One Queer Umbrella to Bind Them
How did this happen? Aren’t gay and trans different?
LGBTQ: initialism, alphabet soup —
It stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and either Questioning or Queer. Back in 1991 when I joined Queer Nation, the Q (which was just beginning to make the odd appearance on the end of LGBT) usually meant questioning.
Queer was still just a little bit too radical for everyday use.
That’s changed, depending on who you ask. Queer used to have a very particular theoretical meaning, though these days it’s accepted more and more as an umbrella term for people who identify as members of Gender and Sexual Minorities. (GSM, another initialism.)
I like that. I think it’s useful —
Some people today, and particularly people younger than me, often wonder why sexual orientation issues and gender identity issues are connected. Aren’t they very different phenomena? What’s the link? Why are our communities joined together and why should QUEER describe all of us?
Our transgender brothers and sisters have always been with us and part of us. Only vocabularies have changed.
