I have a few things I would like to reply with here, but I want to start with assuring you that no part of my analysis is meant as any kind of personal attack on individual queer people; I realize this can be a sensitive topic and at times that can cause people to feel defensive about discussions, but what I wrote about is western hegemony not individual western queers. I'm sorry for any feelings of invalidation you may feel.
Secondly, I will say that there is an implication in your response that I am somehow "outside" of the discussion. That is to say, you imply that you are "actual queer" and that I am not and thus have no place to speak about "actual queers." I'm not sure what led to this assumption, but it's nowhere in my text, and any quick follow-up showing the sheer amount I study and recommend queer theory (in this thread and elsewhere) should serve as at least a rudimentary hint that I am very much "inside" the discussion, and don't appreciate your implication that I have no place to make this analysis.
Now, as to your point: when discussing cultural hegemony, the intentions and the desires of the individual are quite literally immaterial: it doesn't matter what individual queer people intend with their language. The hegemonic institutions of western imperialism are pervasive and invasive, and whether a settler intends to participate in the perpetuation of hegemony or not is irrelevant to the fact that the settler inevitably and inescapably does participate in it. From the innocuous application of english identifiers to other cultures (like claiming that hijra, or two-spirit, or travesti, or transsexuelles are transgender) to outright purposeful queer imperialism. It doesn't matter, it all lends to the weight of the cultural hegemony of the english colonial world.
Even within english itself there are hegemonic ideals of queer identity that get reified through repetition: it is no individual's fault, it is just the way that structures of hegemony function. This is how the word transsexual fell out of vogue, how fairy, dyke and transvestite became relics to mainstream queer theory. And that mainstream is led by white academics and the media apparatus of the bourgeoisie, like it or not.
I also have to disagree with your statement that "literally no gay person in the west does that." Queer media (including posts in this very forum) are rife with discussions of the coming out narrative, and in the western queer lexicon someone is gay, for instance. Homosexuality is not an act, it is a way of being. That's not a value judgement, it's just the way that gayness works in the mainstream (hegemonic) western english culture. The identity tags, while they may matter to varying degrees and for varying reasons to different individuals, do serve the purpose in the mainstream culture of informing a reading of a person's every action, whether we desire it or not. If a trans artist writes a song, that becomes a trans song. For example: look at UGLY DEATH NO REDEMPTION ANGEL CURSE I LOVE YOU by Ada Rook. The first song on the album, "im cis" quite literally says "i say none of my songs are about being trans" and yet the first review published about the album spoke about it being a trans album. (Backxwash has talked about this as well, that her album was largely about immigrant experience, racism, and suicidal ideation, but every article about her when she won the Polaris was about "Trans Musician Backxwash.")
On the other hand, plenty of queer people, whether enthusiastically, reluctantly, ironically, or earnestly, contribute to discussions/memes/discourse about being gay or being trans or whatever other label. Again, this is not a value judgement, it is just a thing that I have personally observed and studied (and participated in, because, as I said, the way hegemony works is we are all implicated to varying degrees). It's not inherently a bad thing (and can even be affirming for the participant), but that does mean that the hegemony is continuing to be reasserted. And the real problem is when it gets applied cross-culturally without introspection.
To take it to the way anglo hegemony works: whether you desire it or not, english is the language of the global hegemon. When you use it, when you translate cultural ideas and feelings into english, you are participating in the spread of that hegemony. Things that exist in non-english cultural contexts necessarily undergo transformation to be translated into english to be understood by an english audience. That's the very nature of translation. However, because of the imbalance in power between english (as the colonial language of the global hegemon) and other languages, this is by its very nature a translation that serves to further cultural hegemony.
The point, I suppose, is that settlers perpetuate hegemony whether they wish to or not, whether they are victims of that hegemony or not, and that goes for queer settlers too. (the colonized perpetuate hegemony too, that is its nature, to become instantiated in the society such that it is self-reproducing)
Gramsci for sure, but also Theodor Adorno (especially enjoyed Jargon of Authenticity) and Paolo Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed for understanding the ways that oppressive ideology self-reproduces; Albert Memmi's The Colonizer and the Colonized and Decolonization and the Decolonized;
and, more specifically for ways that "dominant queer theory" can erase identities within even domestic movements, Julia Serrano's Excluded: Making Feminist and Queer Movements More Inclusive, Angela Pattatuchi Aragón's Challenging Lesbian Norms: Intersex, Transgender, Intersectional and Queer Perspectives, Sara Ahmed's Queer Phenomenology: Orientations, Objects and Others, and Viviane K. Namaste's Invisible Lives: The Erasure of Transsexual and Transgendered People
For explorations of this type of Western-progressive imperialism: Lila Abu-Lughod's Do Muslim Women Need Saving?, Nada Elia's Greater Than the Sum of Our Parts: Feminism, Inter/Nationalism, and Palestine, Saffo Papantanopoulou's Even a Freak Like You Would Be Safe in Tel Aviv: Transgender Subjects, Wounded Attachments, and the Zionist Economy of Gratitude, and one I massively recommend, Jasbir Puar's Terrorist Assemblages: Homonationalism in Queer Times.
These three are a bit more of a tangent, but Joey L. Mogul, Andrea J. Ritchie, and Kay Whitlock's Queer (In)Justice: The Criminalization of LGBT People in the United States, Dean Spade's Normal Life: Administrative Violence, Critical Trans Politics, and the Limits of Law, and Eric A. Stanley's Captive Genders: Trans Embodiment and the Prison Industrial Complex are all great ways to really get at the heart of how American calls for "trans rights/protections" are often channeled towards increased policing, surveillance, militarized borders, and, ultimately, violence against racialized minorities and especially racialized queer people. From within America, it is essential for analyses of queer rights, and for calls for queer safety, to maintain a deeply rigid and principled stance against co-optation for furthering state violence, which is why any such calls from within the US to examine queerphobia abroad not only minimizes the violence faced domestically, but also serves to strengthen imperialist narratives of the necessity of aggression/destabilization of the state's enemies.
deleted by creator
I have a few things I would like to reply with here, but I want to start with assuring you that no part of my analysis is meant as any kind of personal attack on individual queer people; I realize this can be a sensitive topic and at times that can cause people to feel defensive about discussions, but what I wrote about is western hegemony not individual western queers. I'm sorry for any feelings of invalidation you may feel.
Secondly, I will say that there is an implication in your response that I am somehow "outside" of the discussion. That is to say, you imply that you are "actual queer" and that I am not and thus have no place to speak about "actual queers." I'm not sure what led to this assumption, but it's nowhere in my text, and any quick follow-up showing the sheer amount I study and recommend queer theory (in this thread and elsewhere) should serve as at least a rudimentary hint that I am very much "inside" the discussion, and don't appreciate your implication that I have no place to make this analysis.
Now, as to your point: when discussing cultural hegemony, the intentions and the desires of the individual are quite literally immaterial: it doesn't matter what individual queer people intend with their language. The hegemonic institutions of western imperialism are pervasive and invasive, and whether a settler intends to participate in the perpetuation of hegemony or not is irrelevant to the fact that the settler inevitably and inescapably does participate in it. From the innocuous application of english identifiers to other cultures (like claiming that hijra, or two-spirit, or travesti, or transsexuelles are transgender) to outright purposeful queer imperialism. It doesn't matter, it all lends to the weight of the cultural hegemony of the english colonial world.
Even within english itself there are hegemonic ideals of queer identity that get reified through repetition: it is no individual's fault, it is just the way that structures of hegemony function. This is how the word transsexual fell out of vogue, how fairy, dyke and transvestite became relics to mainstream queer theory. And that mainstream is led by white academics and the media apparatus of the bourgeoisie, like it or not.
I also have to disagree with your statement that "literally no gay person in the west does that." Queer media (including posts in this very forum) are rife with discussions of the coming out narrative, and in the western queer lexicon someone is gay, for instance. Homosexuality is not an act, it is a way of being. That's not a value judgement, it's just the way that gayness works in the mainstream (hegemonic) western english culture. The identity tags, while they may matter to varying degrees and for varying reasons to different individuals, do serve the purpose in the mainstream culture of informing a reading of a person's every action, whether we desire it or not. If a trans artist writes a song, that becomes a trans song. For example: look at UGLY DEATH NO REDEMPTION ANGEL CURSE I LOVE YOU by Ada Rook. The first song on the album, "im cis" quite literally says "i say none of my songs are about being trans" and yet the first review published about the album spoke about it being a trans album. (Backxwash has talked about this as well, that her album was largely about immigrant experience, racism, and suicidal ideation, but every article about her when she won the Polaris was about "Trans Musician Backxwash.")
On the other hand, plenty of queer people, whether enthusiastically, reluctantly, ironically, or earnestly, contribute to discussions/memes/discourse about being gay or being trans or whatever other label. Again, this is not a value judgement, it is just a thing that I have personally observed and studied (and participated in, because, as I said, the way hegemony works is we are all implicated to varying degrees). It's not inherently a bad thing (and can even be affirming for the participant), but that does mean that the hegemony is continuing to be reasserted. And the real problem is when it gets applied cross-culturally without introspection.
To take it to the way anglo hegemony works: whether you desire it or not, english is the language of the global hegemon. When you use it, when you translate cultural ideas and feelings into english, you are participating in the spread of that hegemony. Things that exist in non-english cultural contexts necessarily undergo transformation to be translated into english to be understood by an english audience. That's the very nature of translation. However, because of the imbalance in power between english (as the colonial language of the global hegemon) and other languages, this is by its very nature a translation that serves to further cultural hegemony.
The point, I suppose, is that settlers perpetuate hegemony whether they wish to or not, whether they are victims of that hegemony or not, and that goes for queer settlers too. (the colonized perpetuate hegemony too, that is its nature, to become instantiated in the society such that it is self-reproducing)
deleted by creator
hi, any links to hegemony, are you mostly working off of gramsci? ty in advance
Gramsci for sure, but also Theodor Adorno (especially enjoyed Jargon of Authenticity) and Paolo Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed for understanding the ways that oppressive ideology self-reproduces; Albert Memmi's The Colonizer and the Colonized and Decolonization and the Decolonized;
and, more specifically for ways that "dominant queer theory" can erase identities within even domestic movements, Julia Serrano's Excluded: Making Feminist and Queer Movements More Inclusive, Angela Pattatuchi Aragón's Challenging Lesbian Norms: Intersex, Transgender, Intersectional and Queer Perspectives, Sara Ahmed's Queer Phenomenology: Orientations, Objects and Others, and Viviane K. Namaste's Invisible Lives: The Erasure of Transsexual and Transgendered People
For explorations of this type of Western-progressive imperialism: Lila Abu-Lughod's Do Muslim Women Need Saving?, Nada Elia's Greater Than the Sum of Our Parts: Feminism, Inter/Nationalism, and Palestine, Saffo Papantanopoulou's Even a Freak Like You Would Be Safe in Tel Aviv: Transgender Subjects, Wounded Attachments, and the Zionist Economy of Gratitude, and one I massively recommend, Jasbir Puar's Terrorist Assemblages: Homonationalism in Queer Times.
These three are a bit more of a tangent, but Joey L. Mogul, Andrea J. Ritchie, and Kay Whitlock's Queer (In)Justice: The Criminalization of LGBT People in the United States, Dean Spade's Normal Life: Administrative Violence, Critical Trans Politics, and the Limits of Law, and Eric A. Stanley's Captive Genders: Trans Embodiment and the Prison Industrial Complex are all great ways to really get at the heart of how American calls for "trans rights/protections" are often channeled towards increased policing, surveillance, militarized borders, and, ultimately, violence against racialized minorities and especially racialized queer people. From within America, it is essential for analyses of queer rights, and for calls for queer safety, to maintain a deeply rigid and principled stance against co-optation for furthering state violence, which is why any such calls from within the US to examine queerphobia abroad not only minimizes the violence faced domestically, but also serves to strengthen imperialist narratives of the necessity of aggression/destabilization of the state's enemies.