Identity As Political

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I grew up in a small rural town in NC. For most of my life it was looked down upon to be LGBT where I grew up. I remember as a child always wanting to do the things my sister did, even begging my mother to paint my nails when she would paint my sisters. She would reluctantly paint my pinkie nail. I played with my sisters dolls. Always tried to play house with her and her friends. Later as a teenager I would steal her makeup. I was always sort of the "odd" one even in my smaller family.

I hid behind masculinity most of my life, forcing myself to perform even at a young age. I didn't understand how people just fell into these roles. How did people just be masculine so effortlessly and for me it felt as if i had to enforce it by being as masculine as others.

I knew early that i liked guys as well as girls. I also knew I had to hide it form those around me, for fear of being ostracized more. My first crush was on this guy in my class, who defended me from bullying from time to time. While friends with one of my bullies he would intervene regularly. I don't know what happened with him after elementary school though, I have friends who swear they knew him up to high school but I never saw him after the 5th grade.

I came out in middle school, and it was such a major "issue" with my father I went back into the closet. Though I didn't hide it much, it was enough for him to not go and live in a hotel (Maybe I will talk about this in the future). To this day i don't fully know if he believes it himself or not that I'm straight, as I'm not technically out to him about being queer in any ways. I know my sister knows, and my mother, i think has clued in since then.

Identity

This is all to say I Identify as queer. Both from literal identity to politically. It is inherent to how I operate in space and how I see myself.

I don't pass

this is something I don't find important to a conversation but is more a tangent that I am coming to terms with as a trans woman. I don't look like a woman, I don't even present as one in person. While I plan on figuring out hormones and all the fun that comes a long, I also find a weird sense of self in not passing. I am still a woman no matter how I look.

I won't act as if I am happy in this current state of self, but I have come to slowly identify more with butch lesbians, and masculine lesbians because of it. There are parts of masculinity I don't hate. Despite what truscum want a trans person to be, I am not that.

The Politics of Queer in history

This should be a brief section, this will mostly be small additions from a journalist talk on it. If you want to read the whole thing go here. Queer up until the 1960's was mostly just a term that was sometimes derogatory, but also was openly used as a term of endearment among gay men.

In the 60's queer people would begin to reclaim it more openly, with chants like "we're here because we're queer." into the 80's to 90's queer became more of a political identity among gay liberation groups at the time. This was met with backlash from gay integrationist groups, and terfs specifically to push discourse to say it is a slur that we shouldn't use. I will get into this later.

Modern Queer Identity

Queer later became a catch all term for the community, and has slowly been replacing LGBTQIA+. I both welcome this and worry about this. Corporations continue to use LGBT to refer to us, as do many gay people as well.

The catch all term for gay people being queer is not inherently bad, and I believe does move us forward to a better world. The issue for me comes in how capitalism tries to encompass all things with in it, and sell it back to us.

Punk, Goth, and all things Alternative.

Subcultures like punk and goth where built on DIY aesthetics and breaking the status quo. Where does this come in? Well in the modern age punk and goth clothing brands exist and they are corporate as hell. They are built on the back of underpaid workers, they employ slave labor, and do a whole number of shitty things both under our nose and behind our backs. Capitalism saw these groups critiquing it and went and looked at their aesthetics and remade them for cheap.

They did this as a way to muddy the waters of these groups. So now anyone is punk as long as they wear the clothes, and have different hair. No political motive required.

Don't let them take our politics.

In recent we have seen ads downplaying and using protests to promote a product, while proselytizing influencers. While the pepsi one was seen as the worst it certainly isn't the only one.

To this day I will clarify with people the difference between queer and gay. There are gay people, who are republicans, or truscum, or terfs. They are not queer, and I refuse to use the word to include them, This is where I don't believe queer is a catch all. Because some gays are stupid.

Integration into cishet society, will ostracize people who can't fit perfectly within its walls. Cishet society and beliefs are restricting, and will kill us instead of free us. As a queer person I understand that everyone has a unique identity which only they can understand. I understand that I can not dictate how one identifies, I understand wholly that no matter their identity we must stand hand in hand against the oppression we face. There is no "one of the good ones", or "the reason they hate us".

We can't allow them to take that from us, we can not integrate into cishet society. They already try to sanitize gay people, they try to rid the messy, kinky, and weird queers from their pride parades, and dictate how we can identify.

But queer people are weird, and kinky, and messy. Queer people are more than just one set of ideals or beliefs or identity. Queer people have been here forever and will be here forever. In all our weird, messy, kinky lives.

Slurs as Identity.

This section mostly fits in with the later sections, its mostly my own beliefs but also some history thrown in. Though is that not everything here?

You are gonna read some currently in use, uncensored slurs past this point. You should still read it even if that makes you uncomfortable. I wont reaffirm my identity so people can start slur discourse over whether I personally can or can't say them.

Transsexual, while not a slur, is still a wildly outdated term. However elder trans people still use it to this day, as do some trans people who are on the younger side. The outdated nature of the term doesn't dictate whether someone is allowed to use it or not.

Dyke is a slur that is extremely commonly used as an identity. If you call the people who identify with the word anything else, you are actively erasing their identity. This isn't the first instance of this either.

Queer people have always reclaimed words that where slurs as identities. In fact, almost every single word we use now, where once homophobic or transphobic slurs used against our communities in the past. We continue to this day to reclaim these words from our oppressors, and grow as a community.

If you are in community with trans women, especially online. You are going to hear faggot, and tranny used. Often in referring to ones self. I have done this before, and do commonly among other queer people call myself one or the other. Obviously within spaces where people are more comfortable with these words. It is fine to not be comfortable with these words. However I have come to see them as a new term for politically queer people to use.

The more they try to integrate queer people into capitalism and a cishet society. The more our terms for our communities will be watered down and the weird queers and messy freaks will be pushed from the community which these words encompass. Capitalism wants to integrate everyone into one singularity to make the most money, to appeal to every person at once. It will water down words and terms to get its way. What happens if queer is watered down into just another marketing term?

I stand by the reclamation of slurs. I also stand by the usage of them as an identity, whether if be how you identify your sexuality and gender, or how you identify politically. For me it is a lot of both. I am a queer, I am a faggot, I am a dyke, I am a tranny. I am all these things, I am messy, and weird, and a freak. I am the reason the right hate us. I will continue to be that reason. I will not falter in my identity because some do not see it as right or good or pure.

Love Every Trans Woman You Meet Before It's Too Late.