by MATTHEW HAYS

Miriam Green says it still amazes her to think about how much attitudes towards gays and lesbians have changed.

It was more than 30 years ago that she was a social worker employed by Quebec’s Family Services Association to counsel Montreal families through stressful times in their lives. And while Green isn’t a lesbian, as a concerned social worker she realized it was time Quebec needed to take some steps in the right direction.

“In the early ’70s, I had been living in San Francisco,” recalls Green, now semi-retired. “It was there that I became aware of the gay world. When I returned to Montreal, I could see things weren’t quite as organized here as they were there.”

And Green says a couple of cases that she and her colleagues were clearly not ready for made the situation crystal clear. “Two families came in that were led by two lesbian couples. They were dealing with various situations, but no one was ready to take the case, not by a long shot. We had no guidelines, no experience in dealing with gay or lesbian people.”

Building trust

Green says she then reached out to the gay community to try to get a sense of what their needs were. “There was then a gay drop-in centre on St-Denis. I started to go there. Luckily, the head of the agency I worked for was a black activist from the U.S. who was interested in seeing what we could come up with.”

And the first barrier Green faced? “Trust. Many gays wouldn’t come to the agency. It meant we had to go to the community. Once I began attending meetings, people could see I had friends who were gay, that one of my children’s babysitters happened to be a gay friend. More trust was built up over time.”

Green soon had two other social workers with her, and the three then consulted with an advisory group from the gay community to come up with a blueprint for gay- and lesbian-specific social services. “This was very exciting, really, as we were coming up with something entirely new, but something that was really needed. I can’t quite believe we were so brash, looking back. But there was incredible resistance. Some people felt it was not the right thing for us to be doing.”

And Green adds that the thing that struck her most was the high incidence of suicide in the gay and lesbian community. “I remember sitting in a group of about a dozen at one point, and I asked how many of them had seriously considered taking their own lives. Nine of them put up their hands. That really hit me.”

Night callers

Green also remembers taking calls in the middle of the night from distraught clients. “My husband wasn’t so wild about that.”

So the idea arrived: social workers and activists decided to launch the Gay Line, a service that meant that information about the city’s gay and lesbian community, as well as help for those in distress, would always be a phone call away. The volunteer-run Gay Line has proven a huge success, and has since been expanded into a French-language service as well. This year marks its 30th anniversary, something that makes Green very proud.

“Things have changed so much. In the ’70s it wasn’t out of the question that someone might think of sending their kid for shock treatment if they thought they were gay. Of all the work that I’ve done, I must say that I’m most proud of my work to expand social services for gays and lesbians. It we’re going to offer services to families, we must be offering it for all kinds of families, after all.”

The Gay Line can be reached from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m., 365 days a year at 866-5090 in Montreal and at 1-888-505-1010 in the rest of the province.

Miriam Green will speak as part of a panel celebrating Gay Line’s 30th birthday. The other speakers will include Montreal queer historian Ross Higgins, who will discuss the city’s gay-bar culture of the ’50s; UQÀM professor Line Chamberland, who will discuss the city’s lesbian-bar culture of the same period; UQÀM professor Frank Remiggi, on the evolution of the Gay Village; Miriam Ginestier, on the infamous Meow Mix and Boudoir celebrations; Mambo Drag King Johanne Cadorette on the late great l’Androgyne book store; Michael Hendricks on AIDS activism in Montreal; and Nancy Leclerc on the history of Montreal’s bisexual scene, among others. The event will take place on Thursday, June 8, at 7 p.m. at Cocktail (1669 Ste-Catherine E.). Doors open 6:30 p.m., donations welcome.