So when was “queer” adopted as an actual lgbt+ term? I know that it used to be used as a slur or insult so when and why did the community adopt it as a term for anyone not heterosexual and cisgender?

revkryssie:

makingqueerhistory:

rainbow-hotline:

I actually don’t know. Followers?
– Casper

Well the queer community has a long proud history of reclaiming slurs. And language is weird so it’s impossible to find the first person to reclaim it but many people credit Queer Nation for its most public reclamation when they handed out pamphlets at New York City Pride in 1990. So it was probably late 80’s when it began being reclaimed. My personal favorite quote from this pamphlet is “you as an alive and functioning queer person are revolutionary”

I can’t find sources to support it but I feel quite certain that radical LGBT, especially T folk were using Queer and Queer Power in the late 60’s early 70’s… I was pretty sure the famous “you only gave us rights because we gave you riots, Queer Power” poster dated back to at least the early 80’s…

I really like this exposition from the Wikipedia article on “Queer”:
Because of the context in which it was reclaimed, queer has sociopolitical connotations and is often preferred by those who are activists—namely, by those who strongly reject traditional gender identities; reject distinct sexual identities such as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or straight; or see themselves as oppressed by the homonormativity of the politics of the broader “gay” or “LGBT” community. In this usage, queer retains its historical connotation of “outside the bounds of normal society” and can be construed as “breaking the rules for sex and gender”. It can be preferred because of its ambiguity, which allows queer-identifying people to avoid the sometimes rigid boundaries that are associated with labels such as “gay”, “lesbian”, or even “transgender”.

“Queerness thus becomes a path of political resistance against heteronormativity as well as homonormativity while simultaneously refusing to engage in traditional essentialist identity politics.” From Alphabet Soup: Labels and Empowerment.

The thing we all need to remember is that Queer is not new, is not bad, has power precisely because we refuse to allow society to weaponize it against us.