Talk:Lavender Scare/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Possible Improvements?

I've added more information but really feel this could be better served up in a dated order, like 1941, 1942, 1943-1945 etc. It's going to become a jumbled mess otherwise. Anyone have any other ideas? Thanks Jenova20 11:00, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Background

Someday I may try to write this entry properly. (We don't need the sort of timeline suggested above.) But for anyone concerned, there is background material in Allan Bérubé, Coming Out Under Fire (NY: Free Press, 1990), 234-253. He describes a relaxation of formerly negative attitudes toward homosexuality in the years following World War II and says that the scare of the 50s was not inevitable. He has good evidence of that more relaxed atmosphere. Bmclaughlin9 (talk) 01:37, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Suggestion: Why don't you list Berube in the reference section of the article, so interested readers can find it? Textorus (talk) 06:32, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

I think this material is only useful as background for an editor. Berube's work is not particularly useful for a reader interested in the lavender scare per se. Bmclaughlin9 (talk) 13:06, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Requested move 19 January 2015

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. The evidence provided in this discussion doesn't show that 'lavender scare' is consistently capitalized in sources as required by MOS:CAPS. User:RGloucester is supporting per the analysis given by Bmclaughlin, but the latter did not formally vote for either capitalization because it seems he found the evidence equivocal. EdJohnston (talk) 05:26, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

Lavender scare → Lavender Scare – The subject of this article is a proper noun and both words should be capitalized, as in Red Scare. --Relisted. — Amakuru (talk) 13:19, 27 January 2015 (UTC) — TAnthony^Talk 20:05, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

My first instinct was to agree....and I'm not sure what an authoritative source would be, but I do see "lavender scare" here:

review in American Quarterly, page 291

review in Journal of American History, page 1529

The newer the journal, the more likely it is to use Scare. I'm not getting a very consistent read from Google Books. (I wish I could do case-specific searches in JSTOR or elsewhere, and even then you'd have to filter out references to Johnson's book.) There's even this: "during the lavender Scare of the early 1950s" ?! in Frank Costigliola, Roosevelt's Lost Alliances (2011)

I'd really prefer a renaming that didn't use Johnson's label at all, but I can't come up with anything that isn't a mouthful or foolish: U.S. government exclusion of homosexuals from employment etc, McCarthyism (homosexuality). Or even a spin on Johnson's subtitle: Persecution of gays and lesbians in the federal government during the Cold War. So I guess Lavender S/scare it is. Bmclaughlin9 (talk) 21:48, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

Until I read the article I thought that "lavender scare" would mean a sudden unreasonable public safety panic about the scented plant called lavender. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 14:48, 27 January 2015 (UTC)
Oppose – the capitalized form would be right for the book or the movie, but for the actual scare, books use lowercase as often as not; e.g. this one and this one, and this one, and this one. Dicklyon (talk) 06:07, 28 January 2015 (UTC)
Support – Per the analysis given by Bmclaughlin. This is a proper noun, just as with Red Scare. Per MOS:CAPS, proper nouns should be capitalised. RGloucester — ☎ 22:24, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

John W. Hanes Jr. link

I've been to this 'See also' link, but I can't see the slightest collection to the present topic. Delete?80.60.103.23 (talk) 22:32, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

Crittenden Report of 1957

This shows the government had knowledge than ran contrary to the anti-gay propaganda but chose to repress it and even stonewall against FOIA requests for the, by then, very old documents. See the main article, Crittenden Report, for more information.

Hooker's research of 1956, the first to be properly done, was even more crucial in dispelling a rational basis for anti-gay attitudes underlying both the propaganda (the "scare") and rational discriminatory policy. However, even today, the myth that the APA removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders just because of politics (and similar mythology designed to perpetuate anti-gay animus), persists as K-12 schools don't teach about Hooker's research for the most part. Any curricula that includes such facts is attacked as "The Gay Agenda" by right-wing propagandists. Although it was not completely stonewalled like Crittenden, Hooker's work has been largely (purposefully) ignored, in terms of educating the general public. As a result, most members of the public believe that homosexuality is accepted merely because of political whimsy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.33.91.95 (talk) 06:43, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Naming debate: Of course Lavender Scare is a proper noun

I'm surprised that this is even being debated. Proper nouns are capitalized in English. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.33.91.95 (talk) 06:59, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

As for Dicklyon's evidence, let's look at the first citation. It puts both Lavender Scare and Red Scare in scare quotes and doesn't capitalize either of them. Wikipedia's Red Scare article capitalizes Red Scare. So, this first citation contravenes what Wikipedia is currently doing with Red Scare and goes even further by putting both into scare quotes. Scare quotes are designed to reduce the apparent legitimacy of something. So, Dicklyon's first citation supports the belief that not capitalizing Lavender Scare is an attempt to reduce its perceived significance, particularly when Red Scare is simultaneously capitalized (as it is on this site). Why is the Red Scare so much more important than the Lavender Scare, to the point of the latter not being a real scare? Moreover, how can we treat the former as a proper noun and not the latter? Whether or not something is a proper noun is not dependent upon how popular or influential something is culturally. If Goobie Ji is a cave-dwelling hermit who was known only to his mother he still gets his name capitalized.

Dicklyon's second citation also puts Lavender Scare into scare quotes and does not capitalize the name. The same is true for Dicklyon's third citation. Both erroneously refer to "a" Lavender Scare (in scare quotes and lowercase), as if there are multiple ones (which is obviously not the case). There is only one Lavender Scare in American cultural history. However, the third citation does what the author in the first citation did as well and capitalizes the Red Scare (but without scare quotes this time, interestingly) while referring to "the" Lavender Scare in scare quotes without capitalization.

Dicklyon's evidence points to authors who do feel that the Lavender Scare is not significant enough as an established context to merit a proper noun, despite the fact that Wikipedia has an entire article for it, just as it does for the Red Scare. Dicklyon's authors are incorrect. At least the first author was consistent enough to put Red Scare in lowercase and scare quotes, too.

My suggestion is to refer to the proper noun article on this site which says proper nouns are capitalized in English as the general rule. It also makes minimal little sense for the site to capitalize Red Scare and not Lavender Scare since English does not assign proper noun status based on the cultural significance of something but rather by its uniqueness. There is only one Lavender Scare so it is capitalized. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.33.91.95 (talk) 07:26, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

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Lede

The article by Shibusawa has a limited access. Did she actually say "more susceptible to being manipulated" or was it "more susceptible to being blackmailed"? Due to moral panic, blackmail was a significant threat, in contrast to other allegedly at-risk employees who might be manipulated by having debts, alcoholism, gambling tendencies, etc. -- none of which would involve the same vulnerability as homosexuality in terms of blackmail. Martindo (talk) 11:54, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

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