Note: No HNT for a couple of weeks; the internet in my room doesn’t work and I don’t exactly want to upload questionable pictures of myself in the dorm’s public computer room 
But once term ends and I’m home, all should be well.
Lately I’ve noticed that I frequently use the term ‘queer’ to describe myself. I use it when I think about my own sexuality, when I describe it to other people, and in tags/titles in this blog. And I’ve been wondering why I think of myself as ‘queer’ rather than anything else.
When I was first aware of my non-heterosexuality, I decided that that meant I was bisexual. It was the only word I knew back then that described somebody who wasn’t straight, but wasn’t gay, either. I was also mostly thinking in terms of men and women. Of course I knew about transgendered people, but I hadn’t met any, and wasn’t really thinking about them very much. The thought that I might be attracted to anyone besides men was enough to chew on already.
Skip forward some seven years or so. I’ve come to the USA (where sexuality is more openly discussed), spent a year living in gender-neutral affinity housing, and have made close friends and slept with K and the Emperor (both pre-op FTM). I’m starting to understand gender differently – ditching the gender binary in favor of the gender spectrum and, even more recently, the gender galaxy. Not only did ‘bisexuality’ imply only two genders, but it was no longer an effective description of my sexuality; in fact, it was horribly limiting. I’m incredibly attracted to K and the Emperor – not despite their mixed-up, in-between genders, but almost because of it. In other words, I’m not just attracted to cismen and ciswomen, but transgenders, genderqueers, butches, femmes, androgynes, probably intesex people too, though I’ve yet to meet one, and possibly other gender expressions that I don’t even know about yet.
Then I stumbled upon the term pansexual (same-same-but-different: polysexual, freesexual) during a wiki-whirlwind. “Perfect!” I thought. Well, except I disagree with the bit about being ‘genderblind’ or liking people regardless of gender, because I both see gender and note it when I’m attracted to a person, I just… like a wide variety.
I also came across the term sapiosexual (or intellisexual) which means attraction to minds/personality regardless of the body that comes with it. Unfortunately, I’m a terrible, shallow individual (not really) who takes both body and mind into consideration, so that one didn’t work.
I didn’t think of myself as pansexual for more than a month or so, and never described myself as such to others. And at some point I realized that I had been referring to myself as queer.
It’s not that I don’t like using “pansexual”, I just like using “queer” better.
I admit that I’m mostly ignorant about queer history and theory. I don’t know very much about the term itself, except the very basic – it used to be derogatory, meaning strange or abnormal, and has recently been reclaimed and used as an empowering term much like “fag”, “dyke”, etc have been. I have some acquaintances who still find it offensive – when my college’s Gay-Straight Alliance changed their name to something more encompassing, a name with “queer” in it was shot down for that very reason.
To me, “queer” is loaded with a melee of connotations that I consider positive. It’s recognized pretty widely. Maybe not for all the right reasons, but that’s almost a good thing; it’s almost announcing that you’re going to stand by what you are even if you’re judged negatively for it. It’s an umbrella-term for anyone whose gender or sexuality subverts the norm, and thus implies inclusivity and community. And it suggests that sexuality is fluid. Maybe one would eventually have to switch from “gay” to “bisexual” or from that to “pansexual” and, who knows, maybe back to “straight” again… but “queer” will always fit.
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11 Responses to Identifying as Queer
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I agree with you about “bisexual”, but/and I think all the other fancy terms you trawled through are even worse (apart from the last one). At least most normal people understand more-or-less what a bisexual person means when they describe themselves as such (including the vagueness, I think). All the others come with, or give the impression of coming with, a fat kind of contract laced with pseudo-political/philosophical/whatever claptrap that you would have to sign up to — explicitly, and without vagueness — just to use the word. For me, at least, the whole point of avoiding “bisexual” is that I don’t want to sign up to anything.
I like “queer” too. It’s a normal word that real people understand, and that normal gay people use to describe themselves. Its everyday meaning is near enough to the ‘technical’ meaning, and it doesn’t seem to presuppose hardly anything at all. I also quite like it because it seems close to “camp” for which I have a soft spot occasionally (although I personally am not camp in the slightest). I don’t know much about queer theory either, but my prejudice is that it’s as full of ignorant postmodern claptrap as all the others. The attraction of “queer” is that it’s a real word in the real world.
I haven’t seen it used in the real world, but I internally often describe myself as “open”, or that’s how I feel when I’m relaxed about myself.
All that describes ‘perfectlips’, of course. In reality, I describe myself as “happily married”, which kills 99% of known discourse, dead.
Once you’re home, will we get three HNTs in one?
Betraying my age, to me “queer” is a term used by FBI agents in the Fifties to describe “homosexuals” (men, almost always)–not knowing (or maybe they did) that J. Edger Hoover, their chief, was one himself!
We humans love to categorize, and I’m sure this tendency has brought forth all the terminology you described (and there were a couple terms that were new even to me). But what difference does, or should, it make? You make love to individuals, not defined groups. If you find another human attractive enough to initiate sex with, and that human feels the same about you, the enjoyment you derive from the acts of love you choose is justification enough for your emotions.
Personally, I feel like labels are over-used and people attribute too much importance to them and engage in discourse about them too much when there are more important and more REAL things to think about. I’d shun labels altogether if it wasn’t for the fact that to show that I want to be a part of the LGBT community; that I want to learn and educate myself and others, I need to partake in the jargon, so to speak.
I wanted to say that too, perfectlips – I like ‘queer’ because it’s easily recognizable, popular (as in, of the people) and it has gained a sort of legitimacy as a term because people actually USE it, unlike pansexual, sapiosexual, etc, which seem to be only used by pocketfuls of people. Of course, people can popularize a term by using it more often and talking about it but, frankly, I’d rather use my energies for other things…
@ Merlin – I completely agree
Oh, and… @ Perfectlips – sorry to disappoint you, but probably not =p
@ perfectlips
Um, wouldn’t it be a good idea to read a little queer theory before you decide it’s all “ignorant postmodern claptrap?” But hey, conservatives who attack feminist and queer academics never let lack of knowledge stand in the way of a good insult, so why should you, right?
You don’t have to like queer theory–and there is a good deal of it I don’t like although I teach and write about queer studies. However, I do think it’s important to at least acknowledge that the term “queer” would not be available to us now without queer theory and activism (e.g. organizations like ACT UP and Queer Nation).
I’m a huge fan of camp, too, but camp refers to a specific aesthetic or style, whereas queer has a much broader province. The two categories are related but different. Something can be campy without necessarily being queer and what’s queer is not necessarily campy.
SF
sublimefemme wrote:
> I do think it’s important to at least acknowledge that the term “queer”
> would not be available to us now without queer theory and activism
According to my dictionary (the Shorter Oxford), the term “queer” with the homosexual meaning was being used from 1935. Queer theory and activism limped onto the scene in the late 80s, fifty years later. Queer theorists chose the term “queer” to “theorise” precisely because everyone else was already using it.
Funny you should assume I’m a conservative: I find postmodernism fundamentally conservative.
The owl of Minerva may spread her wings at dusk; the parrot of postmodernism is a Norwegian Blue.
Miaow. Hiss.
PL
Just occurred to me, one of the books on my Amazon wish list was written by a queerist: John Ashbery and You by John Emil Vincent. I read the sample chapter & thought it was jolly good. I assume Vincent is Not Like The Rest Of Them.
Just occurred to me, one of the books on my Amazon wish list was written by a queerist: John Ashbery and You by John Emil Vincent. I read the sample chapter & thought it was jolly good. I assume Vincent is Not Like The Rest Of Them.
The blogosphere is a fascinating and wonderful place, but for me it’s value depends upon a respect of difference and a spirit of fair-minded debate. I’m not seeing that happening with this thread, unfortunately.
For the record, PL, I try not to make assumptions about people and I never assumed you were a conservative (to the contrary). I was merely pointing out that your way of insulting queer theory while claiming to know little about it resembles the tactics of cultural conservatives, who attack queer and feminist scholars without knowledge of what it is we actually do.
If I sounded snarky in making that point, I apologize; this is my life’s work. It matters to me.
FYI that history of the term queer is actually incorrect. I won’t waste time or space with a cultural history of the term here, but anyone who is interested may feel free to email me at sublimefemme@live.com and I’d be happy to elaborate. I’ve written a book that takes up this subject, it just so happens.
@ Wilhemina Wishing you peace and joy this holiday season. xo SF
cheers to tossing labels in the wind and just being… us. labels, no matter how fitting you find them at the moment, will eventually limit us as we grow older and mature, and our preferences and opinions change.