Cory A
Since the emergence of the gay liberation movement in the 1960s, a seismic shift has occurred in people’s attitudes to homosexuality. The majority of people in Western societies are actually in favour of reforms such as gay marriage. In spite of this however, the attitudes of societies’ ‘leaders’ enables homophobia to persist.
Statistics from secondary schools can provide an insight into the oppression that Queer people are faced with. A 2004 study indicated that 12.4 per cent of Queer and questioning high school students are bullied once a week and that 14 per cent reported skipping school because they were afraid that they might be bullied1. They reported being targets for bullying, name-calling, social isolation, being told by teachers that homosexuality was wrong; feeling insecure about themselves and that others simply assumed that they were straight. One transgendered woman was told that she couldn’t use the toilets because her gender was unclear, and that teachers refused to use her correct name or pronouns2. The denial of a positive sexual identity results in higher rates of depression and suicide for Queer and questioning youth – 22.9 percent report a significant number of depressive symptoms, and 15.3 percent have attempted suicide1.
Of course, homophobia is not restricted solely to schools. Indeed, many young queer people drop out of school before finishing seventh form, the desire to escape from the school environment being a contributing factor. Gay and lesbian people report being kicked out of bars and nightclubs for kissing their partners, something seldom (if ever) reported by straight couples. Public expressions of affection towards members of the same sex can lead to ridicule or harassment, to such an extent that it is not unusual for Queer students at University to leave a hall of residence before the year is over. Violent attacks against lesbian, gay and transgendered people still occur, even to the point of murder – as recently as in December last year.
In official society law reform has continued, but there are still some legal barriers to equality. It is still legal to discriminate against a lesbian or gay person in some areas of employment, in the provision of shared accommodation and in the disposal of inheritances. Worst of all, the ‘gay panic defence’ remains in section 169 of the Crimes Act, allowing the murders of gay and lesbian victims to claim they were driven to insanity by the fear of sexual assault3. In two out of the four cases in which this defence was employed in recent years, it was successful in having murder charges reduced to manslaughter.
The continued existence of homophobia is the result of bigoted ideologies on one hand, and the actual the structure of the capitalist system on the other. The attitudes of conservatives and church leaders are indeed the driving force behind homophobia, but they in turn are only the ideological prop for the status quo in society – the capitalist system of the free market, private property and the private family. An excerpt from a 2005 article in the Australian magazine Socialist Alternative describes this system well:
…Homophobic ideas - so propagated by ruling class politicians and institutions like the media - are also underpinned by material realities that legitimise them: the reality of the family; the reality of the anti-gay laws that prop it up; the reality of police harassment; the fact that most of the time teachers and bosses do little or nothing to prevent the homophobic abuse endemic in schools and workplaces, and frequently perpetrate it themselves. In this climate, and in the absence of significant struggles for lesbian and gay rights, it is little wonder that many working class people hold views that reflect the sickness of the society they live in.
But these material realities did not simply spring from nowhere. Homophobic oppression is a pillar of capitalist society, a means by which working class people can be organised into nuclear families, so that they reproduce themselves at little cost to their rulers.4
The link between homophobia and the establishment of a capitalist, nuclear family in which everybody is supposed to live in a relationship that has one man, one woman, two and half children and a white picket fence – and all the predefined gender and sexual roles that go with it – becomes even clearer when it is considered exactly when homosexuality was made illegal: in the late 19th century (1885 in England, and 1893 in New Zealand) – the same time as the upper and middle classes were bemoaning the disappearance of the traditional (i.e. peasant) family in England’s factory barracks!
Homophobia is thus an important ideological prop to the capitalism. Whipping up homophobia is also a useful tool for our rulers – it serves to divide up the population, and hinder working peoples’ ability to fight back against every form of poverty and injustice. After all, most of those who marched in Destiny Church’s disgusting display in 2004 were not wealthy industrialists, but the working poor, many of them Maori and Pacific Islanders – people who have themselves faced injustice and oppression at the hands of a Pakeha elite.
To end oppression centered on sexual orientation and gender identity once and for all, then, we need a political movement that can speak out against the system’s bigoted ideologues. It needs to unite all the oppressed – Maori, Pacific Islanders, women, gays, lesbians, transgendered people, the poor and the working class. It is in the interests of everybody – gay and straight. When people are divided, the only winners are those that rule over us.
References: 1 Le Brun C., Robinson E., Warren H., Watson P.D. (2004) Non-heterosexual Youth - A Profile of their Health and Wellbeing, University of Auckland. 2 Out There (2005). Safety in Our Schools. Wellington. 3 GayNZ.com News Staff Law report: “Repeal Gay Panic Defence” 4 Morgan, R. (Aug. 2005) Homophobia in Australia. Socialist Alternative 94. |
