Lavender Menace

'Lavender Menace' began as a slur. In 1969 Betty Friedan, a founder of the National Organization for Women, warned that lesbians were a threat to the credibility of the women's movement. Rather than retreat, a group of lesbian feminists reclaimed the phrase. At the Second Congress to Unite Women in New York on May 1, 1970, activists including Rita Mae Brown and Karla Jay stormed the stage wearing 'Lavender Menace' t-shirts and handed out the manifesto 'The Woman-Identified Woman.' Many later formed the group Radicalesbians. The action pushed lesbian issues into feminist organizing and became a lasting model of turning an insult into a badge of pride.