Catherine Mathys and I are journalists trying to bridge
cultural divides. This is Two Solitudes
On this episode, we'll speak to Ross Higgins
who co-founded the Archives Gaies du Québec
Chris: Two Solitudes, Pride Week, I got a text
message the other day from the member of our team Rachel
and she had a great idea so I thought I'd
just have her take over. Rachel, you wanna switch?
Rachel: Hey, so I'm usually on the other side of the camera
but it's Pride Week and I know Chris was
trying to think of ideas for this week’s episode
So I shot him a text and said why don't we look at
linguistic divides in the LGBTQ community
I figured this would be the perfect place to explore that
Catherine: Let's do it
Ross: My name is Ross Higgins, I come from Southern Ontario
I came to Montreal in 1975
I had been in bars both here and in Toronto often
Where suddenly the lights go up and the cops come in
and they check everybody's I.D.
In some of the raids there were various things that happened
In the sauna raids they broke down doors rather than
asking for keys just to be as violent as possible
Eventually the big Truxx raid in 1977
they went in with machine guns
In the pre-Olympic raids there was one
on a lesbian bar that was down where Concordia is now
called Gilly's and they went in with machine guns
and they photographed all the women who were in the bar
Rachel: amid all this, there's also the two solitudes
Within this, was there an instant bond
Like, 'We're in this together. We need to get through this together.'
Or was there still some tension there?
Ross: After the initial wave of arrests
before the Olympics, we called a public meeting
It was very bilingual. We had just begun to make our voices heard
It's only with the Truxx raid
and the sudden emergence of a very large movement 
and the popular outcry that the
newspapers, in both languages, condemned what the police had done
and questioned the logic of arresting people in a bar
for having a drink
Rachel: While some people in the community definitely experience violence
today, it was really interesting to see how back then
in Montreal, these groups united to fight back
Catherine: Many of the events that he talked about, I had never
heard about. It's not so far away in history but still
we tend to forget really easily. And it's just
so inspiring to hear about these questions
I love how sometimes repression and going through the same
the same repression brings cultures
Rachel: People pull together
and get behind the same cause
