Leather Life: Queer Leather

As our communities across Minnesota complete the Pride season and turn to leather events in the fall and winter, I paused to reflect on my observations of this summer. It seems like every year we need something to get angry about or fight against. No kink in Pride, protecting trans kids, et cetera; they are all valid and important topics. And I feel like I’ve protested for or against them all. One thing continued to rise to the top of my thoughts as heard from so many people of various ages this summer. The words and feelings attached to just five letters strung together to self-identify. These 5 letters aren’t the LGBTQ you might have assumed but rather the word “queer” itself.

From online posts to bar chair conversations to advertisements to protest buttons, it seems the usage and acceptance of such a simple word, “queer,” in both the larger Twin Cities community and the leather community has grown, albeit with some controversies. I debated heavily if I had anything to add to this conversation; admittedly I use the word to identify myself. Could I write about just a word and bring any value to this leather column while not just resorting to some us vs them or ageism argument? Well, let’s see together!

As far as I can tell, the usage of the word queer as a self-identifier sparks two main feelings in the leather community: one, larger acceptance that is broader than just LGBT, and two, a sense of erasure and trauma. As I listened to individuals explain their thoughts on being queer, I came to understand the middle road. I understood as a 50-year-old person of color raised in the South the trauma that could be attached to the word “queer.” As that same person, I understood the pride in and power of reclaiming it.

Growing up in the ‘80s, I remember the first time I heard Tom Brokaw, or maybe Dan Rather, using the word queer to talk about the AIDS epidemic on the nightly news. Without going into established history, we know our lesbian and gay family had to deal with a terrible struggle to gain acknowledgment, health care, and even equality for existence. It came into my small rural home on nightly news from faraway places like New York or San Francisco. I remember sitting around the supper table and asking questions my parents would answer in hushed tones or vague answers, giving me the impression this was something shameful to discuss. For many of us younger and perhaps not out but already different, we faced the dread of the playground game “smear the queer” — a twisted game of reverse tag where one person is chased by a crowd of dirty sweaty classmates. Needless to say, you did not want to be “it.” Queer was slang. It was something shameful and dirty. Queer was talked about quickly and then I was asked to pass the mashed potatoes. Queer was one of the words shouted from a moving car when you were just minding your own business walking down the street.

Fast forward to many years later in the late 2010s as we began to resist efforts to turn the clock back on hard-won liberation and equality causes in our broader LGBTQ community. I began to see the word queer pop up again, especially in leather — this time as a self-identifier that was different, more vocal and angrier. Younger leather folk delved into the history of images from those same ‘80s resistances. I made pink triangles with clenched fists, sold them, and wore them to represent a non-quiet reaction and refusal to go back to any less-than status.

 I heard others and myself use queer as both a political and sexual term and talked about the history of resistance from the ‘80s. We took pride in the past to face the future. Our sexuality wasn’t limited by our gender nor genitalia nor to the ones we loved and certainly not by the types of relationships we could form. Somehow, queer leather became punk and radical —transgressive in a way that seemed designed to piss off anyone who wasn’t willing to fight in the same way. Queer became this catch-all word that brought all sexes and sexualities under the same umbrella.

The problem with umbrellas is that not everyone needs one all the time. I think every generation believes they are revolutionary and always looks with shock when a new generation doesn’t see them as radical. I certainly have now, as a 50-year-old leather person, begun to see both sides of this dilemma.

The use of the word queer upsets some of my older leather friends. They fought hard to be gay leather men, women or whatever other word they used to self-identify. I can see the flinch when it’s used conversationally. And while most of us want equality, we don’t all agree on every single political thing. Catchall words become difficult. Let’s be honest, there are those reading a leather article who can tell me several reasons why they aren’t leather but rather rubber, puppy, kinky, or any other term — so leather should never be used to describe them.

Some of my younger friends love the word queer. They’ve wrapped their identity so strongly around 5 letters they miss out on how it can hurt others. This all crystallized for me with a conversation this summer with a group of leather titleholders from around the country discussing this topic.

 We can identify as queer without forgetting that the word has trauma to others. We can respect their self-determination to be what they want to be without limiting our own. The flip side is that those who chose to maintain or not to identify as queer should not hold grudges or make remarks to those who do. Your trauma is not the responsibility of others to solve.

Maybe this doesn’t seem that important of a topic to take away from this summer’s leather travels. We certainly have important issues to deal with, both about our LGBTQ existence and our daily life experiences such as paying bills and feeding ourselves. Identity is such a root in how we view ourselves to tackle those issues. And those famous 5 letters that go up on posters or are in the news … the Q word does dangle at the end, but is still a part of the whole alphabet jumble.

At the beginning, I said I didn’t want to make an us vs them or ageism argument. I probably failed. I hope I left us all with a little more respect for one another and different perspectives. Queer leather folk … someone, somewhere is going to make up a word that will upset us one day, I’m sure.

Love and leather,

Karri Joe Plowman