“Gay and Proud” is the tenth and final track off the Collective’s first, self-titled album. Written by Debbie Lempke about her upbringing, it was one of the band’s most popular songs and often closed their sets. For many women in the Collective’s audience, the song was an anthem preaching unity and acceptance.
This post recounts an audience member’s transformative experience watching the Collective perform “Gay and Proud.” She recalls that when it was over, “it was hard to remember to clap.”
Lempke wrote “Gay and Proud” before the formation of the Collective. She used to perform it at small clubs in Portland while attending Reed College. In 1973, she performed it to an enthusiastic audience of 1000 women at the West Coast Lesbian Conference at UCLA. Suzanne Shanbaum and Nancy Vogl were in that audience.
“Gay and Proud” was featured on the Olivia Records compilation album Lesbian Concentrate, which was released in response to Anita Bryant’s ‘Save Our Children’ campaign.
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In a recent interview, Debbie Lempke spoke about writing “Gay and Proud” and the affirmation she felt with its reception.
Lily: I bet it was just so rewarding to write a song like that. A song that’s confronting a difficult topic and then have it be so widely well received.
Debbie: Yeah. It was very affirming. It was my story and I got to talk about some issues around me, adoption and stuff. It was my story but it’s a universal story in terms of people having had grown up not being able to be themselves and being forced into conformity in the fifties.
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Lyrics for “Gay and Proud”
Gay and Proud
I was born a bastard
You know my mother she couldn’t keep me
Sent me off to a foster home
Where they tried to teach me
That girls can’t go climbing trees
Or playing with certain toys
Got to stay in dresses else they’re called tomboys
Well I can sing it loud now
I can sing it loud now (x2)
Gay and Proud
When I got adopted
You know they sent me to a shrink
Couldn’t understand why I cut my hair short
Why I didn’t want to wear pink
As I grew bolder
Got to be a desperate situation
People coming up to me at school
Say ‘you out to get an operation’
When I was in my lonely years
Kinda quiet intellectual
Womanfriend tried to bring me out
Had to hide when they cried homosexual
I ain’t sorry I ain’t sad
For all the years i’ve been had
Strutting round like a heavy duty puff
Now I know we got to get tough
We women been waiting all our lives
For our sisters to be our lovers
Hey look around you now
Ain’t you glad we finally found each other