J. S. Kuiken

To be honest, I am always angry when people say they’re are publishing work by queer authors, but that the topics of the stories therein are not “limited” to LGBTQAI etc topics.

I know they mean well, but what they are saying is that somehow, our unique identities and experiences are limiting. That somehow being queer does not touch and infiltrate every aspect of our lives in meaningful, profound, and rewarding ways. That talking about aspects of our lives which are particular to our queerness is limiting. Because, yaknow, those topics could only be of interest to, and relevant for, other people like us. We want to go beyond our queerness somehow – as if cisgender, heterosexual people were beyond their particular experiences of gender or sexuality. We have to scrub ourselves clean of our queerness so we too, can be accessible to cisgender, heterosexual audiences, rather than challenging that, and the way heterosexual, cisgender experiences are privileged and seen as “normal”. So that we can align ourselves with that normality in order to be seen as worthy, and human in some ways. We are just the same as everyone else – as long as we deny our queer lives and experiences. 

So yes. I know people mean well when they say that. But what they actually mean is that we should not be queer.