Hi, welcome back to Who We Are. My name is Aidan Bassett, I'm the summer 2020 opinion editor and a cap. Hi, Aidan. And I'm Pat Chock.
And I'm the summer 2020 deputy behavior editor. And thank you for joining us for this episode of Who We Are. We are is an identity focused student news podcast about queer issues. Sometimes we discuss opinions on the news, sometimes we just discuss opinions.
And today we're going to be talking about all eyeshipping and all its various forms. Obviously, the Black Lives Matter movement has been sweeping the nation since the death of George Floyd in late May. And I think for a lot of queer people and even for a lot of straight people, frankly, for all Americans, I think there has been an increasing discussion and peaceful objection on what it means to be a good ally. And obviously, Cat and I are both seeking to be good allies to the Black Lives Matter movement.
But we also have primarily our own frame of reference for queer issues and how people can be allies to the queer community and also how queer people ourselves, how we can and should be allies to other groups, their marginalized communities. So today we're going to talk about things like the privilege of the queer community, which is in flux. Some groups are having increasing rights, increasing visibility. Some groups are still really fighting on that front.
We're also going to talk about the duty, I think. I think we both agree. Queer people have to support other marginalized communities, especially since the queer community is like many communities, so intersectional. So we have a profound overlap with those marginalized groups and we kind of owe them our solidarity, our allyship.
We're going to talk more in depth about just our own experiences of intersectionality. And we're also going to talk about how straightens as people can be good allies, what behaviors straightens as people demonstrate they can be sometimes somebody be problematic, and how we would want non-care people to be allies in our own. So, just to kick it off, what would you say is maybe the most noticeable change in queer people rights or our formal status or our involvement in the political system that you can think of in the past years, because there have been so many. Well, I'm going to point to the 2015 Supreme Court case on verge of all the hard cases, yay, third gay marriage.
And I think since then there have been several other landmarks queer screen cases. For example, most recent one, I think, this June, Bose County, Bose Office is Clinton County, that reasserted for workers rights. So, I think that it's awesome, like the Supreme Court is doing a lot of extending constitutionality to cover the rights of queer folks, yay. In terms of the presidential administration, things are off, like, vastly different, but I think that I have hoped for this election season.
And hopefully, we can see the legislative and executive bridges pushing forward some more queer legislation. Yeah, I definitely agree. I also think, as we're talking about progress, I think something you and I were discussing with the planning of this episode was the importance of acknowledging for the queer community itself, to acknowledge that even more so for non-cricutant to acknowledge just how much the queer community isn't our monolith in its rights and protections. So, like, you're exactly right, in 2015, I think lots of same-side couples were rejoicing at the magnitude of this shift.
And I think really the whole queer community celebrated that, and it was just more legal proof that we deserve the same rights as everyone else. But I also think, you've pointed out, an unfortunate trend in the last few years, maybe two step forward, one step back, in that North Carolina only repealed its anti-tray on the spectrum bill in 2017, and under the Trump administration, there has been efforts, I don't know how successful, pushed back against from the military and from military leaders, but the administration attempted to ban transgender service members from serving in branches of military. So, there definitely have been, especially for trans people, especially the trans people of color, there have been enormous new barriers increasingly erected, you know, as if it wasn't already hard enough to be trans, they had to be forced out of their military service. Or, you know, there's been a wave of backlash in some ways that has made previous progress also seem more fragile, too.
Yeah, I agree with that. There's also two layers to all these issues as well. There's like, that just because you have a law, because people doesn't mean that the cultural or societal view of that group, people has changed. Yeah, legislation, like, he's so important in so many different ways, but it takes, it unfortunately takes such long-lights time for real cultural, societal progress to mean.
Yeah, and I really feel like there, you know, not to diminish the value of marriage equality, but, you know, the benefits of societal rights and visitation rights, you know, for your ex-fasts in the hospital and things like that, like there are lots of meaningful gains about marriage equality, but I would also say, in many ways, it's, there are aspects of it that are a cosmetic game where it just seems better, but it maybe isn't a wholesale transformation in the experience of queer Americans, because, you know, again, another Supreme Court case upheld workplace rights for queer individuals, not to be, you know, fired by their employer with, without cause or things like that or because of their employers religious convictions, things like that, but I think all sorts of workplace rights are still, I mean, maybe that's the next new frontier for queer activism is to say, you shouldn't be able to be fired or discriminated against in your job for being queer, things like that. And I think that brings us to maybe another point, given that we've talked about how many different communities are experiencing different levels of threat and different levels of privilege, that you and I also both agree that the queer community really has an obligation to help all other, you know, social justice movements, like, you know, not every queer person is a person of color and certainly not every black person is queer, but that there's enough overlap between queer community and every other marginalized group that especially with the black lives matter movement of late, but also of all sorts of movements, you know, to protect the black immigrants, things like that, that queer people have the history to know what it is like to be, you know, a person discriminated against and we need to use that empathy as a kind of, you know, as a spur to our own action on behalf of the marginalized groups. I'm curious, ways in which you encounter that or ways in which you think the queer community is doing a good job or maybe doing a not so good job of being a queer ally. I mean, I think that to talk about, like, to generalize and say like a community at large, you know, like that's not gonna be very effective, but I think that in general, I feel like queer people should be sensitive to these issues because we have this shared history, like entrenched within the LGBTQ rights within are like, you know, black activists, black activists, all types of like the IPOC activists, like trans activists, like, come on, like, you can't talk about the queer, kind of like, rights within what I talked about with the Marshall Johnson or Sylvia, yeah, like, these people of all different identities are also important.
It's interesting. Yeah, and I think, you know, as any student of history can tell you once upon a time when, you know, black groups like the NAACP and, you know, women's rights groups and feminists were both campaigning for, you know, women to get the franchise and for, you know, equal protection for people of color, there were certainly activists and leaders who said, yes, we need to bond together, we need to work together in solidarity. And there were also people who said, no, I, you know, I, my group is not going to get our rights as quickly if we're associated with you, other marginalized group, whom maybe we don't think this earth's rights because groups can certainly be bigoted against each other, but also maybe because we'll be stigmatized by association, like, you know, if people thought in the back of that, you know, early 20th century, you know, if they thought that the, you know, women's suffering was a slippery slope to full enfranchisement of black Americans, you know, if you were both racist, you had sex, it's probably, someone was worse because you were both together. So I think there has been a history of division, I think, you know, kind of the role of the oppressor, right, for the white patriarchy here is to be, you know, divide and conquering of groups that it seeks to oppress or that is convenient to oppress.
But I think that just gives me more and more of a sense these days and more, I learned about that. And it's really important to have that kind of intergroup solidarity too. And I'm curious what examples you see at the moment, where there are more opportunities for them. More opportunities for intersectional activism?
Yeah, intersectional cooperation. Amazing. Well, I mean, people themselves are intrinsically intersectional, like, I identify as a woman and also, and a bi-tire racial person and also a bisexual. So I feel like when you become involved, like politically involved, I would say, like most importantly, like, I mean, I went to my first lady's portion, I was like, damn, I'm hooked, like, this activism stuff, like, it's really great, I love it.
And it's important, and it's important, like, so many different levels. And so it's like, I'm not just going to bear to, you know, the women's margin, also going to go to the BLM protest and I'm also going to go to crime. It's just layered activism, I think, that, you know, it almost reaffirms me and my eternity on many different levels. What about you?
You know, it's a good question. I think, you know, I have been encountering Black Lives Matter protests where I live right now, and just a couple hours north in Portland, obviously, there's been a lot of coverage, increasingly of federal agents coming into Portland. And a lot of people have commented on the disparity of the fact that Portland, by some metrics, is America's slightest major city. But that it also has these ongoing Black Lives Matter protests, such that these kind of secret police ask federal forces, but I don't know very much about that, but are being remarkably violent and insignificant, right, are, you know, cracking down on the city in an effort to suppress it.
And I think, in some ways, I'm proud most of my family that's important and proud that the city is doing such a good job of, you know, acting in racial solidarity, despite the fact that most Portlanders are white, that they're showing up for Black Lives Matter movement. But I also think, and I've heard some critics say that it's very easy for that kind of activism that comes just showing up in a protest, which is, you know, great, being physically present, but it can also spill into co-optation. And I think one of the risks of intersectional allyship, I think sometimes, is that it's really easy to criticize someone who is just showing up for your identity group and doesn't also belong to your identity group as doing it for some kind of extra credit, you know, the idea, right, and that it can be very performative. And I think, I think I don't know, I don't so much believe that it is predominantly the case, or, in the case that people's activism is performative, but I do think that, you know, every time you're going to encourage someone to be part of another group, that their struggle for liberation, for rights, that you should encourage people also to be careful, to be thoughtful and reflective about how they're doing this.
And I think, I mean, in some ways, that kind of takes us into our next topic, which is about our own frame of reference for intersectional, when we talk about being multiracial and being woman and being bisexual. For me, I think that there are definitely times when I'm a little self-conscious because I feel like, you know, most of the great critiques from black activists or black scholars or academics at the moment for the Black Lives Matter movement at least are that one of the great privileges. The whiteness is that you don't really think about race, and I definitely do feel like, you know, despite the fact that Michael Brown was killed by Darren Wilson six years ago, and the Black Lives Matter movement has been around for about seven years at this point, in its current incarnation. I feel like I am only now, and in some way, I feel like many people in the country, but I'm only now coming to appreciate just how little frame of reference I have for topics about, for discussions of race.
And so I'm really feeling a sense that intersectionality helps in some ways, but in others, it kind of shows you that your empathy is only partial, and so I'm understanding it's only partial, so I'm increasingly conscious of the shortcomings of my own perspective. Yeah. I think that's like the best way to be an ally, to be aware of where you are in your learning process, because when you go all continually learning, other that's about, you know, like our nation's tragic history sometimes, or about like identities and people that you don't usually get too interactive. Like I think that's like what you just mentioned.
I think that's like the core of what it means to be a good ally. I mean, I mean, we all feel kind of like guilty or bad in the acknowledge that we're ignorant about something, but acknowledging and facing the ignorance and saying that I want to work and build towards something better. Like that is that it's core I think we're needs to be an ally. Like I'm standing here as someone who may not entirely understand what your experience is, but I'm here for you bro.
And like, I mean, I just want to like support you. I want to learn things about you and your community through this history. Yeah, I agree that as much as, you know, ignorance is in some ways another way of saying that you indulge in having a kind of privilege, or you haven't had to think about something. I also agree that most of the time, the far more important thing is to be firm and committed to like have each other's backs at everyone who's, you know, got some kind of privilege or some kind of faces, some kind of diversity in one way or another.
The more important thing, at least to me, it is definitely the solidarity aspect. I'm curious, Kat, to just how you personally maybe less intersectionally, but at least as you've encountered the way people talk and think about the queer community, just ways in which you think straight or cis people sometimes aren't good allies and ways in which you think just people you've encountered could do better or could do differently. Yeah, that's interesting. So I come from like a rather, like your standards of urban community and where you would like, people don't really how I would do it.
Like we're near like San Francisco, like we're within the vicinity of like, you know, this hub of queer culture, but it's really quite different when you're detached from it. And I mean, okay, like to illustrate within my own family, I am one of seven, like siblings, that's siblings, and I'm the rainbow sheep of the family. And it's really interesting to me because what most of my siblings are older than I am. And so, you know, they're adults, a couple of adults, like we have lived for many years and have operated in society for many years and the veteran has people.
And yeah, they still freed up when they want to talk to me about who I'm dating or who I'm seeing. They almost don't want to bring it up or when they do, when they're like, this or that, any new boys in your life. And then there's like a hazing, like, oh, or girls. Oh, I know anyone.
And it's like kind of awkward, but I can tell that they're trying. And I think that's kind of, that's the most important thing to me. In fact, you know, they're making a conscious effort to like be open and ask me questions about my identity and to what I'm, you know, who I'm dating, even if they mess up a little bit when asking, you know, one of the pieces of advice I was given by a friend of mine in high school, he himself, his family of Pakistani and he was, you know, a practicing Muslim. And he said to me that one of the general behaviors that he found most frustrating for people or have found, kind of got them, you know, with their foot most firmly in their mouth was when they tried to presume they knew more than they did.
And I think that, you know, the question, even that you, you mentioned some of your family members may be asking at times there, like, any new boys in your life, presumed that the answer to who you would be dating is that their voice. And I think in much the same way for this friend of mine, you know, he was always like, people are always like, so like you pray five times a day, right? When they could ask the question, so what is prayer like for you? Yeah.
And again, you probably have to get to an organic point in the session where that's a normal question to ask and probably don't want to be turning around and receiving the period being like, so, you know, what's prayer like for you out of the blue? Because even that can be a pointed question when asked in the wrong context, but I found this quite really instructive because I feel like it has informed a lot of the ways that I realize I prefer people to infer about me too because like I went to prom, he was a girl, like my junior year who said, well, no one's gonna bother, no one's gonna be bothered by the fact you're going like, because they know you're gay. And I was like, well, I'm in fact, I didn't say it quite like that, but it was another one of those instances of presumption. And I think presumption, especially for people who are otherwise doing a pretty good job or who are clearly, you know, on your team trying to help, presumption is one of the most frequent traits I encounter from people that lead them into being, maybe not, you know, rude, maybe it doesn't even quite border on a microaggression, but it gets in that territory of, well, that makes you keep on comfortable and you didn't have to say it like that.
Yeah, I don't know. I know exactly what you mean, but I don't know. This is awful, but sometimes I feel guilty for like asking people to like, you know, change the way that they, as an example. Yeah, I'm just like, I want to do a certain way I am.
And I am in fact, how do I am, but it's so awkward to like, directly, oh my gosh, I so much of what confrontation is awful, but like, it's necessary. It is necessary, especially when somebody is trying and trying to be an ally, like you can't be afraid to correct them, like, you know, to, yeah. You know, in something I may have brought up before and might inevitably bring up again, one of the ideas that a lot of Black activists will mention is that it is not the job of Black people, it shouldn't be the burden of Black people to educate by people, to educate everyone else about racism. And I, in some ways, you know, I fully believe that.
I fully agree. And I also feel like in my own experience, if, for example, I have a friend who uses Vaynam pronouns and another stand at mine or acquaintance of ours or even a classmate, just anyone who is gender-centered who is the key or the she-series, and that person doesn't use this series, it feels sometimes like in that same way of like, I wish it didn't have to be my job to correct my acquaintances. And again, as you say, confrontation to the other one, plus it sometimes, I wish it didn't have to say to them, actually you're misgendering them. And you don't have to put it like that.
I actually think they use the Vay series. You know, there are ways to do it gently, but it is, you know, to your point uncomfortable to have to be the person who's correcting other people because it creates a little bit of distance. It's like, I want you to feel comfortable being vulnerable and making some mistakes around me, but it also can put me in position and having to tell you you have done something differently than how someone wants it, or you've said something in a way that doesn't come across as terribly respectful. And so I think it is, you know, personally, like, is it the end of the world, is it the end of the world for me as a white, cis-capping guy to say to people, actually, we used to help and pronounce it like, we saw it, no, it's not so hard.
Like, obviously, there are different levels of ease and challenge here, but I definitely think that it is unfortunate to have to be in that position you describe, being the one who has to do the correct and has to do the controls, sure. Yeah, it's especially hard to feel just because, like, it's outside of mainstream conversation, obviously, because the mainstream, and the rest is this straight, but I think that there's really distinct things that people can do to start bringing those topics and discussions into that, like, as a different, you know, as part of the norm. Like, for example, like, I've been seeing online on Instagram, I've been recently, like, normalised, putting your pronouns in your bio, even if you are cis and straight, like, and I've never had this happen before, breaking through Berkeley, but having professors or intersections, people are like, institutes to solve, name, aid, or view, pronouns. Like, that's what's amazing to me.
And I feel like it's also harder to be an ally because you don't have the context. Like, I mean, like, marginalized people did not have to educate other communities about their history, but who else is going to do it? You have to seek out that information yourself. Like, I have never had any formal education of, like, clear history, or even, like, inexpensive, like, Asian history, or what next history, or black history in the United States, like, one that is detailed and respectful and comes from the voices or perspectives of those communities.
Yeah. It's kind of, I don't even mean to say it's kind of, it's devastating that we don't do that. I think, you know, at Berkeley, for example, lots of people have been advocating for more than American culture's requirements, where in AC class you have to have material, to be common AC class, you have to have material that reflects experiences, perspectives, stories, what have you, of Americans, I think five principal racial groups, is the system, indigenous peoples, black people, Latinx, Asian Americans, and white, Caucasian Americans. And I think that's a good system, but people are also advocating that there be these more specific history requirements.
And personally, I don't know how I feel about there being a mandatory, everyone has to take a career status course that introduces that to that. I mean, on one hand, like, I don't know that I think it would hurt. I think it would be a really good thing. But I also feel like, you know, just knowing how like, small and in some ways intimate, the gender women's studies department is, I feel like if suddenly every single undergraduate had to take a semester course, you might get a lot of people in there who make that department, which I have heard from people is a real home for them, kind of like, for public thought, like everyone, the respect of how seriously they want to engage with career history, have to learn that.
And I think in some ways, of course, you especially want the people who don't want to seriously engage with it in front of that material, to see if it can change their minds. But I do agree with you that in any case, you know, all through public education, we should have much stronger history. It's because I think history is the beginning of empathy, and then empathy is the beginning of it, right? Like, even if you're putting the wrong words into the phrase, you can still be putting the right tone, the right sense of intent, the right desire to be constructed to be inclusive.
So, yeah, I guess we'll close by. I'll ask, what would you want people to do? Like, what kinds of things would you want them to ask, or say, or talk about, or ways they want people to talk about you to be good allies and to be really pro-queer in your life, for lack of benefits? Oh, interesting.
I'm honestly not entirely sure. I mean, okay, I've grown up in one of the most liberal areas in the entire country, and yet, you know, I still feel uncomfortable about this kind of stuff on a daily basis, which is like, that's an awful thing about the entire country, like as a whole, that concrete, yeah. But what I would love in an ally is just someone that wants to hear what I have to say, and wants to know about that part of my life. I mean, most of my friends in high school were straight, and we never talked about my sexuality.
They never, they were never serious. I don't think they ever really cared, because me coming out from them didn't really change who I was to, I was the same person I was before, but that person was straight cat, not a queer cat. And we never tried to get to know queer cat, which is why I kind of like have trouble with reconnecting with high school friends, because they're just not curious if that's what they're doing. Yeah, like they're definitely not like unsupportive.
Like they will occasionally grow in this. So what kind of hogs are you seeing around Berkeley? Sure. Exactly.
But like, that's so successful to me. Yeah. No, I think it's an interesting point because there are certainly people who have this, I don't know, they think inclusive energy. They think, oh, I'm just gonna shoot, you know, different, everything is gonna be completely fine.
And I think it's always all well and good to have a very neutral reaction to a friend coming out or something like that. But I also feel like, you know, there's a kind of erasure without staying out there. There's not an intent to be bigoted. There's just maybe unspoken discomfort on their heart.
And so the way they've approached it is to pretend like it's not there. And as long as you don't bring it up, they don't have to bring it up. And they can keep interacting with us. You said it's straight cat.
It's not without acknowledging queer cat. Not that a straight cat exists, per se, except in their head. But yeah, I know that it's really interesting because I think there are so many contexts in life that like I experienced people really kind of put a discussion of queer issues to the cycling and the professional context. I worked multiple jobs where I think the idea of me sharing my pronouns and or requesting other peoples, which is really weird, like a cultural disruption.
And, you know, in some ways, a professional context is maybe among the more important places to be getting that right. But it's also maybe one of the hardest places to feel like you're in a position to dictate cultural terms in your workplace and especially if you feel out of place because of it. Yeah, I think you're also onto something there about just the level of sincere curiosity and that like open minded, maybe even generous curiosity, a curiosity that is like not, can you give me answers to these six questions? Like, you know, like interrogating people about their anatomy, like, oh, do you still have parts down there?
Is not the same thing as sincere curiosity. That's closer to interrogation and it's definitely basic. But I think your point of just like open interest, you know, I think there's a terrible stereotype about bisexuals and gays too that we just all are desperately dying to be the center of attention. And I mean, I may exhibit that trait, but I don't think that's true of bisexual generally.
But I do think that there is, I mean, there's both the opportunity for education. If you get to tell your story, get to share your experiences. And there's also probably the best framing there of if someone comes to you and says, so what's your romantic life like? Or what's your experience of dating than a birthday boy?
You feel in the place wherever you have your shared history. I think those kinds of super open-ended questions that let someone say, you know, the dating seems like this or I feel this way about what's or about girls or about, you know, if I'm on binary folks that I'm in relationship. But I think you give someone a lot of flexibility to talk about themselves, to educate you in the process by just sharing their sincere legitimate feelings. And by keeping it open, you prevent yourself, I think, as an ally from asking the kinds of questions that narrow the frame of their experience and force them into something to expect and instead allow them to express things you could never have imagined.
Basically, yeah, that was so awkward. Openness and discretrability about like who queer people or, you know, someone who are like who we are as people and how like our individuals contribute to who we are. And because, I don't know, it's very much the point about pointed questions when we're wondering that, like just one specific aspect of who a person is and all you do is fix it on that one aspect, that's when, you know, it becomes uncomfortable. Because people are more than just like a single identity where the intersection of many of them is not as much as a community.
Yeah, I completely agree. And fortunately, that's actually beautiful jumping off point four at the next time because our episode next time is gonna be about labels, how we put words to identities, how we express them, both within the community and outside of it, all that, no one can tell that vocabulary. And it's definitely complicated. There's a reason that happened in this in the middle of a five-way.
So that's what we'll talk about next time. Thank you so much, Captain. Thank you.