Gay Politics
Margot James, a Conservative PPC, believes that “gay people should not just vote Conservative, they have a duty to vote Conservative.” Laurie Penny at Liberal Conspiracy objects, claiming instead that “queer politics are inherently radical”. Which is falling into exactly the same trap, except from the other side.
Let’s start with a little quiz:
What’s the difference between a homosexual and a heterosexual?
Whether they want to sleep with a person of the oposite sex or same sex to them.
There are no other differences. Unless I’m missing something. I really thought that, by now, we had moved on from thinking that there is any difference between gay and straight other than their preferred partner’s gender.
Thus, gay people have no “duty” to vote Conservative or to be “radical”. Just to make their own decisions as to the parties [and policies] which they believe will best suit them and the country - precisely the same way as everyone else.
When it comes to politics, sexuality means nothing. What matters are your opinions. Whether you are straight or gay, you have precisely the same role to play and decisions to make. Anyone who proposes that someone should vote for someone or believe something purely due to their own sexuality really needs to go away and rethink a lot of things.
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Actually, that’s precisely my point in the post, if you read it. Being gay isn’t political at all. Being queer is, and queer politics don’t necessarily have much to do with what gender you might or might not fancy.
What exactly is “queer politics” then?
Drifting slightly off topic, you can also swap the word “sexuality” for “class” in the last sentence. Even youngsters on Facebook have been known to say- “We’ve always voted Labour in our family and we always will”.
(It’s easer than thinking).
Re: what is queer politics
What is ‘queer’, then?
Queer is not, as I suspect Penny believes, a mindset, or a lifestyle, or a political leaning. Queer is a descriptive word that indicates LGBT sexuality. It has no place in front of ‘politics’, because politics doesn’t have a sexual attraction to anything. The term makes about as much sense as queer food (boy sandwiches that fancy other boy sandwiches?), queer cars (a Ford KA gets a CP) or queer shoes (a pair of trainers that has a crisis in its teens and realises it’s a lesbian).
Of course, this may not be what queer means *to Penny*. I suspect (theorising ahead of my data here, but it’s been 24 hours since Penny commented so I figure I’ve got room) that she means, by ‘queer politics’, either ‘politics made by queers’, in which case she’s wrong, because queers are not always politics radicals, obviously, or she has a more-or-less nebulous definition of queer as a mindset challenging to society, received norms of sexuality etc etc etc, in which case what she’s basically saying is ‘radical politics are inherently radical’. Which is true. But didn’t need saying.
She may, alternatively, have meant that political opinions advanced by queers are inherently radical because they are made by a member of a minority, oppressed group, in the house of the patriarchal, homogenous but heterosexual, lawgivers, and thus the act of advancing opinion/legislation is inherently radical. Which could, I suppose, be argued, but framing gay conservatism in that sort of theory doesn’t actually change the conservatism, does it?
I am speculating and putting words in Penny’s mouth. I hope they are the wrong words and that she has better. I look forward to reading them. I agree wholeheartedly with the substance of this post re: gay politics. Also, I notice that Penny doesn’t have a source for her claim that the lesbian MP hoped that her partner would be assumed to be male. At least, if she has a source, she’s chosen not to share it - why?