Gay studies and organizing Gays in Gay centric groups for self-determination. PART ONE.
Unless we are organized and define ourselves, queer theorists will define us, or whatever nonsense that is yet to come. This is the problem that must be solved.
Prolog: Though I am talking about organizing Gays, I think that much of what I write might apply to organizing Lesbians in independent Lesbian groups.
Organizing Gays
There needs to be an independent organization of Gay partisans. There are organizations of LGBTQXYZ as a part of some political party, movement, cause, religion or professional group. There are Stonewall Democrats and Log Cabin Republicans. Professional societies usually have a LGBT focus group. Often movements have an LGBTQ+ focus group or caucus. Religious denominations and organizations often have organizations of LGBT+ as advocacy groups within. Gays are in LGBT+ organizations providing social services.
It isn’t that these groups are necessarily bad or unnecessary, the issue is that they aren’t independent, aren’t focused on Gay issues, and don’t have a Gay agenda. Given that they are LGBTQ+ they inherently by definition deny that there is an independent Gay agenda. Lumping together all those letters implies there isn’t any significant individual identities of those letters other than they aren’t straight. They tend to be focused on the interests and issues of the movements they are attached, often subordinating Gay interests to those movements. They will be concerned about how they are perceived by the straight people in those movements, groups, professional societies, religious denominations, political parties and other groupings. They won’t be providing intellectual leadership for the Gay community since they are focused on the interests of the movements or groups they are attached or affiliated with and focused on up to 14 different letters of the LGBTQ+.
Contrast this with organizing for ethnic and religion groups. There isn’t a local Buddhist/Lutheran/Catholic/Baptist/Jewish agglomerated religious group. It is expected that they have separate organizations and agendas. No church is expected to be for all religions.
There are sperate groups for different racial groups and ethnic groups. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, (NAACP) isn’t expected to become the National Association for the Advancement of Colored, Asian, Latino, Indigenous, and Indian People.
There are many minority groups that are independent of political parties pursuing an agenda centered on the needs of that minority and ready to be critical of political parties, movements, and groups which are adverse to the interests of that minority.
There used to be independent Gay groups, such as the Gay Activist Alliance, and others. They no longer exist and haven’t existed for some time. As a result, there isn’t any ongoing Gay intellectual development and a Gay centric focused group looking out for the interests of Gays.
Into this void, Gays are subsumed into the LGBTQXYZ, they are part of the menagerie of “queer” theory which includes straight people who imagine they are genderqueer. Persons who aren’t Gay presume to lecture to Gays who is Gay and who isn’t. Gays are denounced for not wanting to have sex with a woman who claims to be a man, or not accepting that being Gay is homogender rather than homosexual.
Even if somehow the excesses of transgender theory are overcome it will not be the result of Gays organizing, but more likely feminists and Lesbians who have had it with trans extremism as well as the general public. It won’t because of the efforts of Gays, though there have been a few active Gays in the effort.
Even if extreme trans ideology collapses, there are no Gay organizations to prevent the next group of ideologues and their excesses from abusing Gays, likely instead we will find even more letters added to the already 14 letters making up LGBTQ+.
We need Gay organizations. Our obstacle is assimilationist ideas of being Gay.
If Gays don’t conceive of themselves as being different, other than having a particular private sexual interest and being nearly like straight people, these assimilationist Gays will see the need for a Gay organization as obsolete as discrimination against sexual minorities is eliminated.
If Gays can’t conceive of there being Gay specific community goals, culture, and opportunities beyond the avoidance of discrimination, they can’t conceive of any need for Gay organizations.
Further with these assimilationist ideas of being Gay as just a private sexual practice and not otherwise significant, with an agenda focused primarily avoiding discrimination, it makes sense to aggregate many different sexual minorities together since it is irrelevant what their sexual minority might be, the only relevance is just that they are discriminated against, and to that mix it would make sense to add in straight people who imagine they are gender queer.
Assimilationist ideas of Gays precludes the idea that Gays from different segments of society and politics and culture need to come together for a common purpose.
Even when Gays have started something different, often people show up and want some of the action on the pretext of inclusion and suddenly it isn’t a Gay centric group. For those Gay activities which exist at variance against assimilation you will find the LGBTQXY denouncing circuit parties, focus on going to gyms, sex parties, leather activities, etc.
In preparation to discussing how Gay centric organizations I wrote a section on how Gays are different and a section on possible goals. (For the online posting of this section, I will provide links to those sections at the end of this post.)
As part of bypassing the LGBTQXYZ establishment I have suggested some activities which could be the focus of Gay centric groups. (I will provide a link to that post for the online version of this post.)
However, I am at a loss as to proposing an activity which would I am certain would get more than a small group of Gays organized on very specific interests. There are multiple Gay art magazines. I don’t know of any Gay literary societies or Gay societies organized around a specific genre.
The most vigorous Gay specific groups are circuit parties and the other party events, but they don’t develop ideological leadership for the community or direction. Though being independent of the LGBTQXYZ establishment and ignoring the proscriptons of the LGBTQXYZ moralities, they are endlessly denounced by the LGBTQXYZ.
It might be that a Gay centric philosophy has to be developed first and this is what I am doing. Perhaps without the understanding that as Gays we are different and have potentials to follow different paths, there will be no effort to start organizing Gays. However, I am NOT the fountainhead of Gay thought.
We need a Gay studies academic movement to provide a framework for Gay communities to exist within and to provide a direction for the Gay community. Otherwise the Gay community will be without defense against “queer” theory, will be defined by “queer” theory, be dragged along into whatever disasters “queer” theory and its 14-letter initialiams (LGBTQIAP…) crashes into, and be subjected to its relentless aggressions.
Also, a Gay studies academic movement would provide the guidance and protection for Gay organizations not to become LGBTQXYZ organizations.
However, it might be that Gay centric groups need to be developed to show that there is a Gay centric agenda and possibilities to provide a Gay community to be receptive to Gay centric academic studies.
I believe that they might work with each other in conjunction, or at least both can be worked on so regardless of whether one effort needs to be prior to another the Gay community will go forward.
It isn’t necessary that a large section of Gays be Gay-centrically organizated. The LGBTQXYZ establishment is just a tiny elite in strategic positions. A Gay studies movement could have huge influence with just a dozen people.
I am going to be writing on parts of this issue of organizing Gays, but first I needed to establish the need to have Gays organized.
I leave it here for persons to think about how Gays might be organized.
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