Michael
Warner opens with an anecdote about the gay magazine “Hero”, the first
intentionally sex-free magazine of its kind. The editor of “Hero” started the
magazine after being shocked that an essay he wrote for another magazine
appeared above an advertisement for phone sex—he wanted a magazine he could
show to his mom. Warner uses this anecdote, and others, to paint a picture of queer
reactions to stigma. He talks about Erving Goffman’s categories of people into “stigmaphiles”,
who share identity and community with other people stigmatized for the same
things as them, and “stigmaphobes”, who each strive to be one of the “normals”
(3).
Warner
draws a line between normative gay and lesbian movements and radical queer
ones, pointing out that normative groups have far more social and political
power than radical ones, saying “The more you are willing to articulate
political issues in a way that plays to a normal audience, the more success you
are likely to have.” (3) He says what defines gay and lesbian communities is
that they have to be somewhat sexual in order to find members united primarily
by who their sexual objects are, but that they simultaneously “draw the curtain”
over that sexuality to avoid shame. He claims that these communities’ rejection
of queerness in favor of normativity isn’t malicious, but based in “trickle-down”
thinking (26). Still, their rejection treads upon people who can’t or won’t
live normatively. Normative gay and lesbian figureheads like James Collard, “post-gay”
editor of Out Magazine, appear as leaders of the “true lesbian and gay movement”
by virtue of the power their stigmaphobic ideologies lends them (28-29). Queer
communities, on the other hand, teach us that “everyone deviates from the norm
in some context or other and that the statistical norm has no moral value” (30)
Warner’s
writing about the conflict between more conservative (mostly) LGB queer people
who want to “stay at home and make their boyfriends dinner” and queer people who
actively reject norms resonated with my own experience in queer communities. A
lot of my earliest queer friends were of the former category, and I remember
being confused that they wanted to fight their feelings of shame and stigmatization
around their sexualities by making their sexualities appear more acceptable,
rather than ~being themselves~ and challenging the definition of acceptable.
This
piece also made me think about disabled queer people’s experiences—many people perceive
those with disabilities, especially intellectual/developmental disabilities, as
neuter or not interested in sex. I wonder how queer disabled people’s
sexualities are seen, if they are seen at all?
Discussion
questions:
1)
How does “respectable” gay and lesbian normativity harm or disempower other,
more non-normative queer people?
2)
Warner says “Variations from the norm…are not necessarily signs of pathology.
They can become new norms” (18). How do LGBTQIA+/queer people conform to norms
within their communities? When do those norms conflict with or diverge from mainstream
heterosexual culture? When do they converge with it?
3)
“Is it normal to want to be normal?” (15)
Bonus
(silly) question: was Warner’s comment about “letting all the gerbils scamper
free” a reference to the urban legend about the gay men and the gerbil?
Apologies for any typos/brainos--I realized too late that this post was due at 6pm yesterday, and I'm running on very little sleep. Forgive me!
In response to question one, I think there are many ways "respectable" norms harm non-conforming queer people. As a group, queer people are already ostracized by "normal" straight society. When norms of respectability begin to be enforced within the queer community, non-normative queer people are ostracized within their own community. This is especially harmful if, as we've seen in the U.S., the mainstream queer movements have prioritized the acceptance of issues viewed as normal, like same-sex marriage. While advocating for same-sex marriage may promote greater acceptance for the queer community as a whole, it further ostracizes non-conforming queer people from both straight society and the mainstream queer rights movement.
ReplyDeleteThe author also vaguely mentions "gender-nonconformity" as a marker of non-normative characteristic in mainstream society. The harm comes when this is directly compared to "respectable" gay and lesbian normativity. While reading this, I thought about how cis-gendered, homosexual people are deemed acceptable if they fit into the prescribed capitalist model of "normal". However, this identification of "normal" is only possible in comparison with "non-normal" or deviant identities. This means that for one group to be accepted by larger society, another group inherently needs to be demonized as "not normal". This relates to historic trans* exclusion and marginalization in queer political movements. Someone is only "normal" when juxtaposed with someone "non normal", therefore normalcy is inherently stigmatizing to a certain group, like LGB leaving behind the T to confer legitimacy in society.
ReplyDeleteTo question 3, at least from a psychology perspective (side note: I'm no psyc major so feel free to correct me) it is normal to want to fit in, which often is related to presenting as "normal". People inherently want to be "normal" aka accepted by others. Since humans live in social groups, being a pariah would lead to anxiety, depression, isolation, and (back in the day) inability to feed or produce offspring. So evolutionarily, it makes sense to want to fit in! And since normal is presented as the majority, and people are so shammed for not being normal, it is often the case that the only group around to fit-in with is the "normal" group. That all being said, there are lots of people who like to be different and take pride in their non-normativity, and these people may create their own group. So it is possible to fit-in with abnormal groups, but those groups still face so much pressure to conform. I'd argue that while it's normal to want to fit in and be normal, I wouldn't say it's always the "right" (morally or ethically, if you believe there are right and wrong things) thing to do. Most of the time, the normal group is the oppressive group with access to money and power, as Warner discusses. So being normal and fitting in is often the same as being complicit in oppressive power structures that harm minority groups. In this way, one might say that being normal or conforming is the easier thing to do, since it gives you access to power. To the bonus question: I'M GLAD I WASN'T THE ONLY ONE THINKING THAT. I laughed really hard.
ReplyDeleteI agree. Because people are so driven and influenced by society, I think it's "normal" to want to be "normal." At the same time, I think everyone wants to be extraordinary or different, but they still filter those desires through some kind of "normal" lens. In order to do anything exciting or different, it involves opening the mind to a new idea or way of seeing something. Yet we are constantly told that there are strict ways to do things. I think this contradiction manifests itself in many ways in our society.
DeleteAlso, sidenote, I actually found the issue with the phone sex ad kind of confusing because at first I sort of agreed that if I wrote an article, I wouldn't necessarily want my mother to read it with the ad underneath. But, as mentioned before, we must question why this ad seems lewd or embarrassing and ask ourselves what it means and what we give up by screening ourselves and our work.
To add on to Andrea and Eliza's comments, I find it interesting that hierarchies form even in oppressed groups. Underneath the LGBTQ umbrella, there are certain queer groups that have more power and privilege than others. For example, white gay men are considered more "normal" than Black trans women. However, as we all know, as a whole the community is not considered "normal" in mainstream society (i.e. white supremacist, capitalistic, patriarchal, heteronormative, homophobic, transphobic, etc.).
ReplyDeleteThis is pretty much what I wrote my essay on -- the stigmaphobe vs. stigmaphile tension is basically the radicalism vs. reformism tension. Reformists/stigmaphobes try to assimilate within a flawed system that establishes the stigma in the first place. However it is their privilege to be able to assimilate, as they are usually white, upper-class, gender-conforming -- basically "respectable" in all aspects except their sexuality. Reformism reassures others further down on the "respectability ladder" that stigmatized people need to rely on "trickle-down acceptance" where the most societally acceptable get benefits from the LGTB movement first. This is a gross injustice because it is usually the more radical "stigmaphile" groups who start these kind of movements. As Warner puts it, the "new arrivals" to the movement don't appreciate the radical efforts of those early on in the movement who are the reason that they can "see themselves as part of a movement without having to take the same degree of risk" (75). We see this in Sylvia Riviera's account of how the queens were "left behind" even though they put a lot of work in founding organizations like GLF. You can't achieve any sort of equality by throwing "lower" minorities under the bus and assimilating into a society rife with racism, classism, homophobia, transphobia, and all that other crappy systemic oppression.
ReplyDeleteThe beginning anecdote of this article really made me think about queerness as community, and how you balance having a community whose main joining factor is non-"normative" sexual preference, and celebrating and supporting that preference, but not reducing all communications explicitly to sex and sexuality. On the one hand, I think sex in general is massively shamed in society and is so often talked about as this warped, sinful thing (going double for queer sex because it is, according to homophobes, not "procreative", though we know that assumption erases trans* people completely) and that this can be really damaging. So on that note, I think it is important not to silence queer people when it comes to expressing queer sexuality. At the same time, I also think it is important to have parts of the community that don't focus exclusively on sex, since A. queer people are obviously not just their sexual identity, and B. this shoves people on the asexual spectrum to the side, who may want to participate in queer community but feel prohibited from doing so if all events are sex-focused.
ReplyDeleteI don't mean to imply that I think queer communities are based only on sex and sexual preference (they are obviously not) and I don't mean to say there is any one "right" way for queer communities to conduct themselves, I just think its interesting in light of the anecdote that begins the article.