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Story: Lesbian lives

Gay Liberation Movement protest

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Gay Liberation Movement protest

While lesbian sex was not criminalised in law like gay male sex, lesbians played a prominent role in homosexual law reform campaigns, in order to support gay men, and because they too faced social discrimination. This is the Gay Liberation Movement protesting outside Parliament in 1974 after the government did not allow enough time in the debating chamber for a private member's bill on homosexual law reform to presented and debated.

Using this item

Alexander Turnbull Library, Dominion Post Collection (PA-Group-00685)

Reference: EP-Ethics-Demonstrations-Homosexual Law Reform-01

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Alison J. Laurie, Lesbian lives – Lesbian political struggles, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/ephemera/30287/gay-liberation-movement-protest (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Alison J. Laurie, published 13 January 2012.

Comments

boy
18 October 2013
i do really appreciate for new zealand and new zealanders for making lesbian 'legally'.. is that true that lesbian can legally get marry in new zealand ? i'm indonesian, 29, and lesbian.