Sexuality and Social Justice - Essay

8/13/2019 Sexuality and Social Justice - Essay

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Bryce Daniel

Ms. Leonard

Sociology 151

18 December 2013

Sexuality and Social Justice

Sexuality and the issues that arise due to varying sexual identifications are relatively new in the

field of sociology. Granted, the adversity that the queer community has faced is nothing new, but only in

times that are more recent have activists brought the problems to center stage. Matters concerning

class, race and womens rights often overshadow the problem, and with such a small relative

percentage of the population identifying in a non-heteronormative manner, it takes a great deal of work

to bring the movement into the light.

People in the queer community face varying degrees of oppression that range from being

bullied in the classroom to harsh treatment from employers. According to data collected from the

Human Rights Campaign, it is legal in 29 states for a company to fire an employee solely because they

are gay. The number jumps to 34 if the employee is transgender. Compare those numbers to the 16

states that allow same-sex marriages and the difference is startling. These numbers show that despite

any progress being made in terms of the queer rights movement, we still have a long way to go. It also

makes me wonder if the queer community and its allies are going about solving the problem in the

wrong way. For a while, the focus was on marriage alone. However, the right to get married will not

solve any of the other problems. It will not change the fact that a company can discriminate based on

sexual orientation. A group of queer-identifying individuals got together to propose the next step in the

movement; in their declaration, Beyond Same-Sex Marriage, they argue that while marriage for the Q+

(Formerly LGBTQIA, see page 7) community is important, it is not the only thing that we should focus on.

Furthermore, they make it clear that we should seek access to a flexible set of economic benefits and


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options regardless of sexual orientation, race, gender/gender identity, class or citizenship status

(Beyond 1). By making the issue no longer about sexual-orientation, but rather a national issue of

equality, the movement would gain support from a larger group of collective minorities. In this

generation, the nuclear family is not as prominent as much as it once was, and in addition to families

that include a same-sex couple, there are a wide variety of relationship types.The struggle for same-

sex marriage rights is only one part of a larger effort to strengthen the security and stability of diverse

households and families. Now families and relationships know no borders and will never slot narrowly

into a single existing template (Beyond 1). One of the things that the Q+ movement does is play an

instrumental role in the creation of and advocating for alternative relationships. Domestic partnerships,

second parent adoptions, reciprocal beneficiary arrangements, joint tenancy/home-ownership

contracts, health care proxies, powers of attorney, and other mechanisms that help provide stability and

security for lesbian, gay, bisexual and heterosexual individuals and families also apply to heterosexuals

as well; the promotion from the queer community has made these unconventional lifestyles more

prominent (Beyond 2). The writers in Beyond Same-Sex Marriagealso iterate that Marriage is not the

only worthy form of family or relationships, and it should not be legally and economically privileged

above all others (Beyond2). The rights of an individual should be no different solely based on whom a

person loves or the type of relationship they form. If the gay rights movement were to shift to a broader

approach, rather than zeroing in on marriage, we might see a more widespread infrastructural change.

It is clear to most that the Q+ community must push for equality and the same rights as their

heterosexual counterparts. The problem is that the construction of gender norms and sexuality in

society is widespread and ingrained into the minds of the young at an early age. The locker room is a

classroom and the football field a training camp for masculinity. Coaches and adult male role models

continue to teach boys how to be menand more masculine, by defining stereotypes and emphasizing

the importance of not being feminine. For instance, a common phrase heard on the field is stop


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do that promotes those forms of privilege (Johnson 105). It is when an issue becomes this widespread

and it no longer only affects the individual that it becomes a social justice issue. According to Johnson,

The greatest barrier to change is that the dominant groupsdont see the trouble as theirtrouble,

which means they dont feel obliged to do something about it (Johnson 127). Whether it is class, race,

or sexuality, the majority tends to lump the oppressed together and title the problem as their issue.

Similarly, we fall under the idea that if something is a certain way now, then it always has and always

will be. The problem with this is that if you look back a few decades, you will see that there was a time

when African Americans and women were both treated as second-class citizens. Though there are

certainly issues that persist, we have come a long way in furthering the rights of all Americans. It would

be foolish to think that the same progress that was made, will not repeat itself. If we as a society do not

make, apoint of studying history, its easy to slide into the belief that things have always been the way

weve known them to be (Johnson 128). The fact of the matter is regardless of whether or not the

majority wants it to, or the minority thinks it will never happen, social systems are fluid,and things

can change (Johnson 129).

In the face of so much adversity, there is always a solution. Being queer-identifying and an

openly gay male, I feel it is my responsibility to contribute to the social movement. I believe that youth

today, especially those who identify as an individual on the Q+ spectrum, have the most ability to incite

change in society. The first step is to bring light to the movement and the social injustice as a whole. By

bringing the issue into everyday conversation, there is the possibility of gathering enough support to

make a change. According to Gandhi, nothing we do as individuals matters but its vitally important to

do it anyway (Johnson 132).Often people feel as though they cannot make a difference because they

do not see the change take place, but what Gandhi says is that we must continue to be the change. If I

speak up about my sexuality, even in a small way, I know that although the effects may not be

immediate, they will still happen later down the road. Similarly, there is a myth of no effect which


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blinds us to our own power in relation to other people.People do not always understand that they can

make a difference, even though they feel powerless. For instance, this reluctance to acknowledge and

use power comes up in the simplest everyday situations, as when a group of friends start laughing at a

racist or a sexist joke and you have to decide whether to go along (Johnson 133). Personally, even

before I came out of the closet, I told my friends not to make jokes about gays because they were

offensive. After a while of being told off, they stopped. Had I not spoken up however, nothing would

have changed and the jokes, whether purposefully homophobic, would have continued. If students as

well as adults who hear disparaging remarks towards certain individuals made just speak up, society will

be a lot better for it. We need to openly support people who step off the path of least resistance

(148). If we outwardly support the right of women and men to love whomever they choose, we could

possibly raise awareness of homophobia and heterosexism.Furthermore, if students were to ask

school officials and teachers about whats happening to gay and lesbian students in local school, both

parties would know whether these students are being harassed, suppressed, and oppressed by others

at one of the most vulnerable stages of life. Lastly, when groups discuss sexual orientation, it raises

questions about its relation to male privilege (Johnson 149).

A second method is the reclamation of words used to oppress the queer community. Though

this method is not widely supported, the tactic has some validity to it. For instance, the word faggot

and queer were used to belittle gays and put them in their place. Now the community embraces the

term queer and uses it to self-identify, especially when they do not fit within the standard sexuality

binary. While the word faggot still has a negative connotation, Q+ youth have begun calling each other it

in a friendly way, in an effort to take the sting out of the word. Some argue that things like this only hurt

the movement, but in my opinion, taking back ownership of a word used to oppress is a powerful way of

telling the majority that they cannot use it to hurt anyone anymore.


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Even more important than bringing up the social issue or reclaiming a few words is for Q+ youth

to come out, and for those around them give their support. I have different opinions about coming out.

While I believe that it is for society that we come out, it is critical to the overall movement. I hope that

someday soon there will not be a need for the world to know whether you are gay, they will just know

that you are in love and are happy, but until then, coming out humanizes the gay rights movement. Of

the people who can be considered homophobic, most of them claim that they do not know any gay

people. However, studies included in the New York Times have shown that there is the same percentage

of queer-identifying individuals everywhere in the country; it is only more liberal places thatseem to

have a higher percentage. With this in mind, were all the closeted youth and adults to come out, no one

would be able to say they do not support something because they do not know any one. One of the

reasons that people are more accepting today than they were a decade back is becauseThree

dimensional people are more persuasive than two-dimensional ones,meaning real people make a

difference. The shift in viewpoint likely came about because, each year, a few thousand more gay

people make the awkward announcement to their families and friends, supplanting images from the

folklore of disgust (Ross 4). With things such as LGBT marriages and coming out, personal gestures

ripple outwards into politics. In the generation of mass media, Facebook and YouTube, kids can come

out and share their story with the world. Watching videos online of people talking about their

experiences is what helped me. When I finally came out, I wrote a Facebook status to all of my friends

and family. That status garnered hundreds of likes, which not only made me feel more accepted, but

also showed me how many people now could say, they know a gay.

With more students coming out, society is beginning to realize that there is not just a binary

when it comes to sexual orientation and identity. According to a college freshmen at an open mike

night, the growing list now includes lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual, queer, homosexual, asexual,

pansexual omnisexual, trisexual, agender, bi-gender, third gender, transgender, transvestite,


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intersexual, two-spirit, hijra, polyamorous, undecided, questioning, other, and human(Schulman 4).

With all of these different labels, there has been a demand to tack more letters onto LGBT.Stephen *a

transgendered student at Sarah Lawrence College] and his peers are forging a political identity all their

own, often at odds with mainstream gay culture,and because of instances like this, Youth today do

not define themselves on the spectrum of L.G.B.T.(Schulman 1). Now, L.G.B.T., expanded from just

gay and lesbian to include bisexual and transgender, is no longer enough. The new vanguard wants a

broader, more inclusive abbreviation (Schulman 1). The emerging rubric is L.G.B.T.Q.I.A., which

stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and then depending on whom you ask, queer or

questioning, intersex, and asexual or ally. The problem with this is that, while it is great to have your

own identity, the community is segmenting. It is important that while society recognizes an array of

identities, the community does not fraction itself, detracting from the initial cause. Personally I think

that Q+ should be the new term. Q, standing for queer and the + for anyone who does not think they fit

within that category. That way, the movement stays united and the term represents everyone equally.

If we are ever going to remedy the social issue of sexuality and inequality, then we need to start

talking about it. Our voice needs to be heard in any way possible. Furthermore, the Q+ community must

recognize the interconnectedness of other issues such as race or class. We must first recognize race,

class, gender, [and sexuality] as interlocking categories that together cultivate profound differences in

our personal biographies (Collins 3). Despite the fact that we all have both/and identitieswe persist

in trying to classify each other in either/or categories (Collins 4).One minoritys struggle should be the

shared struggle of all groups. This is the only way that progress can be made. The majority must be

made the minority, through the combined efforts of the secondary groups. Members of subordinate

groups must work toward replacing judgments by categories with new ways of thinking, in order to

eliminate structural oppression of all kinds from society. In the words of Audre Lorde, each of us is

called upon to take a stand (Collins 26).

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Sexuality and Social Justice - Essay