To you, on this day.
The title's a misnomer, I actually wrote this almost a week ago. But still. I think this needs to be here.
December 6, 2011
8:08 pm
Dear Patricia-of-a-few-hours-ago,
As you read this now, you are no longer the same person. What you've read has changed you, and let me tell you why. Let me write you a letter. In remembrance. In understanding. Let me write you a letter as a relic of the past. Let me write you a letter because the person who walked into class at one in the afternoon is a different person from the one that walked out at fifteen past four.
Before you read that manifesto, you were a bisexual woman comfortable in her own skin. Before you read that manifesto, labels were not quite as important to you. Before you read that manifesto, you were fine when people assumed you were straight. Not anymore. Now you are uneasy.
Bi? Queer? What are you? You itch to re-label yourself. To align yourself with the 'movement'. But what movement that claims representation ignores one of the fundamental members of the so called minority? Is not B the third letter in LGBT(QIA)? Where is the representation--your representation? Where in the eloquently angry manifesto that almost moved you to tears is the paragraph, the sentence, the word saying it is your right to love whomever you choose, irregardless of race, economy and yes, gender?
You are a different person because you realize you are a minority within a minority. The silently ignored. The swept under a rug. The put on display when visitors come over, but locked up in the cabinet when they leave.
You are not a fence sitter. But while you know this innately, personally, as truth, while you accept this as the state of things, remember that there are those who do not feel the same way. It is your job to educate them.
Ask yourself this: is the word queer really that all including? It’s called radical, strange, eccentric. But of all the definitions you’ve read, remember it’s the label of mysterious that struck you the most. Because it remains a mystery if you are queer. If you have a right to belong, even here. The manifesto talks about gay men and lesbian women. But where are your bisexuals? Your transgendered men and women? Your asexuals and intersexed? An umbrella term that leaves the rest of the community wet and shivering is not a very effective shield from the rain.
Are you angry now? Good, then get angry. Because it is your anger that will change how the world sees you. Remember when you were talking to a lesbian friend about bisexuals and she laughed cause “you guys are weird half breeds, straight sometimes and gay when you want to be”? Remember how it difficult it was to explain, to insist, that you were not straight, not ever straight, even if you were dating a man? You may laugh now, but you are not a unicorn, darling. Bisexuals do exist. You should know--you are one. So get angry, but remember not to stay angry.
Remember, too, that this manifesto was written in 1990. In June 1990. Before you were born. Remember, dear, that things change. And that just like the call to arms of the original manifesto, the only way for them--gay, lesbian, straight, queer-- to know that you exist is for you to tell them. No more hiding behind this perceived heterosexuality.
So claim the term. You are queer. Not because a manifesto said you were. You are queer because you claim the word. Words have power only when you give them the privilege, so pour power into this word. Queer. Yes, that’s you.
Patricia Denise Chiu
11:43 pm
http://www.sterneck.net/gender/queer-manifesto/index.php
December 6, 2011
8:08 pm
Dear Patricia-of-a-few-hours-ago,
As you read this now, you are no longer the same person. What you've read has changed you, and let me tell you why. Let me write you a letter. In remembrance. In understanding. Let me write you a letter as a relic of the past. Let me write you a letter because the person who walked into class at one in the afternoon is a different person from the one that walked out at fifteen past four.
Before you read that manifesto, you were a bisexual woman comfortable in her own skin. Before you read that manifesto, labels were not quite as important to you. Before you read that manifesto, you were fine when people assumed you were straight. Not anymore. Now you are uneasy.
Bi? Queer? What are you? You itch to re-label yourself. To align yourself with the 'movement'. But what movement that claims representation ignores one of the fundamental members of the so called minority? Is not B the third letter in LGBT(QIA)? Where is the representation--your representation? Where in the eloquently angry manifesto that almost moved you to tears is the paragraph, the sentence, the word saying it is your right to love whomever you choose, irregardless of race, economy and yes, gender?
You are a different person because you realize you are a minority within a minority. The silently ignored. The swept under a rug. The put on display when visitors come over, but locked up in the cabinet when they leave.
You are not a fence sitter. But while you know this innately, personally, as truth, while you accept this as the state of things, remember that there are those who do not feel the same way. It is your job to educate them.
Ask yourself this: is the word queer really that all including? It’s called radical, strange, eccentric. But of all the definitions you’ve read, remember it’s the label of mysterious that struck you the most. Because it remains a mystery if you are queer. If you have a right to belong, even here. The manifesto talks about gay men and lesbian women. But where are your bisexuals? Your transgendered men and women? Your asexuals and intersexed? An umbrella term that leaves the rest of the community wet and shivering is not a very effective shield from the rain.
Are you angry now? Good, then get angry. Because it is your anger that will change how the world sees you. Remember when you were talking to a lesbian friend about bisexuals and she laughed cause “you guys are weird half breeds, straight sometimes and gay when you want to be”? Remember how it difficult it was to explain, to insist, that you were not straight, not ever straight, even if you were dating a man? You may laugh now, but you are not a unicorn, darling. Bisexuals do exist. You should know--you are one. So get angry, but remember not to stay angry.
Remember, too, that this manifesto was written in 1990. In June 1990. Before you were born. Remember, dear, that things change. And that just like the call to arms of the original manifesto, the only way for them--gay, lesbian, straight, queer-- to know that you exist is for you to tell them. No more hiding behind this perceived heterosexuality.
So claim the term. You are queer. Not because a manifesto said you were. You are queer because you claim the word. Words have power only when you give them the privilege, so pour power into this word. Queer. Yes, that’s you.
Patricia Denise Chiu
11:43 pm
http://www.sterneck.net/gender/queer-manifesto/index.php