WHY THE LGBTQ
COMMUNITY IS HELPFUL FOR CLIMATE
Queer climate activists bring something unique
and special.
Our
community has already had to endure societal climates filled with unpredictable
and freak disasters, analogous to climate disruption. Those who enforce strict
binary roles for expressions, affections and identity strike us and sometimes
violently, analogous to climate induced extreme weather disasters.
The
climate crisis can be ascribed to an overaccumulation of di-pole molecules in
our atmosphere, greenhouse gasses that let solar radiation in but keep it from
being reflected into outer space. It is interesting how close the word di-pole
sounds to binary. Enforcing the strict binaries can be described as molecules
having their dipole moment.
As
a result, we (the queer community)
has already had to develop resilient and interdependent communities rooted in
love and care for each other. It is very parallel to how The “transition town”
branch of environmentalists say we must co-create resilient communities to
weather the shocks of climate disruption.
WHAT WOULD QUEER CLIMATE
INTERSECTIONALITY BE LIKE?
Both
social movements have been brought into an informal political alliance with
each other because they both happen to share common political enemies.
For
both movements to unite around something affirmative or to be in active
dialogue with each other… It would not just be about right beliefs or belief in
rights. It would be about love, the bold, courageous kind of love.
What is the intersectionality between climate
and pride? The experience of valuing my genuine self as I naturally am is
parallel to genuinely valuing the natural world.
It means seeing the world in a critical
thinking manner rather than justifying a dysfunctional system as it is.
It seeks the transformation of
socio=political attitudes with human rights overtones but goes a bit further.
Many among the LBGTQ population have had to stand up for our existence just
like mitigating climate disaster is asserting ourselves for our right to exist.
IRONIC PARALLEL
Rather
than strictly identifying as gay, straight or bi, we are seeing a growing
sector of the population resist labels and ascribe their sexuality as more
fluid. Meanwhile Global Warming increases the amount of fluidity that our
atmosphere can hold. That is an ironic parallel to increased sexual fluidity in
our social atmosphere.
THE IMPORTANCE OF INTERSECTIONALITY
At this time both social causes and numerous
additional ones are being attacked by the same political enemy. When matters
are so stark it is counterproductive to argue about which cause for liberation
has a higher priority than the other. It means we have to get intersectional in
a “How about we all love each other” sort of
way.
As
Naomi Klein says, addressing climate not an inconvenient sacrifice for a
distant threat – it is our best hope for a better present. The need to address
climate brings before us a grand opportunity for all liberation movements to
unite… and to right all multiple past wrongs in one fell swoop. So in this
hypothesis, along with climate action comes the tearing down all forms of
supremacy that considers whole groups of people to be inherently superior to
others, heterosexism being one of them.
Either
way, social movements intersecting and proping each other up, enables us to become powerful
enough to knock common enemies onto their back heels. But if activists across
many intersections are so needlessly compartmentalized in our own little
siloes, we then leave a power vacuum for the mutual opposition to exploit.
Thoughts
of having an intersectional movement is compelling in a parallel way to sexual
fantasies because joining together enables us to become powerful enough to
overthrow our common enemies, and that type of ‘powerful’ is arousing.
But in order to be
“intersectionally attractive”, it means maintaining an appearance of no
throwaway planet meaning no throwaway people. That would include making a place
for guys who perhaps do in fact care but are just too insecure in their gender
roles to feel comfortable going green. Zero Waste would also mean Zero wasted
people, which could manifest in providing green jobs for the formerly
incarcerated.
INTERSECTIONAL CONNECTIONS TO GENDER IDENTITY
Those who shun green products and behaviors
also shun gay products and behaviors for the same reasons. Both are rooted in a
pressing urge to avoid being seen as feminine. But it is more based in
perception than reality. Making choices that harm our common environment does not
safeguard gender identity and we have to take the toxic masc off of that
illusion (referring to toxic masculinity).
According to orthodox gender norms,
expressing care about anything beyond one’s own narrow self-interest (which is what
environmentalism is in most cases) is regarded as sentimental, feminine,
irrational, subjective. It is taken as every adjective seen as the opposite of
manly. But
we can redefine masculinity as using intelligence to stand up to authoritarian
bullies. Profiteering from plundering the public good should be redefined as a
non-consensual relationship rather than as masculine.
MELANCHOLIC DOUBLE NARRATIVE THAT EQUATES LONGING FOR CLIMATE
ACTION OR GAY LOVE
Particularly
in rural, conservative remote areas people who are either gay or alarmed about
climate feel rather isolated and have a hard time finding others who are open
about sharing similar traits. There are prevailing parallel social norms where
displaying gay affection is risky and where talking about climate change rather
than weather is considered a topic inappropriate for polite company or “getting
political”. Such isolated individuals live life day after day going by without
1) taking part in an action as part of a larger climate movement or 2) sharing
affection with another human being they are attracted to.
Such
isolated individuals think their only opportunities to take action on climate
are what they can do as individuals…feeling disempowered from much anything
else. The other half of this analogy is a closeted or isolated gay individual
who only feels empowered for sexual release on an individual level in the realm
of fantasy. “Individual action” in both cases is inadequate in the long run for
the big picture. Yet both instances help isolated individuals feel just a
little better in the moment each day.
Talking
with strangers to build up a movement for climate action brings much the same
apprehensive feelings as directly stating affectionate interest in someone of
the same sex. It risks either a harsh rejection where anti-gay attitudes and
climate denialism are interchangeable, or the softer rejection of “thanks but
no thanks” or “sorry not interested”. Another scenario would be rejection by
someone who actually does have same sex attraction but is not out to themselves
or does not want the risk of outing themselves to others. This would be
parallel to being rebuffed by someone who does think that climate disruption is
real and human caused but has psychological/ sociological motivations to not want
to take it that seriously.
Both gays and environmentalists ridiculed, dismissed or
oppressed in very parallel ways. One side of the opposition impugns both as
weak, feminine or some reactionary nonsense which bullies take
as a sign of vulnerability to exploit. Another side of the opposition demonized
both as powerful & power-hungry who have exploitative agendas. And there is
the opposition that combines the worst of both sides where the authorities in
charge actively persecute people who are gay of who are protecting their
environment.
We
also have to keep in mind, if an affection-starved gay individual or an
action-starved environmentalist were make the first move in reaching out to
someone, there is also a chance that the other person will respond very
affirmatively. It is easy to say to not
take rejection personally, and the feelings of alienation and insignificance
are real which motivates one to retreat. In addition, retreating and doing
nothing does not solve the problem in either case.
When
winning (fill in the blank)” is seen as too big, daunting and overwhelming, it
incites hopelessness and inaction. That blank can be filled with either Climate
Justice or Fulfillment in Gay relationships, interchangeably.
CONNECTION BETWEEN FEAR OF AGING AND “RUNNING OUT OF TIME”
Running
out of time to save the natural beauty of the world from climate disaster is
deeply parallel of fear of becoming too old and unattractive to be considered
desirable or attractive by the gay population, another sense of “running out of
time”.
Normally,
dating life presents many chances to fail and to fail better. But mitigating
climate disaster does not allow opportunity for failure. The analogy here is
that there is a firm deadline of 12 years from now and counting in order to
achieve the promises of climate justice. Otherwise, we would pass the tipping
point making a long-term doom scenario inevitable even if the consequences
won’t be immediately apocalyptic. This sense of permanent doom is parallel to
common perceptions that one’s physical attractiveness will be permanently
unrecoverable due to aging in a culture where age is looked down upon with
disdain. The analogy is not symmetrical, but there is one deep parallel worth
noting.
Taking
action to address climate would have been much easier, less drastic and less
disruptive had we done so 25 years ago. The actions we have to take now to
mitigate climate are a lot more drastic and disruptive now that the curve has
gotten a lot steeper. Similarly, in a gay hook-up world where youth is in
higher demand, it would have been easier for a 45 year old to make affectionate
connections (analogous to implementing climate solutions) if he had the
opportunity to do so 25 years previously, though not impossible or a lost
cause.
The
age of 40 is often put out as an arbitrary deadline for being in demand in the
dating world. A controversial topic indeed but the feelings are real.
THE THINGS THEY SAY ABOUT US ARE TRUE ABOUT THEM
*Some of the common
slurs used against the gay population actually happen to be much more accurate
descriptions of climate denialists and people who express backlash against
environmental values: 1: Having a permissive attitude toward crimes against
nature 2: Spreading tolerance of dangerous lifestyle choices 3: Posing a moral
danger to our children.
*Many climate denialists
accuse global warming of being “a dangerous pseudoscience used to advance an
inhumane social agenda”. But what those same words happen to be an actual
description of gay conversion therapy.
*Those who insist
everyone’s sexual orientation has to be straight (implying that being gay is a
choice) happen to be the same people permitting everyone’s scientific
orientation on global warming to be a type of “because I said so” circular
reasoning, where authority is substituted for actual inquiry. The common phrase
‘get your facts straight’ is rather ironic in this respect.
*While
this may only apply to the most reactionary of self-proclaimed Christian
fundamentalists like the ones who take the big signs onto street corners, I
hear them casting both homosexuality and environmentalism (labelled as earth
goddess worship) as part of some sort of pagan idolatry that will supposedly bring about
the apocalypse. But it is their unfettered, unregulated, vampiric worship of
Neo-Liberal Economic orthodoxy which actually threatens Armageddon.
*Antigay
operatives warned that marriage equality would bring upon a Biblical apocalypse
or some form of societal collapse… something which the global climate crisis
will actually make happen.
MARRIAGE EQUALITY COMPARED TO CORPORATE SUPREMACY
Marriage
equality has been treated as a foreboding sign of a Biblical apocalypse.
Meanwhile marriage between corporations (considered to be ‘people’ according to
a legal fiction) will actually more accurately lead to a Biblical apocalypse if
they act hostile to the natural world. Marriage between corporate ‘persons’ is
known as mergers, so the non-enforcement of the Sherman Anti-Trust act or on
the books anti-monopoly laws is parallel to granting “Merger Equality. The
biggest example is the merging of chemical pesticide companies like Monsanto
and Dupont. Again, the big irony is that the very same things that homophobes
accuse the gay population of actually apply to those in positions of corporate/
political influence who aren’t considerate toward environmental values. The
sense of urgency that the heterosexists had against marriage equality is
parallel to the urgency of stopping these corporate mergers where
anti-environment corporations become too rich and powerful for democracy to
restrain.
Speaking
of unnatural abominations, judges on many courts are willing to give more
rights to artificial corporate persons than they are to flesh and blood natural
persons who happen to be LGBTQ.
COMBINING COMING OUT AS GAY WITH CHALLENGING THE NEVER- ENDING
GROWTH ECONOMY-
The
term ‘sincerely held religious belief’ is often invoked as a justification to
permit discriminate against LGBTQ population who are non-heteronormative. But
there is a way we could flip the script and claim ‘sincerely held religious
belief’ against those who act contrary to environmental values. It would be
specifically to challenge those who use the “linear dogma” of never ending
economic growth to devalue against “our cyclical nature” (in which our natural
world is full of cycles). Linear dogma presents economic growth as an unending
line which just happens to resemble the word straight.
Assuming
infinite economic growth can thus be described as being linear in ones economic
orientation while challenging that assumption can be described as being
circular in ones economic orientation.
Those
who use religion to condemn the gay population accuse us of being sinful,
lustful characters who practice dastardly, obscene and disgusting acts. But
those words more accurately describe the acts by those who put a linear
economic orientation into practice, such as planned obsolescence.
It
basically means chopping down a Northwest Territory’s worth of trees and
pairing them with toxic finishes just to manufacture furniture not designed to
last, so that customers would have to come back and keep buying more. In that
way, planned obsolescence can accurately be described as a “lifestyle choice”
that is “an abomination contrary the laws of nature”, basically the same
language used to oppress the gay population.
The
theology is that God the Creator designed the treasures of our earth be cycled
through the web of life again and again, reflected nontheologically in the laws
of Thermodynamics.
When
a linear economic orientation is put into practice, it means being an automaton
for some iron law of economics that requires things be consumed, burned up,
worn out and discarded at an escalating rate… all in the name of growth. It is
impossible to have never ending linear growth in a closed loop system. But to
publicly state that obvious point is very politically risky and would invite
fierce opposition and ridicule. In analogous terms, it can be described as
“coming out the closet as circular in one’s economic orientation.
If
any of the big names running for President or high office simply declared the
succinct truth that you can’t have infinite growth on a finite planet…then they
would face an absolute tidal wave of bigotry and knee-jerk reaction. They would
be treated as heretical sinners by the high priests of the liner economic
order! The automatons who enforce perpetual economic growth by rebuking those
who challenge or question it are basically an orthodoxy pillars of a secular
fundamentalism that is very parallel to religious orthodoxies who do not want
to institutionalize the questioning of heteronormativity. While not a perfect
analogy given broader LGBTQ acceptance as of late, it is worth noting that the
one gay man currently running for president did not come out until after he won
his first election.
HISTORICAL PARALLELS BETWEEN BOTH
MOVEMENTS
In the early 1980’s we already knew of the
AIDS crisis that would endanger many vulnerable lives. But the powers that be,
the Reagan administration at the time, refused to address the threat because it
was associated with the unfairly stigmatized gay subculture. That is parallel
to how scientists at Exxon already knew of the looming climate danger from
fossil fuel emissions, with the company deliberately covering up the evidence.
And it was followed by periods where the political powers that be refused to
address the climate threat, despite it being well documented.
Global
Warming finally broke into mainstream political awareness in the in the late
1980’s, probably with the congressional testimony of James Hansen in 1988. That
coincided with a call to address the AIDS crisis much more intently.
And we saw 2 parallel reactions. The same
“Merchants of Doubt” who were marketing denial that cigarettes cause cancer
started fabricating and promoting uncertainty about us climate change being
real, having human causation or being serious. It is very parallel to how the
social engineers against LGBTQ acceptance painted the gay population as not
deal (presenting being gay as a choice), being less than fully human and not
deserving of rights (denying that climate disruption is human caused) or not
being worthy of taken seriously (analogous to climate deniers who admit human
causation of global warming but minimize the warming as not serious or a good
thing).
As a result, many of those we thought would
be political allies (the top Democrats) calculated in the 1990’s that is was
too politically risky to have our backs and came up with Don’t Ask Don’t Tell
and Defense of Marriage. In a parallel situation, the Democrats did not take
the opportunity upon winning full federal government control in 1992 and 2008
to pass major pro-climate reforms, probably due to it being perceived of as too
politically risky.
Meanwhile the Republican platform has long
claimed that lending recognition to same sex relationships would be an offense
to some definition of traditional values. That is parallel to when former
President George HW Bush mentioned climate action follow through of the 1992
Earth Summit would upend an American way of life that is ‘non-negotiable’ and
similar statements from other leaders.
The shrewdest of pro-fossil fuel climate
skeptics sidestep denial of climate being real or having human causation and
use skepticism about climate models as a way to dismiss anthropogenic climate
change from being a serious problem.
This dismissal of climate models is somewhat
parallel to the negative stereotypes about the Gay Community being “unreliable,
changeable “drama queens” who have a tendency to exaggerate and engage in a
bunch of projection”.
ANALOGY TO CLIMATE EDUCATION IN SCHOOLS
There are some well-organized and well-funded
groups who are driven to exclude both the climate and LGBTQ social causes. They
want expressions of queer acceptance and for climate awareness expressions to
be censored from the public, silenced by the mainstream media and restricted
from being taught about in schools.
A movement behind Purity Culture is behind the US Government funding
“abstinence-only sex education” in schools.
It is where you teach kids are only about the
basic physical mechanics of sex while having to abstain from doing so until
marriage. And then this purity culture conveniently defines marriage in a
narrow way that excludes the gay population.
There is similar pressure upon schools to limit climate change education
to explaining the physical description of what happens without ascribing
causation of it to human activity. Under this denialist culture, teachers and
thus students would have to “abstain” from making any connections of human
involvement in climate change analogous to promoting abstinence from sexual
activity by not teaching about it.
ADDITIONAL HISTORICAL PARALLEL
Particularly
up until 1975, thousands of Americans lost their government jobs just for being
suspected as gay. And today the Trump administration uses similar authoritarian
marginalization against government employees who speak and document the truth
about climate disruption. And the Trump admin has once again government job
protections against LGBTQ discrimination. Censorship against climate scientists somewhat
resembles the “public morality raids” the authorities used against the gay
population decades ago. The sense of how it is dangerous for climate hawk
government employees to express ourselves is very parallel to the societal
messages telling the LGBTQ population to just hide in the dark where we can’t be
seen.
The stonewalling of
investigations into the bad behavior of Exxon (and other intentionally
deceptive climate criminals), calls upon us to launch a new Stone Wall
Rebellion and a “We don’t have to take it anymore!” flashpoint.
FUN IRONY
A number of the terms used to classify
subtypes within the gay community happen to be the names of animals in the
arctic environments: Polar Bears, Sea otters, Arctic wolves, Pups, Cubs
PERSONAL CONNECTION TO SCHOOL
BULLYING:
While I acted as heteronormative
at the time, coming
out as an environmentalist lent me much the same emotional experience that
coming out as gay would have at an all-guys boarding school.
No matter how well-researched and sound what I expressed, these bullies
chided ecological awareness and passions as if it were a deviant orientation.
The social norm was that students were supposed to ascribe to their individual
self-interest, and environmental awareness was introducing a form of
collectivism. By promoting recycling, the opposition projected an image upon me
of being a zealot evangelist who will not letting individuals think for
themselves, when that restrictiveness much more accurately described the
opposition who basically forbids thinking and acting in collective interests. I
refer to it as the Neo-Liberal “straight” Jacket. Rugged individualists treat collectivism as a
deviant orientation, that is dangerous with much the same tone and fervor as
how anti-gay bigots cast the LBGTQ population as dangerous, deviant and needing
to be restrained. Similar to Anti-LBGTQ blowback, none of the bullies who
intimidated my recycling would offer a rational reason that makes sense but is
purely reactive.
Pursuing
narrow self-interest is considered “acting rational” and the normative thing to
do, accepted in the same way as heteronormativity is accepted as the default
normal. It is not a perfect analogy because heteronormativity is not actively
harmful.
But
there is a strong analogy between strict neo-liberals condemning the intentionally
planning for the greater good of all as being a deviant collectivist
orientation; or simply an abomination against the natural order of how things
are supposed to be.
These bullies presented not
caring about the good of our planet as a whole felt directly hurtful like being
the brunt of anti-gay bullying. Anyone who liked me in that somewhat
hypothetical situation didn’t want to be seen hanging out with me due to fear
of being bullied themselves.
DISPLACEMENT ANALOGY WITH CLIMATE DISRUPTION
Ocean
Acidification and other climate disruption caused displacement of animal, plant
and human life is hauntingly parallel to LGBTQ youth being banished from home
and or church.
The environment which displaced LGBTQ
youth relied upon while growing up hence no longer provides. It is analogous to
how an acidifying
oceanic environment no longer provides for the coral reef habitats, where
acidification represents and environment that is less than open and accepting.
The climate deniers would explain away “acidificH8tion” as part of some
natural cycle rather than being human caused. Likewise, someone who is ant-gay
would explain away homophobic social environments as just naturally the way
things are or are meant to be. Both serve as justifications for doing nothing
to address either anti-gay exclusion or climate disaster mitigation.
