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“Quite simply, the structure of power in the Judeo-Christian world has made procreation its cornerstone. Families having children assures consumers for the nation’s products and a work force to produce them, as well as a built-in family system to care for its ill, reducing the expense of public healthcare systems. All non-procreative behavior is considered a threat…”
-The Queer Nation Manifesto
-The Queer Nation Manifesto
In my last post, I mentioned how late the B and T were added on to the LGBT+ acronym. This fact alone should indicate that the argument that the LGBT+ community is one that stands up to, or experiences either homophobia, transphobia, or both, is not historically accurate.
“We were all involved in different struggles, including myself and many other transgender people. But in these struggles, in the Civil Rights movement, in the war movement, in the women’s movement, we were still outcasts. The only reason they tolerated the transgender community in some of these movements was because we were gung-ho, we were front liners.” These are the words of Sylvia Rivera, one of the women on the front lines of the Stonewall Riots. In that same speech, she went on to say “We were determined that evening that we were going to be a liberated, free community, which we did acquire that. Actually,I’ll change the ‘we’: You have acquired your liberation, your freedom, from that night. Myself, I’ve got shit, just like I had back then.”
I urge you to read the entirety of that speech, which Rivera gave to the Latino Gay Men of New York at their First Friday Of The Month meeting in June of 2001. Understand that it is disingenuous to argue that the community is about fighting homophobia and transphobia when trans people have consistently been marginalized within the community that now claims to have always been about protecting them.
Furthermore, the “homophobia and transphobia” definition of the LGBT+ community ignores the struggles of bisexual people, and other groups who were historically included under the umbrella of bisexuality, both as members of the community and against biphobia within the community. BiNet USA, which formed during the National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights in 1987, and came to be known by its current name during the early 90′s, defines itself as “America’s umbrella organization and voice for bisexual, pansexual, fluid and all other of us 'somewhere in between’ people”. (And, to be perfectly clear, this historically included a nonzero number of asexual people, according to the lived experiences of bisexual people who were part of the community during this time.) BiNet has had to campaign within the LGBT+ community for inclusion, visibility, and recognition of the fact that bisexual people require resources within the community (particularly considering that bisexual people are prone to higher rates of mental illness due to the strain of biphobia than gay and lesbian people).
Finally, the argument that historical exclusion requires future exclusion does not hold water. The LGBT+ community has historically focused on the rights of gay, and to a lesser extent lesbian, people. This does not mean that this is a good thing, or that there are not other people within the wider LGBT+ umbrella that require assistance with problems other than homophobia.
This post was originally posted here on the historicallyace tumblr on June 19th, 2016. It has been edited from its original version.
Further Reading:
Tumblr post on asexuality and bisexuality
Sylvia Rivera's June 2001 talk at the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center, New York City
The Queer Nation Manifesto
BiNet USA
Bisexual Movements
Transgender Activism
Bisexuals Endure Worst Mental Health Problems
