The Furies Collective: Lesbian Separatists
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 15 February 2018
⏱️ 10 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A group of feminist activists in Washington DC set up a commune to live independently from men in 1971. They called themselves the Furies Collective, and they were some of the first lesbian separatists. Charlotte Bunch was one of them.
Picture: The Furies, packing and distributing the newspaper at 219 11th St. SE, in 1972. Left to right: Ginny Berson, Susan Baker (not a Fury), Coletta Reid (standing), Rita Mae Brown, Lee Schwing (picture by Joan E Biren)
Transcript
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| 1:10.0 | history told by the people who were there. |
| 1:13.0 | I'm Lucy Burns and today I'm taking you back to 1971 |
| 1:17.0 | and an experiment in collective living by a group of women in Washington DC. |
| 1:22.0 | They called themselves the Furies. Like many feminists at the time |
| 1:26.2 | and since they were trying to work out how to live in what felt like a man's world. And their |
| 1:31.8 | answer was to try and live without men altogether as |
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