One of the
valuable lessons I am taking away from “Gender, Justice, and Sexuality” is that
people (myself definitely included) will almost always make assumptions about
things that they know very little about. At the beginning of this semester,
although I could say without any hesitance that I identified as someone who
loved and accepted those who do not fit the gender or sexuality norm, I knew
very little about what injustices LGBTQ people in America have experienced
historically and what they still face today. I wrongfully assumed that the equal right to marry was the most important issue
on the gay rights agenda and since that had been achieved, things would pretty
much be downhill from here on for LGBTQ people.
It took only a few
classes to realize that marriage equality and justice for all LGBTQ people was
not at all the same thing. But what exactly does justice for all LGBTQ look
like? In order to answer that question I
want to talk about the words “queer” and “justice” to get at a starting point
of understanding of both and what each word means.
To
begin with, when I say the word “queer” I am talking about it in its reclaimed
sense of the word. While “queer” most simply means “odd or different,”
homophobic people have historically used the word as an insulting word for
someone who is attracted to the same sex or for people who are thought of as
lesser because they do not fit into the binaries around gender and sexuality
that our culture values.
The reclaiming of
queer happened within communities of LGBT people who decided to embrace their
difference instead of feeling shame about it. Queer now can be a way of finding
an identity that relates to anyone who doesn’t quite fit into “normal,” when it
comes to gender and sexuality. Queer acknowledges that not all people can
relate or fit into the sex and gender binaries of our culture. In this sense,
Queer can be used as an umbrella terms to include all LGBT people, but it also
leaves room for those who may not feel that their experiences perfectly fall
into the categories of lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. PFLAG ,
a network of LGBT people and their friends, family, and allies, gives a great
description of why queer can be helpful as an identifier; “It is a fluid label
as opposed to a solid label, one that only requires us to acknowledge that
we’re different without specifying how or in what context.”
Now that I have laid out a basic
understanding of queer, let’s talk about what justice means to me. Being a Peace
and Justice major, every year I get asked by my professors to give my working
definition of what justice is. It’s honestly a lot easier to point out what
justice is not, because I end up
studying more about injustices in order to try and get at what justice actually
is.
If injustice leads
to people struggling (and sometimes failing) to simply survive in the world,
then justice must lead people to being able to thrive in the world. This kind
of “thriving” should not be mistaken with living in such a way that thrives at
the expense of others, but rather thrives with and in relationship to others.
This definition that works best for me because it doesn’t place justice as a
stationary thing, but something that can only be known by what outcomes it
creates for people. If the action or thing does not create conditions for
people to thrive in their lives, or move them closer to thriving, then it is
not justice.
This
definition of justice can be applied to understand what Queer Justice is as
well. Right now, our society is one in which many queer people will have to
struggle to merely survive. There have been steady improvements towards legal
acknowledgement for queer people, but it has been met with furious pushback and
can by no means be said to have given all queer people what they need to
thrive. While conservative Americans cringe at the “eroding moral framework of
our once great (straight?) nation” due to granting same-sex partners the legal
right to marry, many queer people (especially queers of gender and ethnic
minorities) “still ain’t satisfied” and need a lot more to happen to get them to a place of thriving.
I don’t want to belittle the
legislative work that has helped move things in a just direction. Urvashi Vaid,
LGBT activist and author of the above link to “Still Ain’t Satisfied,” acknowledges
that legal equality matters significantly and that the policy wins for LGBTs in
marriage equality, repealing “don't ask don’t tell,” and improvements in
state-level anti-discrimination laws should not go uncelebrated. However, this
does not mean that queer people are not still struggling to simply exist.
So, how are queer people currently
struggling?
Criminalization
and Sexual Abuse in the Criminal Legal System
Queer people (particularly queer people of
color) face criminalization in disproportionate numbers to straight white
people. According to authors of Queer
(In)justice, not only are queer people more likely to be arrested and
sentenced to prison, they are at far higher risk of enduring sexual violence
from inmate and prison officers alike once in prison. In fact, the book sites a
2007 study of six federal prisons that found that up to 67% of LGBT inmates
reported being sexually assaulted.
Queer
Youth Experiencing Homelessness
LGBT youth
disproportionately face family rejection and homelessness as a result. The
reason being that many homeless youth either leave their homes due to familial
rejection and abuse after “coming out” or are forced to leave their homes all
together. The National Coalition for the Homeless reports that 40-30% of homeless youth identify as LGBT. Many such homeless youth
end up in the juvenile justice system. Some studies report that LGBT youth in the juvenile justice system are twice as likely to
have experienced child abuse and homelessness as straight youth.
Just because it is legal for
same-sex couples to marry in all fifty states does not mean that they can’t get
fired for doing so. Discriminating against LGBTQ people in the work place is
still completely legal in most states. You can still be legally fired based
solely on your sexuality in all the red states shown below. Queer people
certainly cannot thrive in the United States if the majority of our state
governments cannot even ensure that they can’t be legally discriminated
against.
Social
Stigma Persists
You don’t have to look very far to
discover that social stigma attached to identifying as queer or LGBT is highly
prevalent. Being “opposed to gay marriage” has become a cornerstone in the
Republican Party’s platform. Just yesterday, while walking through the Chicago
airport, I watched a group of college age boys turn their heads and make eyes
at each other when a gender non-conforming individual walked by them. A recent
study by the Human Rights Campaign found that 63% of LGBT
Americans report being discriminated against because of their sexual
orientation or gender identity. Frankly, I was surprised the number wasn’t
higher.
So how can we seek justice in all
of this?
Queer Justice begins by questioning
the normal, conventional, and assumed, not for its own sake, but because queer
people have valid experiences outside these constructs. In order for queer people
to experience justice, or being able to thrive in their lives, the starting
point lies within questioning and deconstructing norms. In order for me to cast
off any assumptions about what LGBT and queer people need justice in, I had to
begin by questioning my norms and listening to valid experiences outside those
norms. Queer Justice can only happen when people (myself included) are willing
to acknowledge that queer experiences are valid even when they do not coincide
with their own lived experiences. There is something so liberating about having
your voice heard and your experiences validated. Right now, the best way I
believe I can practice Queer Justice is by being quicker to listen and seek
understanding and slower to place assumptions on people that are based off my
own lived experiences. Queer Justice has taught me the value, and ultimately
the justice, that can come from seeking understanding of lived queer
experiences and points of view.
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