Most debate regarding queer identity is erroneously focused on whether persons who do not conform to traditional gender activity or heterosexual relationships are acting on natural impulses. The only reason this would be of concern is if one is locked into debate within the frame developed by the conservative intelligent design paradigm, in which what is "natural" is synonymous with what is right. Plenty of human activity, such as activity taken as part of philosophical praxis or the most passionate practice of religion, involve the higher mental state of many people and are not criticized for being so complex. Love and life activity belong in this category, and queer identity can transcend the current debate regarding its practice if we regard it properly.
The philosophy of Marxism can provide a new frame with which queer activity can be positively supported.
For the purpose of this article, queer activity will refer to a person's expressing gender and/or sexuality in a way not traditionally linked to his or her biological sex, as defined in queer theory.
Karl Marx and Fredrich Engels had little to say directly regarding queer theory. Personally, both philosophers expressed a disdain for gay relationships. Engels wrote to Marx criticizing the efforts of Karl-Heinrich Ulrichs, who worked for gay rights, and Marx wrote to Engels deriding Jean Baptista von Schweitzer, a gay labor organizer, because of his sexuality.
It is wrong to ignore the short-comings of Marx and Engels.
However, it would also be wrong to believe their personal prejudices supercede the emancipation promised by the theory they developed. Many of their own works begin the deconstruction of gender, and Marxism's basic premises are supportive of the realization of queer people's equality.
Fredrich Engels' "The Origin of The Family, Private Property, and The State" provides us with the most comprehensive examination of gender roles in early Marxism. In the book, Engels examines the different roles males and females exhibit depending on the society in which they lived. These gender roles were linked to the division of labor in both society and in the household.
Engels' later additions to the book include anthropological examinations of societies which were at different stages of development than the developed world was at the time, revealing cultures in which female members acted as men did in the developed world, and where males behaved in ways more like the developed world's women.
"The Origin of The Family, Private Property, and The State" revealed that, while male and female biological differences were real, gender was a social construct stemming from the organization of families in specific economic systems.
Another important observation, regarding sexuality, is made in Engels' book. Engels addressed same-sex intercourse in ancient Greece and other Mediterranean cultures. Although he was keen to point out that that intercourse was between adults and minors, and condemned the non-consensual act, he also posited that the practice of same-sex intercourse was, at times, a result of social conditions. This suggests, perhaps inadvertently, the possibility of two consenting adults forming a queer relationship.
Such observations would not be made by such a prominent theorist again in quite some time.
With queer theory's introduction, the implications of "The Origin of The Family, Private Property, and The State" were examined again. Modern Marxist queer theorists have further developed queer theory along lines which allow us to develop a greater argument for the equality of queer people. Perhaps one of the most notable Marxist queer theory works of recent years is Kevin Floyd's "Reification of Desire." The book is incredibly complex, but it is borne from an important observation made by those who have synthesized Marxism and queer studies.
What Marxist queer theorists have done is united Georg Lukacs' idea of reification, in which people forget that things which seem to be natural and static are actually socially created, with the idea of heteronormativity. This unity provides insight as to why many people find it normal to question why queer people exist while not realizing it is equally valid to question why heteronormative people, people who act in traditional gender roles, exist.
The recognition of gender as a social construct, and sexuality as a phenomena many people experience as something more fluid than bound, clashes with the restrictive frame progressives have had to react to thus far in the love debate. The debate grows, leaving what seemed like a controversy about same-sex relationships, and brings into the fold queer identity and sexuality. Not only are female-female partnerships part of the debate, but so are masculine-masculine partnerships, agender and feminine partnerships, and gender queer people, who express gender in ways not tied to their biological sex, as well as others.
The frame constructed by the conservative intelligent design theory is shattered in the face of such complexity.
The debate should not be confined to whether gender or sexuality is biologically determined, as that frame fails to account for the reality of many queer people's experience altogether. Continuing to speak in such terms, or react to such terms by simply taking the opposite position, traps us and keeps us from forming our own, transcendent frame.
How does Marxism provide a new frame with which queer activity can be positively supported?
At Marxism's root is the desire to make real the consciousness of the individual. Human beings are recognized as beings with a consciousness that surpasses other animals, and to have such an exceptional consciousness is what makes us human. Marx states this when he asserts, in his early work "The Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844" that conscious activity is our species-activity. Only when human beings are emancipated, and able to unite their will with action, do they feel satisfied.
It was also in that work that he first examined alienation in detail, defining alienation as the process by which a person's will is subverted by engaging in activity which does not match the person's desires.
Heteronormativity, therefor, is a form of alienation. It enforces this alienation among all competent persons, restricting them from the possibility of queer identity and love. Heteronormativity is antithetical to emancipation and the freedom of adults to chose their life-activity.
Regardless of any individual view of gender or sexuality, queer people's experience is real. As a person's being queer does not limit other people's ability to express themselves, the claim that queer activity is unnatural and should be repressed should not be responded to in a way that invalidates the experience of any queer person. As people are queer, and have constructed loving queer relationships that satisfy them, anti-queer organizations cannot justify their position with any sort of appeal to science, but must present a real, pertinent reason queer love is to be forbidden.
If the debate is framed this way, anti-queer organizations must admit their objections are rooted in personal beliefs, such as their interpretation of religion, and the debate becomes more honest. It becomes a debate over freedom, which is what it has really been about all along, and conservative, anti-queer proponents are framed as nothing more than people who chose to be supporters of oppression.
Further, heteronormativity is another form of alienation. It is both exhibited by what institutions do to restrict love, and what people who remain neutral fail to do to include queer people in our social environment. Racism, sexism and classism have continued to exist as forms of alienation in similar ways, and all people who have experienced such oppression share a common struggle with queer people.
The struggle for queer rights is also our struggle.
Tolerance is not enough. Marxism insists society represent all forms of love.
Have a Happy Valentine's Day!
