Why words like queer and trans make perfect sense

Yes, umbrella terms like queer and transgender make perfect sense, but maybe not for the reasons many think.

You have probably heard the questions: “Being gay is about sexuality and being trans is about gender identity, so why do the two belong to the same queer community?"

Or: “Trans men and women suffer from gender dysphoria, while drag queens and ‘crossdressers"‘ are just ‘performing’,” so why should being trans be a matter of gender expression instead of identity only?”

Setting the false premise of  “all crossdressers are just performing” aside, these questions are based on a fundamental misunderstanding, namely that membership in the queer and trans communities need to be based on some kind of easy definable common “essence”. 

In the case of “queer” some would argue that that would be sexual orientation, I suppose, and in the case of "transgender," gender identity or gender dysphoria.

I am not denying that there may be biological components to the development of queer and trans identities. In fact, I think it is hard to explain the existence of queer and trans people without such components, given the severe social conditioning found in societies where the cis/het (cisgender and heterosexual) ideal is the norm. Why would anyone chose to be queer or trans, given the kind of harassment we see?

 Yet, I do not think we – or science – have come to a point where such factors can be used to define social groups. Moreover, such litmus tests, if possible, would without doubt be used to invalidate some trans people, which is not a good thing.

In spite of this lack of reliable "DNA tests" for transness and queerness the existing LGBTQ+ and transgender communities represent meaningful alliances. Broad terms like queer and trans make sense at the moment we move from some kind of "objective" idea of what people essentially are over to the social scene. 

The terms queer and trans

The Wikipedia now states that "Queer is an umbrella term for people who are not heterosexual or are not cisgender." 

Some LGBTQA+ people do not like the term, as it represents an appropriation of a slur word once used by cis/het bigots.  I understand the argument, but given that I am queer myself, I believe I have the right to use it. We need an adjective to describe rainbow people, and this one has been accepted by many.

By the way: There is also a research discipline called "queer theory", which includes literary and cultural studies that rejects traditional categories of gender and sexuality. In other words: The term is being used in affirmative and supportive ways.

Transgender has been an umbrella term for all kinds of gender variant people since the early 1990s. I do understand that some trans people want to purify the term, and leave out all the trans people who are not gender dysphoric and/or are nonbinary and/or do not live up to some other standard put up by them, but I, for one, do not think this kind of separatism is helpful, constructive or even possible. More about that here.

Defined by social exclusion

The members of the LGBT+  or queer community have all one thing in common: They are all struggling to be accepted  in a word where the dominant narrative about sexuality and gender that says that "normal" women are attracted to men, that they want to appear feminine, and they have an unquestionable female gender identity. "Real men" are masculine, loves women exclusively and would never dream of being a woman. 

Moreover, the same narrative is based on the premise that your genitals or chromosomes are destiny. They, and not people, ultimately decide if you are a man or a woman and how you should feel and behave. And there are no in-betweens. Intersex people are considered statistical outliers of no relevance to the dictates of Nature or God.

This narrative is underpinning social and cultural institutions like courtship, marriage, family creation and – to a lesser degree these days – the division of work and duties. Because this way of thinking is cultural, it also becomes political, as reflected in the current anti-trans activism and in the long history of anti-gay/lesbian/bisexual activism. 

Since this cis/het narrative does not distinguish clearly between sexuality and gender, the people who are oppressed by it will include both those who are oppressed because of their sexual orientation and those who struggle with their gender identity. The two also often overlap as far as gender expression and gender roles are concerned.

In one way you could argue both trans and queer are completely relative terms. Queer are those who are excluded from cis/het “normalcy”. Trans people are those who are not accepted as “real” men or “women” and who do not feel at home in the assigned gender given to them by their community.

The cis/het toleration of this gender and sexuality diversity will vary from epoch to epoch and from community to community, which is why it is not possible to come up with a water tight definitions of queer or trans that fits all regardless of social and cultural context.

Self-identification and the trans and queer umbrellas

I know that some will argue that being trans or queer is a matter of self-identification. Trans people are those who say they are trans, and queer people are those who say they are members of the LGBTQ+ community.

I fully respect people’s right to self-identify as well as their chosen pronouns. But when we discuss queer and trans issues as social, cultural, political and historical issues, we actually do need terms that are a little more coherent than that. 

So from an analytical point of view it makes sense to talk about queer and transgender umbrella, even if not all of those we find under that umbrellas think of themselves as queer or trans per se. Their conscious identity may, after all, be based on different definitions of the terms. Many are on  journeys of self-discovery where words and concepts may shift. 

Broad umbrellas leave more room for such exploration, room where queer and trans people can get help from other queer and trans people, even if they are not all in the same place as far as their own self-understanding or identity go. They have a lot in common, regardless.

In other words: These umbrella alliances make sense because the people belonging under these umbrellas are facing similar kinds of invalidation, oppression and harassment. Homophobes and transphobes are using the same kind of arguments and the same kind of tactics to force all queer people back into the closet and out of public spaces, so that – over time – they may create societies without visible diversity as regards sexuality and gender.

We have been there before, so don't think that they cannot succeed in this. For some queer and trans people to pull up the ladder and leave other queer people behind in an attempt to please the bigots is not only unethical. It won't work.

Right now, in 2022, we see a resurgence of anti-LGBTQ+ hatred, and both TERFs and right wing extremists try to split the queer community. Now, more than ever, queer people have to stand together and help each other.

See also: Why we need a broad umbrella definition of the word "transgender"

---

Appendix 1: Examples of different definitions of the word "transgender"

The modern usage of the word transgender as an umbrella term for people with all kinds of gender variance was established in the early 1990s. 

The American Psychological Association presents a clear umbrella definition:

"Transgender is an umbrella term for persons whose gender identity, gender expression or behavior does not conform to that typically associated with the sex to which they were assigned at birth."

The American Psychiatric Association in its psychiatric manual, the DSM-5, also gives us an umbrella definition, although this one is more loosely associated with identity:

"Transgender refers to the broad spectrum of individuals who transiently or persistently identify with a gender different from their natal gender." 

Note that the DSM-5 still uses the more narrow term  "transsexual", defined as "an individual who seeks, or has undergone, a social transition from male to female or female to male, which in many, but not all, cases also involves a somatic transition by cross-sex hormone treatment and genital surgery (sex reassignment surgery)." Note also that you do not need to experience an alienation from your own body or desire to be another gender to be diagnosed with gender dysphoria. 

There are also sites that gives a much narrower definition of "transgender", making it sound much more like the older term "transsexual".

Merriam Websters states, for instance, that transgender means "of, relating to, or being a person whose gender identity differs from the sex the person had or was identified as having at birth; especially : of, relating to, or being a person whose gender identity is opposite the sex the person had or was identified as having at birth."

For more definitions, see my post "What transgender really means."

Appendix 2: Julia Serano on the term transgender

Transgender activist and thinker, Julia Serano, has written an interesting entry on the term "transgender" which are aligned with some of my arguments:

Transgender: the most commonly accepted umbrella term for people who transgress gender norms or defy traditional gender categories in some way. Activists in the 1990s forwarded this term to unite transsexuals, crossdressers, drag artists, butch women, feminine men, and people who are androgynous, intersex, non-binary, and possibly others (as discussed in Outspoken, pp. 257-268; see also here). 

While the word was intended to be inclusive of all gender-variant people (in the hopes of organizing the largest possible coalition to challenge the gender binary), some individuals or subgroups have objected to being included under the label (see e.g., Whipping Girl, p. 26; Outspoken, pp. 179-188, also here), while some who identify with the term have attempted to exclude other subgroups from using or being included under the label (e.g., some have objected to the inclusion of drag performers and other non-transsexual gender non-conforming people). 

Unfortunately, many people in the cis mainstream are unaware of the broad coalition of identities that exist under the transgender umbrella, leading them to mistakenly equate the word “transgender” with transsexuals (even though the latter are merely one subgroup). For this reason, I sometimes use the phrase “transgender-spectrum” in my writings to stress this gender diversity, even though it is arguably redundant. 

Contemporary activists typically claim that “transgender” should only be used as an adjective (not a noun or a verb), and that individuals should not be referred to as “transgenders” or “transgendered,” even though these variants were routinely used by trans activists up through the mid-’00s (e.g., see Outspoken, pp. 322-323, note 31).

Appendix 3: The Crossdreamer Survey

The Crossdreamer Survey of Gender Variance shows that a great majority of gender variant people support broader transgender, queer and LGBT alliances.

This post is based on responses I published in two threads over at CDL:

Advice for my worst experience with LGBTQ community? Told I'm not allowed as X-dresser/femboy, appropriating queerness.

Are we just protecting cis people and the binary again? 

Photo: kamisoka