LGBT erasure (also known as queer erasure) refers to the tendency to intentionally or unintentionally remove
LGBT groups or people from record, or downplay their significance, which includes
lesbian,
gay,
bisexual,
transgender people and those who identify as
queer.[1][2][3] This erasure can be found in a number of written and oral texts, including popular and scholarly texts.
In academia and media
Queer historian
Gregory Samantha Rosenthal refers to queer erasure in describing the exclusion of
LGBT history from public history that can occur in urban contexts via
gentrification.[4] Rosenthal says this results in the "displacement of queer peoples from public view".[5] Cáel Keegan describes the lack of appropriate and realistic representation of queer people,
HIV-positive people, and queer
people of color as being a type of aesthetic gentrification, where space is being appropriated from queer people's communities where queer people are not given any cultural representation.[6]
Erasure of LGBT people has taken place in medical research and schools as well, such as in the case of
AIDS research that does not include lesbian populations.[citation needed] Medicine and
academia can be places where visibility is produced or erased, such as the exclusion of gay and bisexual women in
HIV discourses and studies or the lack of attention to LGBT identities in dealing with
anti-bullying discourse in schools.[citation needed]
Straightwashing is a form of queer erasure that refers to the portrayal of LGBT people, fictional characters, or historical figures as heterosexual.[7] It is most prominently seen in works of fiction, whereby characters who were originally portrayed as or intended to be homosexual, bisexual, or asexual are misrepresented as heterosexual.[8][9]
In its most extreme form, bisexual erasure can include the belief that bisexuality itself does not exist.[10][12] Bisexual erasure may include the assertion all bisexual individuals are in a phase and will soon "choose a side", either
heterosexual or
homosexual. Another common variant of bisexual erasure involves accepting bisexuality in women while downplaying or rejecting the validity of bisexual identity in men.[13] One belief underlying bisexual erasure is that bisexual individuals are distinctively indecisive.[14] Misrepresentations of bisexual individuals as
hypersexual erases the sexual agency of bisexuals, effectively erasing their true identities as well.[15]
Bisexual erasure is often a manifestation of
biphobia,[10][11][12] although it does not necessarily involve overt antagonism. Erasure frequently results in bisexual-identifying individuals experiencing a variety of adverse social encounters, as they not only have to struggle with finding acceptance within general society but also within the
LGBT community.[16] Bisexual erasure is a form of
stigma and leads to adverse mental health consequences for people who identify as bisexual, or similar, such as
pansexual.[17][18]
Lesbian erasure is a form of
lesbophobia that involves the tendency to ignore, remove, falsify, or reexplain evidence of
lesbian women or relationships in history, academia, the news media, and other primary sources.[19][20] Lesbian erasure also refers to instances wherein lesbian issues, activism, and identity is deemphasized or ignored within
feminist groups[21] or the
LGBT community.[19][20]
In 2007,
Julia Serano discusses trans-erasure in the
transfeminist book Whipping Girl. Serano says that
transgender people are "effectively erased from public awareness" due to the assumption that everyone is
cisgender (non-transgender) or that transgender identification is rare.[22] The notion of transgender erasure has been backed up by later studies.[23]
Aromantic people are often erased due to the societal expectation that everyone prospers with an exclusive romantic relationship, something that
Elizabeth Brake has coined as the term amatonormativity. Aromantic people face continued pressure and prejudice to conform to the "social norms" and form a permanent romantic relationship such as marriage.[24][25]
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Intersex erasure
Intersex and
transgender individuals are often erased in public health research which conflates sex and
gender(see
sex–gender distinction).[26] The narrow and inflexible definitions of sex and gender in some countries means some intersex and
non-binary people are unable to obtain accurate legal documents or identification, preventing their access to public spaces, jobs, housing, education and basic services.[27] It is only recently that the concept of
legal rights for intersex people has been considered,[28] even in LGBTI activist circles. However, there is a growing
intersex activist community which campaigns for intersex human rights, and against
intersex medical interventions which they see as unnecessary and mistreatment.[29]
^Scot, Jamie (2014). "A revisionist history: How archives are used to reverse the erasure of queer people in contemporary history". QED: A Journal in GLBTQ Worldmaking. 1 (2): 205–209.
doi:
10.14321/qed.1.2.0205.
S2CID154539718.
^Mayernick, Jason; Hutt, Ethan (June 2017). "US Public Schools and the Politics of Queer Erasure". Educational Theory. 67 (3): 343–349.
doi:
10.1111/edth.12249.
ISSN0013-2004.
^Mueller, Hannah (April 2018). "Queer TV in the 21st Century: Essays on Broadcasting from Taboo to Acceptance. Ed. Kylo-Patrick R.Hart. McFarland, 2016. 232 pp. $35.00 paperback". The Journal of Popular Culture. 51 (2): 550–553.
doi:
10.1111/jpcu.12662.
ISSN0022-3840.
^Klesse, Christian (2011). "Shady Characters, Untrustworthy Partners, and Promiscuous Sluts: Creating Bisexual Intimacies in the Face of Heteronormativity and Biphobia". Journal of Bisexuality. 11 (2–3): 227–244.
doi:
10.1080/15299716.2011.571987.
S2CID144102905.
^Morrison, Tessalyn; Dinno, Alexis; Salmon, Taurica (19 August 2021). "The Erasure of Intersex, Transgender, Nonbinary, and Agender Experiences by Misusing Sex and Gender in Health Research". American Journal of Epidemiology. 190 (12): 2712–2717.
doi:
10.1093/aje/kwab221.
ISSN0002-9262.
PMID34409983.