Gloria Anzaldua's Queer Mestisaje

Abstract

In 1992 of The Village Voice, Dennis Cooper quotes Johnny Noxzema and Rex Boy characterizing Canadian publication BIMBOX, which Noxzema and Rex Boy edited: You are entering gay and lesbian-free zone.... Effective immediately, BIMBOX is at war against lesbians and gays. A war in which modern queer boys and queer girls are united against prehistoric thinking and demented self-serving politics of above-mentioned scum. BIMBOX hereby renounces its past use of term and / or gay in positive manner. This is civil war against ultimate evil, and consequently we must identify us and them in no uncertain terms.... So, dear womon or gay man to whom perhaps BIMBOX has been inappropriately posted...prepare to pay dearly for way you and your kind have fucked things up. (31) Readers unfamiliar with recent debacles within and gay political circles might be forgiven for at first assuming this to be particularly scurrilous instance of violent homophobia. But, of course, BIMBOX editors are themselves and anti-homophobic activists, and theirs is actually fairly typical articulation of what has by now become relatively familiar opposition in political and cultural realms between and gay activists and queer militants and, in academia, between and gay studies and queer theory. The queer sensibility and aesthetic embodied in BIMBOX has been articulated and flaunted in queer 'zincs of 1980s and 1990s--alternative lesbian, bisexual, and transgender periodicals, often relatively cheaply produced and locally distributed, and usually espousing and embodying militantly non-assimilationist ideology.(1) BIMBOX suggests its contempt for orthodox procedures of publication and distribution employed around much and gay writing that has attained corporate legitimacy by advertising itself as free to those who deserve it (qtd. in Holy Titclamps Zine Explosion 3). The titles alone of some of other 'zincs suggest their oppositional relationship not only to mainstream straight publishing and politics, but also to mainstream and gay publishing and politics: Pansy Beat, Not Your Bitch, The nighttime, sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, stuffy-head, fever, so you can rest zinc. One of 'zincs calls itself Up Our Butts, particularly rich title for readers who have followed feminist sex wars between journals Off Our Backs and On Our Backs, and lawsuit between two (see Brown-worth)! To clarify its distance from categories lesbian and gay, Minneapolis 'zinc Holy Titclamps comes stamped with instructions file under `queer' on its cover--presumably for benefit of perplexed bookstore clerks! Destabilizations of and gay identity abound in 'zincs. QT promises an on the faggot who thought she was lesbian. The contents of Scab #2 are described in blurb for 'zinc as Bitch Nation, anti-William Burroughs stuff, pro-gaybashing with map of gay areas, anti-SPEW convention article (Holy Titclamps 9).(2) The prevalence of sexism, racism, and classism in official and gay culture and politics, as much as in hegemonic heterosexual establishment, is frequent subject of 'zincs. In September/October 1992 issue of 'zinc Infected Faggot Perspectives, Christian Salvador, described as a short, left-handed, 18 year old, Pilipino, cross-dressing, pimpleless whore who's been entertaining idea of water-sports; part-time queer activist writes: Early this last year I was introduced to west Hollywood--What is it?! It's two blocks of 21 and over white fags who don't even notice existence of women standing two inches from them, much less little thing like me.. …