How Slavery Affected Modern SexualityA Story by A. FarrisAnthony Farris 11 May 2017 Research Question: How did slavery shape society’s
views of “normal” sexuality? Abstract: Laws which
constituted acceptable sexual acts and initiated the transgressing of humans
into property facilitated the normalization of violence as a means of sexual
gratification and regulation. This amalgamation of law and socio-sexual
violence generated a hierarchy directly related to notions of racial and gender
stratification. Specifically, the historical domination of heterosexual, White
males beginning in indentured servant society has shaped modern notions of
“normal” sexuality in America. What follows is an assessment of laws, personal
narratives and popular perceptions concerning socio-sexuality and the power
dynamics it fosters. That is to say, this essay is concerned with the
seedlings, festerings, evolutions and enduring qualities of the power dynamics
encompassing sexuality, particularly in their relation to race and gender. The origins
“normalizing” American sexuality will be explored with regard to laws
influenced by religion in the latter period of the colonies and early America.
The constituting of a legal foundation will illuminate the development of
socio-sexual stratification through the fission of power within the
institutions of government, marriage and slavery being supported by historical,
legal documents, modern discourses and first-hand accounts from individuals of
varying genders, statuses and races. Using this information to construct the
socio-sexual hierarchy, the dynamic between gender and race regarding violence
and status will be related to the modern marginalization of minority groups
based on these variables. Introduction American
sexuality begins within the confines of indentured servitude during the
colonial period. Laws which pervaded and facilitated the sexual atrocities of
slavery evolved from regulations imposed upon servants concerning acceptable
forms of sexuality. The specifics of these laws allotted power to the upper-class
and validated notions of sexuality deemed permissible by the master. Moreover,
encompassing sexuality within the sphere of legality amalgamated permissibility
with economy by imposing disproportional penalties based on gender, race and sexual
quality. Thus, Slave-America, having an established foundation, juxtaposed male
sexual satisfaction with the normalization of violence against slaves,
fostering notions of feminine submissiveness and inferiority. The legal bodies
which allowed for the sexual abuse of slaves negatively impacted power dynamics
within the institution of marriage by condescending the status of the mistress
to that of female slaves as well as conventionalizing the objectification of
women. Post-slave
America adopted the sexual practices established on the plantation. However,
without an abundance of slaves employed for the purposes of sexual
satisfaction, wives became the subjects of unbridled male lust. Moreover,
slavery provided the methodology by which the sex trafficking industry
practices acquisition, submissiveness and abuse. The nature of capitalism,
consumerism and postwar conformism necessitated the situating of homosexuality
and heterosexuality as different, stratifying forms of sexual expression. Thus,
contemporary notions of heteronormativity were adopted by the same social,
political and economic institutions which perpetuated the oppression of Blacks.
In response to this injustice, Queer individuals looked to and identified with
the Black social movement, using its ideology to politicize Queer sexuality. This
politicization propelled Queer sexuality to the forefront of societal discourse
while simultaneously highlighting racial, gendered and sexual inequities which
continue to affect contemporary society.
Colonial America: The Status of
Sexuality Colonial
America began to regulate sexuality by enacting legal stipulations which
inherently defined acceptable sexual practices, acting as archetypes for future
regulations which marginalized deviants of society. The laws of 1642-1769 colonial
Virginia defined acceptable sexuality on the basis of social hierarchy, spurning
a correlation between status and sexuality (socio-sexuality). By enacting laws
encompassing sexuality among the servant class and vilifying unconventional
mating (miscegenation and homosexuality), the ensuing socio-sexual
stratification favored the rich, White, heterosexual male. The punishment for
any male servant who secretly married with any maid or woman of the servant
class without consent from her master or mistress would be to finish serving
out his time with his masters with the addition of a year for said offence.
For the maid or woman servant married without proper consent, the time of her
service would double.
In colonial Virginia, the legal validity of marriage between two servants was contingent
upon its officiation by the master. This was reflective of a society which had
already situated the rights of humans as property based on socio-economic
status. Moreover, the discrepancy of penalties for male and female servants highlights
an inherent gender bias with regard to sexuality. That is, the uninhibited sexual
practices of the male were perceived as a natural expectation. Conversely, the
sexual transgressions of women were believed to be rooted in a basic moral or
virtuous laps and, therefore, constituted harsher penalties. Additionally, the
versatility and utility of the female servant (reproduction, sexual satisfaction,
caretaker) bolstered their property value. Therefore, the disproportional
penalties of undesignated marriage for male and female servants reflected a
socio-economic system which amalgamated status and sexuality, viewed
uncontrollable male lust as conventional and placed economic value of female
servants over the male servant. Colonial America: Sexual Virtue Colonial
Virginia’s socio-sexual regulations had ties to the church which catered to the
inherent hierarchy of the master-servant dynamic through notions of religious
virtue and morality. Here too, the dichotomy concerning legal ramifications for
sexual misconduct between masters and servants favored sexual displays rooted
in masculinity and economic status. The laws of colonial Virginia necessitated
that female servants bearing children by their master be sold to the church
wardens of the parish “where she lived when she was brought to bed of such
b*****d” for two years after her servitude.
By contrast, “[t]he punishment of a reputed father of a b*****d child” was
keeping the child, alleviating responsibility from the parish.
The misogynistic orientation of colonial Virginia’s laws illustrates the
socio-economic perceptions of a society which encouraged the licentiousness
power structures of forced labor, vilifying consensual and nonconsensual sexuality
among the lower-classes. However, the degrees of acceptable sexuality among the
servant class varied depending on gender. According to these laws, the child of
a male servant unable to accommodate for said child was kept by the parish until
the father’s servitude expired.
Afterwards, the father would be required to make satisfaction to the
parish.
Unlike the female servant, unapproved male sexuality among the servant class
was perceived as a purely economic and contractual transgression. The
unsolicited promiscuity of female servants was perceived as a transgression of
morality, warranting servitude under religious authority. Colonial America: The Economy of
Unconventional Sex Colonial
Virginia didn’t solely distinguish acceptable sexual practices based on
economic standing, but on the quality of the practice. According to colonial
law, “[i]f any man lyeth with mankind as he lyeth with a woeman… they both
shall surely be put to death.” The
harshness of the penalty regarding homosexual practices is reflective of the socio-political
atmosphere which would seep into early America. These pre-American values also
found contention with miscegenation, inspiring colonial Virginia to decree any
“English or other [free] white man or woman” who married ‘a negroe, mulatto, or
Indian man or woman bound or free… banished and removed from this dominion
forever” after three months of marriage,
implicitly purporting the idea that sexual relations between Whites and
servants was admonish-able but interracial unions desecrated the institution of
marriage. Additionally, socio-sexual exile and fining proved to be a means by
which upper-class citizens controlled sexuality. Those with significant
economic mobility would have been able to afford fines and/ or dislocation.
Moreover, individuals consistently having sex with servants were White,
plantation owners who could afford slaves. By contrast, lower-class individuals
and servants had no protection under the law and the punishments of
transgression would have proved economically devastating. The
socio-economic ramifications of interracial sexuality are shown through laws
regulating sexuality between White women and people of color. Specifically, “if
any English woman being free shall have a b*****d child by any negro or
mulatto,” she must “pay the sume of fifteen pounds sterling… to the Church
wardens of the parish” where the child is delivered.
Being enacted in 1691, this law pinpointed women’s socio-economic position in
colonial-America and used it as a means of controlling women and POC sexuality.
Having little-to-no income, both groups relied on the dominant class (White, landowning
males) for survival. Not only did this law take advantage of women financially,
but it legally lowered their social status. Beyond payments to the parish,
mothers of interracial, “b*****d,” children could be “taken into the
possession” of the church wardens for five years.
Thus, these laws illustrate a stark contrast between the acceptability of
sexuality between White men, women and people of color. Moreover, they
illustrate how the legal system intertwined sexuality with varying economic and
social ramifications to control and promote sexual acts deemed appropriate or
deviant.
Slave-America: Violence of Black Objects The
racial and gendered stratification system which developed on slave plantations
facilitated and encouraged acts of sexual violence as a methodology for
maintaining oppressive family dynamics and normalizing the abuse of Black and
female bodies. The slave master was situated at the plantation’s hierarchical
apex, often taking full advantage of his legal-sexual rights with his slaves.
Dr. Esther Hill Hawks recounts the sexual violence delivered to Susan Black,
whose master first took notice of her “when she was about twelve yrs old.”
According to Hawks, Black was summoned by her master, where upon “he caught
hold of her, held her… stuffed her mouth [and] committed rape.”
Afterwards, “[s]he was sick for three weeks” and, upon recovery, her master
“used her as he liked.”
This account of sexual violence on a young slave girl highlights the socio-sexual
position of slaves in contrast to the master; the slave is a form of sexual
property, the master may indulge in his desires at will. J. W. Lindsay wrote, “[t]here
are men who will buy a sprightly, good looking girl, that they think will suit
their fancy, and make use of them in that way. I knew a man by the name of Ben
Kidd- a desperately mean man to his slaves- who had three or four slave women.” In
being bought for the purpose of sexual satisfaction, slavery established an
acceptability regarding the objectification of women and Black bodies. Additionally,
Lindsay’s account illustrates the emasculation of the male slave by the master,
who used female slaves “whenever he saw fit,” regardless of whether or not she
had a husband. In Harriet Jacobs’ memoir, she stated that, at age fifteen, “[m]y master [Dr.
Flint] began to whisper foul words in my ear,” saying, “I was his property;
that I must be subject to his will in all things.” There
were no laws protecting slaves from abuse by their masters; the slave was at
their mercy in all matters of physicality and emotion. Jacobs echoed this
sentiment, stating, “there is no shadow of law to protect [a slave girl] from
insult, from violence, or even from death; all these are inflicted by fiends
who bear the shape of men.” In
cases of resistance, the master would resort to beating a slave into
submission. Susan Black bore her master’s “abuses, ‘till one day, after
exhausting all his powers to make her yield to his desires, he had her stripped
naked, tied up and then, with his own hands, beat her ‘till the fever of
passion had subsided.” Lindsay’s
master “generally carried a white oak cane, one end very heavy, and if the
women did not submit, he would make nothing of knocking them right down.” Sexual
violence on the plantation primarily served as a means for the master to
maintain submissiveness amongst slaves. The unrestrained use of slave women’s
bodies served as a physical demonstration of their position as property.
Moreover, the disregard for slave marriage emasculated slave men,
simultaneously disenfranchising Black emotion. Ultimately, the rights which
encompassed slave sexuality instilled a sense of entitled satisfaction which
carried over into the institution of marriage.
Slave-America: The Scorned Mistress Due
to the master’s open promiscuity, slave women often found themselves in direct
conflict with the mistress whose socio-sexual position was little better than
the slave’s in the plantation hierarchy. It was an open-secret that masters
took sexual advantage of their slaves at leisure. However, discretion was the
law of the land. Nell Irvin Painter discussed Black’s mistress, Gertrude
Thomas, who, “saw [her]self in competition for the attention of [her] husband
whose black partners were ideal women: Slave women had to come when summoned
and were conceded no will of their own.” Harriet
Jacobs criticized the mistresses, “who ought to protect the helpless victim”
but “[had] no other feelings towards [a victimized slave girl] but those of
jealousy and rage,” being “objects of her constant suspicion and malevolence.” Thus,
the institutions of slavery and marriage were constructed to favor the
promiscuity of the rich, White male while simultaneously reducing Blacks and
women to sexual objects. Painter argued that “[p]roslavery apologists often
insisted that the maintenance of slavery depended on the preservation of
patriarchy within white families, arguing that white women, especially rich
women, must remain in their places and be submissive to their fathers and
husbands so that slaves would not conceive notions of equality.” In
1873, Victoria Woodull criticized the institution of marriage, asserting that “‘marriage
licenses sexuality’… and the horrors that are practiced under this license are
simply demoniacal; almost too horrible to be even thought of without
shuddering.”
She further argued that the “safeguards to virtue and morality” under the
institution of marriage “made almost every wife a prostitute and every husband
a sexual monster.” That
is to say, the prevailing ideology of marriage prioritized the satisfaction of
the husband, necessitating subservience of the wife for the operation of the
institution. Jacobs described the mechanics of the marriage dynamic after the
confessing of her master’s sexual abuses to her mistress (Gertrude Thomas) and
seeing tears come to her eyes. However, Jacobs “was soon convinced that her
emotions arose from anger and wounded pride. She felt that her marriage vows
were desecrated, her dignity insulted; but she had no compassion for the poor
victim of her husband’s perfidy.” Gertrude
Thomas “realized and recorded with tortuous indirection a central fact of her
emotional life: that female slaves and female slave holders were in the same
sexual marketplace and that in this competition, free women circulated at a
discount due to the ready availability of women who could be forced to obey.” That
is to say, the abundance of slave women offered a plethora of opportunities for
the sexual satisfaction of the master, simultaneously juxtapositioning the
mistress and the female slave as sexual commodities. However, the mistress
perceived the superior value of the slave women as a byproduct of their social
position. Neither the mistress’s
“economic or educational advantages nor her social status protected her from
what [they] saw as sexual competition from inferior women,” knowing that “white
men saw women- whether slave or free, wealthy or impoverished, cultured or
untutored, black or white- as interchangeable.” Regarding
this objectification, Jacobs lamented, “[y]ou never knew what it is to be a
slave; to be entirely unprotected by law or custom; to have the laws reduce you
to the conditions of a chattel, entirely subject to the will of another.” By
molding socio-sexuality within the institutions of slavery and marriage,
masters (White males) developed justifications for the uninhibited fulfilment
of sexual desires. In coupling acceptable sexual desire with violence, White
males and husbands internalized sexual superiority and entitlement. By
contrast, the violent yieldings of mistresses and slaves spurned an
internalization of sexual submissiveness and objectification. White women, in
particular, perceived their condescending to the same socio-sexual level as
slaves within the plantation hierarchy despite their supposed racial and
economic superiority. Moreover, female slaves saw themselves develop as sexual
commodities with the ability to produce more slaves, care after children and
provide unlimited sexual relief. Though strapping male slaves were used to
produce ideal physical characteristics in new slaves, their masculinity
fostered contention within the plantation hierarchy. This brute force was
ultimately suppressed through emasculation by abusing their female partners and
family, reducing them to the status of property and demonstrating to the male
slave that he owned and controlled nothing.
Post-Slavery: Hand-Raised Beasts Power
dynamics developed within the institutions of slavery, marriage and family led
to a post-slavery society dominated by the rich, White men who had erected the
prevailing ideology of socio-sexual superiority. Having been established and
sustained for the purposes of stabilizing the institution of slavery, the
ideology of female inferiority within the institution of marriage necessitated
the succumbing of the wife to the will of her husband. Moreover, masculine
expectations and entitlement within the institutions of family and marriage
fostered a concern for the sexual virtues of women. Ezra Heywood criticized
these expectations, stating: “[t]he popular idea of sexual purity, (freedom
from fornication or adultery, abstinence from sexual intercourse before
marriage, and fidelity to its exclusive vows afterwards), rests on intrusive
laws, made and sustained by men… whose better judgement bows to Custom that
stifles the cries of affection and ignores the reeking licentiousness of
marriage beds.”
This reeking licentiousness was relayed through Sadie Magoon, who described the
rapid decline of a woman’s health due to the incessant sexual demands of her husband,
causing her to be “bedridden and placed under a nurse’s care.”
However, “when her day nurse left she was at the total mercy of her husband…
who continued to gratify his desires.”
Thus, the conventions which objectified the wife as a means of sexual
gratification for the unbridled desires of the husband persevered through slave-society
into post-slavery-society. Based
upon traditional plantation hierarchies which allowed for the sexual domination
of slave women and mistresses, attention turned towards the developing sex
traffic industry in the early twentieth century. In 1911, a government agent
from the U.S. immigration commission reported on the social interactions
between sex traffickers. Specifically, the agent was baffled as to how these
men could “talk tenderly with reference to the fortunes or misfortunes of their
mothers or relatives” and “send polite greetings to one another and to their
friends” while discussing “the characteristics of the women in question with
the same coolness with which they would name the good points of a horse or a
blooded dog which they had for sale.” The
sex traffic industry is deeply rooted in values and ideals developed on
plantations. Specifically, it reduces woman (and people, in general) to objects
of sexual gratification through acts of deceptions, isolation and violence,
instilling the sexual satisfactions of customers as the victims’ main
prerogative (slave satisfying the master).
Relating Non-Heteronormative Sexuality to Racial
Injustice The
twentieth century’s differentiating and labeling of homosexuality as a
perversion “simultaneously delimited a sex norm- the new heterosexuality.” In
homosexuality assuming its new role as the sexual deviant, the majority
conformed to “a new sex ethic, one that was congruent with the pursuit of
consumer happiness and capitalist profit.” This new facet in sexual-economic
amalgamation was caused by changing perceptions of the family (and body) from
producers to consumers.
Having been previously perceived as “an instrument primarily of work, the human
body was integrated into a new economy, and began more commonly to be perceived
as a means of consumption and pleasure.” It
was Freud’s “arbitrary, authoritarian assertion” of heterosexuality as
“‘maturity’” which displaced the sexual symbiosis of heterosexuality and
homosexuality. His labeling of homosexuality as a fixation of immaturity
degraded its status from variant of sexual equanimity to an augmentation. Thus, heterosexuality assumed its contemporary role of the master-sex by the
same ideology which had purported the fallacious master-race. Moreover, this
normalization of heterosexuality “proclaimed a new heterosexual separatism- an
erotic apartheid that forcefully segregated the sex normal from the sex
perverts”
Having
been spurned by mainstream society, the sexually oppressed began to equate
their plight for sexual autonomy with Blacks during the Civil Rights movement.
Those labeled by society as deviant saw Black culture and the politicization of
race as an effective means of uniting, addressing and reforming prevailing ideologies
concerning Queer sexuality by relating sexual injustice with racial injustice.
This relation was fortified through the critical analyses of institutions which
perpetuated racial and sexual oppression. The socio-political atmosphere
surrounding the gay community operated with an animosity found in the
Black-socio-political dynamic. Circa 1950-1975, gays were objects of “verbal
abuse, physical attacks, [and] even murder.”
Like Blacks, they found themselves subject to social institutions’ inherent
marginalizations, particularly those rooted in capitalism, emphasizing “[t]he
sexual repression which pervade[s] the efficiency-oriented workplace…
divid[ing] men and especially isolate[ing] gays.” The
capitalist institution’s enterprise regarding the Queer individual found itself
akin to that of the slave on the plantation; the pervading oppression of the
deviant (non-conformist, lower strata, etc.) through isolation and
vulnerability. This psychological subjugation was employed to alienate gay
people “not only from each other but from themselves. Gay people [were]
forced to question their very identities, stifle in themselves feelings of love
and affection for members of the same sex, and remain ‘in the closet,’
concealing their full gaysexuality.” Indeed,
this reflects the methodology behind slave despotism, the master’s prerogative
to ensure the slave recognizes their status as slave and the implications
surrounding that status. By relation, the institutions surrounding homosexual/
Queer life sought to differentiate the deviant individual from heteronormative
society by highlighting their nonconformist position. In the work force, gays
had “almost no security because of sex discrimination” and were, often, not
considered suitable applicants. Religion played a pivotal role in this
alienation; by “[r]egarding homosexuality as unnatural, orthodox religion
infuse[d] many gays with a profound sense of guilt.” Much like the employment of religious justifications
for the caste system and racial stratification, religion was used to vilify
homosexuals as augmentations of heteronormative sexuality. It
was homosexuality’s confrontation with postwar conformism which propelled prejudices
concerning sexuality and race to the forefront of societal discourse. In
recollecting his experience as a gay man during the postwar era, Jeffrey
Escoffier asserted that “[c]ritical writing on the psychological and
sociological consequences of conformism served as an important bridge to the
discovery of the gay social world, Postwar conformism emphasized the norm and
stigmatized the deviant- for instance, the homosexual.” Having been alienated from conformist
society, individuals like Escoffier looked to Black activists and theorists as
a means of politicizing and assimilating homosexuality with race. Indeed,
Escoffier asserts that Norman Mailer’s “vision of the pivotal role of black
culture and its sexual radicalism encouraged [him] to look to the black experience
for lessons relevant to [his] situation as a homosexual.” By exploring homosexuality
and Black politics in American literature, Escoffier stated: “I began to think
of myself as part of a minority- and the struggles of African Americans seemed
linked to my own.” As
homosexuality organized itself into a political-minority movement, gay individuals
began to critically deconstruct and attack oppressive social institutions using
Black methodology. In one newspaper primarily focused on “Gaysexuality [and]
Oppression,” the author asserts that “[t]he sexual repression which pervades
the efficiency-oriented workplace… divides men and especially isolates gays.
The nuclear family plays a central role in fostering sexual misery, instilling
in children the bourgeois morality of class society, male supremacist
attitudes, and anti-homosexual fears… Regarding homosexuality as unnatural,
orthodox religion infuses many gays with a profound sense of guilt.” Here,
the outline of gay oppression directly parallels that of slave domination. The
institution which necessitated the slave condescends the homosexual individual;
that is, the prospect of capitalist economy inherently suppresses the socially
deviant. This economy bleeds over into the institution of marriage and family
which, during slavery, instilled subjugation of the wife and slave while
simultaneously reducing them to sexual objects. Regarding its relationship with
homosexuality, society’s perceptions of traditional marriage and family
(circulated by the dominant, White male) necessitates heteronormativity,
reducing the morality and productivity of the individual to a determination of
sexual preference. Finally, religion, notoriously dominated and oriented by
masculinity, supports this esoteric conformity through pseudo-morality and
virtue. Indeed, even individuals within the nonconformist socio-sexual
community felt a hierarchical oppressiveness in representation and acceptance.
Ellen Roberts explored this in her article, “Black Lesbian,” claiming, “little
if anything at all has been written on the Black Lesbian” who “is, in effect,
dealing with two aspects of discrimination- racial and sexual.”
Roberts goes on to write that “[a]side from the usual uptight heterosexual
derision and oppression directed towards gay women, the Black Lesbian must also
deal with static from her Black brothers, and sometimes her white sisters. It
is a fact that on numerous occasions, Black gay women have been ignored or
harassed by white women who frequent gay bars on the East Side. It is a fact that
Black women are often refused admission to bars or dance clubs unless they have
identification or are accompanied by a white friend.” Thus,
queer sexuality became subject to the same racial and gendered hierarchies
which continue to plague its socio-political mobility.
Conclusion In
contemporary society, heteronormativity and its associated oppression are
juxtapositioned or encompassed by the American patriarchy. Specifically, the tradition
of licensing sexuality based on socio-economic standing has resulted in a
society whose ideals are governed by masculine/ misogynistic heteronormative desires
within the narrow frame of capitalism. In his article, “America Is Still a
Patriarchy”, Philip Cohen addresses this issue, describing patriarchal America
as “a systemic characteristic that combines dynamics at the level of the
family, the economy, the culture and the political arena.” Of
the family, Cohen address-es the custom which dictates that the wife take on
the husband’s name after marriage, arguing that it perpetuates male-dominance.
Indeed, only 29.5% of women in 2014 kept their maiden name after marriage.
While seemingly irrelevant, during the 1970s, the rights of women to vote, do
banking and get a passport were jeopardized in maintaining their maiden name. Thus,
historical regulations surrounding the institution of marriage continue to resonate
within contemporary culture. The
promotion of violence established as a justifiable means of satisfaction during
slavery led to patriarchal notions of sexual entitlement. The statistics
surrounding modern sexual violence speak for themselves: As of 1998, 1 in 6
women “have experienced attempted or completed rape.” In
2010, the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey reported that
approximately 1 in 6 women, or 16.9% of women, had “experienced sexual violence
other than rape by an intimate partner in her lifetime.” 10.7%
of women have been stalked by an intimate partner in their lifetime. In
1999, 76% of female homicide victims had been stalked by their killer, 54% of
them had reported their stalker to the police.
Moreover, 89% of victims who had been physically abused had also been stalked
by their abuser before being murdered.
This isn’t a heterosexual issue as sexual violence greatly affects the LGBT
community. In 2010, the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey
reported that 44% of lesbian women and 61% of bisexual women (as opposed to the
35% of heterosexual women) had been raped, victims of domestic violence and/ or
stalked by an intimate partner. 26%
of gay men and 37% of bisexual men had also experienced rape, physical violence
or stalking by an intimate partner.
Interestingly enough, the percentage of heterosexual men in this category was
29%.
Moreover, male victims of rape and unwanted sexual advances (not physical) reported
mostly male attackers.
Additionally, almost half of their stalkers were men. However, other forms of violence
against males were predominantly performed by females. The
socio-political and economic climate which oppressed Blacks, women and gays is
becoming a major topic in societal discourse concerning transgender
individuals. 2016 saw the highest record of transgender deaths in the United
States as a result of violence, 22. The
Human Rights Campaign addressed this issue, asserting that “[w]hile the details
of these cases differ, it is clear that fatal violence disproportionately
affects transgender women of color, and that the intersections of racism,
sexism, homophobia and transphobia conspire to deprive them of employment,
housing, healthcare and other necessities, barriers that make them vulnerable.” In
his article, “The Queers Left Behind: How LGBT Assimilation Is Hurting Our
Community’s Most Vulnerable,” Colin Walmsley discusses the origins of these
barriers and the fallaciousness surrounding them, arguing that, by making
marriage equality the “modern cornerstone of the gay rights movement,” it
asserted that the Queer community had “reached an important milestone,
transcending basic issues of health, safety, economic security and social
stability.
However, he dismantles this argument, stating: “[o]ver 20 percent of all LGBT youth
are homeless, and 40 percent of all homeless youth are LGBT. 58 percent of queer homeless youth have been sexually assaulted. 64 percent of transgender
people make less than $25,000 per year. 41 percent of transgender people and 62 percent of queer homeless youth have attempted
suicide. And 10 transgender women have
been murdered in the U.S. so far this year (2016).” By focusing on the fight for gay marriage, Walmsley
argues that “other less marketable LGBT issues were largely forgotten. The
number of queer youths on the streets rose. Violence against transgender people
increased.” Beyond
statistics, the individual is accosted by daily injustices like the Brock Turner
case and Donald Trump’s existence. To a large degree, American society has
internalized notions of egregious male sexuality and heteronormative
oppression. Moreover, the individual is incessantly berated with a conformity
which proports the heteronormativity, racial integrity, gender performances of
capitalism. This heteronormativity is the afflatus which boycotted the new
“Beauty and the Beast” for having a gay character. This racial integrity was
the backlash for Old Navy’s ad featuring an interracial family. This emphasis
of gendered performance was the boycotting of Target for implementing a
gender-neutral bathroom policy. Even within the LGBT/ Queer community, POC
still seek the representation and acceptance their white peers have been
afforded in and outside of the community. Additionally, bi-sexual and asexual
individuals, being rejected by heterosexual culture, also feel disenfranchised
by their queer counterparts for their fluidity and indolence, respectively. Thus,
in amalgamating sex, economy and gender, the ideology which established racial
hierarchies normalized stratification among members of various communities.
© 2017 A. FarrisAuthor's Note
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