A word, or several, on "Politcal Correctness"

I'm often accused of being very "politically correct." I deliberatly use the word "accused" because it's never been used as a compliment. In fact I've come to cringe at the words "politically correct." So what does it mean? The dictionary is telling me that to be politically correct means, "conforming to a belief that language and practices which could offend political sensibilities (as in matters of sex or race) should be eliminated." Which sounds harmless enough, but what it comes to have mean in our culture is angry, humorless, close-minded and a major obstacle to socializing. Which is ironic, because I think people choose these specific words as a politically correct way of calling me an angry bitch who should really keep her mouth shut.

I told a friend today, after she referred to me as politically correct that I wouldn't call it politically correct, so much as I am "sensitive." She laughed at me and told me, "No, I get it, you're just very aware of how certain things can effect many different types of people." I told her no, it's about how it affects ME, but she wasn't buying it. For example, I was recently subjected to an episode of "The Office," and this particular episode had a character referring to another character as a "faggot." The word was used many times by Steve Corell in a fast-paced monologue (hilarious I'm told) until he confronted said "faggot" and apologized and said, "I'm sorry I called you a faggot, I didn't know you actually WERE a faggot, and perhaps some time I can take you out for a drink and... you can tell me how you can do that to another guy." When I didn't laugh and just said flatly, "that's awful." He assured me that if I knew the characters and watched the show I would laugh. What so few people seem to understand is that when I hear the word "faggot," I see my ex-girlfriend in middle school laying in the dirt being kicked in the stomach by a boy yelling, "FAGGOT!" I can't smile when that image pops up in my head. I don't care what show it's on. I love Scrubs but if they ever referred to someone as a faggot there is no way I could ever get out a laugh when it's hard enough to just let it go enough not to cry and scream and throw shit because the world is fucked up and I don't want to be reminded of it.

But my political correctness extends beyond my sexual orientation, which is even less understood. People get annnoyed at my "hang ups" on the word "retarded." Or on racist jokes. "But I don't MEAN it like that." And that's what people don't understand, my silence and lack of laughter isn't about secretly hating you or judging you, it's about the image in my head of true stories of my friends, of children I've worked with, of the young boy of color beaten with a metal bat the night Obama was elected. Do people not see the connection between words like "magic negro" and the bat against this kid's skull? Why does this image not come up in everyone's head? When people say, "That's so gay," before I can get a thought out my face gets red and my blood pressure shoots through the roof and my heart pounds and I think, "Should I say something?" It's not something I think about. It happens. It impedes my laughter.

But this sensitivity is not something of which I'm ashamed. I think it's the effect of a patriarchal culture that has people disconnecting words from their meanings and reality from their hearts. People are too ashamed to admit when they feel sadness or empathy for the murdered animal they are about to eat, or that that rape joke has them reeling with memories of an event they'd like to forget, that they remember being called "fat" and being embarassed to eat in the cafeteria, or how hard the "special ed. kids" got teased and called "retarded." Ashamed to admit when something hurts.

Yes people have found me dramatic, but I honestly think it's the effect of our cultural machismo that the words "politically correct" have been feminized and made into a fucking insult.

I consider myself a funny person in life, and I've been told by others that I'm funny so it's not totally in my head. I used to hang out mostly with guys, I participated in a prevalantly male sport, I've "walked amongst them" as much as any tomboy could and I have participated in those jokes and comments. But I've also been the butt of those jokes, and over the years have come to realize that my empathy, sensitivity and emotion are incredibly real, importent and essential parts of myself that I am incapable of denying anymore, and that, more importently, I don't care to. I'd be ashamed of myself to ignore these feelings and to deny that when a person tells me a tragic story, or I read one, I feel it and that story becomes part of me and when a joke is made about a similar event that story comes up in me and weighs heavy and I just don't have the urge to laugh. I'm not going to fake it just to make YOU feel more comfortable.

"Politically correct," really means aware, empathetic, strong and outspoken and really, don't let anyone make you feel guilty or ashamed about it because it's absolute bullshit. Tell THEM to quit being numb macho assholes. Keep loving, keep fighting.

The Home Front

I'd like to offer hugs for all who need them, but especially for those queer folks among us and especially the queer feminists.  I feel you.  It can be nice to see all the family faces again, catch up, enjoy the good food, all of that, but home can also be a stressful and oppressive place for some of us and I hope I can offer a little support there. I can say that over the past few years it's become harder and harder to come back, despite my love for my family, and this year being single for the holidays I'm lacking for the first time in years the support of a partner to laugh through it with me.  So let's all blog shall we!

Families criticize, they bicker, they take anger out on each other, they give opinions when they're not asked of them, it's what families do.  If you want the benefits of family and the joys of being with your loved ones, this comes with it.  I can deal with that.  Part of growing up is taking a deep breath, letting it slide and laughing with your friends later about how crazy your family is.  I'd like to differentiate though, the difference between anger, hurt, retaliation from societal and institutional oppression, to affirm in us that we don't deserve the latter and we shouldn't need to passively accept it.

I just had an argument with my for the most part liberal, accepting, open-minded mother, about this very issue.  I have a homophobic uncle (through marriage). Not only is he incredibly homophobic, he's incredibly racist, sexist, the whole package.  On top of this he lacks a personality, he's lacks humor, and I've yet to see evidence of a soul, but hey, who am I to judge. He's a pilot and a military man, and has that terminator, "I was just following orders" empty hateful look about him.  I was venting about this to my mother along with his homophobic behavior around me and my now ex-girlfriend.  My mom gets defensive and tells me my aunt can love him despite his "politics" and for that matter, "religion or prejudices." This sent me into a rant about how those are the very things that make a person who they are, that this person hates me based on who I love and that's an indication of a serious internal issue.  In my defensiveness I MAY have referred to him as a "hateful, soulless mutherfucker," which my mother interpreted as hatred.  She ended the spat with, "God Meghan, you are so full of hate."  The fact that I'm defending LOVE is completely eclipsed by my defensive anger.  I couldn't believe she was defending not only this guy who don't like on a personal level, but someone whose beliefs make me less of a human being my society's standards.  This is the point I'm getting at.

Homophobia, racism and sexism are by definition hatred and judgement BASED IN INSTITUTIONAL POWER, meaning calling me a "fag" isn't just a word, it also represents me not having  job security, not having full protections under the law, being a potential target for violence and slurs at any time, etc.  Calling someone "ignorant" or "priviledged," an "asshole" or even a "honky/cracker" has none of these societal, institutional consequences, in fact, they are generally rewarded by our institutions.

There's a difference between individual, personal disagreements and participating in oppression.  Some of us have no choice on whether we hold our tongues around our families - it's a matter of having family or losing them, or sometimes life or death.  But we need to be able to parse out the everyday family disagreements and misunderstandings from the oppression we face everyday and at the very least, remind ourselves that we don't deserve that.  We don't deserve hatred based on who we are and who we love.  Falling in love is not a choice, but it is a choice to follow that love and fight for it and stand by it and help it grow and thrive and THAT choice is a brave and fucking noble choice and don't ever doubt that.  Especially in these family dinner moments when they can't separate anger from oppression and don't realize that we don't have a choice in whether or not to get angry and hurt, and it certainly doesn't mean that we're "full of hate" - we're full of love and fighting tooth and nail to protect that.  So keep this in mind and keep loving and keep fighting, we're in it together.

I'm going to close with an award winning haiku called "I Could Never Have a Homophobic Lover" by Caroline Rothstein, who I was lucky enough to hear perform at SUNY New Paltz last week:

Why would you want a

lover that discriminates

against sex and love?

Peace Talk

I just watched the short Swedish film "Peace Talk" ("I Fred") by Jenifer Malmqvist and was, for lack of truly fitting words, touched. I was brought to tears by the 15 minute movie, and immediately got online to look up more about it and where I could purchase it. I was excited to find the film available to view online in it's entirety, but crushed when reading the comments. Every summary and review I read of the movie was from a completely heteronormative and often homophobic view, and all clearly misunderstood the movie. So for those who may not have have the queer lens through which to see this movie, let me provide one of my own.

The film begins with two young girls (maybe 11?) playing, when Jenna imagines a siren signaling enemy attack. Emile wants to continue playing "Rockgroup," but Jenna says "Even rockgroups need to defend themselves." They grab their waterguns and shoot down Barbie Dolls and Teddy Bears. As the game continues, Jenna's mother becomes the "enemy attack," Jenna tells Emile to keep her voice down so her mother won't hear. Reviewers seem to confuse the movie here by interpreting the girls affection toward each other as a formation of some type of lesbian/queer identity. But a closer look at the film reveals that Jenna already understood her identity to be deviant. The war game itself is symbolic for her defense against her mother, homophobia, mainstream society.

While in the symbolic foxholes of this imagined world, Jenna and Emile are able to express their true identities and their feelings for each other. When the girls are first confronted by Jenna's mother who catches them kissing, they are first ashamed and embarassed, the covers have literally been pulled off of them and the safe, imagined world they created and they are forced again into the roles of deviant, misbehaving, abnormal girls who were playing "just a game." But this time it is Emile who encourages Jenna to resist as she places Jenna's camouflaged cap back on her head. They lock themselves in the bathroom, were they kiss and put on both lip stick and war paint because the two are one in the same. They are forced into war and refuse to be beaten down.

When Jenna's mother touch catch them, Jenna puts up a silent but powerful fight - spraying her mother with a squirt gun, and when told Emile is being sent home, even spitting in her face. When told to apologize, she puts duck tape over her mouth. As Emile leaves and Jenna is pulled from her arms, Jenna is a prisoner of war. She feels powerless except in her ability to resist. Her mother offers peace, but Jenna knows that she is fighting a defensive war and peace is not possible. Her mother rips the duct tape off her face.

The closing scene is Jenna under the covers on her bed, thinking, we can assume, about her mother's offer. Hurt, pushed down and frustrated, Jenna wipes Emile's lipstick kiss off her hand (symbolic of a battle wound, healed by Emile). Jenna wants to please her mother and conforms with wiping off the kiss, but she sobs, knowing what was lost.This is a movie about identity, about the power of The Erotic (the natural, powerful force within us that cannot be erased by oppression), and about the defensive war "queer" people (outsiders)are forced to fight. Jenna and Emile would have like to stay protected from the outside, content in eachother's company and with what they discovered in each other, but they were forced to give up with private world.

I read comments on the movie referring to it as "cute," one saying "cute girl but what a brat! omg... poor mommy!" a couple blatantly homophobic comments, the LOGO website said it was about "two tomboys playing wargames" and one iMDB review (the only one) stated: "the film is about the girl's mother realizing the child may be a lesbian, as this game involves kissing and caressing. This would explain why Logo (a gay cable channel and internet site) would post the short film." This review takes a completely heteronomative point of view on the film, furthering the point that the girls' reality really could only happen under a blanket alone. Also the reviewer take the fact that there is "kissing and caressing" (the girls peck on the lips and Jenna runs her finger down Emilie's nose) as the reason LOGO picked it up. This deeply political, emotional film is being reduced to sex, which of course is what being Queer is all about, so OF COURSE LOGO picked up on it. *sarcasm* Please watch and enjoy the film and don't be swayed but the overwhelming, heteronormative readings of it - by understand the real meanings of the movie from a "queer" perspective, we can keep alive that which so far, can only exist under that sheet and behind locked doors.