Once an octopus lays all of its eggs, it suddenly stops eating and slowly starves. By the time its eggs hatch, it has died. Newroz mentioned this cycle of life during Newroz’ lecture on the historiography of trans queer of color organizing in Berlin. Just as a generation of octopi die before the next generation can live their lives, there is a ghost of a generation of trans and queer of color organizing that seems to be disconnected from this new generation.
During the lecture, Newroz spoke about the concept of “Institutionalized Academic Activism,” and asked a very crucial question: What happens to our movements when they get institutionalized? Newroz pointed out that from the 60s through the 80s, there was so much organizing around feminist topics, but once there was a position in the government who was “responsible” for gender equality, the movements on the streets started to disappear. Newroz insightfully noted that this is starting to happen to trans and queer of color organizing. Suddenly, more questions started to form. What happens to our movements if they rely on state funding? What happens to our movements if the state determines what is or is not important? What happens to our movements if we start to compete for funding and turn political commitment into labor market competition?
Now, more than ever, there are many, many, many spaces for queer and trans people of color to party. It seems you can party anytime, anywhere. (Trust me, I would know…) But as on-the street organizing starts to dwindle… As the metaphorical octopus dies and a new generation of transgender-octopus-babies is born… One has to ask themselves, “Is visibility and ‘spaces’ all there is to it? Is ‘representation’ all that matters? Is it really safer for me now?”
And evidently, the answer is no! Newroz pointed out that as movements become institutionalized, the people with the most radical ideas “suddenly” do not align with the ideas that can get funding from the state. Some people do not have legal status or do not use their legal names for organizing and cannot fill out contracts or paperwork. Once movements are institutionalized, it is the most radical and vulnerable people that are left out.
Newroz told us an anecdote about queer performance spaces that will have a BIPOC lineup and lean into the idea of “representation,” but these places will have entrance fees of 15 or more euros. You start to ask yourself, “Who is this place for? Who actually has access to these spaces? And if there is a person of color performing that just enters and exits the stage with no communication, is this really ‘community’?”
It seemed very clear to me that this was not community. Community could never involve excluding groups and making spaces financially inaccessible, but as the lecture continued, I started to ask myself “What is community?” Ultimately, I reached the conclusion that this very lecture, this moment in time is community. It is through these trans-generational conversations, through learning about the history of organizing, through listening to and empathizing with personal anecdotes and stories, that community is formed.
