The state we're in: Locations of coercion and resistance in trans policy, part 2 (original) (raw)

The Uneasy Collaboration of Gay and Trans Activism, 1964-2003

People who are today known as transgendered and transsexual have always been present in homosexual rights movements. Their presence and contributions, however, have not always been fully acknowledged or appreciated. As in many other social reform movements, collective activism in gay and lesbian social movements is based on a shared collective identity. Homosexual collective identity, especially in the days before queer politics, was largely framed as inborn, like an ethnicity, and based primarily on sexual desires for persons of the same sex and gender. 1 However, such definitions make sense only when founded on clearly delineated distinctions between sexes and genders. It becomes considerably harder to delineate who is gay and who is lesbian when it is not clear who is a male or a man and who is a female or a woman. Like bisexual people, transgendered and transsexual people destabilize the otherwise easy division of men and women into the categories of straight and gay because they are both and/or neither. Thus there is a long-standing tension over the political terrain of queer politics between gays and lesbians, on the one hand, and transgendered and transsexual people, on the other.

Searching for Normal: A History of the Discourse of the Modern Gay Rights Movement

2013

Searching for Normal: A History of the Discourse of the Modern Gay Rights Movement Author: Tyler Quick Across the industrialized world, nations and subnational entities are establishing methods by which to recognize same-sex unions, banning discrimination based on sexual orientation, and making policy decisions about how to legislate sexuality based upon the ideology of the gay rights movement. This movement relies on the classical liberal and modernist ideal of citizenship, with its grounding in human rights, and the theory of biologically innate sexual orientation to advocate for the inclusion, and perhaps the assimilation, of LGBTQ people into state and society. The critics of gay rights argue that this tactic is, at its best, assimilationist and, at its worst, harmful to queer people. In analyzing the discourse surrounding the legislation that has been passed in three case studies (the cities of São Paulo, Brazil, Mexico City, and San Francisco, California and the states in whic...

When Saying Gay Is No Longer Sufficient: Response to Marie-Amélie George’s Expanding LGBT

FloridaLaw Review Forum, 2023

In her article, Expanding LGBT, Professor George attempts to provide a framework beyond incrementalism and radicalism to think about how U.S. LGBT organizations can reformulate their missions and advocacy efforts to benefit queer individuals. She argues that doing so will not only better the lives of queer non-binary, intersex, and asexual people, but also the more marginalized individuals within the LGBT community (i.e., trans and bisexual folks). As a departing point for her proposal, she uses the incorporation, about two decades ago, of the trans community into the U.S. national LGB movement. This response focuses on three interrelated aspects that George’s article does not explore. First, whether it is possible or advisable that, in lieu of the expansion of the LGBT movement to LGBTQIA, we transition to a movement focused on inequality in general with an emphasis in sexual orientation and gender identity and expression (SOGIE) equality. Second, the effects the historical context has on conditioning the different alternatives discussed for movement expansion. Third, whether the current social landscape could mean a setback in SOGIE equality if movements continue their advocacy with limited representation of the more marginal members of the LGBT community.

Defending Genders: Sex and Gender Non-Conformity in the Civil Rights Strategies of Sexual Minorities

Hastings Law Journal, 1997

2. Id. at 114748. 3. John D'Emilio identifies the emergence of identity politics in the 1970s, which became "the organizing framework for oppression and... the basis for collective mobilization," as partly responsible for the foundering of the more radical aspects of the gay liberation movement in the U.S., a movement which originally sought to challenge the very categories upon which gay oppression was based. The rise of the Gay Activist Alliance and the concomitant demise of the Gay Liberation Front exemplifies this shift. JOHN D'EMILIO, MAKING TROUBLE 245 (1992).

The unfinished revolution: social movement theory and the gay and lesbian movement

Choice Reviews Online, 2002

Tracing the rainbow: an historical sketch of the American gay and lesbian movement To be overtly homosexual, in a culture that denigrates and hates homosexuals, is to be political. An historical analysis of the American gay and lesbian movement utilizing the political process model seeks to answer a variety of questions. What changing opportunity enabled the movement even to be contemplated? What types of organizations existed to capitalize on this opportunity? When did members of this disenfranchized minority realize their inherent agential power thereby experiencing cognitive liberation? What organizations did the movement spur? What type of response did the movement elicit from both the government and other citizens? How has the movement changed over the course of its existence? What factors have in¯uenced this change? This chapter attempts to address these questions by sketching the evolution of the American gay and lesbian movement throughout the post-war period. Starting with an analysis of the effect of the Second World War on homosexual identity and community, this chapter traces the development of the homophile movement of the 1950s and 1960s, explores the effect of the Stonewall riots of 1969, examines the ideology of gay liberation in the 1970s, analyzes the complex impact of AIDS on the movement, and assesses current notions of gay and lesbian visibility and the present status of the movement. Although homosexuals have obviously existed before this time, and a homosexual subculture had been emerging since the late nineteenth century, the onset of the Second World War ushered in a new era of visibility that would profoundly shape not just the lives of American gay men and lesbians, but question the understanding of sexuality itself. Despite and sometimes because of the mounting political war against them, the generation of the Second World War gay veterans did ®nd ways to break through

The Politics of Homosexual Minorities: The Evolution and Identity [26.05.2013]

The purpose of this essay is to explore the identity of homosexual minorities and how this discourse has become such a big phenomenon. Can homosexuals be considered minorities based on sexual orientation? Do homosexuals have the right to demand certain freedoms or benefits? These questions and concerns regarding homosexual discourse have been a hot-button issue in the last 50 years and have set the movement on the agenda of many a nation. In order to better understand the evolution of homosexual identity there will be a progressive characterization of this term and its part in discourse theory. Under the five arguments established by E. Laclau and C. Mouffe, homosexuality as a discourse will be analyzed.