distance myself from the term ‘activist’ and also now that I don’t do as much forward-facing work and I do a lot of background work; I do teaching, facilitating young people in order to get them on the stage, it feel less activist-y and organised-based. So I prefer the word ‘organiser’ or ‘facilitator’ but then Femi was also saying the work we do is activism, why should we be ashamed of calling ourselves that, and that made me think, maybe I need to rethink why I call myself the things I do.

MT: I think there is something there about reclaiming the word, the term, the feeling of being an activist and I’ve spoken to some young people who have rejected the word, although they are activists, they are making huge change, but ultimately for me it's not necessarily about what we call it but what we do and being in a position to call out those who aren’t doing it, right?

FA: I think it’s also really interesting because I’ve recently been interviewing people for my organisation and a lot of our questions sare about social justice. Does everyone have the same understanding and language? And a lot of the people I’ve interviewed have been like, ‘Well I've never really done any social justice work but I was fundraising for my church when I was 16’ and you have to be like ‘that’s activism!’. Or ‘I’ve never done social justice but I've been youth working for my local yout service since I was really small child and I volunteer there every week’ or, ‘no, I don’t do social justice but I work at my food bank every week’ and it’s like, that’s all social justice! That’s all activism! You’re all organising. But people are like ‘oh no it’s not getting on a stage and speaking to 5000 people so I can’t be an activist’. So I think there is something to be said about reclaiming the word or just redefining what we think of activism, because in order for any social change to happen we need people to be doing the fundraiser, we need people to be dong the community organising at their churches, we need people to be working at the food banks, because those service-use types of jobs are so important, they might not be glamorous but they are so deeply powerful.

[Music]

MT: So I just want to ask you, you’ve had this great conversation, what impact do you think that's going to have on your work going forward, and your activism?

FA: I mean, so many things! I think, first of all, and I said this at the beginning, it’s just so comforting to just be, the work I’m doing or the thoughts I’ve had about my identity and the part I play within it, I’m not the only one who’s felt that. So it was really nice to be met with an older Black woman and be like ‘I’ve been there kid, don’t worry.’ And that is, that feeling of being held that I think a lot of queer people, specifically queer people of colour, don’t get that intergenerational feeling of being held. Also, Femi was like, ‘make sure to take pictures of everything you do because in 20 years, you’ll be back here like ‘why didn’t I record it!’ So I’m taking pictures of everything, all my friends, all my family. 

MT: So it sounds like a really rich, rewarding, impactful conversation that you had with Femi. And I’m so glad you got to connect, was there anything that was challenging that came out of the conversation for you at all?

FA: I think it was, there are bits of it that we disagreed on and we touched on this; I believe that freedom is inevitable and she said it’s not and that’s why we must continue to work. And it challenged me to ask myself why I believe the things I believe, and I don’t believe we have to live in an echochamber where we all agree with the same things, but I think it’s so important to question yourself and why. I’ve only been doing this for 10 years, and here’s someone who’s been doing it for so much longer than me, maybe I should learn from their wisdom, or just their experiences. I also don’t necessarily think I would've gone with the same strategy as that Femi would’ve done for Section 28, I don’t necessarily believe in local governments, I don’t think it could be useful but also maybe sometimes it is. The plurality of strategy is so deeply important, so I need to sit with myself, read some more and be like ‘what is it I believe and what do I believe it?’ 

MT: Femi has been doing activism for a really long time and as an activist myself you can get burnt out and tired and you still keep fighting. Did Femi give you any tips for self-care and making sure you can stay in the game? Because we need you!

FA: Thank you so much for saying that, because sometimes I don’t know if we believe that ourselves. It wasn’t necessarily what Femi had said but in order for Femi to still be doing what she’s doing after all this time, it was this idea that we have to name the people who have come before us and when we were looking at the photo she was trying to remember the people who were there. And we were talking about radical archiving and how memory is so deeply important as we’ve seen on Instagram and she said, ‘it’s not about archiving for archiving’s sake but sometimes we just need to celebrate ourselves’. And I was like ‘you’re so right!’ because too often we celebrate people who have passed but we should be celebrating the people when they’re still here. Femi was like, when so much of the world is trying to bring you down whether it's through homophobia or racism or your family or a community that you thought would hold you in but don’t because of racism, sometimes you need to find your people and you need to celebrate and that is something that is so right, that is so true. So I will be at the club this weekend celebrating! 

MT: You see! I’ve always believed that the reason I got through activism and the dark times was getting on the dance floor. 

FA: It’s the only remedy and the only cure!

[Music]

MT: I've been your host, Marc Thompson. The reporter in this episode was Fopé Ajanaku. You can find the picture we've discussed in today's episode and all the images talked about throughout this podcast on Instagram, @BlackAndGayBackInTheDay. And drop us a message if you have something you want to submit to the archive, a link will be available in the show notes. 

[Credits]