I believe there has to be a better way to refer to our community than an initialism list approach, which is structurally exclusive: that’s why we’ve seen various groups rightfully seek increased recognition and try to change the most popular term - LGBT, LGBTQ, LGBTQIA+ and literally dozens of other variants. That indicates that an initialism is an exclusive, rather than inclusive, route which will always fail to represent everyone as our understanding of sex, sexuality and gender change over time, and it possibly encourages accidental erasure.
Are there any recognized alternatives which capture the full breadth of this community?
-
Explicit terms are particularly tough because the community isn’t simply defined by a single concept like sexuality (gay, lesbian, bi, asexual, etc.) gender (trans, non-binary, etc.) or sex (intersex, etc.). Some academic institutions have used terms like “sexual and gender minorities” (GSM), which I think is a huge improvement, although even then we see that term evolve as more factors come to light (“gender, sexual and romantic minorities”, GSRM). Are there any criticisms of those terms we should be aware of?
-
I’ve heard using “queer” as an umbrella term remains controversial for its historical use as a slur, so using it in wider contexts might be inappropriate?
-
I’ve heard “rainbow community” once or twice, which seems is clear enough that it doesn’t need an introduction, with the great symbolism of a rainbow covering all the colors. But I wonder if rainbow symbolism is considered inclusive, or considered specific to certain subgroups. Especially how the “progress flag” contrasts against the rainbow flag.
-
Any others you like?
…
I ask this question out of ignorance: while I am part of my local community, we generally aren’t very familiar with the broader community in other countries and their diverse perspectives yet. So I hope I haven’t accidentally said anything careless!
Also sorry if this is comm is specifically for trans questions. Let me know if I should ask this somewhere else instead, I just didn’t want to put it on a general instance and have too many over-confident outsiders and trolls answering.
Adding to the pile of support for queer. It’s a reclaimed term. We’ve grown to use it so much in a positive light that we’ve stripped it of the power it previously had for hate. Everyone I know who is queer in any way is quite happy and supportive of the term, and we use it pretty often in conversation. Despite its historical use as a slur, if someone were to attention to use it in a hateful way, it would offend me no more than if they used “gay” in the same way. And I’m sure we can both agree that isn’t a slur, nor is it controversial. Of course, that’s simply my opinion on the matter. What I’ve seen anecdotally, however, is that basically no one in the community really treats it as controversial.
I love queer. I liked it anyway, but a book I’ve been reading made a strong case for embracing it as being defined in it’s opposition to societal norms, its useful and imo desirable to define it this way. Queer culture is not something I want to see assimilated out of existence, and I sure don’t want to pretend like liberty can be achieved by disappearing into some liberal imitation of cishet culture.
I love that for me, being queer means being radical, demanding better for everyone, loving and supporting each other and giving everyone the chance to be their genuine selves, we don’t demand conformity. Pride means celebrating being ourselves, with no compromises and no apologies.
I like the ones that dont sleep on 2-spirit folks when it comes to those of us on turtle island. Solidarity with the struggle to preserve Indigenous folk’s cultures is of paramount importance to the struggle for Liberty Of and-or-From Gender and Sexuality
Nova Scotia does this!
Goddamn preach
The trans action collective I’ve helped start made this one of our core talking points/demands. You can’t achieve liberty at the expense of anyone else’s, trans liberation demands indigenous liberation
Queer is a very good embrella term, its long since been reclaimed
I generally use queer.
It’s often used in the names of university programs (e.g. queer studies), so I think it’s been pretty well reclaimed.
It is also intuitively inclusive of romantic minorities, which gives me the sense it will continue to be inclusive as the aforementioned acronym continues to grow.
An aside, I’m also all for reclaiming the t-slur (I am trans) but I don’t use it unless I am certain the people around me won’t be hurt.
Friends of Dorothy always makes me giggle.
I saw “QUILTBAG” before.
Queer (Q and U, and sometimes people use Questioning instead), Intersex, Lesbian, Transgender, Bisexual, Asexual and Gay. I don’t think it’s my favorite, I prefer just “queer” personally, but I do like how it being more of a word than an acronym denies the message of the “-without the T” bigots. You can’t take out any letters without noticeably destroying the word. A quilbag isn’t anything.
The only issue is that ending it with “-bag” makes it sound kind of rude to me. It makes me think of the word douchebag. I definitely like the spirit, though. There must be other words out there that could seamlessly incorporate the existing acronym, shuffle it up a bit, and not sound too rude either.
And quilted bags look awesome!
queer and gay are both common umbrella terms, e.g. a “gay bar” basically means a bar for LGBT+ folks
that said, with my partner I jokingly call us the “lgbt”, pronounced like all the consonants are shoved together, the way it’s pronounced in this tiktok:
https://old.reddit.com/r/TikTokCringe/comments/125jlqw/exposing_our_woke_teacher/
I generally use “queer” in a “reclaiming it from bigotry” mindset, though I understand some people may have negative feelings with it. Because of that I am careful to make sure it’s clear that I’m not using it negatively. Usually around people who already know I’m with them.
I think the alphabet letters (LGBTQetc) are too specific to be properly inclusive without always changing them, so I find them counterproductive, but they at least don’t have any such baggage.
The “Alphabet Mafia” - Yeah, it’s a term invented by fascists, but - dammit! - does it sound bad ass and I have seen plenty of queer people use it proudly.
There’s a good one I can’t quite remember which has the initials spell out like basket or some other neat word like that. Wish I could remember it
there is MOGAI but it mostly ended up with people trying to make every gender in the world and there was so much overlap it was a mess.
Now that you mention it, I think it’s been at least 5 years since I’ve seen MOGAI in the wild.
