only one instant, and it's right now

like im pretty sure i vaguely remember seeing something about it a while back but this slapped me in the face shook me to my core

Oops, I never uploaded this one to Tumblr (which I only realized when someone else did, but then was kind enough to tag me, thank you)!

“flies.., -worms?”

“spiders, !”

“spiders     ?“

These days, I see people arguing that straight cis drag queens and GNC folks aren't "actually lgbt+" (one of the limits of using lgbt+ rather than queer), and acting like trans/nonbinary/genderqueer folks are a wholly separate group than lesbian/gay/bi/etc folks. People, lgbt+ people, talking bad about xenogenders and neopronouns because they are too weird, just for attention, giving us all a bad name, etc.

But this separation between gender, sexuality, and presentation is *new*

Looking back at history, especially within US and Western Europe, and either you were a heterosexual man/woman who presented accordingly, or you *werent.* That was the divide. If you transgressed on any 1 of those things- you were transgressing on ALL of them.

Being gay/bi inherently called your gender into question. Being gender nonconforming immediately reflected upon your sexuality. There wasn't a divide between these concepts. They were one and the same. You were *normal* or you were queer. And of course, not all gay/bi/lesbian folks were crossdressing (how else did one stay in the closet?) , and not all people in gender nonconforming clothing had a sexual interest in the same sex. But these ideas were constantly melding together. To be a man was to be straight and dress "like a man." To be a woman was to be straight and "dress like a woman." They defined each other.

In much of the country, you could be arrested if you weren't wearing at least 3 pieces of "correctly gendered" clothing. That's the rule that got a lot of folks arrested in gay bars- regardless of sex or gender. Even after same sex dancing was technically legalized, crossdressing would get you beaten and arrested by the cops. Cops would "inspect" bar patrons to ensure they were dressed in the "correct" clothes when raids occurred.

And that's not to say that the community was ever fully free of assimilationist/exclusionist factions. There have always been groups, generally of cis/gender-confirming gay, lesbian, and bisexuals who argued in favor of respectability and fitting in and showing a willingness to leave the crossdressers and drag queens and butches behind if it meant they could keep their white collar jobs. If it meant social tolerance and safety for *them.*

But we should be able to recognize that the heart and soul of queer Liberation is in unity and embracing the weird, not shunning it. That we are strongest when we stand together.