Linking arms and movements - Lesbian Rights Summit of the National Organization for Women April 23-25 in Washington, D.C., 1999 - Brief Article

More than 800 lesbians, bisexual women, transendered women, queer women, and supportive straight women (and a handful of men) gathered at the Lesbian Rights Summit of the National Organization for Women April 23-25 in Washington, D.C. The same weekend a contingent of more than 300 progressive queers of all colors marched on Philadelphia as part of the rally demanding freedom for Mumia Abu-Jamal, the black radical writer and activist many of us believe is falsely accused of murdering a police officer.

A tale of two lesbian movements could be written in the parallel trajectories of these two events. It would be easy, for example, to characterize the NOW meeting as the gathering of the white lesbian-feminist movement--but that would negate the participation and leadership of strong women of color. And it would be equally easy to dismiss the Mumia mobilization as the Left's issue du jour--but such a characterization would continue the false negation of the critical leadership role that lesbians of color and radical gay men have long played in the Left. It is the links between feminism and queerness that interest me in both of these gatherings.

Lesbian-feminist politics are across the board more multi-issue and progressive than mainstream gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender organizing. Dykes and queer girls see the connections and try to organize from the intersection of politics rather than from a single identity. Lesbian-feminist political theory owes much to lesbians of color and to radical women of all colors. The women at the NOW gathering are in many ways the offspring of this progressive tradition among lesbians. There were students, labor activists, mainstream political campaign workers, veteran dykes, and cultural lesbian feminists.

Many of the organizers and supporters of the queer contingent at the Mumia rally represent a who's who of a radical lesbian-feminist movement. Veteran activist and writer Barbara Smith gave a keynote speech noting that queer progressives had always been present inside people-of-color movements.

Lesbian feminism and queer progressive organizing share several points of connection. Both movements share the truth that economic and technological changes help shape our lives and influence public policy choices about the regulation of sexuality. Economic-based decisions shape policy about sex and birth control today. The welfare reform bill passed by Congress and endorsed by the Administration contains population control measures such as efforts to reduce the "out of wedlock" birthrate and to promote heterosexual relationships and two-parent families. These measures are designed to control the sexual lives of poor or low-income women. For our queer movement's struggle to create families, those measures are especially dangerous.

There are at least four other links that bind a progressive movement for GLBT liberation with women's liberation. First, there is an intimate connection between homophobia and sexism: Homophobia maintains gender inequality. Labels like "fag" or "dyke" are deployed to police the boundaries of sexual and gender expression.

Second, there is an intimate connection between sexism and gender rigidity and between the gay and lesbian liberation movement and gender nonconformity. Feminists have long argued that biology does not limit men or women to performing preassigned, gender-specific roles. Homophobia persecutes all those who are gender nonconformists--the sissy, the butch, the transgendered person.

Third, feminists and queers have long shared a critique of the limitations and pathologies of the traditional, patriarchal, nuclear family and a commitment to opening up other forms of family.

Fourth, both movements have worked hard to achieve and protect full sexual, reproductive, and personal autonomy and choice for women and men--a struggle that is far from over.

These are the links between the much more traditional politics of NOW's lesbian summit and a more radical lesbian-feminist movement. In the final analysis, both are lesbian movements built on a faith in an intersectional politics that focuses on the need for fundamental change in social institutions.

COPYRIGHT 1999 Liberation Publications, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Group