In “Punks...,” Cathy J. Cohen discusses queer politics and analyzes the issue of normalization. Cathy Cohen believes that queer politics must be left politics, anti-capitalist, because queer activists are willing to “confront normalizing power by emphasizing and and exaggerating their own antinormative characteristics and nonstable behavior.” Cohen implies that to be queer is to be the opposite of normal. To follow normalize constructs is also follow capitalism as it is the normal to the United States’ economic system. Furthermore, Cohen states “a Left framework of politics… brings into focus the systematic relationship among forms of domination, where the creation and maintenance of exploited, subservient, marginalized classes is a necessary …show more content…
Cohen addresses “heteronormativity” as “localized practices and those centralized institutions that legitimize and privilege heterosexuality and heterosexual relationships as fundamental and ‘natural’ within society.” Cohen believes heteronormativity will “work to support and reinforce institutional racism, patriarchy, and class exploitation.” Heteronormativity provides power to the “‘morally correct,’ white, state authorized, middle-class male heterosexual” and oppresses the “culturally deficient, materially bankrupt, state-dependent heterosexual woman of color.” Heteronormativity gives people a sense of privilege and “feeling of supremacy” if they are to be within the norms of …show more content…
In the video, gay marriage is seen as the root of destruction for building a family. People are scared of things that have not been normalized in society, and having same-sex marriage destroys the foundation of a nuclear family. However, to gays and lesbians, anyone in love with each other can build a family even with adoption. In the article, Priya Kandaswamy believes that marriage is not based on love, but “a legal institution that is fundamentally about preserving property relations.” Marriage does not any sexuality from loving or expressing affection to one another. However, it does affect whether or not their spouse or family will inherit or retain family wealth. Homosexuality is also intersecting with race. In the video, homosexuals wanted to be considered as a minority group; however, this would put them under the Civil Rights Act which was made possible by the colored community. People of color do not agree with having homosexuality as an individual group because it will then grant all sexuality the rights within the Civil Rights Act, making it null and meaningless. Homosexuality does not also follow the three requirements to be considered a minority group: immutable characteristics, financial discrimination, and political weakness. In the article, sexuality can be seen intersecting with gender and race as stated by Marlon Bailey, “not
In Vicki L. Eaklor’s Queer America, the experiences of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, and transgender people in the years since the 1970s gay liberation movement are described as a time of transformation and growth. The antigay movement, threatened, now more than ever, created numerous challenges and obstacles that are still prevalent today. Many of the important changes made associated with the movement were introduced through queer and queer allied individuals and groups involved in politics. Small victories such as the revision of the anti discrimination statement to include “sexual orientation”, new propositions regarding the Equal Rights Amendment and legalized abortion, were met in turn with growing animosity and resistance from individuals and groups opposed to liberal and
They mention the transition of “the closet,” as being a place in which people could not see you, to becoming a metaphor over the last two decades of the twentieth century used for queers who face a lack of sexual identity. Shneer and Aviv bring together two conflicting ideas of the American view of queerness: the ideas of the past, and the present. They state as queerness became more visible, people finally had the choice of living multiple lives, or integrating one’s lives and spaces (Shneer and Aviv 2006: 245). They highlight another change in the past twenty years as the clash between being queer and studying queerness (Shneer and Aviv 2006: 246-7). They argue that the active and visible contests over power among American queers show that queers now occupy an important place in our culture. They expand on the fact that queerness, real, and performed, is everywhere (Shneer and Aviv 2006: 248). This source shows the transformation in American culture of the acceptance of queerness. It makes an extremely critical resource by providing evidence of the changes in culture throughout the last two decades. Having the information that queerness is becoming more accepted in culture links to a higher percentage of LGBTQ youths becoming comfortable with their sexual identity. However, compared to the other sources, this
Aaron Devor’s essay “Becoming Members of Society: Learning the Social Meanings of Gender” describes how despite popular belief, gender and sex are not directly related and how social norms affect individual’s choice of gender. Devor‘s main argument is that gender is not determined by genitalia, but instead by the individual's own choices. Michael Kimmel’s essay “Masculinity as Homophobia” claims that gender equality is a positive thing for males and that social norms force men to act a certain way. Kimmel’s main argument is that men are always having to protect their masculinity in order to prevent themselves from appearing weak. Both authors present compelling arguments for both gender equality and for how social norms influence individuals’ gender choice. However, the two authors approach the same topic in different ways. Kimmel takes a more laid-back approach to the topic by using simple words and a conversational tone that relates to the casual gender sociologist. Devor writes a more sophisticated essay using complex terms and a more formal tone that relates to the serious sociologist that research gender studies.
In an effort to legitimize all subcategories of sexuality considered deviant of heterosexual normatively, queer theory acknowledges nontraditional sexual identities by rejecting the rigid notion of stabilized sexuality. It shares the ideals of gender theory, applying to sexuality the idea that gender is a performative adherence to capitalist structures that inform society of what it means to be male, female, gay, and straight. An individual’s conformity to sexual or gendered expectations indicates both perpetration and victimization of the systemic oppression laid down by patriarchal foundations in the interest of maintaining power within a small group of people. Seeking to deconstruct the absolute nature of binary opposition, queer theory highlights and celebrates literary examples of gray areas specifically regarding sexual orientation, and questions those which solidify heterosexuality as the “norm”, and anything outside of it as the “other”.
...n’s work, forming same sex bonds on things other than homosocial behavior, and no longer conforming to hegemonic masculinity are all steps that could be taken to lessen the patriarchal system. However each of these steps requires one to take turn down the “path of least resistance” and go against the patriarchal system that our culture continues to promote.
In this essay we are going to analyze identities, but if we want to go in depth about identities first of all we need to have the knowledge about the meanings of companies and the architecture skeleton which all of this are going to express what punk sulcubture is. Firstly we have to start to point out to the architecture skeleton because as humans we exist in a social structure that effect the way we think and perform so because of this effect we dont have our total freedom, the world limit us. On the other hand we have to analyze the agency. the quantity of the solitary to act with self - determination and to make their own decisions. To synopsize we are saying that we construct our identity, your personality it could be the same to the identity of other human being but never it is going to be the same, you construct it and you want to
While the gay rights movement has been around for some time, the things that they fight for is forever changing. Currently it is fighting for the right to marry, and receive all the rights straight people get when they marry. Married privilege is like white privilege; married people have more rights then non-married people, no matter what sex a person is married to. These benefits include insurance coverage’s under a spouse policy, social security benefit inheritance, receiving pension and personal assets without taxation, visitation rights at the hospital without question and making health care decisions (LaSala, 2007). In addition to all that, there is a social benefit to being married; it represents a healthy, developed and normal relationship (LaSala, 2007). Before reading this article, I never thought about why married people are given all of these rights. I never thought about where they came from, who made them up, or why they were even made. Why are we fighting for legalizing same-sex marriage a...
In the publication Black Sexual Politics: African Americans, Gender, and the New Racism, author Patricia Hill Collins, she discusses sexism, gender and the new racism. Collins discusses that heterosexuality operates as a hegemonic ideology that influences human sexuality, racism, and psychological processes (Collins 2004 p.37). This placement of heterosexuality at the top, positions it as the basis of understanding sexuality. For example Collins illustrates that the term sexuality itself is used so synonymously with heterosexuality that schools, churches, and other social institutions treat heterosexuality as natural, normal, and inevitable (Collins 2004 p.37). This in turn facilitates stigmatization of individuals who engage
As a United States citizen who was born in the new millennium, I was brought up with the idea that, as stated in the Declaration of Independence, “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” This statement was one of the main sources of fuel for the Civil Rights Movements in the mid 1950’s/60’s in the United States. Minority groups have often been mistreated in the United States culminating in movements much like that of the women’s suffrage movement, civil rights movements and now a movement toward equality for the LGBTQIA. In the last few decades a new minority group, lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transgender, queer/questioning, intersex and allies, and their struggle to attain their right to the pursuit of happiness. This small makes up roughly 4 percent of the US population. Though many say that gay marriage will weaken the moral foundation of our country, it should be legalized, not only because banning it is unconstitutional, but also because strips people of their human rights
There are several instances where Cohen’s piece and the struggles faced by the LGBT society can interact. Similar to Cohen’s argument, the LGBT community is a “pure culture” that challenged a common way of thinking of our society (Cohen, 4). It’s a “projection” of a culture that signals a need of change into individual's old way of thinking (Cohen, 6). The LGBT groups refuse to obey the norms of society, since the latter often ignores the urgency to adopt the necessary
Adrienne Rich attacks heterosexuality as “a political institution which disempowers women” in her 1980 essay Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence (Rich 23). What most see as a traditional way of life, Rich views as a societal mandate that serves as “a beachhead of male dominance,” (Rich 28). For a woman in Virginia Woolf’s time, “the one profession that was open to her [was] marriage,” and though females entered the public sphere as the 20th century progressed, “single women…are still viewed as deviant” and somewhat ostracized (Woolf 25 and Rich 30). Compulsory heterosexuality, Rich argues, is one of many institutions that historically and currently have allowed men to maintain a dominant societal position, and this institution, although seemingly unrelated, is fundamentally parallel to American slavery, which was even more compulsory for Africans than heterosexuality is to women. These institutions are strongly linked when considered with Césaire’s Discourse on Colonialism, which examines colonialism as “relations of domination and submission which turn the colonizing man into a classroom monitor, an army sergeant, a prison guard, a slave driver, and the indigenous man into an instrument of production,” (Césaire 42). His primary concern with colonization, the method by which a relationship of colonialism is established, is not the physical presence of colonists trespassing on land that doesn’t belong to them. Rather, he deplores colonialism because the relationship between oppressor and oppressed has negative consequences for both parties. “Colonization works to decivilize the colonizer,” who is acting towards a self-serving, profit-driven goal and “not [as] a philanthropic enterprise,...
It is important to note that I am viewing and analyzing this text from the positionally of a Caucasian, lower-class, female. Not only do I identify as female, but I also consider myself to be a feminist, which is one of my reasons for choosing the feminist framework. I also feel that it is critical to state that I identify as heterosexual, but consider myself an ally to the LGBTIQ community. Therefore, my views on gender may extend to my views on sexuality, since they often go hand-in-hand.
As Tamsin Wilton explains in her piece, “Which One’s the Man? The Heterosexualisation of Lesbian Sex,” society has fronted that heterosexuality, or desire for the opposite sex, is the norm. However, the reason behind why this is the case is left out. Rather, Wilton claims that “heterosexual desire is [an] eroticised power difference [because] heterosexual desire originates in the power relationship between men and women” (161). This social struggle for power forces the majority of individuals into male-female based relationships because most women are unable to overcome the oppressive cycle society has led them into. Whereas heterosexual relationships are made up of the male (the oppressor) and the female (the victim who is unable to fight against the oppressor), homosexual relationships involve two or more individuals that have been freed from their oppressor-oppressed roles.
Marriage is a “socially recognized and approved union between individuals, who commit to one another with the expectations of a stable and lasting intimate relationship. It begins with a ceremony known as a wedding which formally unites marriage partners. A marital relationship usually involves some kind of contract, either written or specified by tradition, which defines the partners’ rights and obligations to each other, to any children they may have, and to their relatives. In most contemporary industrialized societies, marriage is certified by the government,” (Skolnick, 2005). Marriage is also an important institution because of the impact it has on society. Marriage is the main way that reproduction of human life occurs. In some societies it is tradition for family heirlooms or things of value be passed on through marriage. Marriage also serves as a healthy way to have intimate relationships with an individual. In most places a marriage exists between two people of the opposite sex. However, the legal definition of marriage is currently being challenged by many. According to Skolnick’s article a marriage can be defined by responsibilities that a couple would share, some examples are: living together, having sexual relations, sharing money and financial responsibilities, and having a child together. The issue is that homosexual couples can do these things like heterosexual couples.
... the past several years is the same-sex family. Since the sexual revolution of the 1960’s, changing attitudes have brought more tolerance to the gay and lesbian community. This has somewhat loosened the stigma previously associated with this segment of the population. Along with evolving public attitudes, economic and legal changes in the United States have also reduced barriers previously facing same-sex couples making it more likely for them to form families (Butler, 2004). On the other hand, continued strong institutional ties to marriage between one man and one woman continue to pose problem for this group and shape social agendas (Glenn, 2004; Lind, 2004). While several states and many employers have given recognition and benefits to homosexual partners, there is still no uniform policy in place which addresses their familial rights in the United States.