Every once in a while I go off on a rant about this phrase and the problems it presents. I don't think I've ever written it down though, so here's a post about why using the phrase "love is love" actually negatively impacts most of the queer community and needs to be retired yesterday.
"Love is love" implies that the only reason people are queer is WHO they love, full stop. Which isn't the case anymore, there's the aromantic community (who do not feel romantic attraction), trans community (who do not identify with their gender assigned at birth), and the intersex community (whose biological sex does not fall neatly into male/female). All of which are queer and none of these identities are based on strictly WHO they love. You could easily have a straight trans individual, who is still a cherished part of the queer community.
To take a closer look at these identities, let's start with the aromantic community. It's true that some individuals within the aro community do identify with "love is love" because they love their friends or because they date, but there are plenty of aros who describe themselves as being loveless and say that they don't love at all. Just because a subset identify with this phrase, doesn't mean you can use it to apply to the community as a whole. Like everything else, it is a spectrum. You can personally identify with a phrase without tacking it onto everyone. It feels really gross to me that part of the aromantic community is alienating another part over this.
Not to mention that emphasizing that aromantic individuals can love misses the point entirely. The existence of the aromantic community indicates that love is not an essential part of human existence and that space needs to be made for those who want to stay single and on their own. Turning that around to make it about "hey we aren't that different from you" reflects what the queer community did to the trans community (more on that later) and it's a brutal way to get acceptance.
I'm also unconvinced that anyone saying "love is love" is actually thinking of the aro community which isn't enough for me. I personally identify as aromantic, and I even date and am in a romantic relationship. Seeing this phrase around Pride Month doesn't make me feel included. I don't think anyone is using to explicitly include the aromantic community. It's more the case where some aromantics have reclaimed and adopted it. Which is fine, but it indicates that this phrase isn't being used for the whole community. Which is more reason to not use it for that.
Trans individuals are queer because of their gender identity. They could identify as trans and heterosexual. This is directly excluded by "love is love." In fact, post-Stonewall, this phrase has directly been used to exclude the trans community. A big part of marriage equality was making the case that queer people are exactly the same as straight people, they just love different people. Since the trans community doesn't fit into that, they have been thrown under the bus. Recently efforts have been rectifying this, but there is a lot of history there.
Intersex individuals are queer because of their biological sex and they are also excluded by this phrase. The intersex community has time and time again been marginalized within queer spaces. It's often forgotten about, or tacked on as a last-minute addition. But again, intersex people are queer and belong in queer spaces.
This phrase can be wielded in a very bi/pan-phobic way as well, in that people are quick to revoke "love is love" the second a bi/pan person is in a relationship with the opposite gender. And bi/pan people don't stop being queer once they're in a "straight passing" relationship"! So here these identities may not be queer based on who they love! What a concept.
With all that in mind, the only communities that directly vibe with "love is love" are the gay and lesbian communities. And if that sounds like TERF nonsense, that's because it can be! Again, "love is love" has been used to directly exclude the trans community, and separate them from modern queer rights movements by insisting that queer people are the same as straight people, we just love someone else. This is an attempt to water down queer existence to make it more palatable by alienating part of the community.
The bottom line is that people are queer because of WHO THEY ARE and not WHO THEY LOVE. Any attempt to say otherwise is likely gatekeeping queerness, and we need to be mindful of this to be supportive of everyone in the LGBTQIA+ acronym. To that end, I suggest that we abandon this phrase, and instead pick up something more inclusive. There's plenty of options, "we're here, we're queer, get used to it" or "LGBTQIA+ pride" or anything else. Doing this will allow many people to feel more comfortable within the queer community, and create more acceptance for us. So drop this phrase, get a new inclusive one instead.
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