LGBTQ culture orqueer culture is the sharedculture, experiences, values, and expressions ofLGBTQ people, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer individuals. It may be referred to by other variants[a] of theinitialismLGBTQ, while the termgay culture can refer either to LGBTQ culture in general or specifically tohomosexual culture.
LGBTQ culture varies widely by geography and the identity of the participants. Elements common to cultures of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, andintersex people include:
Not all LGBTQ people identify with LGBTQ culture; this may be due to geographic distance, unawareness of the subculture's existence, fear ofsocial stigma or a preference for remaining unidentified with sexuality- or gender-based subcultures or communities. TheQueercore andGay Shame movements critique what they see as the commercialization and self-imposed "ghettoization" of LGBTQ culture.[4][5]
In some cities, particularly inNorth America, some LGBTQ people live in neighborhoods with a high proportion of gay residents, otherwise known asgay villages orgayborhoods—examples of these neighborhoods includeGreenwich Village,Hell's Kitchen, andChelsea inManhattan;[6]Castro andWest Hollywood inCalifornia,United States;Le Village in Montreal, Canada; andChurch and Wellesley inToronto,Canada. Such LGBTQ communities organize special events in addition to pride parades celebrating their culture such as theGay Games andSouthern Decadence. On June 27, 2019, theNational LGBTQ Wall of Honor was inaugurated at theStonewall Inn in Greenwich Village.[7]
As with gay men, lesbian culture includes elements from the larger LGBTQ culture, as well as other elements specific to the lesbian community. Pre-Stonewall organizations that advocated for lesbian rights, and provided networking opportunities for lesbians, included theDaughters of Bilitis, formed in San Francisco in 1955. Members held public demonstrations, spoke to the media, and published a newsletter.
Primarily associated with lesbians in North America, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, lesbian culture has often involved large, predominantly lesbian "women's" events such as theMichigan Womyn's Music Festival[8] (closed after 2015) and theClub Skirts Dinah Shore Weekend.[9][10] Lesbian culture has its own icons, such asMelissa Etheridge,k.d. lang (butch),Ellen DeGeneres (androgynous) andPortia de Rossi (femme). Lesbian culture since the late 20th century has often been entwined with theevolution of feminism.Lesbian separatism is an example of a lesbian theory and practice identifying specifically lesbian interests and ideas and promoting a specific lesbian culture.[11][12][13] Examples of this includedwomyn's land andwomen's music. Identity-based sports teams have also been associated with lesbian culture, particularly with the rise of lesbian softball teams and leagues in the 1980s and 1990s. Softball and other athletic teams created social community and allowed lesbians to reject social expectations of physicality, but were typically considered separated from lesbian feminism and political activism.[14]
1950s and early '60s stereotypes of lesbian women stressed a binary of "butch" women, ordykes (who present masculine) and "femmes", orlipstick lesbians (who present feminine), and considered a stereotypical lesbian couple abutch-femme pair. In the 1970s,androgyny, political lesbianism, and lesbian separatism became more common, along with the creation of women's land communities. The late 1980s and 1990s saw a resurgence of butch-femme, and influences frompunk,grunge,riot grrrl,emo, andhipster subcultures.[15] Agenderqueer subculture developed in the 1980s and 1990s. In the 2010s, the rise ofnon-binarygender identities brought some degree of return to androgynous styles, though at times with different intentions and interpretations than in the 1970s.
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According to Herdt, "homosexuality" was the main term used until the late 1950s and early 1960s; after that, a new "gay" culture emerged. "This new gay culture increasingly marks a full spectrum of social life: not only same-sex desires but gay selves, gay neighbors, and gay social practices that are distinctive of our affluent, postindustrial society".[16]
During the 19th and early 20th centuries, gay culture was largely underground or coded, relying on in-group symbols and codes woven into ostensiblystraight appearances. Gay influence in early America was more often visible inhigh culture, where it was nominally safer to be out. The association of gay men withopera,ballet,haute couture, finecuisine,musical theater, the Golden Age ofHollywood andinterior design began with wealthy homosexual men using the straight themes of these media to send their own signals. In theheterocentricMarilyn Monroe filmGentlemen Prefer Blondes, a musical number featuresJane Russell singing "Anyone Here for Love" in a gym while muscled men dance around her. The men's costumes were designed by a man, the dance was choreographed by a man and the dancers (as gay screenwriterPaul Rudnick points out) "seem more interested in each other than in Russell"; however, her presence gets the sequence past thecensors and works it into an overallheterocentric theme.[17]
After the 1969Stonewall uprising inNew York City was covered on the mainstream news channels, showing images of gay men rioting in the streets, gay male culture among the working classes, people of color, street people, radical political activists and hippies became more visible to mainstream America. Groups such as theGay Liberation Front formed in New York City, and theMattachine Society, which had been in existence and doing media since 1950, gained more visibility as they addressed the crowds and media in the wake of the uprisings inGreenwich Village. On June 28, 1970, the firstChristopher Street Liberation Day was held, marking the beginning of annualGay Pride marches.
In 1980 a group of seven gay men formedThe Violet Quill in New York City, a literary club focused on writing about the gay experience as a normal plotline instead of a "naughty" sideline in a mostly straight story. An example is the novelA Boy's Own Story byEdmund White. In this first volume of a trilogy, White writes as a younghomophilic narrator growing up with a corrupt and remote father. The young man learns bad habits from his straight father, applying them to his gay existence.
American female celebrities such asLiza Minnelli,Jane Fonda, andBette Midler spent a significant amount of their social time with urban gay men (who were now popularly viewed as sophisticated and stylish by thejet set), and more male celebrities (such asAndy Warhol) were open about their relationships. Such openness was still limited to the largest and most progressive urban areas (such as New York City,San Francisco,Los Angeles,Boston,Philadelphia,Seattle,Chicago,Dallas,Houston,Atlanta,Miami,Washington, D.C., andNew Orleans), however, until AIDS forced several popular celebrities out of the closet due to their illness with what was known at first as the "gay cancer".[18]
Elements identified more closely with gay men than with other groups include:
There are a number of subcultures within gay male culture, such asbears andchubbies. There are also subcultures with an historically large gay-male population, such asleather andSM. Gay critic Michael Musto opined, "I am a harsh critic of the gay community because I feel that when I first came out I thought I would be entering a world of nonconformity and individuality and,au contraire, it turned out to be a world of clones in a certain way. I also hated the whole body fascism thing that took over the gays for a long time."[20]
Some U.S. studies have found that the majority of gay male couples are inmonogamous relationships. A representative U.S. study in 2018 found that 32% of gay male couples had open relationships.[21] Research by Colleen Hoff of 566 gay male couples from theSan Francisco Bay Area funded by theNational Institute of Mental Health found that 45 percent were in monogamous relationships, however it did not use a representative sample. Gay actorNeil Patrick Harris has remarked, "I'm a big proponent of monogamous relationships regardless of sexuality, and I'm proud of how the nation is steering toward that."[22]
During the 1980s and 1990s, Sean Martin drew a comic strip (Doc and Raider) which featured a gay couple living in (or near)Toronto's Gay Village. His characters have recently been updated and moved to the internet. Although primarily humorous, the comic sometimes addressed issues such asgay-bashing,HIV, andspousal abuse.
An Australian study conducted by Roffee and Waling in 2016 discovered how some gay men felt like they were expected to be hyper-sexual. Participants reported how other gay men would automatically assume that any interaction had sexual motivations. Furthermore, if it was then clarified that this is not the case then these gay men would suddenly feel excluded and ignored by the other gay men with which they had been interacting with. They felt that they could not obtain purely platonic friendships with other gay men. One participant reported feeling alienated and disregarded as a person if they were not deemed by other gay men as sexually attractive. This presumption and attitude of hypersexuality is damaging, for it enforces preconceived ideals upon people, who are then ostracised if they do not meet these ideals.[23]
A number of online social websites for gay men have been established. Initially, these concentrated on sexual contact or titillation; typically, users were afforded a profile page, access to other members' pages, member-to-member messaging and instant-message chat. Smaller, more densely connected websites concentrating on social networking without a focus on sexual contact have been established. Some forbid all explicit sexual content; others do not.[24] A gay-oriented retail online couponing site has also been established.[25]
Recent research suggests that gay men primarily make sense of familial and religious challenges by developing online peer supports (i.e., families of choice) in contrast to their family allies' focus on strengthening existing family of origin relationships via online information exchanges. Participants' reported online sociorelational benefits largely contradict recent research indicating that online use may lead to negative mental health outcomes.[26]
Fashion
Notable gay and bisexual fashion designers includeGiorgio Armani, Kenneth Nicholson, Alessandro Trincone, Ludovic de Saint Sernin, Patrick Church,Gianni Versace,Prabal Gurung,Michael Kors and others are among the LGBTQ fashion designers across the globe.[27]
Bisexual culture emphasizes opposition to, or disregard of, fixedsexual andgender identitymonosexism (discrimination against bisexual, fluid,pansexual andqueer-identified people),bisexual erasure andbiphobia (hatred or mistrust of non-monosexual people). Biphobia is common (although lessening) in the gay, lesbian and straight communities.[28]
Many bisexual, fluid, and pansexual people consider themselves to be part of theLGBTQ orqueer community, despite any discrimination they may face.Western bisexual, pansexual, and fluid cultures also have their own touchstones, such as the booksBi Any Other Name: Bisexual People Speak Out (edited byLani Kaʻahumanu andLoraine Hutchins),[29] Bi: Notes for a Bisexual Revolution (by Shiri Eisner), andGetting Bi: Voices of Bisexuals Around the World (edited byRobyn Ochs);[30] theBritish science fictiontelevision seriesTorchwood, and personalities such as British singer and activistTom Robinson,the Black Eyed Peas memberFergie, Scottish actorAlan Cumming and Americanperformance artist and activistLady Gaga.[31]
Thebisexual pride flag was designed by Michael Page in 1998 to give the community its own symbol, comparable to thegay pride flag of the mainstreamLGBTQ community. Thedeep pink (orrose) stripe at the top of the flag representssame-gender attraction; theroyal blue stripe at the bottom of the flag represents different-gender attraction. The stripes overlap in the central fifth of the flag to form a deep shade oflavender (orpurple), representing attraction anywhere along the gender spectrum.[32]Celebrate Bisexuality Day has been observed on September 23 by members of the bisexual community and its allies since 1999.[33][34]
The study oftransgender andtranssexual culture is complicated by the many ways in which cultures deal withsexual identity/sexual orientation andgender. For example, in many cultures people who are attracted to people of the same sex—that is, those who in contemporary Western culture would identify as gay, lesbian or bisexual—are classed as athird gender with people who would (in the West) be classified as transgender.
In the contemporary West there are different groups of transgender and transsexual people, such as groups for transsexual people who wantgender affirming surgery, male, heterosexual-onlycross-dressers andtrans men's groups. Groups encompassing all transgender people, both trans men,trans women, and non-binary people, have appeared in recent years.
Some transgender or transsexual women and men, however, do not identify as part of a specific "trans" culture. A distinction may be made between transgender and transsexual people who make their past known to others and those who wish to live according to their gender identity and not reveal their past (believing that they should be able to live normally in their true gender role, and control to whom they reveal their past).[35]
According to a study done by theWilliams Institute of UCLA on "How Many Adults Identify as Transgender in the United States?",[36] they found that younger adults are more likely to identify as transgender than older adults. This may be a result of a newly wider acceptance of transgender people from the communities, allowing for those who identify as transgender to have a greater voice. In their research they found that an estimated 0.7% of adults between the ages of 18 and 24 identify as transgender, while 0.6% of adults age 25 to 64 and 0.5% of adults age 65 or older identify as transgender.
The pink on the transgender pride flag represents female while the baby blue on the flag represents male. The white stripe in between the baby blue and pink represents other genders besides male or female.[37]
Transgender relationships
In the report "Views from both sides of the bridge? Gender, sexual legitimacy, and transgender people's experiences of relationships", authors Iantaffi and Bockting conducted a study with 1229 transgender individuals over 18 years old, to learn more about transgender relationships in the US. When it came to a relationships within a transgender person, it depended on if they wanted a heteronormative or mainstream culture relationship. Studies show transgender people can also be victim to heteronormativity too, and it can impact their relationships. There are also transgender people that try to challenge Western traditional beliefs in gender roles and sexual differences within relationships.[38]
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Many annual events are observed by the transgender community. One of the most widely observed is theTransgender Day of Remembrance (TDOR) which is held every year on November 20 in honor of Rita Hester, who was killed on November 28, 1998, in an anti-transgender hate crime. TDOR serves a number of purposes:
Related events are thetrans marches, a series of annual marches, protests or gatherings that take place around the world, often during the time of the local pride week. These events are frequently organized by transgender communities to build community, address human rights struggles, and create visibility.
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Youth pride, an extension of thegay pride andLGBTQ social movements, promotes equality amongst young members (usually above the age of consent) of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual or transgender, intersex and questioning (LGBTQ) community.[40] The movement exists in many countries and focuses on festivals and parades, enabling many LGBTQ youth to network, communicate, and celebrate their gender and sexual identities.[40] Youth Pride organizers also point to the value in building community and supporting young people, since they are more likely to bebullied.[41] Schools with agay–straight alliance (GSA) handle discrimination and violence against LGBTQ youth better than schools without it; they develop community and coping skills, and give students a safe space to obtain health and safety information.[42] Sometimes the groups avoid labeling young people, preferring to let them identify themselves on their own terms "when they feel safe".[43]
Gay and lesbian youth have increased risks for suicide, substance abuse, school problems and isolation because of a "hostile and condemning environment, verbal and physical abuse, rejection and isolation from family and peers", according to a U.S. Task Force on Youth Suicide report.[44] Further, LGBTQ youths are more likely to report psychological and physical abuse by parents or caretakers, and more sexual abuse. Suggested reasons for this disparity are:
A 2008 study showed a correlation between the degree of parental rejection of LGB adolescents and negative health problems in the teenagers studied.[46] Crisis centers in larger cities and information sites on the Internet have arisen to help youth and adults.[47] A suicide-prevention helpline for LGBTQ youth is part ofThe Trevor Project, established by the filmmakers after the 1998 HBO telecast of theAcademy Award-winning short filmTrevor;Daniel Radcliffe donated a large sum to the group, and has appeared in itspublic service announcements condemninghomophobia.[48]
Increasing mainstream acceptance of the LGBTQ communities prompted the Massachusetts Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth to begin an annual Gay–Straight Youth Pride observance in 1995.[40][49] In 1997 the nonprofit Youth Pride Alliance, a coalition of 25 youth-support and advocacy groups, was founded to hold an annual youth-pride event in Washington, D.C.;[50]Candace Gingrich was a speaker the following year.[51] In 1999, the first annual Vermont Youth Pride Day was held. As of 2009 it is the largest queer and allied-youth event in Vermont, organized byOutright Vermont to "break the geographic and social barriers gay youngsters living in rural communities face."[52] In 2002, a college fair was added to the event to connect students with colleges and discuss student safety.[53] In April 2003 a Youth Pride Chorus, organized withNew York's LGBT Community Center, began rehearsals and later performed at a JuneCarnegie Hall Pride concert with theNew York City Gay Men's Chorus.[54]
In 2004 the San Diego chapter ofGay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) worked with San Diego Youth Pride coordinators to organize aDay of Silence throughout the county.[55] In 2005, Decatur (Georgia) Youth Pride participated in a counter-demonstration againstWestboro Baptist Church (led by church headFred Phelps' daughterShirley Phelps-Roper), who were "greeting students and faculty as they arrived with words such as 'God hates fag enablers' and 'Thank God for 9/11'" at ten locations.[56] In 2008 Chicago's Youth Pride Center, primarily serving "LGBTQ youth of color", opened a temporary location and planned to move into their new building on Chicago's South Side in 2010.[57] In 2009, the Utah Pride Center held an event to coincide with Youth Pride Walk 2009, a "cross-country walk by two Utah women trying to draw attention to the problems faced byhomeless LGBTQ youth".[58] In August 2010 the firstHollywood Youth Pride was held, focusing on the "large number of homeless LGBTQ youth living on Los Angeles streets."[59] According to a 2007 report, "Of the estimated 1.6 million homeless American youth, between 20 and 40 percent identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender".[60]At larger pride parades and festivals there are often LGBTQ orqueer youth contingents, and some festivals designate safe spaces for young people.[61][62]
LGBTQ youth are more likely to be homeless than heterosexual, cisgender youth due to the rejection from their parents because of their sexual orientation, or gender identity (Choi et al., 2015; Durso and Gates, 2012; Mallon, 1992; Whitbeck et al., 2004). Out of the 1.6 million homeless people in the United States, forty percent of them identify as part of the LGBTQ community.[63] In a survey of street outreach programs 7% of the youth were transgender (Whitbeck, Lazoritz, Crawford, & Hautala, 2014). Many of the transgender youth that are placed in homeless shelters do not get the type of help they need and often experience discrimination and systemic barriers that include sex-segregated programs in institutional practices that refuse to understand their gender. Many transgender youths have problems acquiring shelters because of certain policies like binary gender rules, dress codes, and room assignments (Thaler et al., 2009). Problems with classification happen when the procedures or policies of a shelter require the youth to be segregated based on their assigned sex rather than what they classify themselves as. As a result, many of the LGBTQ youth end up on the street instead of shelters which are meant to protect them.[64]
LGBTQ youth also have a higher suicide rate in the U.S. Those who identify with the LGBTQ community are four times as likely to attempt suicide than those who do not.[65] There was a study that was done to look into the difference of rates between gay high school students and their straight peers. They were asked about their sexual orientation and then about suicide. They found that about 32 percent of sexual minorities (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual) had suicidal thoughts in comparison to almost 9.5 percent of their heterosexual peers.[65]
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LGBTQ parades are outdoor events celebrating LGBTQ social and self acceptance, achievements and legal rights.
Several other segments of the LGBTQ community have their own communities and cultures.
African-American LGBTQ culture
In the United States and Europe, some cities host black gay pride events with a focus on celebrating the black gay community and culture. The two largest in the world areAtlanta Black Pride andD.C. Black Pride.UK Black Pride is the largest celebration of its kind outside the U.S.
Movements and politics
LGBTQ social movements aresocial movements that advocate for LGBTQ people in society. Social movements may focus on equal rights, such as the 2000s movement for marriage equality, or they may focus on liberation, as in the gay liberation movement of the 1960s and 1970s.
LGBTQ conservatism is a socio-political movement which embraces and promotes the ideology ofconservatism within anLGBTQ context.
LGBTQ culture in the military
In 2010, the repeal of theDon't Ask Don't Tell (DADT)[66] was a great step in the inclusion of lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals in the military. "The repeal of DADT reversed the practice of discharging LGB service members on the basis of sexual identity." Although this was a large shift in policy by the U.S. for those identifying as LGB, those who are transgender are still not fully included in this change.
Criticism of LGBTQ culture comes from a variety of sources, much of which is critique from within the community itself. Some, likeMichael Musto, view the culture as conforming to caricatures or stereotypes that alienate "fringe" members of the community.Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore and movements likeGay Shame have argued that LGBTQ culture has been depoliticized by a tiny minority of relatively privileged queer people, who participate in "institutions of oppression" at the expense of the vast majority of LGBTQ people.[68] Some consider the very notion of "separatism", or a group lifestyle, alienating (including of LGBTQ members in the broader society).[citation needed]
Another problem is thatbisexual andtranssexual/transgender individuals experience social pressure to identify asgay orlesbian, and may face ostracism and discrimination from the mainstream LGBTQ culture. For bisexuals, this pressure is known asbisexual erasure.New York University School of Law professorKenji Yoshino has written, "Gays de-legitimatize bisexuals...the lesbian and gay community abounds with negative images of bisexuals as fence-sitters, traitors, cop-outs, closet cases, people whose primary goal in life is to retain 'heterosexual privilege'".[69]
Criticism has been made that the LGBTQ community represents an artificial separation, rather than one based on tangible customs or ethnic identification. In particular, labels that LGBTQ members use to describe themselves vary widely; some simply prefer to identify as loving a particular gender. Some believe that the LGBTQ community concept is alienating; the term itself implies estrangement from straight people as a separate group. Further, including three groups involved withsexuality and one group exploring transsexual/transgenderidentity (a broader phenomenon) is artificial.[70]
Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore argues that the single-issue focus of LGBTQ politics, which ignores allintra-group differences, has naturally led to a movement and culture focused on the needs of white, middle-class gay cisgender men, which alienates anyone who does not fit that description.[68]
Some gay male commentators who are inmonogamous relationships argue that mainstream gay culture's disdain of monogamy and its promotion ofpromiscuity has harmed efforts to legalizesame-sex marriage.[71] Yuvraj Joshi argues that efforts to legalize same-sex marriage have emphasized the sameness of gay people to heterosexuals, while privatizing their queer differences.[72]
British journalistMark Simpson's 1996 book,Anti-Gay, describes forms of intolerance by the mainstream gay community towards subgroups.The Times wrote that Simpson succeeded in "pointing out that oppression and prejudice do not become legitimate just because they happen to be practiced by the previously oppressed". Aiden Shaw ofTime Out New York wrote that "Thank fucking God someone did this, because...whatever happened to our individuality, our differences?" Other commentators harshly criticized Simpson's argument, withBoyz declaring that "Simpson is a cunt."[73]
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