ABSTRACT
This chapter investigates the ways in which a group of nascent lesbian activists used the politics of appearance to gain greater civil rights and social acceptance in the United States during the mid-twentieth century. Founded in 1955, the Daughters of Bilitis (DOB), a San Francisco-based organization for lesbian women, was among the first groups in American history to advocate for the rights of sexual minorities. At the time, lesbian women and gay men faced unparalleled social and legal discrimination. In response, the DOB deployed aesthetic assimilation as a strategy for personal survival and societal change. As this chapter shows, members of the DOB consciously fashioned a mainstream aesthetic by consciously stylizing their dress, hair, and general appearance in accordance with popular definitions of female attractiveness. Indeed, lesbian leaders even attempted to gently push heterosexual understandings of suitable attire for the everyday woman into what they viewed as a more lesbian-friendly direction.
