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One mode of exclusion knows another (anti-immigration article in the Advocate)

  
 
Disco is My Class War
02:08 / 13.04.06
This article in the mainstream gay/lesbian mag, The Advocate, argues that 'illegal immigration' [sic] should not be okayed in the US until they legaise gay marraige. This is her logic:

America has forgotten that there are legal, taxpaying, and voting citizens in America who don’t yet have all of their rights.

American citizens continue to be denied the right to marry because of their sexual orientation while their families are deprived of access to the 1,138 federal rights, protections, and responsibilities automatically granted to married heterosexual couples.

It’s a slap in the face to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people to take up the debate on whether to give people who are in this country illegally additional rights when we haven’t even given the people who are here legally all of their rights.

Following on from that aticle, there's an open letter to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community from Quelaco, the Queer Latino/a Artists' Coalition, which you can read here.

An exceerpt from the letter:

To begin with, Cannick fails to realize an obvious fact - the LGBT
community and the immigrant community are not mutually exclusive. There
are thousands of LGBT immigrants in this country. There are thousands of
black immigrants. And there are thousands of black LGBT immigrants. To
put forward an argument that says "we should get ours first" makes us
question who exactly is the "we" in that analysis. In addition, we
recognize the historically interconnected nature of the immigrant and LGBT
struggles - such as the ban on "homosexual immigrants" that extended into
the 1990's, and the present HIV ban, which disproportionately impacts LGBT
people - and we believe that only by understanding these connections and
building coalition can we ensure real social change for all.

And we ask those who share the destructive views of this article to
remember the immortal words of Audre Lorde when she said that "There is no
hierarchy of oppression". We reject any attempts to pit the struggle of
multiple communities against each other and firmly believe that "Rights"
are not in limited supply. We condemn the "scarcity of rights" perspective
espoused by Cannick and other members of the LGBT movement, and are
surprised to see members of our community trafficking in such ugliness.


So I'm interested in what people think of this. I'm particularly interested in this topic given the conversations in the 'WFB male reponse' thread about certain kinds of oppression leading to an understanding of all oppressions. That obviously isn't happening here; and my question would be, why not? And how safe is it to assume that this equivalency and relativity of oppressions can always happen? More importantly, though, I feel infuriated by this article -- which once again proves to me that 'queer activists' and commentators have absolutely no politics and cannot be trusted. But I'm also trying to interrogate whether my fury is because of this woman's skin colour, and my expectation that because she's a woman of colour, she should automatically understand and support more rights for everyone. This seems an unrealistic expectation to have, and I would like to know why I have it. I also like the way the open letter talks about a scarcity model of rights, and how we should fight for more rights for everyone -- not a limited amount of rights for some people.

I will have to come back and write more about this later, because I have a whole theoretical slant on it -- which is why I put it in the Head Shop rather than the Switchboard. Thoughts, anyone?
 
 
Aertho
13:46 / 13.04.06
This is partially something I wanted to bring up during Feminism 101. Along the lines of "expectations" and responsibilities... I'm much more revolted by racist things said by women than by racist things said by men. I think it has to do a lot with what this thread is confronting, but it says a lot about me as well. Something that I can't well describe or at all feel comfortable with.

Does one's status as a minority necessitate sensitivity to other minorities? I'd like that to be true, and in the best of cases —it is, but it certainly cannot be the norm. Are we expecting too much of the [whichever] minority?
 
 
sdv (non-human)
14:35 / 13.04.06
This highlights one of the known limits of particularist politics, namely that all particularities, feminism, race and other gender politics - always produce a fascist/ne0-fascist line.

This is not a problem, merely a recognition that there is no contradiction in the idea (for example) of a gay-fascist or a black-fascist. Why should there be ?

Underlying this is the fact that any position which is founded on a particularist politics can and probably must produce a fascist variant because it is not founded on a universalism. Surely only a radical egalitarian position ideologicall forbids such a position ?

After all shouldn't we welcome the existance of Condi Rice or Ms Hewit - reactionaries they may be but still, at least they are not men...
 
 
*
16:38 / 13.04.06
This highlights one of the known limits of particularist politics, namely that all particularities, feminism, race and other gender politics - always produce a fascist/ne0-fascist line.

Can you explain how this statement, which has "always" in it even, can be "known"? It could be that I'm just not as familiar with the arguments agains particularist politics, but I don't have the information or evidence at hand to take this as a given, as you seem to.
 
 
Disco is My Class War
04:43 / 14.04.06
Cassandra said:

Are we expecting too much of the [whichever] minority?

Well, precisely.


sdv, I too am wondering about the basis for your assertion of a 'known limit' to particularist politics. I'm especially interested in the argument that any ideologically non-fascist political position must be founded on a universalism. I know you're a bit of a Kantian, so okay, but please clarify what you mean? I think I would argue in response, if this is what you mean, that identity politics are universalising in themselves. But I'd like to be clear on what you mean before I tak about that.
 
 
alas
12:24 / 14.04.06
The response I was thinking of making to this thread, I realize I pretty much made already before in the schisms in the isms. In that thread, too, we talked about the limits of identity politics, but my argument is, in a nutshell, that how one approaches identity politics--whether or not you're using a fully egalitarian framework or not--makes a big difference. Otherwise it's just crabs in a barrel, which works against us all.

I don't think persons of any group have any MORE or any LESS responsibility to fight against oppressive structures, although I sympathize with the difficulty of thinking on mulple fronts. There is no hierarchy of oppression, Audre Lorde repeatedly told us. So, people in the GLBT community should be called on this kind of support for structural racism and xenophobia, just as I would hope people would call me on the homophobia, racism, sexism, classism, etc., that exists in my language and actions. And, most importantly, in the structures that give shape to my life and which I not only don't resist but inevitably support (e.g., I haven't stopped paying the part of my taxes that supports our don't-ask-don't-tell military and all our hideous actions in Iraq).
 
  
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