Incarcerated women at Westville Female Correctional Centre in Durban, South Africa have been using popular participatory theatre (PPT) to create a space to generate debate about aspects of prison life for over 10 years. This article explores how these women engaged the issue of lesbianism in the Correctional Centre and how the process and form was co-opted to promote what appeared to be a conservative and homophobic agenda. In light of this, the question of agenda setting by facilitators is raised. It asks whether facilitators' often liberal agenda's may in fact not be in the best interests of the participants who not only come from different socio-cultural backgrounds, which need to be respected; but that the parameters of possibility in their own lives may not be able to accommodate the ideals of democracy and individual human rights. (Contains 4 notes.)