Artifact 4: Misfortune - Photograph of Second Toronto Bathhouse Raids Protest, Undercover Police Indicated
This is a photograph of the landmark protest against Toronto’s police brutality against the gay community and others which took place on the night of February 20, 1981. This photo, and in particular the figures shaded in blue, illustrate the pervasiveness of undercover police officers infiltrating the gay community and gay events in Toronto. A Body Politic article from the following April reports that these officers repeatedly provoked the protestors by ripping the banner they carried in half and spitting in people’s faces, which succeeded in starting fights. The article also published a number of photos of these police, including one of the left-most two in this image arresting a demonstrator following those fights. These acts are unsurprising given reports of unacceptable police behaviour from the night of the ‘Operation Soap,’ which included slinging homophobic slurs and, disgustingly, inspecting the genitalia of each person for no apparent reason other than to shame and humiliate. While it is disheartening to see these undercover police at the frontline of a protest that is, clearly, against people like them, the Body Politic article also demonstrates the gay community’s desire to fight back against police persecution by naming and shaming the officers involved so to be better prepared to confront undercover police in the future.
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Artifact Citation: Ding, Henry. Bathhouse Raids Protest, 1981 (Undercover Police Indicated). 1981. Photograph. The Arquives, https://digitalexhibitions.arquives.ca/items/show/2612.
Caption Bibliography:
- Hannon, Gerald, Bill Loos, Elinor Mahoney, Craig Patterson, and Roger Spalding. “An Italian housewife and thousands of gay people find out what they have in common: “Who is the next? Me?” The Body Politic, April 1, 1981. https://archive.org/details/bodypolitic72toro/page/9/mode/1up?view=theater.
- The Body Politic. “Undercovering the enemy within: Toronto’s plainclothes police expose a few dirty tricks on a gay demonstration.” April 1, 1981. https://archive.org/details/bodypolitic72toro/page/12/mode/1up?view=theater.