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Die pinke Linie - Weltweite Kämpfe um sexuelle Selbstbestimmung und Geschlechtsidentität
Für wie viele Geschlechter sollte es Toiletten geben? Manche sehen in dieser Frage nur einen Karnevalskalauer, andere nutzen sie zur Inszenierung eines Kulturkampfes. Viele Menschen erinnert sie jedoch schlicht an tagtäglich erfahrene Demütigungen. Über Themen der Geschlechtsidentität und der sexuellen Selbstbestimmung wurde in jüngster Zeit weltweit erbittert gestritten. Und während in einigen Ländern erhebliche Liberalisierungsfortschritte zu verzeichnen sind, schüren in anderen mächtige politische Akteure gezielt Stimmung gegen Lesben, Schwule und Transpersonen.
Mark Gevisser zeichnet diese neue Konfliktlinie – die pinke Linie, wie er sie nennt – rund um den Globus nach. Er schildert, wie queere Paare und Familien für rechtliche Gleichstellung kämpfen und zu welchen Strategien Aktivist:innen greifen, um tradierte Geschlechtervorstellungen in ihren lokalen Kontexten zu überwinden. Er spricht mit von Diskriminierung Betroffenen in Kenia, Ägypten und den USA: Welche Probleme stellen sich ihnen im Alltag? Welche Pronomen verwenden sie für sich und warum? Welche Ziele verfolgen Dritte, die sich ihrer Sache annehmen?
Einfühlsam, klug und in bestechender Prosa kombiniert Gevisser Reportage und Analyse und liefert ein ebenso faktenreiches wie bewegendes Standardwerk zu einem der prägenden Themen unserer Gegenwart.
Mark Gevisser zeichnet diese neue Konfliktlinie – die pinke Linie, wie er sie nennt – rund um den Globus nach. Er schildert, wie queere Paare und Familien für rechtliche Gleichstellung kämpfen und zu welchen Strategien Aktivist:innen greifen, um tradierte Geschlechtervorstellungen in ihren lokalen Kontexten zu überwinden. Er spricht mit von Diskriminierung Betroffenen in Kenia, Ägypten und den USA: Welche Probleme stellen sich ihnen im Alltag? Welche Pronomen verwenden sie für sich und warum? Welche Ziele verfolgen Dritte, die sich ihrer Sache annehmen?
Einfühlsam, klug und in bestechender Prosa kombiniert Gevisser Reportage und Analyse und liefert ein ebenso faktenreiches wie bewegendes Standardwerk zu einem der prägenden Themen unserer Gegenwart.
655 pages, Hardcover
First published July 28, 2020
326 people are currently reading
7875 people want to read
About the author
Mark Gevisser
16 books50 followersMark Gevisser is one of South Africa’s leading authors and journalists. His next book “Dispatcher”, about his personal relationship with his home-town Johannesburg, will be published by Farrar Straus Giroux and Atlantic Press in 2013.
Gevisser has been awarded an Open Society Followship for 2012/13 working on The Sexuality Frontier. During his fellowship he will be looking at the ways ideas about sexuality and gender identity are changing globally, and how this is changing the way people think about themselves and their worlds. He will travel to United States, India, Nepal, Russia, Hungary, Poland, China, Turkey, Lebanon, Senegal, South Africa, Kenya, Uganda, Brazil, Argentina and Western Europe.
Gevisser’s book A Legacy of Liberation: Thabo Mbeki and the Future of the South African Dream was published by Palgrave Macmillan in the UK, and by Jonathan Ball in South Africa under the title, Thabo Mbeki: The Dream Deferred. It was the winner of the Sunday Times 2008 Alan Paton Prize.
Gevisser was born in Johannesburg in 1964, and educated and King David and Redhill Schools. He graduated from Yale in 1987 with a degree magna cum laude in comparative literature and worked in New York as a high school teacher and writing for Village Voice and The Nation, before returning to South Africa in 1990. His journalism has appeared in publications and journals including Granta, the New York Times, Vogue, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, Foreign Affairs, Public Culture and Art in America.
Gevisser has previously published two books – Defiant Desire, Gay and Lesbian Lives In South Africa which he co-edited with Edwin Cameron, and Portraits of Power: Profiles in a Changing South Africa, a collection of his celebrated political profiles from the Mail & Guardian. He has also published widely, in anthologies, on sexuality and on urbanism in South Africa. His publications on art include a biographical essay on Nicholas Hlobo and a response to William Kentridge and Gerhard Marx‘s The Firewalker. He has also published an essay on Thabo Mbeki‘s legacy.
Gevisser’s feature-length documentary, The Man Who Drove With Mandela, made with Greta Schiller, has been broadcast internationally, and won the Teddy Documentary Prize at the Berlin Film Festival in 1999. The film is an excavation of the life of Cecil Williams, the South African gay communist theatre director. Mark has also written scripts for the South African drama series Zero Tolerance; his scripts were short-listed for SAFTA and iEmmy awards.
Since 2002, Gevisser has been involved in heritage development. He co-led the team that developed the heritage, education and tourism components of Constitution Hill, and co-curated the Hill’s permanent exhibitions. He is a founder and associate of Trace, a heritage research and design company. His Exhibition Joburg Tracks was exhibited at Museum Africa. Gevisser works as a political analyst and public speaker; his clients have included several South African and multinational organisations and corporations.
From 2009 to 2011, Gevisser was Writing Fellow in the Humanities Faculty at the University of Pretoria, where he taught in the journalism programme and ran a programme on public intellectual activity. He is an experienced writing teacher, and has conducted narrative non-fiction workshops in South Africa and Kenya. In 2011, he was a Carnegie Equity Fellow at Wits University, and convened a major event at the university on creativity and memory featuring Nadine Gordimer, William Kentridge, Hugh Masakela, Zoe Zicomb and Chris van Wyk.[1][2][3]
Gevisser has been awarded an Open Society Followship for 2012/13 working on The Sexuality Frontier. During his fellowship he will be looking at the ways ideas about sexuality and gender identity are changing globally, and how this is changing the way people think about themselves and their worlds. He will travel to United States, India, Nepal, Russia, Hungary, Poland, China, Turkey, Lebanon, Senegal, South Africa, Kenya, Uganda, Brazil, Argentina and Western Europe.
Gevisser’s book A Legacy of Liberation: Thabo Mbeki and the Future of the South African Dream was published by Palgrave Macmillan in the UK, and by Jonathan Ball in South Africa under the title, Thabo Mbeki: The Dream Deferred. It was the winner of the Sunday Times 2008 Alan Paton Prize.
Gevisser was born in Johannesburg in 1964, and educated and King David and Redhill Schools. He graduated from Yale in 1987 with a degree magna cum laude in comparative literature and worked in New York as a high school teacher and writing for Village Voice and The Nation, before returning to South Africa in 1990. His journalism has appeared in publications and journals including Granta, the New York Times, Vogue, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, Foreign Affairs, Public Culture and Art in America.
Gevisser has previously published two books – Defiant Desire, Gay and Lesbian Lives In South Africa which he co-edited with Edwin Cameron, and Portraits of Power: Profiles in a Changing South Africa, a collection of his celebrated political profiles from the Mail & Guardian. He has also published widely, in anthologies, on sexuality and on urbanism in South Africa. His publications on art include a biographical essay on Nicholas Hlobo and a response to William Kentridge and Gerhard Marx‘s The Firewalker. He has also published an essay on Thabo Mbeki‘s legacy.
Gevisser’s feature-length documentary, The Man Who Drove With Mandela, made with Greta Schiller, has been broadcast internationally, and won the Teddy Documentary Prize at the Berlin Film Festival in 1999. The film is an excavation of the life of Cecil Williams, the South African gay communist theatre director. Mark has also written scripts for the South African drama series Zero Tolerance; his scripts were short-listed for SAFTA and iEmmy awards.
Since 2002, Gevisser has been involved in heritage development. He co-led the team that developed the heritage, education and tourism components of Constitution Hill, and co-curated the Hill’s permanent exhibitions. He is a founder and associate of Trace, a heritage research and design company. His Exhibition Joburg Tracks was exhibited at Museum Africa. Gevisser works as a political analyst and public speaker; his clients have included several South African and multinational organisations and corporations.
From 2009 to 2011, Gevisser was Writing Fellow in the Humanities Faculty at the University of Pretoria, where he taught in the journalism programme and ran a programme on public intellectual activity. He is an experienced writing teacher, and has conducted narrative non-fiction workshops in South Africa and Kenya. In 2011, he was a Carnegie Equity Fellow at Wits University, and convened a major event at the university on creativity and memory featuring Nadine Gordimer, William Kentridge, Hugh Masakela, Zoe Zicomb and Chris van Wyk.[1][2][3]
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June 29, 2020
Towards the end of this deeply moving and impeccably researched book, Mark Gevisser comments: “As a journalist and biographer, I had always held that the best way to understand change was to tell people’s stories …” This is a sure-fire means to “effect social and political change”, mainly because it influences and inspires people by talking to both their heads and their hearts.
Honing in on such different stories from around the world in order to give a meaningful and comprehensive overview of the way that the gay rights struggle has developed globally (or not developed, or even regressed, as the case may be), and also how it has interacted with new flashpoints such as transgender rights, #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter, all resulted in Gevisser ultimately spending an astonishing six years on this book. That can only be described as a labour of love, as noted by author Colm Tóibín in his review for The Guardian:
“This is a valuable book not only for the quality of Gevisser’s analysis and the scope of his research, but because he spends a good deal of time with the people on whose lives he focuses. He does not just sail into such cities as Cairo, Nairobi, Kampala, Ramallah and Istanbul, interview a few gay locals, deplore their plight and depart. He sticks around; he finds people whose lives he can follow over a couple of years. He hangs out with them, enjoys their company; he renders them in all their complexity.”
It is this ‘lived-in’ quality that gives the book such a profoundly emotional impact, especially when, in some instances, months or even years have passed before Gevisser touches base again with his subjects, only to discover that relationships have ended, new problems arisen, or simply that things did not work out as planned.
But that is the nature of life and the real world. Gevisser notes his own influence on the many people he comes into contact with, and how he has to grapple with his inherent ‘saviour complex’, intertwined inextricably as it is with issues of neo-colonialism and white cis gay privilege (the book ends with Gevisser’s personal declaration in this regard that is so humbling and yet so transcendent that it brought tears to my eyes.)
It is impossible in this day and age of media saturation not to alter what one is observing and reporting on, and acknowledging this dichotomy adds both tension and melancholy to the wonderful and vibrant personal accounts documented here.
So what is the ‘pink line’? Gevisser describes it as “a human rights frontier that divided and described the world in an entirely new way in the first two decades of the twenty-first century.” He states that “no global social movement has caught fire as quickly as the one that came to be known as ‘LGBT’.”
However, the ‘movement’ (this is a highly ambiguous term, as forward progression is not always implicit) has seen a change of focus from gay marriage, largely a preoccupation of activists in the US and the West in general, to the new, potentially even more divisive line drawn in the sand between sexual orientation and gender identity.
What this implies is a fundamental change of focus from a ‘gender divide’ to a ‘gender spectrum’. Gevisser highlights: “If this book has one overarching agenda, it is to show that there is not only one way to be in the world.” This links back to the importance of telling individual stories:
“A primary tenet of this new generation of activism – for trans people, as well as for people of colour – was that it was time for people to tell their own stories, rather than to endure what was often called the ‘violence’ of misrepresentation or appropriation.”
In this regard, Sean – who is described as “petite and curvy and had a manga look” – schools Gevisser in the sexual and gender taxonomies of the day: “I am pansexual but homoromantic. This means I have no problem having sex with any gender, but in a relationship I would only date women or genderqueer people. I am genderqueer myself, which means I use ‘they’ and ‘their’ pronouns.”
What has had a profound impact on the transgender movement has been in the medical field, particularly endocrinology, where advances in cross-sex and puberty-arresting hormones have saved a lot of transgender people from complex and potentially dangerous early surgical intervention. (It also gives parents a bit of a breather to get to know their transgender offspring a bit better and thereby come to grips with the latest iteration of the ‘pink line’.)
Another factor shaping the current debate is the “rampant white heterosexual masculinity represented by Donald Trump, one that separated migrant children from their parents, that stood in the way of letting transgender children use the bathrooms congruent with their gender identities, that sneered at people who were different or weak, that seemed to care less about the destruction of the planet and what would be left for their children to inherit.”
Gevisser is also at pains to point out the dichotomy of a country like Israel championing gay rights, while ignoring the fundamental human rights of Palestinians, a phenomenon known as ‘pinkwashing’.
Similarly, many Asian, African and Islamic countries perceive the West’s foisting of a gay-rights agenda upon them, particularly when it is linked conditionally to receiving development aid, as a thinly veiled colonialist attempt to ‘Westernise’ them.
Many of these intolerant societies have no qualms to use the importation of ‘gay decadence’ from the West as an excuse to entrench their own dictatorial and conservative authority. Russia hosting the Olympics and simultaneously driving its gay and transgender citizens underground is another clear example of ‘pinkwashing’, combined with old-fashioned hate-mongering and gay panic.
As Gevisser notes towards the end: “We are forged by our contexts and, of course, we make our contexts, too.” I was especially moved by his statement: “And I have changed, thanks to this book. I no longer walk around in the certain box of my masculinity, and I find that immensely liberating.” It is a liberation that we can all share in by embracing the ever-shifting dichotomies of the ‘pink line’.
Honing in on such different stories from around the world in order to give a meaningful and comprehensive overview of the way that the gay rights struggle has developed globally (or not developed, or even regressed, as the case may be), and also how it has interacted with new flashpoints such as transgender rights, #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter, all resulted in Gevisser ultimately spending an astonishing six years on this book. That can only be described as a labour of love, as noted by author Colm Tóibín in his review for The Guardian:
“This is a valuable book not only for the quality of Gevisser’s analysis and the scope of his research, but because he spends a good deal of time with the people on whose lives he focuses. He does not just sail into such cities as Cairo, Nairobi, Kampala, Ramallah and Istanbul, interview a few gay locals, deplore their plight and depart. He sticks around; he finds people whose lives he can follow over a couple of years. He hangs out with them, enjoys their company; he renders them in all their complexity.”
It is this ‘lived-in’ quality that gives the book such a profoundly emotional impact, especially when, in some instances, months or even years have passed before Gevisser touches base again with his subjects, only to discover that relationships have ended, new problems arisen, or simply that things did not work out as planned.
But that is the nature of life and the real world. Gevisser notes his own influence on the many people he comes into contact with, and how he has to grapple with his inherent ‘saviour complex’, intertwined inextricably as it is with issues of neo-colonialism and white cis gay privilege (the book ends with Gevisser’s personal declaration in this regard that is so humbling and yet so transcendent that it brought tears to my eyes.)
It is impossible in this day and age of media saturation not to alter what one is observing and reporting on, and acknowledging this dichotomy adds both tension and melancholy to the wonderful and vibrant personal accounts documented here.
So what is the ‘pink line’? Gevisser describes it as “a human rights frontier that divided and described the world in an entirely new way in the first two decades of the twenty-first century.” He states that “no global social movement has caught fire as quickly as the one that came to be known as ‘LGBT’.”
However, the ‘movement’ (this is a highly ambiguous term, as forward progression is not always implicit) has seen a change of focus from gay marriage, largely a preoccupation of activists in the US and the West in general, to the new, potentially even more divisive line drawn in the sand between sexual orientation and gender identity.
What this implies is a fundamental change of focus from a ‘gender divide’ to a ‘gender spectrum’. Gevisser highlights: “If this book has one overarching agenda, it is to show that there is not only one way to be in the world.” This links back to the importance of telling individual stories:
“A primary tenet of this new generation of activism – for trans people, as well as for people of colour – was that it was time for people to tell their own stories, rather than to endure what was often called the ‘violence’ of misrepresentation or appropriation.”
In this regard, Sean – who is described as “petite and curvy and had a manga look” – schools Gevisser in the sexual and gender taxonomies of the day: “I am pansexual but homoromantic. This means I have no problem having sex with any gender, but in a relationship I would only date women or genderqueer people. I am genderqueer myself, which means I use ‘they’ and ‘their’ pronouns.”
What has had a profound impact on the transgender movement has been in the medical field, particularly endocrinology, where advances in cross-sex and puberty-arresting hormones have saved a lot of transgender people from complex and potentially dangerous early surgical intervention. (It also gives parents a bit of a breather to get to know their transgender offspring a bit better and thereby come to grips with the latest iteration of the ‘pink line’.)
Another factor shaping the current debate is the “rampant white heterosexual masculinity represented by Donald Trump, one that separated migrant children from their parents, that stood in the way of letting transgender children use the bathrooms congruent with their gender identities, that sneered at people who were different or weak, that seemed to care less about the destruction of the planet and what would be left for their children to inherit.”
Gevisser is also at pains to point out the dichotomy of a country like Israel championing gay rights, while ignoring the fundamental human rights of Palestinians, a phenomenon known as ‘pinkwashing’.
Similarly, many Asian, African and Islamic countries perceive the West’s foisting of a gay-rights agenda upon them, particularly when it is linked conditionally to receiving development aid, as a thinly veiled colonialist attempt to ‘Westernise’ them.
Many of these intolerant societies have no qualms to use the importation of ‘gay decadence’ from the West as an excuse to entrench their own dictatorial and conservative authority. Russia hosting the Olympics and simultaneously driving its gay and transgender citizens underground is another clear example of ‘pinkwashing’, combined with old-fashioned hate-mongering and gay panic.
As Gevisser notes towards the end: “We are forged by our contexts and, of course, we make our contexts, too.” I was especially moved by his statement: “And I have changed, thanks to this book. I no longer walk around in the certain box of my masculinity, and I find that immensely liberating.” It is a liberation that we can all share in by embracing the ever-shifting dichotomies of the ‘pink line’.
September 22, 2022
Świetny reportaż, ale bardzo gorzki. Zwłaszcza epilog do polskiego wydania i czytanie o homofobicznym polskim bagienku oczami dziennikarza z RPA.
December 24, 2022
La Línea Rosa es un libro que nos abre los ojos ante la realidad de muchísimas personas de la comunidad LGBTIQA+ alrededor del mundo. Cuando, como aliados, pensamos que el mundo ha avanzado un montón, que se están respetando más los derechos, que hay más diversidad, etc., este libro nos da una buena dosis de realidad relatando las historias de refugiados en África que tienen que huir de sus países por su identidad, de mujeres en México que tienen que luchar contra viento y marea para formar una familia, de personas trans en lugares como Egipto cuya vida corre peligro por ser quienes son, y mucho más.
July 20, 2022
To jest jeden z najlepszych reportaży, jakie przyszło mi przeczytać. To praca obszerna, wnikliwa, szczegółowa i zakrojona na szeroką, bo światową skalę. Mark Gevisser przygląda się queerowym społecznościom w różnych zakątkach świata, przedstawiając czytelniczkom autentyczne historie, których bohaterowie i bohaterki często sami szukają dla siebie tożsamości, zadają sobie trudne pytania, trochę błądzą, wcale nie zachowują się nienagannie i "poprawnie politycznie" i uczą się, jak sam Gevisser. Te osobiste spotkania i rozmowy poprzetykane są rozdziałami syntezującymi, które przedstawiają to, jakie zmiany zachodzą w queerowych środowiskach, w prawie, w kulturze. Gevisser zwraca uwagę, jak wiele różnych kwestii politycznych wpływa na jakość życia osób queerowych. Przygląda się kapitalizmowi. Przygląda się światowej polityce. Przygląda się religii. Ale patrzy też na małe historie, na prywatne poglądy swoich rozmówców. I to jest to, co sprawia, że jest to dla mnie książka kompleksowa – mamy duży plan i zbliżenia, teorie i pojedyncze ludzkie historie, mamy też samego autora, który szczerze przygląda się samemu sobie i zmienia się w procesie pracy nad książką. Trzeba przeczytać.
June 23, 2022
Ewidentnym kłamstwem byłoby stwierdzenie, że ostatnimi czasy cierpimy na niedobór książek o tematyce LGBTQIA. I jest to jak najlepszy trend wydawniczy, który autentycznie cieszy. Zwłaszcza w naszym kraju, gdzie homofobia jest powszechna, gdzie rząd nie tylko dyskryminację osób nieheteroseksualnych akceptuje, ale i jej przyklaskuje i sam propaguje, książki poruszające tematykę mniejszości seksualnych - czy to powieści z reprezentacją osób LGBTQIA czy reportaże traktujące o tych grupach są ogromnie potrzebne. Jednak nie da się zaprzeczyć, że są i wydawnictwa, które na tym delikatnym i wymagającym potraktowania z największym szacunkiem temacie chcą tylko i wyłącznie zarobić. Nie obchodzi ich edukacja społeczeństwa, szerzenie tolerancji, przekonanie zatwardziałych homofobów, że LGBTQIA to ludzie - a nie ideologia. Nie trzeba więc dużo na księgarnianych regałach się naszukać aby natrafić na z realną troską o mniejszości seksualne nie mające nic wspólnego tęczowe wydawnicze babole - miałkie, powierzchowne, pisane na kolanie. Co tam jakość i merytoryczność - na fali elgiebetowego (sic!) „trendu” wszystko z tęczą na okładce zejdzie na pniu. Na szczęście mająca u nas premierę zaledwie kilka tygodni temu książka Marka Gevissera nie zalicza się do tego typu publikacji. Gevisser - pochodzący i wychowany w RPA nieheteronormatywny dziennikarz- napisał reportaż doskonały - wnikliwy, wartościowy, którego największą mocą jest unikatowość wyróżniająca go spośród innych podobnych pozycji. Autor podszedł do tematu osób o różnych orientacjach seksualnych i tożsamościach płciowych od całkiem innej strony niż większość jego kolegów po fachu (i „temacie”) i w „Różowej linii” oddał głos tym zazwyczaj niezauważalnym i pomijanym - przedstawicielom społeczności LGBTQIA z najdalszych krańców świata, zamieszkałych i dorastających w państwach potocznie zwanych “egzotycznymi” czy “turystcznymi”, w których o panujących prawach i zakazach względem mniejszości seksualnych, bądźmy szczerzy - przeciętny Europejczyk czy Amerykanin nie wie nic. Para lesbijek prowadząca homo-kawiarnię w Kairze, ugandyjski nastolatek przebywający w obozie dla uchodzców w Nairobii, transpłciowa Rosjanka starająca się o opiekę nad jedynym synem. To tylko garstka bohaterów „Różowej linii”, z którymi w ciągu siedmiu długich lat tytanicznej pracy nad reportażem rozmawiał i których losy miesiącami śledził Gevisser. Reporter obszerne i naprawdę dramatyczne, ale i niepozbawione szczęsliwych momentów, wspomnienia swoich rozmówców przeplata rozdziałami, w których wnikliwie i szczegółowo, ale przejrzyście i zrozumiałym dla przeciętnego czytelnika językiem przybliża historię i sytuację ruchu LGBTQIA na całym świeice. I owszem, są kraje, które dla tej społeczności są istnym rajem na ziemi; kraje, w których osoby z mniejszości m są traktowane jak każdy inny obywatel - przysługują im te same prawa, ale i obowiązują identyczne nakazy i zakazy. Jednocześnie ich rówieśnicy mieszkający kilkaset/kilka tysięcy kilometrów dalej za trzymanie się za rękę z osobą tej samej płci czy inne i niewiele bardziej wylewne publiczne okazywanie czułości są skazywani na dożywocie, a nawet karę śmierci. Polska, niechlubnie sytuuje się bliżej tych drugich. Z resztą specjalnie do polskiego wydania autor popełnił dodatkowy rozdział, który w całości skupia się na sytuacji osób nieheteronormatywnych w naszym kraju. Co nie powinno być dla nikogo z czytelników nowością - wyłania się tu gorzki obraz sytuacji niegodnej pozazdroszczenia.
Książka Gevissena to bardzo ważny głos w dyskusji w sprawie wzajemnej tolerancji i promowania praw mniejszości seksualnych. Oby wybrzmiał jak najgłośniej!
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Książka Gevissena to bardzo ważny głos w dyskusji w sprawie wzajemnej tolerancji i promowania praw mniejszości seksualnych. Oby wybrzmiał jak najgłośniej!
August 7, 2020
The Pink Line provides the reader with a combination of analytical chapters that situate the LGBTQ struggle for human rights in the ongoing story of globalization and deeply moving personal vignettes of the queer folks the author encountered on the Pink Line's front lines in nine countries. These stories include a trans Malawian refugee granted asylum in South Africa and a gay Ugandan refugee stuck in Nairobi; a lesbian couple who started a gay café in Cairo after the Arab Spring, a trans woman fighting for custody of her child in Moscow, and a community of kothis—“women’s hearts in men’s bodies”—who run a temple in an Indian fishing village. What makes this narrative truly powerful is the way in which the author highlights the interconnectivity of these struggles for human rights, that is, how progress and change in one region of the world, could spark both momentum for LGBTQ rights and backlash against LGBTQ rights in another. This global push/pull has led queer lives to be instrumentalized for political causes that have little to do with their call for equality and dignity. In Western Europe and the United States conservative politicians have reframed LGBTQ rights as a battle call against the influx of immigrants. For example, in 2018 right-wing Flemish Nationalist Vlaams Belang claimed that his party was the most LGTBQ friendly because all the others were "willing to import thousands of Muslims who have very violent ideas against being gay or transgender." In Eastern Europe and Russian, advances in LGBTQ rights in Western Europe were used as battle cry against allowing decadent Western liberalism to take hold there.
But this is not a story without hope. Even as some politicians have manipulated LGBTQ rights to their own ends, LGBTQ activists around the world have pushed for the recognition. of LGBTQ rights as human rights. Thanks to these efforts, in May 2019, the World Health Organizations finally adopted the ICD-11, thereby no longer labeling transgender identity as pathological. That same month, Taiwan became the first country in Asia to allow same sex couples to marry and although efforts to decriminalize homosexuality failed in Kenya, the author notes, the atmosphere was changing there as increasingly in urban areas the LGBTQ community found new allies. Thus, while progress has been far from a straight line, the "it gets better" campaign that first took shape in the United States after several LGBTQ teens committed suicide after years of experiencing bullying, has become a global campaign. What began as celebrities in the United States posting videos online about their experiences and how "it gets better" has become a global movement with LGBTQ individuals from Egypt, Russia and elsewhere posting "it gets better" videos. For example, the author tells of a young Egyptian man who was found by his family with his male lover. They shaved his head and dragged him through the streets tied to a horse cart and then locked him in a room for a month. But rather than succumb to despair, this young man posted his own "it gets better" video on YouTube via his cell phone. In 2018, this young man overcame the odds and qualified as a lawyer.
The arc of justice is shifting, although at times the backlash obscures from view the progress being made. But as the people across the globe who shared their stories with the author understand, change requires taking an active stand. A must-read for anyone interested in human rights and in the struggle across the globe of LGBTQ individuals to have their humanity recognized.
I would like to thank the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.
But this is not a story without hope. Even as some politicians have manipulated LGBTQ rights to their own ends, LGBTQ activists around the world have pushed for the recognition. of LGBTQ rights as human rights. Thanks to these efforts, in May 2019, the World Health Organizations finally adopted the ICD-11, thereby no longer labeling transgender identity as pathological. That same month, Taiwan became the first country in Asia to allow same sex couples to marry and although efforts to decriminalize homosexuality failed in Kenya, the author notes, the atmosphere was changing there as increasingly in urban areas the LGBTQ community found new allies. Thus, while progress has been far from a straight line, the "it gets better" campaign that first took shape in the United States after several LGBTQ teens committed suicide after years of experiencing bullying, has become a global campaign. What began as celebrities in the United States posting videos online about their experiences and how "it gets better" has become a global movement with LGBTQ individuals from Egypt, Russia and elsewhere posting "it gets better" videos. For example, the author tells of a young Egyptian man who was found by his family with his male lover. They shaved his head and dragged him through the streets tied to a horse cart and then locked him in a room for a month. But rather than succumb to despair, this young man posted his own "it gets better" video on YouTube via his cell phone. In 2018, this young man overcame the odds and qualified as a lawyer.
The arc of justice is shifting, although at times the backlash obscures from view the progress being made. But as the people across the globe who shared their stories with the author understand, change requires taking an active stand. A must-read for anyone interested in human rights and in the struggle across the globe of LGBTQ individuals to have their humanity recognized.
I would like to thank the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.
December 13, 2021
Antje las ein Buch/Youtube
„Pinke Linie“ nennt der südafrikanische Journalist Mark Gevisser die Grenze zwischen jenen, die Homosexualität und vielfältige Gender-Identitäten akzeptieren, und jenen, die ein heteronormatives Modell von klaren Unterschieden zwischen Männlich und Weiblich verteidigen. Die pinke Linie trennt nicht nur Länder mit liberalen Gesetzen von solchen mit entsprechenden Verboten, sie verläuft auch quer durch Gesellschaften und Kulturen, durch Familien und teilweise sogar durch Individuen. Anhand von Protagonist:innen aus Südafrika, Uganda, Ägypten, Russland, Mexiko, Israel/Palästina, USA und Indien, die er teilweise über viele Jahre begleitet, zeichnet Gevisser kenntnisreich und differenziert diese globalen Auseinandersetzungen nach. Die Entwicklung geht leider nicht immer nur in eine freiheitliche Richtung. Gerade in den vergangenen zehn Jahren ist die Situation in vielen Ländern für Menschen, die nicht ins heteronormative Raster passen, wieder schwieriger geworden. Ein unverzichtbares Buch für alle, die aktuelle Geschlechterdebatten und die daraus resultierenden Konflikte verstehen möchten. (Erschienen in: Publik Forum, 3.12.2021)
„Pinke Linie“ nennt der südafrikanische Journalist Mark Gevisser die Grenze zwischen jenen, die Homosexualität und vielfältige Gender-Identitäten akzeptieren, und jenen, die ein heteronormatives Modell von klaren Unterschieden zwischen Männlich und Weiblich verteidigen. Die pinke Linie trennt nicht nur Länder mit liberalen Gesetzen von solchen mit entsprechenden Verboten, sie verläuft auch quer durch Gesellschaften und Kulturen, durch Familien und teilweise sogar durch Individuen. Anhand von Protagonist:innen aus Südafrika, Uganda, Ägypten, Russland, Mexiko, Israel/Palästina, USA und Indien, die er teilweise über viele Jahre begleitet, zeichnet Gevisser kenntnisreich und differenziert diese globalen Auseinandersetzungen nach. Die Entwicklung geht leider nicht immer nur in eine freiheitliche Richtung. Gerade in den vergangenen zehn Jahren ist die Situation in vielen Ländern für Menschen, die nicht ins heteronormative Raster passen, wieder schwieriger geworden. Ein unverzichtbares Buch für alle, die aktuelle Geschlechterdebatten und die daraus resultierenden Konflikte verstehen möchten. (Erschienen in: Publik Forum, 3.12.2021)
January 5, 2022
To see more reviews check out MI Book Reviews.
I got an ARC of this book.
This book started out amazing. It was dense, but it made sense. There needed to be this background to make the points work. The history of the countries and history of politicians all were necessary to make the world make sense. This was a difficult read and until the last few chapters I was really loving it. I was learning so much and seeing things from a new way of thinking.
It was wild to see just how much the world really is connected. Countries influence other countries, money talks loudly across the world, there is just so much that this book explored. It was fascinating. It was clear that the author spent considerable amounts of time and effort making this book and researching everything. It is also clear that the author is cis. It is painfully clear near the end of the book.
The last few chapters focus on trans issues. The thing is the author gives so much time to the opposition and without showing how damaging this is. This is not the case in the earlier chapters. In the earlier chapters there is talk of asylum, drug use, abuse, and horrific events that come from denying queer people rights. Yet in the chapters that focus on trans people specifically in the US, there is none of this. Instead there is so much talk of how teens transitioning is dangerous that I felt sick to my stomach. There was no analysis. There was no mention of suicide rates among trans teens being higher when they are not allowed to socially transition. There was no mention of trans people coming out later in life. It was “transsexuals know early on, but they can’t transition because they are forced to to be queer enough”. Then the author repeatedly mentions how hard and confusing they/them pronouns are. I’m sorry, is this a book about the queer world or the gay world? Because this author wasn’t able to handle trans stuff well at all.
This book was amazing for the gay stuff and for gender nonconforming gays or for queer people who don’t want/need medical transitions. It was terrible for trans people like me who transitioned as teens, who would be dead without their transitions. Instead it vilified this idea that teens could know who they are (which despite what the author claims, is against many studies shown across the world).
So my recommendation is read the first 60% of the book, then stop. I am appalled at the last few chapters. I was lulled into this false sense of security at how well the author handled gender differences across the world and how gender was less binary is so many of the people interviewed, but then I was let down. There was a documentary on Netflix that hit me the same way. A white guy went around and did dark tourism stuff (Dark Tourist, maybe?), but I couldn’t even make it through the first episode since it was such a white guy making himself the moral compass and the star. This happens in this book in many of the interviews where he talks about what he did for the people and then related him giving money to paying people to be queer. I am so lost at where this is getting so many five star reviews. It has so many problems. My three stars are for the effort this book took and from the enjoyment I got from the more fact based chapters. I doubt I will read something from this author again.
I got an ARC of this book.
This book started out amazing. It was dense, but it made sense. There needed to be this background to make the points work. The history of the countries and history of politicians all were necessary to make the world make sense. This was a difficult read and until the last few chapters I was really loving it. I was learning so much and seeing things from a new way of thinking.
It was wild to see just how much the world really is connected. Countries influence other countries, money talks loudly across the world, there is just so much that this book explored. It was fascinating. It was clear that the author spent considerable amounts of time and effort making this book and researching everything. It is also clear that the author is cis. It is painfully clear near the end of the book.
The last few chapters focus on trans issues. The thing is the author gives so much time to the opposition and without showing how damaging this is. This is not the case in the earlier chapters. In the earlier chapters there is talk of asylum, drug use, abuse, and horrific events that come from denying queer people rights. Yet in the chapters that focus on trans people specifically in the US, there is none of this. Instead there is so much talk of how teens transitioning is dangerous that I felt sick to my stomach. There was no analysis. There was no mention of suicide rates among trans teens being higher when they are not allowed to socially transition. There was no mention of trans people coming out later in life. It was “transsexuals know early on, but they can’t transition because they are forced to to be queer enough”. Then the author repeatedly mentions how hard and confusing they/them pronouns are. I’m sorry, is this a book about the queer world or the gay world? Because this author wasn’t able to handle trans stuff well at all.
This book was amazing for the gay stuff and for gender nonconforming gays or for queer people who don’t want/need medical transitions. It was terrible for trans people like me who transitioned as teens, who would be dead without their transitions. Instead it vilified this idea that teens could know who they are (which despite what the author claims, is against many studies shown across the world).
So my recommendation is read the first 60% of the book, then stop. I am appalled at the last few chapters. I was lulled into this false sense of security at how well the author handled gender differences across the world and how gender was less binary is so many of the people interviewed, but then I was let down. There was a documentary on Netflix that hit me the same way. A white guy went around and did dark tourism stuff (Dark Tourist, maybe?), but I couldn’t even make it through the first episode since it was such a white guy making himself the moral compass and the star. This happens in this book in many of the interviews where he talks about what he did for the people and then related him giving money to paying people to be queer. I am so lost at where this is getting so many five star reviews. It has so many problems. My three stars are for the effort this book took and from the enjoyment I got from the more fact based chapters. I doubt I will read something from this author again.
August 4, 2020
I was blessed with friends, family and a professional circle of people who give a rats ass who I love. That combined with living in western Europe, my "fight" for gay rights consists of equity on levels of running activity's for queer youth, ask attention for laws on alternative parenthood and all-round better acceptance for LGBTQIA who do not have the same experience as me. Of course, we have all heard about gays around the world not having such great lives as we do. But those are short news items that give us only a glimpse.
This book by Gevisser gave me insight into people's lives around the world. Their struggles, the way they cope, what their day looks like and how that must feel. How society around them copes with their queerness and how that affects them on a daily level. Gevissers writing portraits people in a beautiful and respectful way.
I would advise anybody who is sincerely interested in this topic to pick up this book.
I was given an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
This book by Gevisser gave me insight into people's lives around the world. Their struggles, the way they cope, what their day looks like and how that must feel. How society around them copes with their queerness and how that affects them on a daily level. Gevissers writing portraits people in a beautiful and respectful way.
I would advise anybody who is sincerely interested in this topic to pick up this book.
I was given an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
January 8, 2024
A look into global queer struggles, especially some areas less mentioned in mainstream media. This was a fascinating, heartfelt listen, open-minded, with the research and years of interviews very evident, and not in a bad way. A long but very worthy listen\read with a good narrator and plenty of personal investment in the material on the author's part.
August 5, 2020
The stories of individual LGBTQ people from a variety of countries were very compelling, though I found myself wanting more analysis of policy and economics (that’s very much about my brain and what I want from queer nonfiction). There are a few threads that felt like misses, though. The book asserts the idea that some of the battles around the pink line are about the idea of homosexuality as a colonial export. It doesn’t quite affirm that view but also doesn’t have the analysis that, actually, homophobia and transphobia are colonial and many indigenous cultures have long pre and anti-colonial histories of acceptance and celebration of gender variance and queerness. The author writes throughout with thoughtfulness (and self awareness) about the economic relationship between LGBTQ people experiencing violence and seeking asylum and largely white affluent benefactors. At the end of the book he returns to this a bit and seems to imply that dependence on aid is a failure. I mean, yes, the whole structure of philanthropy and saviorism is a mess, but if people can thrive with some mutual aid or direct support... great, fine. Being an employed, “productive” member of society is overrated, especially for LGBTQ people who face discrimination in applying and maintaining jobs and even in leaving their homes (if they are even stably housed to begin with). One of the questions I’ll be considering more as I continue to ponder this book is: is success of LGBTQ rights best measured by homonormativity? What would it take for us to consider success along different lines, like widespread access to housing and economic security and affirming relationships?
July 1, 2024
Nieważne czy temat was dotyczy czy nie, to zdecydowanie warto przeczytać. O ile dużo się mówi w kwestii seksualności i orientacji, to szeroko wiadomo co dzieje się u nas i na pewno w stanach. W innych krajach już niekoniecznie, a to było bardzo ciekawe, smutne, ale ciekawe.
November 22, 2020
Profound, fascinating, incredibly well researched and deeply moving, this study of the many continued struggles faced by the LGBTQ+ community around the world is a must-read for anyone with an interest in the subject. Vast in scale and providing sharp analysis of the global state of sexuality- and gender-related human rights issues interspersed with the personal narratives of a diverse range of interview subjects the author visited while working on this book, this is an immensely important work shedding light on how far we have come and how much further we still have to go.
September 12, 2024
Dnf!
I so wish I was enjoying this but I’m struggling to engage with it and I can’t connect with the writing or people. The author’s writing style and tone in places isn’t my favourite. Hopefully I’ll try again at some point with different results.
I so wish I was enjoying this but I’m struggling to engage with it and I can’t connect with the writing or people. The author’s writing style and tone in places isn’t my favourite. Hopefully I’ll try again at some point with different results.
September 6, 2025
JEZU WRESZCIE
gwiazdka mniej za slabe rozdzialy o gender spectrum i dziwne podejscie do feminizmu
gwiazdka mniej za slabe rozdzialy o gender spectrum i dziwne podejscie do feminizmu
dnf
August 23, 2023świetny reportaż, ale nie wiem czy uda mi się go kiedyś przeczytać w całości xd
November 15, 2021
[7.11/10]
This was a comprehensive and thoroughly researched analysis of queer identity outside of the western world. And whilst there was a focus on how the western world has influenced thoughts on queerness in non-western places in a post-colonial world, I think it could have touched more upon colonial influences a bit more too, however I'm also not sure if Mark Gevisser is the right person to write about that particular subject.
The biggest thing that I took away from this read was how much my experience of growing up in the western world has impacted the way I think about queerness. Gevisser explores the lives of many gender non-conforming people and the idea of dismantling the binary is touched upon several times, but I don't think it quite reached the level of depth that I was hoping for.
The overwhelming response to the trans identities interviewed for this book seemed to be rather melancholy and quite cynical when it came to the discussion of transitioning. I think perhaps the intention was to demonstrate the range of trans identities and their approach to living authentically, both through transitioning and not transitioning. Yet, and I'm not sure if it was just my incorrect interpretation, but there seemed to be quite a bit of alarmist language used when talking about transitioning, especially for young people. I think the main issue came from Gevisser inserting himself into the stories a bit too much. These people chose how they wanted to live in their bodies and I think that speaks for itself enough, I don't think the author needed to chime in so much with his opinion on others' body autonomy. It didn't come across as malicious or transphobic, but it did feel antithetical to what this book what intending to achieve.
I do think this is an important book though. It's an excellent resource for exploring queerness and how it has progressed in this snapshot of time, as well as giving a voice to queer people in places all over the globe. The pace of the evolution of queer theory likely means that a lot of what is posited here will be out of date quite soon and I think that can only be a positive thing.
This was a comprehensive and thoroughly researched analysis of queer identity outside of the western world. And whilst there was a focus on how the western world has influenced thoughts on queerness in non-western places in a post-colonial world, I think it could have touched more upon colonial influences a bit more too, however I'm also not sure if Mark Gevisser is the right person to write about that particular subject.
The biggest thing that I took away from this read was how much my experience of growing up in the western world has impacted the way I think about queerness. Gevisser explores the lives of many gender non-conforming people and the idea of dismantling the binary is touched upon several times, but I don't think it quite reached the level of depth that I was hoping for.
The overwhelming response to the trans identities interviewed for this book seemed to be rather melancholy and quite cynical when it came to the discussion of transitioning. I think perhaps the intention was to demonstrate the range of trans identities and their approach to living authentically, both through transitioning and not transitioning. Yet, and I'm not sure if it was just my incorrect interpretation, but there seemed to be quite a bit of alarmist language used when talking about transitioning, especially for young people. I think the main issue came from Gevisser inserting himself into the stories a bit too much. These people chose how they wanted to live in their bodies and I think that speaks for itself enough, I don't think the author needed to chime in so much with his opinion on others' body autonomy. It didn't come across as malicious or transphobic, but it did feel antithetical to what this book what intending to achieve.
I do think this is an important book though. It's an excellent resource for exploring queerness and how it has progressed in this snapshot of time, as well as giving a voice to queer people in places all over the globe. The pace of the evolution of queer theory likely means that a lot of what is posited here will be out of date quite soon and I think that can only be a positive thing.
Read
November 8, 2020Very interesting discussions of how LBGTQ+ rights issues are playing out in various parts of the world outside the USA and Western Europe. The book alternates between essay chapters and interview or biography chapters of individual people. The most interesting parts are the ones about cultures I know the least about, for example hijras and kothis in India or bakla in the Philippines. Sadly for many individuals "It Gets Better" isn't quite true, but I'm overall hopeful for the long run.
This is rather long, so not an easy read. But you easily read different sections at different times if you get tired.
This is rather long, so not an easy read. But you easily read different sections at different times if you get tired.
June 28, 2020
I was given an ARC of this book from NetGalley. This book beautifully connects deeply personal accounts of queer people living all over the world with the facts and figures of the global fight for LGBTQ+ rights. I had many personal connections to this book and learned so much while reading it. Mark Gevisser writes it in a way that is accessible and impactful. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking to expand their awareness of the global queer community and everyone who needs a reminder that we have made it a long way but there is still so much work to be done.
March 10, 2021
This is a really smart, thoughtful, complex book. I think it should be more lauded than it is.
September 2, 2022
epilog do polskiego wydania to powinien każdy w tym kraju przeczytać
December 10, 2020
Bits:
“In the twenty-first century, the Pink Line is not so much a line as a territory. It is a borderland where queer people try to reconcile the liberation and community they might have experienced online or on TV or in safe spaces, with the constraints of the street and the workplace, the courtroom and the living room. It is a place where queer people shuttle across time zones each time they look up from their smartphones at the people gathered around the family table; as they climb the steps from the underground nightclub back into the nation-state.”
“The new politics was not only about erecting new walls, but also about making claims that older walls had been taken down too quickly.”
On domestic violence: “Kheswa, himself a transgender man, told me that he had noted, too, that ‘particularly in relationships, if you are a trans woman, you’re likely to compromise a lot: here’s a person who says, “You’re my woman!” You’ll let go of everything to hold on to that.’”
A Massachusetts’ judge said that Scott Lively had aided “a vicious and frightening campaign of repression against LGBTQI persons in Uganda’.”
“some in these countries used this colonial legislation to back up their claims that homosexuality was unacceptable, and that the demand for its decriminalization was a neo-colonial slight on their sovereignty.”
“Their advocacy provoked unnecessary cultural conflict … and a new awareness of homosexuality that actually shut down space rather than opened it up, by forcing the fluid sexuality of Arab men into the ‘Western binary’ of ‘gay’ or ‘straight’. Suddenly the customs that provided cover for homosexual activity, such as holding hands in public or washing one another in a hammam, became suspect.”
“I sent him two hundred fifty dollars. This was meant to be for food and shelter but, having heard that his mother had been in a road accident, he chose to send a large part of it to her: like so many of the rejected queer kids I have met on my travels, he was trying to buy his way back into the family. … When Michael and I met in Nairobi, he told me that he was under terrible pressure to send money home to his ill mother now that he was working in Kenya.
‘But you are not working here, Michael,’ I said. ‘You are an unemployed asylum seeker with a tiny UNHCR grant. You’re not even allowed to work in Kenya yet.’
He looked sheepish. ‘My family think I am here because I have a job.’
‘Why didn’t you tell them the truth?’
‘Because when I sent my mother that money I didn’t want her to know it was gay money.’
‘What’s gay money?’
It was a leading question, and Michael got it immediately. He shot his eyebrows up in a characteristic arch and nodded his head forward, in my direction, by the slightest of degrees.”
Dutch naturalisation test: “One of these … offers the following question: ‘You’re on a terrace with a colleague and at the table next to you two men are fondling and kissing. You are irritated. What do you do?’ The answers available were:
a. You stay put and pretend you don’t mind.
b. You tell your colleague in a rather loud voice what you think of homosexuality.
c. You tell the men to sit somewhere else.
The assumptions are revealing: the possibility that you might not be irritated at all was not anticipated.”
“Jair Bolsonaro was given to saying things like gay children could be beaten straight, and that if his son were gay, he would rather he died in a car accident.”
“In an influential and prescient 1996 essay titled ‘On Global Queering,’ the Australian sociologist Dennis Altman tracked the way the expansion of the free market had opened the world to American gay branding and thus to the – primarily American – ‘idea that (homo)sexuality is the basis for a social, political and commercial identity.’ Gay people the world over were wearing the same clothes and aping the same styles, dancing to the same music, watching the same porn, aspiring toward a lifestyle made for American consumers. The Pride parades mushrooming across the globe celebrated an American liberation mythology, too.”
“The claiming of lesbian/gay identities can be as much about being Western as about sexuality.”
“He seemed always to be rolling both a cigarette and his eyes,”
Israel/Palestine: “The existence of such a policy was verified in 2014, when forty-three veterans and reservists in the country’s elite intelligence unit signed a public letter refusing to continue serving in the Occupied Territories, in part because they were instructed to use sexual orientation to blackmail Palestinians into becoming informants.”
Israel/Palestine: “’You gay boys just want to go and see the good life in Tel Aviv, and then you come crying to us when you get into trouble.’”
“My gay friends who were parents, attending school meetings and medical clinics and kiddies’ birthday parties, were more on the frontline than I was, even if their lives appeared to be more conventional.”
“Like many transfeminine activists, Wolf was convinced that ‘things are more scary and dangerous’ than they had been before, precisely ‘because of being in the public view. It’s not that the degree to which people hate us has increased. It’s that people both hate us and now know we are real. Before, if someone noticed us, they might get violent. Now people are looking for us.’”
“’The idea that “children should be seen and not heard” doesn’t hold anymore. So when we start asking children, ‘Who are you?’ they tell us. It is our responsibility to listen to them.’”
“‘If a person likes me wants surgery. I’m just not going to get it,’ said Emani Love. This has led her to a certain level of self-acceptance: ‘My body is as it is.’ A kid who identified as trans but was dressed – for the street – in male attire, agreed. ‘We work with what we got. But we know who we are.”
Someone began to transition, but then paused. Then reversed: “’I had to go through being a man to understand that I am a woman,’ she said to me. ‘You know, if I’d been born male, it would have been the same: I’d have had to spend time as a woman. That’s just how it is with me: I don’t fit into the boxes.’”
On people changing their minds about transition: “we are all formed by the paths we chose to take or ignore, driven by the callow passions of youth, or inertia, before we know better.”
“’When girls are lesbians or become trans, they’re taking a step up to a guy, but when guys are femme-y, t’s almost like they’re taking a step down to a girl, in the social marketing.’”
“Ross recounts how, as a college professor, “I accidentally misgendered a student of mine during a lecture. I froze in shame, expecting to be blasted. Instead, my student said, ‘That’s all right; I misgender myself sometimes.’”
“’My body is no longer my destiny. It is now my canvas.’”
“Goldner called for an understanding of gender in this context as ‘a process rather than a thing in itself, a gerund, rather than a noun or adjective, a permanent state of becoming, rather than a finished product.’”
“Stryker defined ‘the concept of transgender’ as ‘the movement across a socially imposed boundary away from an unchosen starting place, rather than any particular destination or mode of transition.’”
“’Mainly, I’m a woman because there are huge parts of me that have come to be coded in this culture as feminine, and that this culture makes so difficult to express unless I identify as a woman.’”
“In the twenty-first century, the Pink Line is not so much a line as a territory. It is a borderland where queer people try to reconcile the liberation and community they might have experienced online or on TV or in safe spaces, with the constraints of the street and the workplace, the courtroom and the living room. It is a place where queer people shuttle across time zones each time they look up from their smartphones at the people gathered around the family table; as they climb the steps from the underground nightclub back into the nation-state.”
“The new politics was not only about erecting new walls, but also about making claims that older walls had been taken down too quickly.”
On domestic violence: “Kheswa, himself a transgender man, told me that he had noted, too, that ‘particularly in relationships, if you are a trans woman, you’re likely to compromise a lot: here’s a person who says, “You’re my woman!” You’ll let go of everything to hold on to that.’”
A Massachusetts’ judge said that Scott Lively had aided “a vicious and frightening campaign of repression against LGBTQI persons in Uganda’.”
“some in these countries used this colonial legislation to back up their claims that homosexuality was unacceptable, and that the demand for its decriminalization was a neo-colonial slight on their sovereignty.”
“Their advocacy provoked unnecessary cultural conflict … and a new awareness of homosexuality that actually shut down space rather than opened it up, by forcing the fluid sexuality of Arab men into the ‘Western binary’ of ‘gay’ or ‘straight’. Suddenly the customs that provided cover for homosexual activity, such as holding hands in public or washing one another in a hammam, became suspect.”
“I sent him two hundred fifty dollars. This was meant to be for food and shelter but, having heard that his mother had been in a road accident, he chose to send a large part of it to her: like so many of the rejected queer kids I have met on my travels, he was trying to buy his way back into the family. … When Michael and I met in Nairobi, he told me that he was under terrible pressure to send money home to his ill mother now that he was working in Kenya.
‘But you are not working here, Michael,’ I said. ‘You are an unemployed asylum seeker with a tiny UNHCR grant. You’re not even allowed to work in Kenya yet.’
He looked sheepish. ‘My family think I am here because I have a job.’
‘Why didn’t you tell them the truth?’
‘Because when I sent my mother that money I didn’t want her to know it was gay money.’
‘What’s gay money?’
It was a leading question, and Michael got it immediately. He shot his eyebrows up in a characteristic arch and nodded his head forward, in my direction, by the slightest of degrees.”
Dutch naturalisation test: “One of these … offers the following question: ‘You’re on a terrace with a colleague and at the table next to you two men are fondling and kissing. You are irritated. What do you do?’ The answers available were:
a. You stay put and pretend you don’t mind.
b. You tell your colleague in a rather loud voice what you think of homosexuality.
c. You tell the men to sit somewhere else.
The assumptions are revealing: the possibility that you might not be irritated at all was not anticipated.”
“Jair Bolsonaro was given to saying things like gay children could be beaten straight, and that if his son were gay, he would rather he died in a car accident.”
“In an influential and prescient 1996 essay titled ‘On Global Queering,’ the Australian sociologist Dennis Altman tracked the way the expansion of the free market had opened the world to American gay branding and thus to the – primarily American – ‘idea that (homo)sexuality is the basis for a social, political and commercial identity.’ Gay people the world over were wearing the same clothes and aping the same styles, dancing to the same music, watching the same porn, aspiring toward a lifestyle made for American consumers. The Pride parades mushrooming across the globe celebrated an American liberation mythology, too.”
“The claiming of lesbian/gay identities can be as much about being Western as about sexuality.”
“He seemed always to be rolling both a cigarette and his eyes,”
Israel/Palestine: “The existence of such a policy was verified in 2014, when forty-three veterans and reservists in the country’s elite intelligence unit signed a public letter refusing to continue serving in the Occupied Territories, in part because they were instructed to use sexual orientation to blackmail Palestinians into becoming informants.”
Israel/Palestine: “’You gay boys just want to go and see the good life in Tel Aviv, and then you come crying to us when you get into trouble.’”
“My gay friends who were parents, attending school meetings and medical clinics and kiddies’ birthday parties, were more on the frontline than I was, even if their lives appeared to be more conventional.”
“Like many transfeminine activists, Wolf was convinced that ‘things are more scary and dangerous’ than they had been before, precisely ‘because of being in the public view. It’s not that the degree to which people hate us has increased. It’s that people both hate us and now know we are real. Before, if someone noticed us, they might get violent. Now people are looking for us.’”
“’The idea that “children should be seen and not heard” doesn’t hold anymore. So when we start asking children, ‘Who are you?’ they tell us. It is our responsibility to listen to them.’”
“‘If a person likes me wants surgery. I’m just not going to get it,’ said Emani Love. This has led her to a certain level of self-acceptance: ‘My body is as it is.’ A kid who identified as trans but was dressed – for the street – in male attire, agreed. ‘We work with what we got. But we know who we are.”
Someone began to transition, but then paused. Then reversed: “’I had to go through being a man to understand that I am a woman,’ she said to me. ‘You know, if I’d been born male, it would have been the same: I’d have had to spend time as a woman. That’s just how it is with me: I don’t fit into the boxes.’”
On people changing their minds about transition: “we are all formed by the paths we chose to take or ignore, driven by the callow passions of youth, or inertia, before we know better.”
“’When girls are lesbians or become trans, they’re taking a step up to a guy, but when guys are femme-y, t’s almost like they’re taking a step down to a girl, in the social marketing.’”
“Ross recounts how, as a college professor, “I accidentally misgendered a student of mine during a lecture. I froze in shame, expecting to be blasted. Instead, my student said, ‘That’s all right; I misgender myself sometimes.’”
“’My body is no longer my destiny. It is now my canvas.’”
“Goldner called for an understanding of gender in this context as ‘a process rather than a thing in itself, a gerund, rather than a noun or adjective, a permanent state of becoming, rather than a finished product.’”
“Stryker defined ‘the concept of transgender’ as ‘the movement across a socially imposed boundary away from an unchosen starting place, rather than any particular destination or mode of transition.’”
“’Mainly, I’m a woman because there are huge parts of me that have come to be coded in this culture as feminine, and that this culture makes so difficult to express unless I identify as a woman.’”
June 27, 2020
The Pink Line by Mark Gevisser should become pretty much essential reading on the challenges that LGBT+ people are faced with around the world. Alongside the challenges, Gevisser celebrates recent progress and success. It was great reading so many stories from across the world and Gevisser really conveys the impact of geography on identity and one’s life in general.
The book is clearly well-researched and I was also pleasantly surprised by the theoretical background in the book. It’s just enough to provide a much needed critical context without becoming overly theoretical. Gevisser writes in a very accessible way, keeping it simple but without in any way ‘dumbing down’ any of his rich material for the book. Overall this is a very worthwhile read and highly recommended.
With thanks to the publisher for the free review copy in exchange for my honest and unedited feedback.
The book is clearly well-researched and I was also pleasantly surprised by the theoretical background in the book. It’s just enough to provide a much needed critical context without becoming overly theoretical. Gevisser writes in a very accessible way, keeping it simple but without in any way ‘dumbing down’ any of his rich material for the book. Overall this is a very worthwhile read and highly recommended.
With thanks to the publisher for the free review copy in exchange for my honest and unedited feedback.
October 13, 2020
This book is so necessary for queer studies today as it so thoroughly challenges the master narrative of steady worldwide affirming progress towards the whole world becoming a gay Valhalla al la The Castro, Christopher Street and Amsterdam. As Grevisser demonstrates again and again, to most of the world on the other side of the pink line, the terminology, rituals and politics of gay liberation can actually be harmful to queers and is often alienating. His privileged life as a highly educated white South African provides him with a knowledgable vantage point to explore colonial, gender and queer theory with humility, compassion and insight that is all to rare from American and European writers. Even rarer is his use of engaging language without the jargon.
What really makes this book so engaging, insightful and enlightening are the stories that make up most of its 500 pages. Case studies can often become repetitive or simplistic, but as he layers his pastiche style, he constantly and brilliantly complicates any simple narrative of the West as all knowing saviors and the native peoples as innocent, pure victims. All of the individuals in this book are complex and contradictory as they search for understanding and dignity - none more so than Grevisser himself.
What really makes this book so engaging, insightful and enlightening are the stories that make up most of its 500 pages. Case studies can often become repetitive or simplistic, but as he layers his pastiche style, he constantly and brilliantly complicates any simple narrative of the West as all knowing saviors and the native peoples as innocent, pure victims. All of the individuals in this book are complex and contradictory as they search for understanding and dignity - none more so than Grevisser himself.
May 21, 2021
This incredible and well-researched cross-borders collection of queer stories should be essential reading. Examining how different parts of the world have addressed gender identity and sexual orientation, Mark Gevisser's highlights the vastly different paces of queer emancipation in the latter half of the 21st century. Each chapter looks at gender politics, socio-economic factors, and the multitude of ways in which family, friends and society converge to either support, tolerate, or at worst, oppress, LGBT+ individuals. From a transgender refugee from Malawi, to a lesbian couple in Cairo, to the heartbreaking story of a Russian trans-woman fighting for custody of her child, "The Pink Line" charts the lines that define or break queer identity.
Although analytical in its approach,"The Pink Line" was never dry, never stagnant. It was informative, moving and thought-provoking, reminding me of the chasm between countries with regard to LGBT+ acceptance. It was also the perfect addition to my LGBT+ reading repertoire, as it provides the "bigger" picture of how LGBT+ issues are handled in the world today - from laws to travel to social norms. Highly recommended.
Thank you Profile Books and Net Galley for a copy of this eBook in return for an honest review.
Although analytical in its approach,"The Pink Line" was never dry, never stagnant. It was informative, moving and thought-provoking, reminding me of the chasm between countries with regard to LGBT+ acceptance. It was also the perfect addition to my LGBT+ reading repertoire, as it provides the "bigger" picture of how LGBT+ issues are handled in the world today - from laws to travel to social norms. Highly recommended.
Thank you Profile Books and Net Galley for a copy of this eBook in return for an honest review.
May 15, 2022
The book has a familiar format -- case studies (from around the world) -- on which giant generalisations are hung like rainbow flags: "The dissonance can be severe: disclosure might result in expulsion or even violence upon you, while on the other side of the Pink Line you might be fetishized as a symbol of tolerance and diversity."
At over 500 pages, this is a rambling book with many insights and a lot of padding. Toibin has compared the case studies to novelistic portraits -- rather generous praise.
In some cases, key issues are covered with staggering brevity. The shift from sex as something "I do" to something "I am" (Gevisser's terminology) is over and done with in a few pages: the emergence of the Pink Line in the nineteenth century reads like a Wikipedia entry and skips over much complexity. The Pink Line is drawn by a few key one-liners from sexologists.
The book is stronger on geography than history and one of its main strengths is how it examines the connection between gay rights and political expediency and resistance to the USA's global liberalism.
A provocative and well-researched book, but one that meanders too much.
At over 500 pages, this is a rambling book with many insights and a lot of padding. Toibin has compared the case studies to novelistic portraits -- rather generous praise.
In some cases, key issues are covered with staggering brevity. The shift from sex as something "I do" to something "I am" (Gevisser's terminology) is over and done with in a few pages: the emergence of the Pink Line in the nineteenth century reads like a Wikipedia entry and skips over much complexity. The Pink Line is drawn by a few key one-liners from sexologists.
The book is stronger on geography than history and one of its main strengths is how it examines the connection between gay rights and political expediency and resistance to the USA's global liberalism.
A provocative and well-researched book, but one that meanders too much.
December 17, 2020
Really fascinating look at LGBTQ issues across the world. I wasn't expecting such great foreign affairs analysis, but it was there. Wish there was more representation of bi people though.
July 10, 2022
Najlepszy reportaż jaki w życiu czytałam
June 6, 2021
I really needed this. For so many reasons.
The Pink Line, and Mark Gevisser himself, traverses the globe in an effort to tell the stories of the people and communities who are at the forefront of the fight for gender and sexual orientation equality.
This really opened my eyes to a lot of things. Most importantly is the way we, and I include myself, in the West have coined and promoted "LGBT" as a catch-all which has and continues to have detrimental effects in countries where the governments, in their aim of not wanting to be seen as inviting in Western culture or practices, have rallied against the very freedoms those of us are campaigning for in the West.
It's obviously far more complicated than that and it's not a call to abandon the fight for LGBT rights or the language the West uses but more of an education to those who don't know that there are countries who already had and have their own culture surrounding gender and sexuality and that a blanket approach from the West can sometimes do more harm than good. If you're in the West, as I am, and want something to kickstart your own education on these issues in other countries, this is certainly a good book to start with.
I felt the section that spotlighted the LGBT communities in Israel and Palestine was so invaluable. This was written and released prior to the most recent escalations and so obviously doesn't mention it but it helped further educate me with regards to Israel's pinkwashing. I have seen many "takes" recently from people suggesting LGBT people should not be supporting Palestine given the disparity in the acceptance of the community between Palestine and Israel. The Pink Line perfectly illustrates why that is an issue as support of LGBT rights are essentially being used as propaganda by the Israeli government for that exact reason.
There really is a lot to praise here and it must have been no mean feat having worked on this book over several years and so I can only commend Mark Gevisser on that.
If I personally had one criticism, I felt that the relationship the author had with the people he was interviewing for these stories wasn't conveyed well enough. You can tell from the author's writing that he passionately cares about these people but I would have liked to have had a bit more character from the subjects so that I could have connected with them too. Yes, this is non-fiction but I think the strength in formats like the one in The Pink Line is that you can allow a reader to still become invested in the characters (who just so happen to be real) but I was missing that. Don't get me wrong I empathised with them greatly but I just wanted a bit more personality from some of them. I wanted to know who they were as well as the issues they were fighting.
All in all, a very good book. Probably one I need to buy a hard copy of and go back to because as the author notes, this isn't a story with a neat ending. The fight for global LGBT rights, in whatever form they take in individual countries, is ongoing and I know for me, this is a kick I needed to be far more active on trans rights in the UK as they are facing what feels like almost daily hounding at the minute. I'm glad The Pink Line was here to remind me just how fragile the rights for these communities remain regardless of how progressive any nation is and that the fight continues for so many of us.
Thanks to Profile Books and NetGalley for providing me with a copy for review.
The Pink Line, and Mark Gevisser himself, traverses the globe in an effort to tell the stories of the people and communities who are at the forefront of the fight for gender and sexual orientation equality.
This really opened my eyes to a lot of things. Most importantly is the way we, and I include myself, in the West have coined and promoted "LGBT" as a catch-all which has and continues to have detrimental effects in countries where the governments, in their aim of not wanting to be seen as inviting in Western culture or practices, have rallied against the very freedoms those of us are campaigning for in the West.
It's obviously far more complicated than that and it's not a call to abandon the fight for LGBT rights or the language the West uses but more of an education to those who don't know that there are countries who already had and have their own culture surrounding gender and sexuality and that a blanket approach from the West can sometimes do more harm than good. If you're in the West, as I am, and want something to kickstart your own education on these issues in other countries, this is certainly a good book to start with.
I felt the section that spotlighted the LGBT communities in Israel and Palestine was so invaluable. This was written and released prior to the most recent escalations and so obviously doesn't mention it but it helped further educate me with regards to Israel's pinkwashing. I have seen many "takes" recently from people suggesting LGBT people should not be supporting Palestine given the disparity in the acceptance of the community between Palestine and Israel. The Pink Line perfectly illustrates why that is an issue as support of LGBT rights are essentially being used as propaganda by the Israeli government for that exact reason.
There really is a lot to praise here and it must have been no mean feat having worked on this book over several years and so I can only commend Mark Gevisser on that.
If I personally had one criticism, I felt that the relationship the author had with the people he was interviewing for these stories wasn't conveyed well enough. You can tell from the author's writing that he passionately cares about these people but I would have liked to have had a bit more character from the subjects so that I could have connected with them too. Yes, this is non-fiction but I think the strength in formats like the one in The Pink Line is that you can allow a reader to still become invested in the characters (who just so happen to be real) but I was missing that. Don't get me wrong I empathised with them greatly but I just wanted a bit more personality from some of them. I wanted to know who they were as well as the issues they were fighting.
All in all, a very good book. Probably one I need to buy a hard copy of and go back to because as the author notes, this isn't a story with a neat ending. The fight for global LGBT rights, in whatever form they take in individual countries, is ongoing and I know for me, this is a kick I needed to be far more active on trans rights in the UK as they are facing what feels like almost daily hounding at the minute. I'm glad The Pink Line was here to remind me just how fragile the rights for these communities remain regardless of how progressive any nation is and that the fight continues for so many of us.
Thanks to Profile Books and NetGalley for providing me with a copy for review.
May 15, 2022
This book is a thorough, in-depth look at what it's like being queer in places that aren't the US or Western Europe, and how those experiences are changing in response to exposure to Western culture and values.
I feel like I have to give this book five stars, because it's definitely a five-star book in terms of the depth and breadth of information presented, but at the same time I feel a little weird about doing so, because it's not exactly the feel-good hit of the summer. There are a lot of people recounting an awful lot of hate crimes and various other terrible life experiences. So I wouldn't say it's a happy book, but I think it's an important book, and if you're queer and you'd like to know what that's like these days, all around the world, you should read this book. It's very informative.
The latter portion of the book had a focus on how modern Western conceptions of gender are affecting cultures that previously had some kind of "third gender," and I thought that was one of the most fascinating sections of the book, because people always bring up examples of those kinds of genders but it never occurred to me that maybe that would all have changed, or be in the process of changing, and that was interesting.
Anyway. If you're queer, you should read this. If you're not queer but you'd like to learn more, you should also read this.
I feel like I have to give this book five stars, because it's definitely a five-star book in terms of the depth and breadth of information presented, but at the same time I feel a little weird about doing so, because it's not exactly the feel-good hit of the summer. There are a lot of people recounting an awful lot of hate crimes and various other terrible life experiences. So I wouldn't say it's a happy book, but I think it's an important book, and if you're queer and you'd like to know what that's like these days, all around the world, you should read this book. It's very informative.
The latter portion of the book had a focus on how modern Western conceptions of gender are affecting cultures that previously had some kind of "third gender," and I thought that was one of the most fascinating sections of the book, because people always bring up examples of those kinds of genders but it never occurred to me that maybe that would all have changed, or be in the process of changing, and that was interesting.
Anyway. If you're queer, you should read this. If you're not queer but you'd like to learn more, you should also read this.
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