@sophrosynic Obviously reclamation is not universal. Words in such common usage by the community such as “gay” and “dyke” are still slurs in many contexts and places, but we don’t see the “queer is a slur” crowd running around trying to shut down these terms.
Also, queer can’t be an umbrella term for all people who are not straight/not cis, and the claim that we’re trying to use it to describe the whole LGBT+ community is false. “Queer” is associated with radical activism and resistance to heteronormativity specifically as a reaction to mainstream LGBT+ politics, so it can’t be replaced with LGBT+ and vice versa.
If you’re not queer then you’re not queer. Simple as that.
Except the problem with the word queer has never really been what you’re saying here. No one is saying that people who use the term as an identity can’t do that, or that the word has to be scrubbed entirely out of existence even in historical & certain contemporary contexts. What people have overwhelmingly tried to critique are the politics of reclamation that people ascribe to when it comes to the word queer, specifically the idea that reclaiming a slur on a personal level somehow stops it from being a slur, period, when this is really not true.
It’s not comparable to words like ‘gay’ or ‘d*ke’, mainly because the word gay is not an analogous slur to begin with, and ‘d*ke’ is a slur that is overwhelmingly derogatory towards lesbians and no one else. Many of the lesbians who use the term don’t deny that it’s still a slur, regardless of their own personal usage of the word, which is exactly why non-lesbians are not allowed to use it to refer to lesbians, even if said lesbian happens to use the word as a personal descriptor.
It’s great that you’re happy with identifying as queer, and that this is empowering to you. That’s your personal decision, and no one should dictate to you otherwise on the subject. But it’s not a “reclaimed” slur, and it hasn’t stopped being a slur because some folks have chosen to identify as such. It’s still a slur. Acknowledging that is important.
So not being called queer against your wishes isn’t enough for you. Here you are getting honest, telling me you want it to be relegated to historical and **limited** contemporary contexts. You want us to sharply cut back on its use, to the personal and whatever specific contents you decree.
Like, buddy, of course it’s a slur. If it wasn’t a slur it would never have had to be reclaimed. The reclamation is part of the radical act, turning derision and hatred and violence against us into strength. And no it’s not just personal, it’s a political movement with a lot of history–bold of you to try to erase that on your say-so lmao. Queer is purposefully not respectable like LGBT+ because it is meant to be a giant fuck you to heteronormativity. It is a different politics and replacing it with a word that is not a slur misses the entire point. You don’t like that it’s a slur? Then stay in your respectable LGBT+ boxes where you never have to hear a bad word with bad connotations. Queer isn’t for you and it’s not about you.
You want to know what some of the biggest Pride events in my country are? Queer Culture Festival and Queer Parade. Not Gay Pride, because we reject the idea that cis gay men and cis lesbians represent us all. Not LGBT+ because we don’t all fit into neat categories, and no one gets to play cute little tricks like “Drop the T” or “A is for Ally.” Queer, because we are an indivisible whole, and those who want to pull shit like “Lesbian, not queer” know to stay home. We’re not changing that just because you have an issue with how inclusive the term is and the fact that dirty little aceys can claim it just as easily as you.
We’re here. We’re queer. Cover your damned ears and stay in your fucking lane.
“Here you are getting honest, telling me you want it to be relegated to historical and **limited** contemporary contexts. You want us to sharply cut back on its use, to the personal and whatever specific contents you decree.“
That’s really not what I said? I was offering clarification and an understanding that there are always going to be contexts where the word queer is required and necessary and important, especially if you’re referring to, like you mentioned, “a political movement with a lot of history.”
Also, I didn’t use the word “limited”–you chose to add that, so maybe don’t put words in my mouth? Neither did I say that I wanted to “sharply cut back on its use”–you chose to add that take yourself, so acting like I said or meant that in some way is to have read my response in really bad faith.
“The reclamation is part of the radical act, turning derision and hatred and violence against us into strength.“
Except this isn’t actually all that simple, which was the whole point of my response. It’s much more complicated than that, especially given the complex history and evolution of the movement to begin with, as well as the complex history and usage of the word ‘queer’. This is what I mean when I say that this is a perspective that works for you, but isn’t one that’s shared across the board, especially when you consider the full breadth of the history of queer activism as a whole.
Acting like “reclamation” in general falls neatly into two groups where one group is happy with the word as an identifier, and the other group is not doesn’t even come anywhere close to the actual reality. This perspective wrt “reclamation” has always been super ignorant of the variety of ways in which the word ‘queer’ has been used and is still used today. Quoting from this post:
people have been debating the political efficacy and ethical concerns of using the word “queer” as a self-identifier, unifying term to describe populations, and/or theoretical framework for decades. these debates are not about two sides, where one side thinks it’s great and the other thinks it’s terrible and everybody in either camp agrees with everybody else in their camp.
The perspective also ignores the fact that perspectives on things like queer history/theory/activism are not monoliths, not even within the same organization, let alone the movement. The post I quoted from offers a number of those perspectives from a bunch of different sources, and even that doesn’t come close to just how many varied viewpoints there are, even from the people who were at the forefront of activism in the 90s.
So when I said that “reclamation is not universal.” I don’t just mean that there are some people who are unhappy with and don’t identify with the word ‘queer.’ I meant that there’s a spectrum of views, where the idea of “reclaiming the word” represents just one of them. This is what I meant when I said that it’s great that it works for you, and that this is your perspective, but this is nowhere near representative of the views of the queer movement as a whole. Even if that movement happens to have the word ‘queer’ in the title.
Again, to quote from the same post:
“queer” is complicated, it has multiple histories and meanings, and not accounting for that, especially when talking as if you’re an expert on the issue, is an enormous failure. lgbtq people have rich and complex histories and cultures. if you’re not willing to account for that, then get out of the business of trying to tell our stories.
“Queer is purposefully not respectable like LGBT+ because it is meant to be a giant fuck you to heteronormativity. It is a different politics and replacing it with a word that is not a slur misses the entire point. You don’t like that it’s a slur? Then stay in your respectable LGBT+ boxes where you never have to hear a bad word with bad connotations.“
Holy shit, this is an entire mess. I didn’t address this implication in your original response, because I wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt, but now that you’ve set this down so clearly, it’s worth responding to.
In what world are LGBT+ “respectable” and “tidy” categories of identification? Do you not realize what a profoundly bad take it is to imply that identifying as “queer” makes you somehow more radical in your subsequent politics? Do you realize what you’re saying when you say that LGBT+ is somehow less of a giant fuck you to heteronormativity? And do you even understand where this criticism of the LGBT+ movement as “heteronormative” even emerged from to begin with?
The implication that people who might not want to identify as queer for a variety of reasons are somehow less radical in their identities and their rejection of heteronormativity isn’t just a bad, incorrect take. It’s a deeply homophobic one. If your intention is to use the word queer in a way that encompasses and unifies radical politics against heteronormativity, then I’m gonna tell you flat out that the way you’re using it here is not only wrong, but also immensely disrespectful to the very movement you think it describes, as well as the people who are a part of it.
And like, people have criticized this exact take on multiple occasions because of its limitations and also because it’s one of the most fundamental pitfalls of “queer politics/theory/activism” as a whole. Not only because it’s been a framework that has historically not accounted for things like “race, gender, class” etc, but also because it does the exact thing that you claim it doesn’t do, which is sanitize everyone’s identities into a nebulous, neatly defined little category that doesn’t even account for the sheer diversity of peoples’ identities:
There is something odd, suspiciously odd, about the rapidity with which queer theory–whose claim to radical politics derived from its anti-assimilationist posture, from its shocking embrace of the abnormal and the marginal– has been embraced by, canonized by, and absorbed into our (largely heterosexual) institutions of knowledge, as lesbian and gay studies never were. Despite its implicit (and false) portrayal of lesbian and gay studies as liberal, assimilationist, and accommodating of the status quo, queer theory has proven to be much more congenial to established institutions of the liberal academy.
[…]
The next step was to despecify the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or transgressive content of queerness, thereby abstracting “queer” and turning it into a generic badge of subversiveness, a more trendy version of “liberal”: if it’s queer, it’s politically oppositional, so everyone who claims to be progressive has a vested interest in owning a share of it
“Queer, because we are an indivisible whole, and those who want to pull shit like “Lesbian, not queer” know to stay home.“
And speaking of homophobia, it really didn’t take you very long to break out the garden variety lesbophobia now did it? I mean, I would say I’m surprised, but I’m not. How are you honestly going to start off with the premise that “queer = inclusive” and then say something like “lesbians know to stay home if they don’t like it”? The fact that you typed this shit out with a straight face and zero awareness is emblematic of nearly everything that’s wrong with popular Tumblr discourse about the word queer, lol.
It’s laughable that you state that “queer = indivisible whole,” except for those lesbians who should stay home if they don’t agree with you, because they’re probably too respectably heteronormative anyway. If your so-called “queer activism” and radical politics is one that seeks to exclude people, then it’s not radical, or inclusive, and it’s not activism. It’s just stale, rehashed bigotry.
Also, have you actually spoken to local Korean activists at length, aside from Pride? Because if you sincerely believe that your dumpster fire of a take is somehow universal among the community, then you’re in for a really shocking eye-opener.
“We’re here. We’re queer. Cover your damned ears and stay in your fucking lane.“
That’s cute. Except the way you’re using the phrase “we’re here, we’re queer” is entirely divorced from its actual historical context. So maybe instead of throwing this around like a gotcha, you can spend some time reading up on the history of this chant and how it was born from HIV/AIDS activism, and how it isn’t actually a cutesy little catch-all snap back for people to fling around when they don’t have a leg to stand on.
If “certain contemporary contexts” doesn’t sound limiting to you and you didn’t mean it that way, then fine. You already agreed that it’s okay for people to identify as queer, that it’s a political movement, and that it’s okay to use it. I agreed that it is a slur–a slur that, whatever its level of reclamation, we agree is all right for personal, political, and academic use, though its level of efficacy may be in dispute (more on that later). According to you, you didn’t even mean to tell people to limit its use when you went all “it’s a sluuuuur.” (Jeesh, we know!)
So what was even the point? What’s the point of contention here? You just completely change the subject from queer being a slur to critiques of the queer movement and the fact that my opinion isn’t universal. Why? Because you need to keep this “conversation” going somehow? Because you need to waste more of my time by shifting the conversation every time we reach an agreement?
I never claimed my opinion is universal or that I speak for the whole movement, because who can? Do you speak for the whole LGBT+ movement? The best “rebuttal” you can give is that it’s not that universal or simple, which is… okay? What movement is simple and homogenous? What theory is free from problems? If you were going to come at me about the efficacy of queer as a label and a movement then you could have done that from the start. You didn’t need to act like its being a slur was the end of the argument then move on to substantive critique when we reach an agreement on that. These critiques are valid and important but they really weren’t the point.
Also, you’re being deliberately obtuse if you think my stating the aspirations and background of (some in the) queer movement is an attempt to pin it down to one thing. I was explaining why a slur can still be useful and be worth reclamation and make a political statement–and you agreed. Your points of contention seems to be that it’s not that effective and there isn’t broad agreement, but again, that’s a different conversation that I’m not sure why you’re even bringing into a post about whether it’s okay to continue to use queer. It looks like we’re in agreement: It is! That was the whole point of the OP! To me the fact that you’re dragging things on by adding a ton of irrelevant stuff makes it look suspiciously like you’re still trying to say it shouldn’t be used, while also insisting that’s not what you mean. Maybe talk out of just one side of your mouth?
“The implication that people who might not want to identify as queer
for a variety of reasons are somehow less radical in their identities
and their rejection of heteronormativity isn’t just a bad, incorrect
take. It’s a deeply homophobic one. If your intention is to use the word
queer in a way that encompasses and unifies radical politics against
heteronormativity, then I’m gonna tell you flat out that the way you’re
using it here is not only wrong, but also immensely disrespectful to the
very movement you think it describes, as well as the people who are a
part of it.“
Holy strawmannig, Batman! Like, maybe read what I actually said? I was responding to people like you who object to its use for being a slur. Which you say you’re not. So what’s the argument here, again? I have already said on this very thread that you have reblogged that it’s not an umbrella term and cannot replace LGBT+, and in fact reacts against mainstream LGBT+ politics (M A I N S T R E A M which is by definition not radical, what even are words). That is why, I argued, they are not interchangeable and queer should continue to be in use. Way to accuse me of saying the exact opposite of what I said.
Thanks for the sources, like I said these are really important and good critiques but, again, doesn’t really pertain to this discussion, which is about the usage of “queer.”
“it really didn’t take you very long to break out the garden variety lesbophobia now did it?”
Zomggggg are you really ignorant of what “lesbian, not queer” was about or are you purposefully obscuring it? It’s the same slogan used by the “Get the L Out” people, a.k.a. TERFs, which is what they turned to after “Drop the T” failed. Here it is from the “Get the L Out” campaign’s own website (link):
If you don’t identify as queer, have trauma with it or have other objections to it, then we’re not including you when we say “queer community.” Full stop. Also nearly every word LGBTQ+ people have been using for themselves have been slurs at some point, or still are used as such. If you think an alternative would be better, present one and fight for it to be used. Do what you need to do to protect your mental health, filter words, block people, but don’t tell people who need an inclusive term that they can’t have their own identity because you personally object to a word that has been so thoroughly reclaimed that there are “queer studies” and “queer theory.”
We believe that lesbian rights are under attack by the trans movement and we encourage lesbians everywhere to leave the LGBT and form their own independent movement …
“Lesbian not queer” is literally AT THE TOP OF THEIR WEBSITE. Did you really think these peeps are just stopping at not identifying as queer, that they are critiquing the problems of the queer movement in good faith? Did you really think they’re not flaming transphobes?
Jesus H. Christ, this is how aphobia and exclusionism become gateway drugs to TERF thinking and help mainstream their rhetoric. Get your head out of your ass and stop conflating pushback to transphobia with lesbophobia. That is literal TERF talk. You don’t seem like a transphobe yourself but what you’re doing here is called being a useful idiot.
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