Arlene Stein’s book “Sex and Sensibility” is a literary masterpiece that develops the framework of content that was essential towards explaining the rise of the lesbian movement; though solid in its message, Stein’s bias is recognized throughout the text, she was cognizant of issues and factors that affected the movement but she fails to piece together the entire spectrum. Stein captures three fundamental factors displayed throughout the text: (1). The recognition of new sexual identities and their associated orientations (2). The separation of the Feminist and Lesbianist movements, and (3). The differentiation of the “Old Gay” and “New Gay”lesbian identities.
Society tries to create a “perfect” image on people; leading us to believe that if we are not the specific way that we created, we do not fit in. In reality everybody is supposed to create themself, regardless of what society believes. Does what we label others matter? Who are we to judge how others chose to create themselves? In David Crabb’s memoir Bad Kid, Crabb takes the readers through what it was like discovering that he is gay, and how that changed how kids treated him during school.
In their respective pieces about the transgender community, Mari Birghe’s piece falls short due to its lack of detailed examples and its heavy reliance on eliciting sympathy from the reader to persuade as well as its failure to see the other side of the argument while Elinor Burkett’s piece proves far superior due to its multitude of extensive examples in addition to its surplus of concessions. Burkett’s piece is stronger in part due to the surplus of concrete examples provided in contrast to Birghe’s meager examples. In Elinor Burketts’s piece, which states transgender women are not entirely female because of their previous male privilege, she intertwines many specific examples that help to prove her overall message. This is that transgender
“The Gay Liberation Youth Movement in New York: "An Army of Lovers Cannot Fail" : Stephan Cohen : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming.” Internet Archive, 14 August 2019, https://archive.org/details/cohen-gylib. Accessed 23 March 2023. K, Kristi. “Something Like A Super Lesbian: Stormé DeLarverie (In Memoriam).”
This emotionally appeals to readers to accept Croome’s truth on the issue of vilification, that unregulated discussion on LGBTI issues will cause damage that must be avoided. The historical context surrounding the quote of a Tasmania with criminalised homosexuality alongside public hatred and bashings of homosexual people further positions the modern-day audience to sympathise with Gadsby as someone ill-treated by archaic laws. The omission of other queer voices establishes Gadsby as the personification and representation of all LGBTI people. The predominance of Gadsby influences readers by characterising queer cultural values as just the helpless ones Gadsby embodies and none of the positive values the movement embodies. Croome’s privileging of Gadsby’s experience as a homosexual is intended to inform the audience that, when unrestricted debate is allowed, LGBTI existence is drab and oppressed, clearly stating his stance on the issue of hate speech.
In this day and age, the LGTBQ+ community is expanding rapidly. Therefore, the community has included the plus sign at the end to represent those who are questioning, pan-gendered, intersexed, transsexual, or two-spirited and the many new ways people are self-identifying. Each generation is becoming more exposed to more information and are capable to choose from openly out members of the LGBTQ+ community as role models. For younger generations, it may become easier to recognize and acknowledge one’s sexual orientation or gender identity than those apart of Generation X and the Baby Boomers. However, even in this more open-minded society, homophobia is still living, breathing, and thriving.
Even time, one of the most seemingly constant things in life is relative. Within this relative space is queer time. The queer movement has had its own timeline and relationship with time both within and outside of the dominant timeline. Unlike in the dominant culture in which one’s past remains in the past and the future is always progress, queer time constantly looks simultaneously forward and backward, appreciating the importance of the past for the creation of the future. This more fluid definition of time is demonstrated through editing and framing in “Hollywood Je T’aime” and the historical basis of “A Slacker and Delinquent in Basketball Shoes” as is the idea that people are not forgotten, simply because they are in the past.
The author of "Conflict between Religious Convictions and Sexuality: An Autoethnography," Carlos E. Gerena, (2019) examines the challenges experienced by those who identify as LGBTQ+ and have religious beliefs in his work titled "Conflict between Religious Beliefs and Sexuality. " The paper analyzes the consequences of this conflict for social work practice while also discussing the use of autoethnography to investigate this conflict. In addition, the author draws on relevant material and his or her own personal experience to give insight into the challenges confronted by persons with religious convictions and a sexual orientation that is not heteronormative.
Lesbian feminist separatists worked against misogynistic attitudes and practices in the gay liberation movement, and anti-lesbian discrimination in the women’s liberation movement. “Emerging lesbian feminist collectives, such as The Furies and Radicalesbians. Argued specifically for a separate ‘Lesbian Nation’ (Johnson)” (Alexander, Gibson, and Meem 74). The group Radicalesbians created a manifesto called “The Woman-Identified Woman” to challenge all feminists to reconsider their conception of lesbians and lesbianism.
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick in her Epistemology of the Closet claims that “many of the major nodes of thought and knowledge in twentieth-century Western culture are structures—indeed, fractured—by a chronic, now endemic crisis of homo/heterosexual definition” (Sedgwick 2008, 1). Sedgwick argues that it is a crisis “indicatively male, dating from the end of the nineteenth century” (1). This is an interesting point since the male perspective is the pillar, of the Western Patriarchal model of gender role’s construction—and for our purpose sexual identity constraint. The author, in her book, says that “virtually any aspect of modern Western culture must be, not merely incomplete, but damaged in its central substance to the degree that it does not incorporate a critical analysis
Queering Religious : An Exploration of British Nonheterosexual Christians’ and Muslims’ Strategy of Constructing Sexuality-affirming Hermeneutics While acknowledging that homosexuality is indeed portrayed negatively in some parts of religious texts, the participants critique traditional hermeneutics by highlighting its inaccuracy and socio-cultural specificity, and arguing for a contextualized and culturally-relevant interpretation. Queering religious texts, therefore, has a de-stabilizing effect, through the transgression and de-construction of naturalized and normalized hermeneutics, which reinforces heteronormativity. Christians and Muslims acknowledge that homosexuality is presented in a negative light in some parts of religious texts.
He was so insulted he even filed a formal complaint with the state of Colorado for having queer as an option for gender identity on a job application for Colorado College (Marusic). Despite much negative backlash from the older generation, many younger members of the LGBT community consider queer to be a part of their identity; a positive connotation. Younger members see the word queer as way of uniting members of the community, not separated by labels of gay or lesbian. Jenny Block, an author for Huffington Post explains why she uses the “Q” word. “Queer is the most inclusive word that we have,” she says, “‘LGBT’ leaves out some of our family” (Marusic).
According to Barry Brummett (2014), Queer Theory is based heavily on feminism and the studies on gay, bisexual, and transgender communities. One of the most prominent figures of this theory is Judith Butler. In her book Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity(1999), she challenges society’s concept of gender identity and feminism, an activist drive for social equality for women. She brings up a social concept she calls “binary categories” which basically states that when every child is born, they are typically placed into one of two distinct categories: male or female, which, in turn, influences how the child is taught to behave for the rest of their life. The concept that in order to truly be deemed a man or woman, one must behave or avoid behaving in certain ways coupled with the idea that it is even necessary to create and abide by these categories are issues that Queer Theory wishes to dispute.
Postmodern Feminism Essay Whether sexuality and gender are learned or based in nature has been, and continues to be, a highly debated question with in our society. There are individuals that believe sexuality and gender are innate, meaning that we are born into them. On the other hand, some individuals believe that our sexuality and gender are learned, that they are socially constructed. The latter belief is known as gender performativity, coined by Judith Butler, and is a widely held belief among postmodern feminists.
