Queer Liberation from a socialist perspective

By Mr Rev Comrade Rowley

Aboriginal Australia Colonialism and capitalist expansion in Australia Queer oppression isn’t universal Capitalism Germany Russian Revolution Stalinism America AIDS Cuba Australia Equal marriage Queer Adoption Rights Venezuela Aboriginal Australia In aboriginal culture which is about 40,000yrs old until white settlement there existed the hunter gatherer mode of production. A type of as Marx called it primitive communism existed. Sexuality was an integral part of indigenous culture, beliefs and a strong connection to the land. While having economic and social dealings with other groups they did not form large confederacies for purposes such as warfare or conquest. With their deep connection to the land they organised in traditional tribal structures by a shared production and consumption of the entire social product. Both men and women would use their shared labour power to kill animals with spears. As there was no surplus, there was no chance of a ruling class institution of a family, private property or a state So if they didn’t work together to get food they died. So because there was no surplus there was no nuclear family. IE no mum dad and the two kids. Homosexuality as well as heterosexuality was irrelevant and communal raising of children was shared. The primary structures of Aboriginal society therefore were based on kinship. As such communal understandings of sexuality were critically important for the survival of the tribe. We don’t have many records but quotes like this from early anthropologists seem to show queers were not oppressed. Anthropologist Phyllis Kaberry on Aboriginal people in the Kimberley stated: “The lesbian relationships of Australian women were an acknowledged part of their sexual behaviour and were included in their ritual activities.” Another example of indigenous sexual freedom was the Bugis system Colonialism and capitalist expansion in Australia A distinct conclusion can be drawn about the colonialisation of aboriginal sexual freedom. The nature of the convict settlement was calculated to breed brutality. This inevitably took on a racist and sexist colouring. Racist because white settlement trampled on the ancient laws and social rules of the Aborigines. Yet at the same time depriving them of their hunting and gathering lands. The destruction of Aboriginal society could therefore be justified by a belief they were inferior either as a race or culture or both. Through religion, education, disease, sexual abuse and cultural dominance colonialism divorced many Indigenous cultures from traditional practices, which included communal understandings of sexuality. The Gay & Lesbian Aboriginal Alliance article concludes in reference to the US queer theorist Michael Warner’s claim: “heterosexualisation of society was a fundamental imperative of modern colonialism.” Colonial authorities in relation to European settlers, including convict men and women, also committed homosexual acts. For example, Joy Damousi and Kay Daniels have both investigated official accounts of lesbian sexual practices as well as relationships. This included relationships between young girls and women who acted as ‘pseudo males’. This was where women went to great lengths to stay together. Damousi observed of Tasmanian convict history, the ‘solution’ to expressions of lesbian suppression was universal. For “to isolate these women in separate cells in the Hobart factory, is used in order to contain and regulate their sexuality.” Evidence of the performance of unconventional female genders is a wide spread feature of lesbian and queer history in Australia. Consider De Lacy Evans of Bendigo, found in 1879 to have a female body. Enormous interest uncovered three marriages to women from his previous twenty plus years of living as a man while working as a miner. He was father to an 18-month old daughter from his most recent marriage. After a collapse in his health and controversy over his female body, Evans was hospitalised. Three months later he emerged in women’s clothes, ‘entirely feminine’ and entirely cured. It’s a miracle. Not all past relationships between queers have been uncovered by historians or told by the subjects themselves. Both aboriginals and white convict settlers were caught in a system of discipline as well as punishment. The bugis system is another example of queer suppression of discipline and punishment. Queer oppression isn’t universal The Bugis in Indonesia have a five-gender system and practice same sex marriage. This was a system of rules, which severely governed the role of women. Pederasty was condoned in Ancient Greece. The term pederasty embraces a wide range of erotic practices between adult males and young boys. This is also known as age structured homosexuality. The role of homosexuality in classical Mediterranean culture and society has only recently received significant study. Modern American society generally regards homosexuality as, at best, an intriguing subculture often providing stock for humorists and satirists. Yet at worst, a menacing counterculture threatening impressionable adolescents with irreparable harm. Yet, homosexuality has not always been an aspect of "others." Ancient Greeks acknowledged homosexuality as an important tool in boys’ education. They institutionalised and regulated its practices within their law codes. Sport was also an integral part of their society. Athletics included wrestling, foot races, running, long jump, javelin, discus throwing, and performance on hanging rings as well as parallel bars. Most boys in general eagerly trained in athletics in hopes of attaining competitive levels for the Olympic games. If they could not win or compete in athletics, they may still have hoped for one of the prizes awarded for physical beauty. Capitalism Homophobia has a basis in capitalism, but it’s not simple or mechanical. The relationship between economics and ideas is always complicated. There is a need to biologically reproduce the working class. This is why capitalist governments like the one we are living under have a weird fixation on fertility rates. Economic production and exchange doesn’t take place in the family under capitalism. People have to sell their labour power as individuals on the market. So this means people (mostly men) have a new freedom to lead their economic and sexual lives outside the family. There was a marked development of queer subcultures in 19th century Australia. There are indications from as early as the 1830s in Sydney a small urban homosexual subculture with dress codes and appropriation of public space was beginning to emerge. People then found guilty of sodomy were executed. This was well established by the 1890s and 1900s at least in Sydney, Melbourne and to a lesser extent, Brisbane. In Australian Colonies, the ‘abominable crime of buggery’ was punished by a sentence of life imprisonment and the first known one was tried in 1700. The combination of disease, loss of land and direct violence reduced the Aboriginal population by an estimated 90% between 1788 and 1900. During the 1950s there was a decrease in the institution of the family. So under capitalism the Catholic Church considered there still to be a high level of promiscuity and continual resistance to assimilating aboriginals to white culture. The white Australia policy officially adopted in the 1920s not only increased the number of children removed from their families but was also a fundamental contribution to the suppression of homosexuality. Germany This was the birthplace of the queer revolution in the 1800s. The Scientific-Humanitarian Committee (Wissenschaftich-humanitares Komitee, WhK) was founded in Berlin on the 14th or 15th of May, 1897. The WhK was established to campaign for social recognition of homosexual and transgender men as well as women facing legal persecution. It was the first such organisation in history to do so. The initial focus of the WhK was paragraph 175 of the Imperial Penal Code, which criminalised ‘coitus-like’ acts between males. The WhK assisted defendants in criminal trials, conducted public lectures and gathered signatures for a petition for a repeal of the law. Original members of the WhK included Doctor Magnus Hirschfeld. Hirschfeld put up a petition to repeal this law. At its peak, the WhK had about 500 members with branches in approximately 25 cities in Germany, Austria and the Netherlands. The committee was dissolved in 1933 when the Nazis destroyed the Institute fur Sexualwissenchaft in Berlin where the WhK was based. In 1962 in Hamburg, Hiller who had survived Nazi concentration camps continued to fight against anti-homosexual repression then tried unsuccessfully to re establish the WhK. Russian Revolution The Russian revolution was THE most significant moment in the whole history of queer struggle. The new criminal code of 1922 declared, “the absolute non-interference of the state and society into sexual matters, so long as nobody is injured, and no one’s interests are encroached upon.” This happened in the broader context of the Bolshevik attempt at totally revolutionising the family. IE access to abortion as well as equal rights between women and men, thus changing the institution of marriage. Trotsky said you cannot abolish the family, you have to replace it. Amongst all the war and poverty, they were unable to replace the family in Russia. There is also a genuine pro-gay and pro-sex socialist tradition, which must be defended. Eighty-seven years before sodomy laws in the U.S. were repealed by the Supreme Court, the Russian Revolution of 1917 wiped laws against homosexuality from the criminal code. The Bolshevik Party–in the tradition of Marx and Engels under the leadership of Trotsky as well as Lenin–was a mass party numbering in the hundreds of thousands. At the time of the revolution, gained wider support among millions of workers and peasants. Every aspect of Russian society was thrown into turmoil by the revolution. The "curious fact" Engels had written about decades before was accurate: "A phenomenon common to all times of great agitation, the traditional bonds of sexual relations, like all other fetters, are shaken off." Marx and Engels had argued "sex love" was distorted as well as alienated by commodity production. Monogamy under capitalism was an extension of the bourgeois concept of private property. While sex itself was turned into a commodity. Dr Grigor Batkis, Director of the Moscow Institute for Social Hygiene, published a pamphlet entitled the Sexual Revolution in Russia in 1923. The revolution, it says, has attempted to promote "forms of sexual relations responding to the needs and natural demands of the people". (Soviet legislation) declares the absolute non-interference of the state and society into sexual matters.” Now this is not to say homophobia was totally gotten rid of in the Russian revolution for the revolution was betrayed. Stalinism Stalin came to power after Lenin and the Bolshevik revolution came to power in 1917. The Stalinist bureaucracy was horribly homophobic. Homophobia was related to forced collectivisation and rapid industrialisation. People were pushed into massive workloads with more pressure on the nuclear family to be the economic basis of society. War and poverty took their toll on the leading activists of the revolution. Therefore the grass roots which made the revolution, were unable to stop the bureaucrats from taking over. Stalinist homophobia influenced new revolutionary movements elsewhere. Stalinism and fascism destroyed the queer movement for a whole generation. In addition, the queer movement is still recovering from it. Homophobic laws were reintroduced in 1934. Soviet medical and legal experts were very proud of the progressive nature of their legislation in 1930. The medical expert Sereisky wrote in the Great Soviet Encyclopaedia: 'Soviet legislation does not recognise so-called crimes against morality. Our laws proceed from the principle of protection of society. Therefore they countenance punishment only in those instances when juveniles and minors are the objects of homosexual interest' (p. 593)." America In the horribly capitalist conservative McCarthy era in the 50s, there was a huge crackdown on communists and gays. The Government conducted homophobic smear campaigns against the Communist Party of the USA. (Saying the communist party was gay as an excuse to crack down on them). The way the party dealt with this was to purge queers from the party. This was also a legacy of Stalinism. Harry Hay was a communist who came out of the closet and out of the party forming the first major gay organisation in the US. This was the Mattachine Society started by communists (without assistance from the homophobic Communist Party) in 1952. Then the sixties happened. Mass protests in the US against the war on Vietnam. Gay liberationists inspired by all the movements start to organise. They begin to attempt to forge alliances and form collectives with other movements. Black civil rights, women’s' liberation, Cuban revolution and all sorts of stuff. New nation-wide radical organisations/networks form. Gay Liberation Front, Daughters of Bilitis, Gay Activists Alliance. Mass protests on campuses and everywhere. Homophobic laws start to be repealed. Through the process of the anti-homophobia struggle, gay liberationists start to realise oppression is systemic. Brutal police repression of both gay liberation and black power intensified when they tried to work together. Splits happened on both sides over the issue. The Stonewall riots in 1969. Huge upsurge and first ever real mass movement follows. Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries, the first ever transgender activist group, formed after the Stonewall riots. AIDS Epidemic in America in the 1980s. Homophobic propaganda from the Reagan government. Increase in homophobic violence. The government didn’t give a fuck people were dying. They didn’t fund programs for prevention or treatment or subsidise cheap drugs. AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power (ACT UP) formed in 1987. Cool actions like political funerals bringing the ashes of dead AIDS victims to the steps of parliament occurred. T-shirts said “DESPERATE DYING HOPELESS PEOPLE WITH NOTHING TO LOSE ARE DANGEROUS AND UNPREDICTABLE.” Cuba US Gay Liberationists went on the brigade to Cuba, hopeful Socialism would provide a solution to homophobia. They were heartbroken to find homophobia in revolutionary Cuba after the revolution took place in 1969. Their cry for queer liberation was ‘Se dice nada, se hace todo meaning, ‘say nothing, do everything.’ Realising this was a mistake revolutionary Cuba took the queer struggle head on recognising homophobia is a mistake. They start to try and turn the situation around. Strawberries and Chocolate, queer sex ed in schools, drag queens lead May Day parade, same sex marriage and free Sex Reassignment Surgery are being discussed. After the collapse of Russia during the special period a system of free health care and education was now extended on a much broader level. Yet because of this economic crisis the queer liberation movement slowed. They form Co ops and are one of the leaders on the environment (Although they copped more homophobia from the other people on the brigade than from the Cuban’s). This is in stark contrast to the reactions in America. This occurred after Hurricane Katrina where queers were blamed for the disaster because of their tendencies towards “sinful behaviour” by the Christian right. Cuba did take many good anti-homophobia measures in the 1990’s and now provide free male to female operations. Che died defending the interests of the exploited and oppressed including queers of this continent. As Cuban’s would say, “Before history men who act as he did, who gave everything for the poor, grow in stature with each passing day finding a deeper place in the heart of the people.” Raul Castro revolutionary descendant of Fidel proposed to pass the bill for same sex marriage this year. Mariela Castro has carried on the legacy for full queer rights which the Communist Party of Cuba has welcomed. The plan is to reform the country's family laws granting "full rights" to homosexual couples. This includes adoption of children, allowing sex and identity changes for transsexuals. So in the long term, legalizing homosexual unions. Australia 1950’s In 1951, the NSW Crimes Act is amended to ensure ‘buggery’ is a criminal act ‘with or without the consent of the person’. Thus removing the legal loophole of consent. Yet as late as the 1950s and 60s, the typical identifiable homosexual male type remained ‘feminised’. Sexual relations were between ‘normal’ (non-effeminate) men who saw themselves as quasi-heterosexual. The ‘real male’ in the relationship were the effeminate passive ‘camp’ men. Transition from homosexual identity based on gender-inversion to identity based on same-sex attraction seems to have begun by the 1940s. Yet gender-inversion remains institutionalised. 1969 In early 1970 it remains a crime for men to engage in homosexual sex in every state and territory in Australia. Running against this acceptance is a continuing tradition of homophobia with legal and medical codes, which were strongly anti-homosexual into the 1970s. 1970 In 1970 the Campaign Against Moral Persecution (CAMP) is formed. 1971 CAMP organises the first gay and lesbian demonstration in Australia outside the headquarters of the Liberal Party in Sydney. 1972 The political activist association, Gay Liberation, is launched at Sydney University. Groups soon flourish on campuses around Australia. 1973 First queer NDA. 1975 The first National Homosexual conference is held at Melbourne University. This attracts around 60 delegates. Under Premier Don Dunstan’s Government, South Australia becomes the first Australian State to decriminalise homosexuality. Campaign, the longest running commercial gay magazine in Australia, is launched. 1976 In ACT, homosexual law reform legislation is passed. 1978 Socialist Youth Alliance (SYA now Resistance) supported gay liberation in Australia pretty much from the get-go. Ken Davis of SYA was behind the first one in 1978. The first Mardi Gras was a protest to mark the Day of International Gay Solidarity. This was the ten-year anniversary of the Stonewall riots. Therefore socialists instigated it forming the Gay Solidarity Group in March 1978. Twenty groups were involved. It was intended as a conscious bridge towards the club/pub scene. There were 1000 – 2000 participants and 53 arrests. “Out of the bars and into the streets” became the chant. 1979 The first FM gay radio program ‘Gaywaves’ begins broadcasting on Sydney’s 2SER. 1980 The ALSO Foundation is established in Melbourne in response to the Hamer Governments decriminalisation of homosexuality. 1981 The first Australia media reference to AIDS is made in the Gay and Lesbian newspaper The Sydney Star Observer. The Gay Rights Lobby is formed concentrating on the decriminalisation of homosexuality. 1982 NSW becomes the first state in Australia to pass laws prohibiting discrimination against homosexuals. Homosexuality is not decriminalised in NSW until 1984. 1984 The Australian Medical Association agrees to remove homosexuality from its list of illnesses and disorders. Decriminalisation of homosexuality is enacted in NSW. Three gay men are elected to Sydney City Council. 1989 The Sydney Gay Mardi Gras becomes the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. The largest gay rights march in Australia history is held, commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Stonewall riots. Of the 2,000 odd demonstrators, 53 are arrested, 53 are arrested on charges of offensive behaviour and resisting arrest. 1990 In the 1990s gay venues in the form of ubiquitous drag shows. Indigenous Erotica sets out the politics rewriting 1960s sexual liberation on indigenous terms. 1994 ACT passes Domestic Relationships Act. First jurisdiction to give same-sex relationships the same legal standing as heterosexual defacto relationships. UN Human Rights Commission rules certain Tasmanian legislation discriminates against homosexuals. Therefore this was found to breach the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The Federal Government passes legislation, which establishes the right to sexual privacy, effectively overriding Tasmanian’s anti-gay laws. 1995 The Pride Sydney Lesbian and Gay Community Centre opens. 1996 After 3 years of often-divisive community debate, Sydney’s first lesbian cultural and community centre, the Lesbian Space Project, is opened. Chrystos, Taylor, Akiwenzie-Damn as well as Driskill challenge us to recognise the interdependence of our sexual choices. They also help us to recognise our social and political situations. They at the foreground were about erasing the stigma and silence attached to complex and highly politicised areas of sexual experience. Their courage in speaking out is strengthened by the necessity of doing so. The queer generation is breaking down barriers, educating society their sexuality as natural and not problematic. Hence are helping to lead the fight against all forms of discrimination. 1997 Tasmania the last state to repeal sodomy laws, now having the best laws in Australia. Huge campaign led by the TGLRG. Protests attacked brutally by cops. Counter protests by right wing bigots. Activists took their case to the UN and embarrassed Tasmania internationally. 1999 Community Action Against Homophobia formed out of the globalisation movement environment and student movement. Queer student movement given a new lease of life by the queer bloc at the S11 blockade of the World Economic Forum. Over 20 000 people rallied. It was like heaven on a stick for queers. 2001 Successful queer space campaigns at Griffith Uni, Wollongong and ECU in Western Australia. Queer blocs organised at anti-VSU and trade union rallies. 2003 Relationship recognition and adoption rights allowed in WA. Yet because queers are continually put at the bottom of adoption lists it would be another four years before a same sex couple could be the first to adopt in Australia 2004 August 13th – the Marriage Act (1961) was amended via a bipartisan agreement to specifically ban same sex marriage. The National Day of Action to repeal the ban begins with barely enough time to organise. Was pushed through after the proposed ban on same sex adoption was dropped to get the ALP on board in the lead up to the elections. 2006 Queer refugee actions pursued. G20 & work choices queer blocs. Queers lead the G20 protest with a banner drop and a two-way chant initiated by CAAH and Resistance. It was the most amazing experience. The Queer Activists Network established. 113 organisation with 3500 people around the country joined the fight on NDA. Bill for de facto rights passed in SA. Couples still must live together for 3 years before they can be recognised. ACT ban on Civil Unions 2007 VSU has been introduced, yet the struggle continues. Ruddock proposes to quash the proposed Civil partnership bill. Nationwide snap actions initiated in 48 hours over the weekend in Sydney, Adelaide and Perth. Over 200 people showed up. Howard proposes to ban HIV/migrants from entering Australia. Over 100 people show up for candlelight vigil. Same sex adoption also proposes to be banned under bilateral and multilateral agreements. First same sex adoption by a gay couple in WA on June 13th. Howard opposes it. ALP proposes relationship register for the states but not federal. Then sides with Howard by opposing same sex adoption Bill of the Greens with Howard. The Human Rights & Equal opportunity commission put out a report identifying 58 laws, which currently discriminate against queers, their relationships and their children based around defacto rights. First NDA forum launched by CAAH to build the NDA to help double last year. 35 organisations nationwide have signed on. Faz reckons we're way ahead of last year considering the ebb in the movement. Yet there is a revolutionary drive we can have a bigger movement with around 2 million queers in Australia. Queers begin organising for Stop Bush around Australia. There’s another banner drop on the cards to stop Bush in September who proposes to ban adoption in 16 states in the US. Internationally homophobia under capitalism is at an all time high not seen since the 70s. Refugee tribunal classes sexuality in detention centres as situational as a product of their circumstances of limited exposure to opposite sex people. Same sex marriage Passed first in the Netherlands in 2001 Followed by Belgium, South Africa, Spain and Canada. 2007 Russia experiences the worst homophobic attack on gay Pride parade for 2nd year in a row. Pantera initiates Europe wide daily pickets; thousands from around the world have signed the online petition. 2007 Massachusetts 400 people stop the ban for marriage rights going ahead where it’s legal. 2007 10 000 people march in Rome for queer rights. 17 countries allow civil unions. Queer Adoption Rights NDA endorse adoption rights and civil unions for the first time as its only a matter of time before Howard proposes to ban same sex adoption. Legal in Tasmania, WA and ACT Legal in Guam, Andora, Belgium, Iceland, Netherlands, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, UK and France First Same sex adoption in WA in Australia. Queers are continually put to the bottom of adoption waiting lists. ALP & Liberals oppose it, as it does not maintain the institution of the family because a mother and a father can only raise children. Venezuela Revolution is good for the poor. Homeless queers who were kicked out of homophobic families get better access to food etc. Massive increase in Pride parade attendance. Free AIDS drugs. Opposition of the Catholic Church to contend with. Same sex marriage/civil unions on the cards. Summary Socialists support a queer liberation because this equals a socialist revolution. Queers don’t want some rights but all our rights just like our heterosexual counterparts. We don’t ask for much but the same as anyone else. Anything less is not good enough. For there cannot be queer liberation without a socialist revolution. A socialist revolution wants: Eradication of all homophobic laws Withering away of the institution of the family and the state Anti discrimination campaigns which will eliminate bigoted, homophobic ideas Affirmative action towards queers Relationship rights, adoption rights, all our rights Fully funded health care including AIDS care and free education National queer organisations to run queer campaigns While Marx stated even after the revolution there would still be remnants of the old society left over, a queer revolution is possible. Under capitalism we’re made to believe we can’t fight back, but this is far from the truth. Through collective mass action, we can unfuck the world now with Resistance. Resistance is the socialist youth organisation who is doing something about it right now and you can too by joining if you haven’t already. As individuals we can’t do much but together we can. Resistance has been leading the campaign since the early 60s when we initiated Mardi Gras to help lead the queer struggle. On a united front we can change the world in the lead up to the NDA and Stop Bush right now. “For human rights for all to be realised we would have to live in a different system, because capitalism doesn’t allow it to happen. To say we only want equal rights is to fall into a trap. What we want is a more just society. For we want is heaven hear and now.” -Fabiana Tron, from Desambrando, Cordoba, a lesbian arts group of Contrama 10