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Ok so lets talk blood. Obviously this is an important step forward, however the decisions and recommendations are still seeped in deep institutional homophobia.
A THREAD
1/ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55296525
A THREAD
1/ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55296525
Context: The ban on gay men giving blood was brought in in 1980 in the face of the AIDS epidemic, where little was known about HIV and testing was patchy at best. This is understandable- however what should have been a temporary measure has remained in status quo for 4 decades 2/
The 'deferral period' of 3 months, brought in in 2011, allowed a straight woman to have unprotected sex with an HIV positive man and give blood the next day while gay men had to remain abstinent for 3 months regardless of the riskiness of their sex. 3/
The obvious problem was that assumptions were being made about the risk of gay men giving blood that showed an ignorance and lack of understanding on the part of policymakers which was rightly criticised and lobbied against 4/
Over the years, LGBT+ lobbying has largely used the image of beautiful white middle class gay men in a long term committed relationship to sell the idea of equality to conservative Britain - 'We're just like you!' we shout as we show people our fascia of respectability. 5/
The problem here is: we're not just like them. Our lobbyists are like them. Our community is driven by white middle class men. Obviously notable exceptions get raised (the indominable Baroness @ruth_hunt stands out) but largely we present as male and pale AND WE'RE NOT 6/
Our community is a vibrant, multicultural, richly identifying place for people of all sexual identities: queer, polyamoury, BDSM, open relationships, monogamy - a place of sexual liberation made even more so by the introduction of PrEP (thank @Greg0wen for that!). 7/
Our community also has a dark undercurrent where issues of societal rejection, familial dispute, the status quo of 'emigrating' to big cities, shame, loneliness, chemsex and addiction all mix as people try to live as themselves as authentically as they can 8/
And here we have the meat of the issue. Once again, decision making is made with married, monogamous relationships in mind. I'm in a long term relationship. And a long term BDSM D/s situation. And I play around, as do my partner and my sub. Where do we fit? 9/
Poly people who are in multiple stable and committed relationships - where do they fit? And what about bisexual people who are in stable same sex relationships who may also play casually (or less casually) with opposite sex partners? 10/
This cuts both ways - because straight swingers can still give blood. Straight sexually liberated men and women can still give blood. Straight semi-casual D/s partners can still give blood. Straight drug users who go to sex parties can still give blood. 11/
Our sexual liberation has been whitewashed. Our liberation from AIDS through the free dissemination of PrEP has been whitewashed. The acceptance of a more diverse and liberated generation of LGBT+ people has been hidden from sight in the name of 'progress' 12/
The richness and diversity of our community has been compressed to a 2d representation of that 'ideal' gay couple for whom more and more concessions are made: at the cost of nonconforming people being swept under the rug in the race to the bottom of respectability politics 13/
So yes, this is progress. But it is progress at a terrible price - once again we have taken the wedge out from between the straight and LGBT+ community, and hammered it firmly between 'gay (publically) monogamous married couple' and the rest of the LGBT+ community. 14/14 END
