The Great Queer Encroachment: On marginality, intersectionality and transcending DOMA

By Aimée Josiane

Oh hey y’all, it’s just me, another queer who is trying to take over your movement… no really, I’m here to encroach upon all the movements that don’t have my interests in mind. You might recall this being done in the past. For instance, Black women encroached on the original (women’s) Suffrage Movement, then Black workers encroached on the early Labor Movement and now, we LGBTQ folks (and particularly those of us who are people of color) are encroaching on damn near every movement we find ourselves being a part of.

Now, all sarcasm aside (because I’ve got a lot more of that) I want to dig a little bit deeper into this fear about LGBTQ centrality in “other movements.” I want to sincerely discuss some questions that have been following me around like the police on the last day of the month. First, I ask what exactly do people fear will happen when LGBTQ folks’ interests are added into a movement’s goals? Second, what do people (and I’m looking at you, so-called progressives) think that the LGBTQ agenda is to begin with? And finally, what evidence of successful encroachment do people base their fears on?

I’ll start with my first question: What do people think will happen if LGBTQ interests are added to some other movements’ goals? So obviously, the problem within this question is that it presumes that my interests as a queer lady can be separated from my interests as a Black, African immigrant, former refugee/asylee, current working-class student, struggling for insulation from sweeping gentrification in southwest Atlanta. So in asking what you might think will happen if LGBTQ interests become part of ‘other’ movements, I am also asking you why those movements cannot be for me too? Damn, ain’t I an immigrant? Ain’t I a Black woman in the struggle? I have been part of some organizations that have done wonders for my aching heart and for my need to feel a kinship with people who are textured like me, but as soon as I place my amorous and sexual selves on the table, the love disappears. I can’t help but feel like these fears of LGBTQ interests are really ways of communicating that some folks in these movements do not want to do the work that is needed, in order to gain comprehensive understandings of marginalization within the current racist, heterosexist, capitalist paradigm.

On to my second question: What do people think that the LGBTQ agenda is anyway? If you are ding-dinging to DOMA right now, you’re wrong. Well, you’re mostly wrong. Marriage is important to some LGBTQ folks, but it is certainly not the issue that a number of us are fighting for. First of all, some of us are single, or polyamorous, so marriage isn’t even on the radar. Also, we work jobs, we have kids, we are students, we work in the public sector, we live in red states and we cross the border on the regular; basically, we have issues that range from labor to family to migration to visibility and more, but the string that ties all of our struggles together is our unyielding desire for dignity in all of these arenas. Dignity can be defined as “the quality or state of being worthy, honored, or esteemed” so to claim this as our interest in Black/Brown liberation, or in Labor or in Reproductive Rights movements, is to claim our need to be present, valued and recognized as people who exist in complex ways. The LGBTQ agenda as I understand it, is a goal to be genuinely our full-selves in all the spaces that we navigate on the day-to-day, including our homes, schools, workplaces, worship houses, markets, streets, public facilities, clubs, etc. without the threat of losing our sources of income, or our sources of support, or our children, and in the worst cases, our limbs and our lives. So if you take anything away from this point, please understand that vulnerability and lack of protection are what make dignity unachievable…and dignity, y’all, is an ESSENTIAL human need.

Finally, I ask what successful encroachments do people have to base their fears on? … If you’re drawing a blank, it’s because this fear has no basis. The fear of a “Great Queer Encroachment” is founded on a combination of microaggressions (racist and/or homophobic beliefs that are subtly expressed in unsupported fears and offensive expressions) and revisionist history. The truth is that some of the greatest organizers have been queer people who were not granted the privilege of being fully themselves in their respective struggles. Consider Bayard Rustin, a Black gay man who orchestrated one of the most memorable marches in U.S. history, the famed March on Washington. If this ‘encroachment’ idea had any truth to it, let’s just say the ‘DL’ would not be a topic of discussion. See what I’m getting at? I get annoyed by the lack of critical thought behind some of the comments that supposed allies and progressive people make regarding the much feared encroachment of LGBTQ folks and agendas. If anything, we risk participating in movements that speak to many of our identities and that gladly invite our energy and our efforts, while demanding that we remain silent, marginal and closeted.

Now y’all, I am only a quarter-century young, but I am old enough to not let my talents and energies be exploited by circles that do not value my full self, or those that do not consider my dignity a part of their overall goals. In the words of Tamar Braxton, “Get your life” social movements, I am not about that eternally marginal life!

Aimée Josiane has been part of the Fulton County Greens since 2013. Originally from Rwanda, she is now a proud  and active Oakland City resident, a queer and quirky co-mama of 3 pets, a wannabe housewife, a jeweler and political organizer. You can Tweet her @Rwandalicious.