Femme FATale

last night, i went to bed with a full heart and mind over the success of president-elect, barack obama, only to wake up with feelings that are bittersweet because of the passing of several ballot iniatives that proffer hate and discrimination – gay marriage bans in california, arizona, and florida, a ban on gay couples adopting children in arkansas, and a ban on affirmative action in nebraska and, possibly, colorado.

as a queer person who, institutionally, finds marriage unappealing, but who very much supports the rights for everyone to make that decision for themselves, to articulate relationships in any way they see fit – whether that be through an “official” marriage ceremony, sworn commitment amongst only one another, living together in relationships or couples of two, three, or twelve folks – i am heart heavy. again, as a queer person, but also as a white person, a woman, a fat girl who works diligently to engage with her own privilege – race and other, who works to promote anti-racism, anti-homophobia, anti-ableism, etc., in her communities big and small, who is overwhelmed with joy to have a young, more progressive, black president, i can’t help but be crestfallen over actions taken to eliminate access to education and employment that have been so improved by affirmative action.

for the sake of delineating what is at stake, i describe these ballot initiatives to ban the rights of queers and affirmative action as separate incidences, but they’re not. difference, whether it be racial, class, sexuality, gender, ability, size, etcetera, is in the cases of these ballot initiatives as well as beyond, under assault collectively. barack obama may be our next president, but colorado, a state he won last night by 7%, may be, as i write this, overturning affirmative action. california, notoriously progressive, which obama won by 24% of the vote, passed proposition 8. while we hugged and cried on the shoulders of strangers in the streets last night, and as we watched eagerly the writing of history as our first black president gave us his victory speech, a lot of us missed what else was happening until we woke up today. as queers, as persons of color, as part of any marginalized group(s), it is imperative we see the links between each other’s oppression in order to draw strength across issues in our moments of success and defeat; moments like today where both are so present.

i am thrilled about the results of last night’s presidential election. i am for, probably, the first time in my life, honestly proud of saying i am american. i love that voter turn out amongst people of color and young people and young people of color was unprecedented – i read a statistic today that 4 million more youth voters participated in this election that in 2004. that’s huge and nothing to sweep under the carpet. we deserve to continue celebrating this victory even while we mourn our losses and what they mean to us personally and beyond. we are not “just” queers or people of color or queers of color who, last night, were wounded. we’re a nation of “other” people, people who are different across a whole host of identities and in this there is so much present and so much potential love, warmth and strength. that is, if we continue to, and in many other cases figure out how to, harness it.