As regular readers may know, I have recently been doing a series of posts reviewing the chapters of the Occupy Handbook, which I have been making my way through. Whilst I haven’t quite finished the Handbook yet (almost there) today I embark on a new project. I have decided to finally start a book that has been sitting on my bookshelf for ages and has been begging me to read it; That’s Revolting: Queer Strategies for Resisting Assimilation. Published in 2004, as the title describes, this book is a series of radical queer essays (therefore right up my alley!).
Today I though I would start by covering a piece by Priyank Jindal called Sites of resistance or sites of racism? As the title suggests Jindal’s piece looks at racism within the queer movement. The piece couldn’t start more strikingly:
“Racism is articulated over and over again by the LGBT movement, especially in this time of increased Amerikan* militarisation. After September 11, there was a very clear response from the gay “community”: Gay bars suddenly discovered what fabulous fashion patriotism makes, drag shows suddenly had an infusion of patriotic themes, and Amerikan pride and gay pride flags were found flying proudly side by side.”
*(Jinal uses the spelling Amerikan throughout the piece – if anyone understands the reason, would love to know it).
Jindal uses the aftermath of September 11 to point out how efforts to assimilate by many in the queer movement meant assimilating into a ‘white heterosexual nation’.
“The response of the mainstream gay community to 9-11 was to focus on how “we” were affected just like the rest of white Amerika and to prove the “we” would respond in the same way: to stand behind the war on terrorism. This essentially means standing behind the killing and terrorizing of brown people inside and outside of Amerikan borders. The gay community’s emphasis on the similarities of experiences between (white) heterosexuality and lesbian/gay homosexuality, through a shared racism agains brown folk, has helped white gays and lesbians to assimilate and become part of the white heterosexual nation.”
As Jindal continues:
“9-11 created a space for the privileged gay community to talk about their rights vis-a-vis the terrorists. Who is worse: the white middle-class gay person next door who wants to see Amerika “succeed” just as much as any heterosexual, or the terrorists?”
As I said, Jindal uses the reaction to 9-11 as a launching pad to discuss the ongoing racism they find within the mainstream queer movement. As they state:
“Most spaces identified as radical queer spaces, unless they are explicitly for people of colour, generally lack any significant attention to or inclusion of issues or struggles not specifically queer. In this context, unfortunately, those spaces are not radical alternatives to gay identity, but a continuation of the legitimisation of white identity that exists in gay mainstream culture. This has led to deep-rooted forms of racism in alternative sites of resistance. Organisers of these spaces may give lip service to an anti-racist agenda, but in practice their actions maintain the status quo.”
So the issue here therefore is twofold. Firstly, gay mainstream spaces are still dominated by white voices. Secondly, within this context, these spaces tend only to advocate for what are seen as ‘queer’ issues – i.e. things like marriage equality, adoption rights, Don’t-Ask Don’t-Tell. As other voices are missing, so are the other struggles, which are just as queer as the issues focused on. Jindal describes the problem as thus:
“Why do sites of radical queer resistance consistently fail to effectively resist racist ideology? The answer is that these sites have been created from and organised around the lived experiences and political agendas of white people.”
Jindal points to a number of instances of this, one being ‘radical’ drag king shows.
“We see this pattern again in “radical” drag king shows where performers generally fail to interrogate the role of racism in their performance of gender. I have been to performances where I am one of the few brown faces in the crowd, and all the performers are white but not all of the performances are of white masculinity. There are many instances where white queers perform masculinities of color and do not recognise this as a very racist act. Just because it’s queer blackface doesn’t make it any less racist.”
As a white man in the queer community and movement, this says a couple of really important things to me. Firstly, it is about time that we all recognise that just because you are part of one minority, or even a part of a struggle as part of that minority, doesn’t not mean you cannot be discriminatory to another group. Too often we forget to challenge our own sexism, racism and homophobia within our communities, because we seem to think that it doesn’t exist.
The next obvious link therefore is to recognise that these issues are all linked and you cannot have one without the other. Unfortunately however much of ‘gay ideology’ doesn’t do this – it solely focuses on ‘gay issues’.
“The discussion of gay rights shaped by this ideology centers around providing assistance to gay partners; fighting for gay marriage, gay adoption and social security benefits; and fighting against the don’t ask/don’t tell policy. Needless to say, these are not the most pressing issues amongst working-class, poor, and transgendered people of colour whose race, documentation, class status, or gender identity often prevent them from receiving the wide array of social benefits afforded to white, middle-class gays and lesbians.”
A queer movement that does not join the fight against racism, sexism and classism however is not doing our community justice. We do not live in a ‘queer isolation’, meaning that these fights are just as much ours as they are anyone elses. And importantly if we do not recognise this, we have the very real potential to become a white male movement – one that ignores other struggles and focuses solely on things that benefit white gay people. This is not the movement I want to see.