When Judy Stanleigh moved back to Toronto, she joined a number of active feminist organizations and participated in many events during the 70s and 80s. These included Education Wife Assault, WREC and Broadside. She began working at the Ministry of Community and Social Services on domestic violence funding and policy/research support and was a member of the Ontario Provincial Interministerial Committee on Violence Against Women.
She joined Broadside first of all because a colleague at WREC, Ottie Lockey, encouraged her to join. Secondly, she was already a Broadside reader and found the newspaper thought provoking and relevant. She believed it was critical to have a national print media vehicle that provided Canadian feminists with the ability to connect across Canada. She was an active member of the Broadside collective for over three years. She sold a lot of advertising for the paper, wrote an feature article on relationships some short vignettes about things that were happening.
What is most memorable to her as a Broadside Collective Member is participating in the intense discussions and debates on a broad range of issues that came up during Broadside collective meetings. To be part of ‘history in the making’ was truly enlightening.
Since those early years, every volunteer, personal and/or work experience she has engaged in has been informed by the ideas, protests, marches, discussions, workshops, newspapers, literature, music and initiatives that began during that time.