20211129 Newsletter
What do we want as a Gay community? What are the Gay community's structural weaknesses?
NOT INTERESTED IN REPLACING TRAN EXCESS WITH THE OLD REGIME EITHER
For some of those outraged by the policing and repression of trans extremists I think part of their complaint is that they are NOT in charge of policing and repression. I am not interested in replacing one sanctimonious set of moral police with another. I emphasize SOME opponents of trans extremists.
WHAT DO WE WANT AS A GAY COMMUNITY?
I have written what I thought are the strengths of the Gay community and with this newsletter will list what I think are the structural weaknesses of the Gay community. It occurred to me what do we want as a Gay community? So, I am going to think about that.
What occurred to me first off is that the LGBT agenda and those elements more directed toward Gays are mostly negative goals. We don’t want to be arrested, we don’t want to be subject to violence, we don’t want to be discriminated against in the areas of employment, housing, public accommodation. We don’t want to be subject to other persecutions by parent, psychologists, and religious groups. It is a long list of things we want to stop. There is nothing wrong with this in itself. All these are things that should be stopped.
What there isn’t much a focus on in discussing the Gay community is what do we want in a positive sense, as Gays?
It is fairly clear what we want to stop, what would we like to see start for Gays specifically?
It could be argued that there are a lot of positive goals also. We would like to have the same social support institutions, programs, social services, etc. that the straight people have. Hence there is a push for marriage, psychological counseling services directed for Gay people, couples counseling, and that other social welfare services also encompass Gays in their services. Thought it might be argued that this is a negative item in that we don’t want to be discriminated against in the provision of support and services provided to the general community. However, I will think of these as positive goals, but there are goals in which we want to get what the straight people get.
However, I don’t see too much thinking about what specifically Gay people would like to have that would be uniquely or primarily oriented to them. Or what might be a goal for Gay people as Gay people. Given that there are issues of violence and a real lack of some basic supports it is understandable that there might not be much focus on this, but there nearly is NO focus on it. I say nearly, since I imagine someone must have done some thinking about it, but I just haven’t heard of it. I think we should at least imagine what it might be occasionally. A goal, though it is far off, provides direction and is inherently implying that there is a Gay community. A dream can build cohesion. I think that there isn’t speculation on this because we don’t’ conceptualize ourselves as being Gay people as a type of being and instead gay, lowercase, is a private individual practice.
If you have ideas hear let me know. edwardsebesta@gmail.com
GAY COMMUNITY STRUCTURAL WEAKNESSES
1. Gays mostly start from a position from being anti-Gay or somewhere in a spectrum of anti-Gay to at best the attitudes of “tolerant” straight people, and then discover that they are Gay, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they cease being anti-Gay or having negative feelings. They might possibly essentially conceptualize their being Gay like a drug addiction or a failure they indulge in. Gays often start out generally below zero.
Gays often think that they have overcome internalized homophobia, but in reality, it is just an attitude of acceptance of a reality that can’t be changed and making the best of it. This has consequences that they have low expectations from straights since they basically don’t self-value themselves as a Gay person and other Gay people aren’t valued and treated accordingly. Since the concept of internalized homophobia is understood regarding the more blatant forms, the more blatant forms are not often manifested, but instead it is manifested in a thousand subtle ways.
2. A lack of supporting institutions: Though it is good that Gays are basically outside the many institutions and social control systems that manage and support heterosexuality, we don’t have institutions and social systems that are directly designed to support Gay people. Instead, there is attempted adaptation of existing systems, customs, institutions designed for straight people to meet Gay needs.
3. Lack of intergenerational transfer of knowledge: Mom and Dad are very unlikely to be able to tell you about Gay life and relationships and sex. Young Gay people are not likely to be able to significantly connect to other Gay people and the Gay community until they are teenagers.
Even something as fundamental to a Gay person as realizing that they are a Gay person can be significantly delayed because they are isolated from information to assist them comprehending who they are.
Often even basic information about being Gay often has to be discovered secretly and covertly.
There aren’t institutions to transfer Gay literature, art, history and other things from one generation to the next. Public school systems don’t provide that information nor do parents. Gay bookstores used to be good locations for the intergenerational transfer but they have vanished. Gay studies programs have been replaced by gender studies and Queer studies where what might be of interest to Gays is likely squeezed in with a lengthy list of other sexual minority concerns, and filtered through the viewpoint of social workers who may not be Gay. How to deal with homophobia isn’t passed down in families, indeed the family maybe a problem itself, but is instead passed on through word of mouth between Gay people. Though this lack of intergeneration transfer isn’t always a problem, when there needs to be an adaptation to a new situation, the Gay community isn’t weighed down by past customs.
4. Powerful and numerous enemies: Though this item might be thought as particular to this time in history, I don’t think the major anti-Gay religious forces are likely to be gone soon. This list is not meant to be current 500 years from now, but for the current situation as it is likely to remain for some time. Rather than list and acknowledge and strategize on how to deal with these often-powerful enemies in a real way, there is instead various strategies of denying or minimizing these enemies’ anti-Gay character and danger to the Gay community and fear of antagonizing them.
In regards to some political movements that are hostile, they might change in a lifetime, but at this time various conservative movements are hostile to Gays, often as part of their alliance with anti-Gay religious forces and reactionary cultural movements.
Dealing with anti-Gay forces needs a systematic theory and global analysis of dealing with anti-Gay forces over time.
5. Diverse origins: Our strength is also potentially our weakness. Since we are from all backgrounds and the entire spectrum of society, we will have contained within our Community Gay people from different segments in society that are in conflict with each other in society as a whole. These conflicts in society in general can be conflicts brought into the Gay community. Without a Gay community identification or a weak one, it is hard to have a strategy to manage these conflicts.
Further, the widely different origins which bring a wealth of perspectives as a resource, also mean a community which that is often failing to comprehend the background of others in the Gay community and accept others as being a part of the Gay community. Without a Gay community identity and a program to drive Gay community identity there isn’t a program to bring unity.
6. Lack of collective Gay identity: Without a sense of Gay solidarity and the concept of Gays as a community, we often don’t act as partisans for the Gay community as a collective identity or have an identification as being a member of a Gay community with solidarity and group loyalty. Instead, we are individuals with a difference in a collection of fourteen or more letters in the latest initialism. There is the idea that being Gay is just sexual practice that you carry around in a black bag as your particular tool set of sexual satisfaction as opposed to the type of being you are.
Some of these four issues are sometimes partly addressed, but it is ad hoc for one particular issue or another. There was the advertising campaign that it gets better, to let young people know to bear with their situation until they are legal adults to help with intergenerational transmission of information, but just a minimum to survive. What is the program for intergenerational transmission of information to thrive? Other social welfare related issues are there. Different specific issues are sometimes addressed, but there is no global thinking about the Gay community as to its weaknesses and strengths and conceptualization of a Gay community strategy or operating plan. Certainly, there is no concept or theorizing of a strategy of building Gay community influence and power. Instead, one political faction or another’s agenda is proposed to be a path for that Gay community, and not even that. Instead, it is an agenda with the Gay community lumped into a lengthy list of letters, there is just social welfare support of the neoliberal state for Gay individuals are part of a portfolio of sexual minorities often with little common interest.
Probably most revealing, no institution, political faction, movement fears the wrath of the Gay community.
WILL RESUME DOING SOME SPECIFIC TOPIC SOON.
I am sharing some of my philosophical speculations and ideas to develop them. If I have to write them down I am forced to think them through and make them coherent and definite.
I am publishing them in the newsletter so the subscribers know I am still actively working and also start thinking of the broader issues. I think without a global framework, discussing specific issues is somewhat ad hoc and less effective. Though sometimes you do need to address the issue at hand and can’t wait on theorizing.
I do plan to write on specific issues, but I thought if I hadn’t thought through a global perspective on the Gay community my writings would be less effective.