It's clear that the LGBT movement at the present is dead, or at least its gone back to sleep. Two years ago, we marched in the streets for equal rights chanting "Yes, we can!" Today, we're back to spending our time waiting for the powers that be to act and gossiping among ourselves about the next move of so-and-so politician. As the latest chapter of the LGBT movement comes to a close, it's time for a reassessment. Over the coming months, I’ll be writing critical assessments of the LGBT Liberation movement from a Marxist perspective.
Some of the topics I’ll be covering:
- 1. The four main periods of the LGBT movement and what was different about the latest chapter
- 2. Gay Rights v. Queer Liberation, how activists from each camp undermine the progress towards liberation and why neither makes a priority of teaching LGBT people to see themselves as the agents of the their own liberation
- 3. An analysis of the concept of “assimilation”, its origins, and its ultraleftist strand
- 4. The question of “middle class ideology” in the movement
- 5. The ultraleftist stand of the queer liberationists towards the trade unions
- 6. A critique of the “queer oppositionist” perspective: “The point is to change it”
- 7. The unique challenges of LGBT Liberation compared to other social movements including the relatively late development of the notion of “homosexual” identity and community, the early co-optation by the Democratic Party, the impact of AIDS and its decimation of an entire generation of movement cadre, and the impact of neoliberalism
- 8. Democracy as a solution to the impasse of gay politics
- 9. The radical roots of LGBT Liberation: why Marxism was necessary for the birth of the movement and why a return to Marxism is necessary to move forward
Here's a taste: Today's corporate model of activism seeks validation from the guardians of ...the status quo. This is wrong. Our allies are not in the Halls of Congress but in the streets, in the churches, in the fields, in day labor camps, in mosques, in union halls, in schools and universities, on stage, and in prisons. What is solidarity? The first post-Stonewall protest occurred in July 1969 when gay and lesbian activists protested the conditions of the House of Detention for Women just a few blocks from the Stonewall Inn. One of the prisoners at the time was Afeni Shakur, mother of the late rapper Tupac Shakur, who was arrested for her involvement with the Black Panther Party.
ReplyDeleteI would really like to kiss you for the premise alone. I will be reading!!!
ReplyDelete