Support NeoGAF

[Chmpocalypse]

It's more than that particular attitude though that Ekai mentioned, it's about queer liberation being transformed into a "clean and safe" thing that plays by the rules established already by heteronormative capitalist society. It went from "we're here, we're queer, get used to it" to "See, we're just like you and want to be good citizens with monogamous families, 2.5 kids, and a middle class life with a house with a white picket fence!" That's the sort of thing Spica was talking about at least, the way that the Democratic party has "co-opted" the gay liberation movement without breaking down structural barriers. That's the radical position on it at least. I'm about as straight as they come so I'm not really the best person to speak to the validity of that (I think any sort of forward step is commendable if not necessarily radical enough), but it is a valid critique that many radical LGBTQ leftists make, and their particular worry is that now that gay marriage has been held up as the "big thing" in gay rights, nobody will pay attention to other queer issues which are inherently tied into the capitalist structure.

That's why I hope Spica wasn't banned for that post.

As queer myself, I'd love to hear about these issues that are allegedly being ignored. I don't see it.

 

[Ekai]

As queer myself, I'd love to hear about these issues that are allegedly being ignored. I don't see it.

I already said I didn't want to derail this thread with this but to briefly address your post:

Trans issues, for example, were completely pushed to the rear when the movement got co-opted by some gay cis-men decades back. Mostly white too. LGBT as a whole was a movement started by transwomen of color (I make the contrast for a reason here-for reference some of the biggest names in earlier LGBT were Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson, both were huge for their involvement and for starting activist movements immediately at/surrounding Stonewall) and there was a huge push for trans rights, and lgb rights together. Then the white cis-dudes made it all about them. Not all cis-dudes did this but it's frankly a basic part of LGBT history. And frankly speaking there are gay cis-dudes who are today quite satisfied with stopping at gay marriage and are happy to leave us trans-individuals out to still fight for our basic rights and awareness of our own medical issues. I mention the medical thing just because even during the AIDs epidemic these same people pushed trans-individuals to the rear who suffered from the disease as well. They silenced trans-suffering to make it solely about them and that's just distressing to me. Specifically that they'd so desperately want to mock the suffering of their brothers/sisters to make it solely about them. Some have even tried to white-wash the actual history of that time so there's some blatant racism at work here too. There are some cis-lesbians who are like this as well who are more or less TERFs but they are far fewer in number than the cis-dudes in this regard. At least from my experience/understanding cis-lesbians are generally more okay with trans-individuals than cis-gays.

They don't want to be equated with us now that they have their own rights and there have been numerous campaigns to "drop the T" in response to the fear they have of being associated with Trans-individuals. Even reading any of these petitions showcases just how transphobic these people are. They attempt to rewrite history and assert the lie that white gay cis-men started the lgbt movement among numerous other ridiculous and insulting talking points. They've also created many transphobic websites, reddits, etc. etc. pushing their twisted message. I mean, these people have fricking Milo in their ranks.

Thankfully these petitions have all been met with derision from every last LGBT organization but they exist all the same. These people want to be seen as normal (hence the push for marriage, it's the easiest way for people not in the spectrum to accept them as normal because it quantifies what homosexuality is about, love of another) and believe us to be abnormal. They don't want to "risk" their newly obtained normal status. I am not dismissing gay/lesbian marriage. I am happy for it's existence and it's an important thing. I am simply speaking a fact of the matter regarding how some within the LGBT spectrum took over the movement to make it solely about them and how now that they have what they wanted, those same individuals want to leave us out to dry. They are actively working against us. It's transphobia (and in some respects racism) really, plain and simple. And it's all about a "fuck you, got mine" attitude.

Now can we not derail the topic further? Thinking of these matters just makes me upset about them and they have little to nothing to do with the topic at hand. At best I could equate it to the topic regarding my view of how Hillary will work for LGBT rights (I don't trust her as much as I do Bernie) but that's a stretch.