The other thing about the word “queer” is that almost everyone I’ve seen opposed to it have been cis, binary gays and lesbians. Not wanting it applied to yourself is fine, but I think people underestimate the appeal of vague, inclusive terminology when they already have language to easily and non-invasively describe themselves.
Saying “I’m gay/lesbian/bi” is pretty simple. Just about everyone knows what you mean, and you quickly establish yourself as a member of a community. Saying “I’m a trans nonbinary bi woman who’s celibate due to dysphoria and possibly on the ace spectrum”… not so much. You’re lucky to find anyone who understands even half of that, and explaining it requires revealing a ton of personal information. The appeal of “queer” is being able to identify yourself without profiling yourself. It’s welcoming and functional terminology to those who do not have the luxury of simplified language and occupy complicated identities. *That’s* why people use it – there are currently not alternatives to express the same sentiment.
It’s not people “oppressing themselves” or naively and irresponsibly using a word with loaded history. It’s easy to dismiss it as bad or unnecessary if you already have the luxury of language to comfortably describe yourself.
There’s another dimension that always, always gets overlooked in contemporary discussions about the word “queer:” class. The last paragraph here reminds me of a old quote: “rich lesbians are ‘sapphic,’ poor lesbians are ‘dykes’.”
The reclaiming of the slur “queer” was an intensely political process, and people who came up during the 90s, or who came up mostly around people who did so, were divided on class and political lines on questions of assimilation into straight capitalist society.
Bourgeois gays and lesbians already had “the luxury of language” to describe themselves – normalized through struggle, thanks to groups like the Gay Liberation Front.
Everyone else, from poor gays and lesbians to bi and trans people and so on, had no such language. These people were the ones for whom social/economic assimilation was not an option.
The only language left, the only word which united this particular underclass, was “queer.” “Queer” came to mean an opposition to assimilation – to straight culture, capitalism, patriarchy, and to upper class gays and lesbians who wanted to throw the rest of us under the bus for a seat at that table – and a solidarity among those marginalized for their sexuality/gender id/presentation.
(Groups which reclaimed “queer,” like Queer Patrol (armed against homophobic violence), (Queers) Bash Back! (action and theory against fascism, homophobia, and transphobia), and Queerbomb (in response to corporate/state co-optation of mainstream Gay Pride), were “ultraleft,” working-class, anti-capitalist, and functioned around solidarity and direct action.)
The contemporary discourse around “queer” as a reclaimed-or-not slur both ignores and reproduces this history. The most marginalized among us, as OP notes, need this language. The ones who have problems with it are, generally, among those who have language – or “community,” or social/economic/political support – of their own.
Oh hey look it’s the story of my growing up.
All of this is true.
Yes.
also, “qpoc” is a thing, like how about we not take away a term that a lot of people of color id with? thanks :))))
It’s the only word I have for what I am, that encompasses both identity and sexuality. It’s literally the only word. I’m not calling myself a “slur”, I’m using literally the only term that works to define me.
I’m not LGBTQ+. I’m not a catchall. I am a very specific thing.
I know there are people who don’t want it applied to them and I try to be considerate of that because I’m not a total asshole, but we CANNOT throw the term away.
Hank Green + his friends made a whole YouTube channel dedicated to videos explaining how to vote in every. single. state. None of them are longer than three and a half minutes. Deadlines to register are fast approaching in a lot of places so it’s incredibly important that everyone is well informed about what they need to do in order to exercise their right and make their voice heard. Go forth, America. Show up for what you believe in. Make good choices. Please.
because the Republican he’s running against is far worse and Democrats need to retake the Senate, period. You can’t do anything without a majority, that’s just how the whole thing works
Normally I would very much agree, but like…if a “Democrat” habitually votes with the Republicans, then how are they actually Democrat? Manchin’s voting recording is scarcely better than that of Rand Paul and Susan Collins. If you can’t rely on a politician as a Democratic vote, then you don’t have them as part of your potential majority. What good is a vote you can’t rely on?
The Democrats having a majority means they control all committees, which means they control what legislation comes *out* of committees and gets a vote, and what never comes to the floor. They have final say over the rules of parliamentary procedure. They can block Presidential nominees. Controlling Congress, even because of one shitty conservative Senator, basically gives the Democrats the institutional advantage and ability to influence legislation that they completely lack right now, which is why we’re in such constant crisis. People are constantly urging them to fight harder, as if this will materialize a majority out of thin air. If they don’t control either the House or the Senate, they are virtually powerless.
Manchin represents a state that voted 68.5% for Trump, which was literally his largest margin of victory. In West Virginia, Manchin is consistently attacked for being “too liberal.” And like, let’s not forget that “scarcely better” than Rand Paul and Susan Collins still means something, because there’s still a lot of room between the most conservative Democrats and “moderate” Republicans these days. Last summer, Manchin voted against the ACA repeal, while Paul voted for it. Manchin voted against the tax bill while Collins voted for it.
Also, the primary is over. In November he’s up against a Republican, not a more progressive Democrat. It’s going to be one of them seated in the Senate in 2019. Even if control of the Senate were not in play, there is no way anyone on the left could honestly look at his opponent Patrick Morrisey’s positions and conclude it would be better to have him in the Senate. I hope that Manchin gets sidelined in a Democratic controlled Senate, but I’m not willing to risk everything just to punish him for this cowardly, disgusting vote.
Kids, this is strategy not philosophy. You need to look at this at a very, very base level, and that base level is: every red tick in the Houses is an obstacle, every blue tick in the Houses is, at the very least, A LACK OF OBSTACLE.
This is called “hold your nose” voting. Hate Manchin a lot? That’s totally legit. If you’re in the appropriate area, right now it is absolutely also a good idea to start looking for a Democratic challenger to get rid of Manchin for NEXT time. And you should do that now, because it may well TAKE all the rest of the time working to get the right momentum to unseat Manchin. But that’s next time.
For this time, you don’t have another Dem option. You have Manchin, or a red tick. A red tick is REALLY. REALLY. BAD. Manchin is kinda crappy.
If it’s NOT MANCHIN then it will be THE RED TICK. There is no “neither” option. That option is not available to you. There is no “neither”. There is Manchin, or part of the GOP machine.
Is it crappy that this is where things are? For sure. Should it be different? Yes. It will take a lot of work to make it different, and that work does not start by handing that seat to a Republican because Manchin sucks. In fact, that will prevent the work from being done.
Triage. Prioritize. You are trying to get to a point where you will have the breathing room to do real work: to try and bring the landscape up to where you can have better options than Manchin. If a Republican takes that seat, YOU WILL BE FURTHER FROM THAT PLACE.
Voting Manchin in DOES NOT MEAN you’re saying “I approve of everything they do and think shit is solved if Manchin gets elected”. You can (and SHOULD) vote Manchin in AND THEN KEEP PUSHING.
But in this mid-term you have two choices. One of them adds strength to the GOP machine that is a problem. One of them doesn’t.
One of them means your bigger project of Changing Things stops dead in the water or worse, gets pushed backwards. One means it doesn’t, even if it doesn’t help.
That’s a no-brainer.
Please do not let Evil win because Good is too effing stupid to be able to set up a long-term ongoing strategy to effect our goals.
The Supreme Court just issues a ruling allowing Ohio and other states to purge voters from their election registration rolls due to their failure to cast a ballot in previous elections.
This is a major victory for the Trump administration and the GOP, and a direct consequence of the Supreme Court being stacked with more conservative judges (the votes were 5-4). This is also a huge part of what Trump/the GOP were counting on to save them in the 2018 midterm elections, which is where Democrats have been hoping to take back a majority in the House, giving them more power to combat Trump’s abuses of power and Republican legislation.
What this means is YOU CAN NOT ASSUME THAT YOU ARE REGISTERED for the 2018 elections, just because you SHOULD be. Thanks to this decision, red states can purge voters’ registration based on their not having cast a ballot in even just previous federal elections, NOT just the national Presidential elections. Effectively, if you haven’t voted in previous senate races or for congressional representatives in the past few years, that’s all they need now to say you’re no longer registered and need to register again.
They’re deliberately counting on people assuming they’re still registered and so not checking until after registration deadlines have passed, or showing up to vote this November and only then finding out they’re no longer registered, when its too late to do a damn thing about it.
And this is absolutely targeted at marginalized communities, low income voters, disabled voters, and basically anyone who simply can’t always AFFORD to keep on top of every federal election and show up to vote in every senate race, etc. Which not so coincidentally happen to be all the communities and voters who have the most to gain from Democratic victories in the 2018 midterms and are the least likely to cast votes for GOP candidates at this point.
This was absolutely a calculated effort aimed specifically at keeping the GOP in power with a majority control of the government come November, and unfortunately, it has a DAMN good chance of accomplishing just that if it goes by unacknowledged. I’m not looking to alarm or panic anyone, simply to say:
If you are a registered voter in a red state at this point, please please please do not take your registered status as assumed. Check on your registration status, look up all relevant voter registration deadlines for your state and district, CIRCLE THAT SHIT ON YOUR CALENDAR, and check your registration status AGAIN right before those deadlines pass, so you can be sure of it before its too late to do anything about it til the next voting cycle.
Make sure you check it periodically because the newest voter roll purges likely haven’t happened yet.
IF VOTING DIDN’T MATTER, THEY WOULDN’T BE TRYING TO TAKE AWAY YOUR RIGHT TO DO IT.
Reblog this and then reblog it again.
REBLOG REBLOG REBLOG
You can use resistbot to both check your registration status AND register to vote if you need to. You can also have it text you every month with your status to ensure that nothing has changed.
Some people are commenting by saying that when an employee is fired, it’s because the employee did something wrong.
But the same is true when someone quits. Usually an employee quits because their boss did something wrong. For example, if the boss doesn’t pay a living wage, then the boss has been doing something wrong for literally every second that the employee was there.
“why can’t female heroes kick arse in heels” because it’s not practical and will literally snap your damn ankle you can scream weaponised femininity all you want but first off, you need to admit that they’re not an almighty symbol of empowerment, and secondly that if you do a job with a lot of physical activity in heels you’re risking your own safety. all these women fighting in heels on tv are going to end up seriously injuring themselves.
weaponised femininity is a concept made up in an attempt to get us to embrace the industries created to hold us back/profit from our insecurities so that we can continue to fit into the male expectation of what a woman should be and not question why we are forced to spend thousands on our appearance every year
just a small anecdote. I had a friend who worked in theater; she was the stage manager and an actress came to her in tears one day because the director absolutely refused to let her do a choreographed fight scene in less than 3 inch heels because “they’re platforms so you’ll be okay.” My friend, who is a woman’s size 10, brought her own heels in the next day and DEMANDED the director put them on and try the choreography before the actress did it. He finally agreed to change it, without putting the heels on.
so like I know you might think of “all those women on tv fighting in heels” as fictional woman who WOULD hurt themselves in real life, but its fiction so its okay…except those women are portrayed by real actresses who are actually fighting in actual heels, being directed by dudes who have never worn a pair of heels in their lives, alongside men who aren’t expected to constantly wear things that make their stunts 2x more dangerous than they have to be. Just a thought.
Men take “let’s see feminine women being badass” to mean “let’s see women impractically focused on their appearance in combat situations.“
That’s why I loved Black Panther even more Nakia took off her heels and used them as weapons and was running and driving around barefoot in that one scene
A number of stuntwomen have spoken out about getting injured on sets because the character is wearing heels and skimpy clothing that provide no protection or padding. It literally harms rl women.
The only way I wanna see a women fight with heels is if she takes them off and fights with them a la Mulan/Nakia style.
sorry i can’t hear the noise of male entitlement over the sound of Evangeline Lilly and every other woman sighing in frustration
They photoshopped the heels onto wonder woman. Not even Gal Gadot could fight in them, but it was so important to The Look™ that they frame by frame added them. Gal wore flats to the red carpet in protest.
Frankenuff’s Castle 