Without masks
Abigail Maxwell reports on a weekend gathering of QGSDC
The Quaker Lesbian and Gay Fellowship became QLGF, with a strapline saying it supported the LGBT+ community. Then it became the Quaker Gender and Sexual Diversity Community (QGSDC), and I rejoiced: no longer putting us into discrete boxes with initials – bisexual, trans, intersex, asexual – it could celebrate our common humanity and our similarities with people outside those boxes. Someone might be part of QGSDC who did not identify as LGBT.
For that to work, we need to see ‘gender diversity’ as a positive thing, though that idea might vary. For me, gender diversity is about escaping expectations and becoming more fully myself, and transition from male to female is an essential part of that, which I date from the last day I went into work presenting male. Since then, I have always expressed myself female.
Anyone with agency will make changes in their lives, so that they more fully express their gifts and qualities and shake off oppressive expectations. We are all in transition, creating or relinquishing the worlds we desire. The QGSDC weekend at Woodbrooke was our first weekend gathering for years. We are no longer the Friends Homosexual Fellowship, with weekend gatherings sleeping on a Meeting house floor.
I grope towards understanding other positions. Gender, for some, is a social construct, the tool of patriarchy, particularly oppressing women with servile expectations, such as caring for others’ physical needs and feelings, preventing them from fulfilling their gifts and qualities. Then gender diversity is trite, as no one fits supposed gender, and characteristics thought of as ‘feminine’ do not correlate well with each other. Do women who appear happy with feminine roles and symbols simply need their consciousness raised?
A Friend says something I do not understand, which makes me consider letting go of my stereotypes: the judgments I make of a person based on hair, clothes and accent. How can I know fully, as I am fully known?
The weekend was difficult. A Friend asked me if I could understand why another had walked out as I was speaking. Perhaps, though it took me a while: possibly she saw my celebration of myself as derogatory of others. If I want reconciliation, I reach out, saying: ‘We are gender diverse! We have so much in common!’ Another might deny this, seeing the very idea as meaningless and oppressive.
I sought reconciliation, explaining the different positions, then reached the point where I could no longer bear putting the arguments against myself. That view needs to beheard, and perhaps not from me. So, I put it baldly, without explanation: ‘Trans inclusion supports patriarchal oppression.’ I began to see loyalty to my own kind as more important for me: trans men and women should be seen as capable of making decisions for ourselves, and understanding who we are. The allegation that someone might have been tempted to call herself a trans man in her teens, before coming out as lesbian, erases the trans man, turning him from a person with understanding and agency to a victim of impersonal forces. Those who deny the meaning and value of transgender encourage trans surgery even as they proclaim their horror of it: surgery is a way we can prove we are really trans. Though trans people may also choose surgery freely. Things can always get worse: seeing and hearing each other can drive people apart, though I pray it will not, or not permanently.
There were tensions between lesbians and gay men before trans people showed up. So, I do not seek reconciliation. Instead, I want us to see and hear each other, from which may emerge truth, unity and right action, which might be different from a consensus I can live with. It needs courage. We are doing our best under difficult circumstances. I saw another repeatedly reach out for understanding, and we did not connect. We were seventeen Quakers including one recent attender, being ourselves without masks, carrying traumas in our own lives. We did not reach unity. I hope we moved towards it.
