The Feminist Combining Process
created by:
Sangeeta Ahmed, Ashley Howard and Hiywete Solomon
GLBT Movements
Lesbians as well as other non-heterosexual individuals were sidelined in the early days of the Feminist movement. Their voices, like those of women of color, were considered “distraction” as it was assumed that they were retracting from the actual goals and direction of the Feminist movement.
Of course not all individuals who are GLBT are women, many are men. The issues people who are identify with GLBT face are often violence related. Acknowledging and addressing the issues of GLBT women is an integral aspects to the Feminist movement because the amount of oppression/hate crimes these individuals experience negatively affects their experiences as women; not addressing it would just deter from the Feminist goals of attaining justice for all women. If women are being beaten and killed or even discriminated against in the job market because of their sexuality, this does not just affect the victims, but their families as well as society.
Some examples of GLBT Movements that exemplify Feminist Combining include:
NOW Lesbian Rights
NOW, National Organization for Women, as the largest organization of feminist activists in the United States, addresses multiple issues that women are facing, including discrimination women are facing because of sexual orientation and gender identity. Through the Lesbian Rights summit, that brought together all types of people, including lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transgender and allies. In addition, NOW works on policies to help prevent hate crimes against GLBT. (18)
The Audre Lorde Project Inc.
About 14 years ago, the Audre Lorde Project Inc. was started in New York. This organization was established to support lesbian, gay, bisexual, two spirit, and transgendered people of color. This organization works towards attaining social and economic justice for all people through acknowledgement of individual differences and uses these differences in experience and culture to build support for multiple groups of people.The Audre Lorde Project brings together individuals, Combining sexuality conflicts with gender conflicts, people of color and allies.
TransJustice is a political group within the Audre Lorde Project Inc. that was created by and for trans and gender non-conforming people of color. TransJustice works as a support system, helping address multiple issues its communities face due to injustices regarding finding jobs, housing, and education.. This group voices the concerns of its communities including issues such as the need for trans-sensitive healthcare, HIV-related services, and job-training programs, as well as resisting police, government, and anti-immigrant violence. (2) This organization exemplifies combining in how it tackles issues more than one group of people face and works with different groups at both the top and bottom of the hierarchical polarization on policies that work towards social justice for all.
These organization are acknowledging the issues of multiple groups and what is being done to help them. All though these examples were of Organizational Combining. Personal Combining is occuring inside the allies of these multiply oppressed groups. Heterosexual women who are working with The Audre Lorde Project and the NOW Lesbian Rights are exemplifying the acknowledgement of the injustices and doing something about it despite the fact that they are not experiencing the oppression. Internal Combining is evident as well in that GLBT people, although they are composed of different groups, all share similar oppressions because of their sexuality/gender identity.
