lesbian and gay press in Britain and the USA have been filled with a new debate - on 'queer politics and building a 'queer' movement. REBECCA FLEMMING investigates. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was Queer, and Queer was the Word.
Before the beginning, Queer was an abusive epithet, mainly aimed at gay men. It was occasionally used by lesbians and gay men, pubicly in chants and privately to refer to ourselves. It was used to inject an element of sett. depreciation, parody or defiance.
After the beginning, Queer became a radical new word for lesbian of gay. which some felt was clumsy (hence Tesbian and gay or had become as hstlutonalsed and sexualy respectable as homosexual.
T-shirts
Organisations such as A Queer Tabe in Brighton and Queer Nation (ON) in the USA were born. Outrage's 'Queer as Fuck' T-shirt, so successfully advertised by Jason Donovan, was much in evidence.
These groups shared certain themes. The focus was on publicity stunts and there was a conscious em patis on style, culture and a good For some, that is where Queer remains - a label with a cutting odge. provocative and sexy. and a single. inclusive term for lesbians and gaya. men. But both of those points have been questioned. Is a Queer wedding June 27, 1992 Certainly the constant splintering o and demonstrates the limts of words to Some north American lesbian academics have taken the concept of Jeer several stages further an created 'Queory". "heir ideas ar rooted in a complex discussion involving psychoanalysis and different forms of human communication.
Campagning (doing) is conveniently reduced to theatrical stunts, media coverage and use of the word Queer (saying).
Apolitical
On this side of the Atlantic there has been the appearance Queerpoitics, also loosely linked to the new activism. It has captivated the eabian and gay press was din shaped by move towards individualism and the apolitical after 13 years of Tory rule.
Sex is a fundamental concept for Queerpolitics' - become what we do in bed, cottage, dungeon, whatever turns you on. Worse, this is seen as a victory over lesbian feminism which is reduced to ts pro-censorship, anti-sex current.
This is combined with a retreat from autonomy • Movement is not the lesbian and gay movement by another name. Rather it encompasses - in theory - some l lesbians and gay transsexuals and transvestites (the vast majority of whom are straight). heterosexual saco-masochists, and psooopnlas among others Outrage!, for example, is no longer a lesbian and gay organisation but a Queer one, prompting some to leave. No. 24 are on the individual - who is urged to be Queer. This is in contrast to the lesbian and gay movement's project, calling for society to accept and incorporate lesbians and gay men. This may well be the direction of lobbying groups like Stonewall, but at least they are doing something, however inadequate.
Shocking
Queerpolitics is empty gesture, posdure. slanfying nothing, let alone a radical atternatire. The only public action seems simply to shock, in the most reactionary way. It prefers not to ask why, avoiding confronting key issues around the nuclear family. gender. race and class in its search for the glib and sexy, But ultimately, words cant sub sttute for politics. People, gay or straight, can announce themselves to be Queer, but will it change anything?
Will it hel lesbian mothers keep custody of their children? Will X stop Ansual sex? Wil it move us one iota towards a : where people car lecide their own sexual orientation free from inequality and oppression?
Unfortunately the answer to all these questions is 'no'.
Oppressed
The harsh reallty is that one sexual identity - heterosexuality - is rivileged, and one - lesbian and ga sexual identity • is oppressed. Thi can't be wished away.
* demands a long, hard struggle for lesbian and gay liberation, to end a specific oppression rather than a vacue norm And struggle means doing, not saying. Outrageous stunts are fine, but don't amount to a strategy for lesbian and gay liberation PHOTO: Paul Motseon
Anti-abortionists throw away Irish Maastricht referendum International News * * * copax ten the amendment into European law, denying Irish women the right to travel.
Despite the unions' call for a 'Yes' vote, opposition to Maastricht was strongest among working class communmes, when expentence unt mployment and deprivation The Irish National Organisa tion for the Unemployed was among those calling for a No vote, as was the Union of Students in Ireland (USD).
USI were instrumental in sethasht, the "Youth Against camogressive platfor: for workers' rights, women's rights and defence of Irish neutrality.
But the main anti-Maastricht campaign, the National Platselves from SPUC in the hope of some spurious tactical advantage. The opposite proved