The Daughters of Bilitis (/bɪˈliːtɨs/), also called the DOB or the Daughters, was the first lesbian civil and political rights organization in the United States. The organization formed in San Francisco in 1955, conceived as a social alternative to lesbian bars, which were subject to raids and police harassment. The Daughters of Bilitis endured for 14 years, and became an educational resource for lesbians, gay men, researchers, and mental health professionals.
As the DOB gained members, their focus shifted to providing support to women who were afraid to come out. The DOB educated them about their rights, and about gay history. Historian Lillian Faderman declared, "Its very establishment in the midst of witch-hunts and police harassment was an act of courage, since members always had to fear that they were under attack, not because of what they did, but merely because of who they were."
Read more about Daughters Of Bilitis: Background, History, Organizational Archives
Famous quotes containing the words daughters of and/or daughters:
“Daughters of Time, the hypocritic Days,
Muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes,”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“He was high and mighty. But the kindest creature to his slaves—and the unfortunate results of his bad ways were not sold, had not to jump over ice blocks. They were kept in full view and provided for handsomely in his will. His wife and daughters in the might of their purity and innocence are supposed never to dream of what is as plain before their eyes as the sunlight, and they play their parts of unsuspecting angels to the letter.”
—Anonymous Antebellum Confederate Women. Previously quoted by Mary Boykin Chesnut in Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, edited by C. Vann Woodward (1981)