 Hi, I'm Jean-Faye and this is Jean this way, and in this installment I'm going to be asking, what is homo-nationalism? Homo-nationalism is a term that was coined by academic Jasbir Poir in her landmark text, Terrorist Assemblages, Homo-Nationalism in Queer Times, which marks its 10th anniversary this year. And if you're unsure how to celebrate the 10th birthday of a landmark text in Queer theory and Foucaultian biopolitics, then look no further, because I've already thrown the party. At times, especially in activist circles, the concept has become somewhat simplified, just to mean any time that LGBT liberation politics could be co-opted by the nationalisms of the far right. For example, the National Front's appeal to white gay people in France, based on racist fear mongering about Muslim homophobia, or in the US, the rise of pro-right LGBT slogans and groups, including, among others, twinks for Trump. While this phenomenon of fascism or white supremacy co-opting LGBT politics for its own ends is real and alarming, it's not exactly what homo-nationalism is. Homo-nationalism as Poir intends it, is an analysis or organizing principle of global politics, not a personal ideology that you can choose or disavow as an individual. This isn't about good gays or bad gays. Terrorist assemblages was a rejection of the idea sometimes found in feminist and queer theory of the 90s that the nation-state is always heteronormative, and that the queer citizen is always an alien or outlaw within it. Instead, Poir argues that homo-nationalism is how acceptance and tolerance for gay and lesbian subjects have become a barometer by which the right to and capacity for national sovereignty is evaluated. So what does this mean? Well, in other words, it means that it's not about when LGBT people and racism visibly join forces, but a critique, a critique which basically argues that all liberal lesbian and gay rights movements uphold certain ideas of social progress and modernity. In particular, LGBT equality movements rest on the basic assumption that the western nation-state is capable of expanding to include all marginalized populations and capable of being a benefactor to all its subjects. Poir argues that these assumptions and discourses cannot be true as they always afford some populations full legal and cultural citizenship at the expense of others, specifically racialized others, both at home and internationally. A simple example would be the progress towards marriage equality. Marriage has been considered the pinnacle of gay and lesbian participation in civic life, and marriage does provide equality with straight citizens, but it also upholds an institution which, for example, entrenched Western sexual and family norms as supreme and exceptional in comparison to those of other cultures. Marriage also upholds the nation-state as the supreme arbiter of sexuality in the way that it sometimes allows those inside the institution right to remain or citizenship, while others outside of it can be deported. A more modern example 10 years on could be transgender rights. So, for example, as part of the social and legal process of transitioning within a nation-state, a trans woman like me may apply to obtain a female passport. While this can be considered a success of a modern trans rights movement, and an example of the excellence of a liberal nation-state which allows its trans citizens full participation in national life, the very existence of passports still upholds the sovereignty of the nation-state to police its borders, to arrest and detain and deport those who do not have documentation, and its role in using the passport system for surveillance and monitoring of racialized minorities as part of counter-terrorism efforts, as well as all of the capitalist exclusions that come with non-citizenship. Does that mean that I'm not going to apply for a passport? Of course not, and this is what's meant by homo-nationalism being more of a lens to view queer politics through than a bad political philosophy you can simply disavow. However, 10 years on from the release of terrorist assemblages, which was largely considered the leading queer analysis after 9-11 and the war on terror, we find ourselves in a rather different political landscape. How, for example, do queer communities alive to the critique of homo-nationalism respond to President Trump's attempt to ban transgender people from serving in the US military this year? Trump's intention was not merely to signify that trans people are a burden to the health and vitality of the nation-state, but to use the publicly funded healthcare of trans service personnel as a wider testing ground for policies around publicly funded healthcare and, namely, whose bodies are disposable. However, in order to contradict the symbolism of the move, it's difficult not to recreate homo-nationalist discourses, namely that US trans citizens are fully entitled to participate in their country's military-industrial complex, or, to put it more bluntly, that American trans people are just as good at killing brown people overseas as cis people. When LGBT rights for the white and all-citizen become actively forced into reverse, homo-nationalist discourses entrench themselves in response. So what is the solution? Well, perhaps it's to look at the point of universal healthcare instead of the military, and to fight Trump on the position that some bodies are entitled to public healthcare while others are not. Applying the lens of homo-nationalism should be a call for greater debate and critique of what liberation looks like, its shape, its form, and its limitations. Homo-nationalism is a huge, complex, and expansive subject, which I can only begin to touch on in a social media shareable. But if there's one thing I'd like you to take away from this video, it's that it is not a political position designed to separate good politics from bad politics, but rather better thought of as a structure through which queer politics and liberation are formed, rather than providing us with answers on the right way to struggle if only things were that easy. Homo-nationalism invites us to harshly critique our own role in global politics, even as we gather under the banner of queer liberation or anti-racist politics. I want to know absolutely anything you think about anything I've discussed in the video today, whether that's homo-nationalism, whether it's Jesper Poir's book, whether it's passports, whether it's Trump and trans-military personnel, any of it. Hit me up in the comments below, tweet me at Sean Fay, use the hashtag Sean this way, and don't forget to follow Navarra Media at Navarra Media. Thank you so much for watching, bye!