Queer and Disorderly

This essay examines contemporary lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender (LGBT) activism in the light of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick's important Social Text piece from 1991, “How to Bring Your Kids Up Gay.” It revisits the restrictive views of gender that she discovered in the psychotherapeutic professions via current (2008–2009) controversies over the authors chosen to write the entry “Gender Identity Disorder” in the forthcoming edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V). It argues that the priorities of current LGBT activism, centered largely on same-sex marriage, indicate a shift away from the deeply antinormative strain of queer politics, a move that threatens to isolate lesbian and gay activists from transgender activists.