John Boyne in the telegraph

[Codlingmoths]

Apologies in advance I have not a link, I read it in a paywalled Australian newspaper but there is a great piece by John Boyne (Irish book awards author of the year) about don’t call me queer. And… a few other things many people don’t say. It’s from the telegraph originally. Hoping someone can link it!

This piece?

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/02/27/stop-calling-queer-derogatory-traumatising/

Yes that one- looks like it’s a couple of days ago, it was in todays newspaper here 😁

@Codlingmoths what newspaper? You might be able to see it with your library membership.

That's a great piece (unsurprisingly 🤣) well written.

[If on your phone you can bypass the paywall on telegraph articles by clicking the link then switching to airplane mode as the article loads]

Birdsweepsin's link worked for me - thank you! And thanks to Codlingmoths for raising the topic.

As someone old enough to have had "queer" yelled at me as a teenager, and old enough to have had to think twice about whether I might confront menacing people howling "queer" whenever I went out (this still happens in a lot of places globally), and old enough to have a friend who died because attackers considered him "queer" - I say fuck all the way off about the "universal" use of "queer" to mean LGBTQ2IA2+. Some people can't and some people won't use the term; get over it.

I'm bisexual, have a same-sex life partner, and am a few years older than John Boyne. I remember standing at protest marches as a teen and then as a uni student in the late '80s/early '90s yelling "we're here, we're queer, get over it!" But like John, I also remember the word "queer" being yelled as my friends and people like me were assaulted over sexual orientation, in one case fatally. It's not simple.

I don't want to take away anyone's agency to say "I'm queer" - I understand that it preserves privacy and promotes community/mutual interests in some cases - but I also do not want to enable anyone to call another person, or group of people, "queer" as an imposition, when there's a strong history of that term hurting those people and that community.

Reclaimed terms can be great. They can be empowering. But they can't be imposed. I want to explain what I mean but in doing so, I am going to stick with the (relatively very mild) terms that describe the (relatively privileged) demographics I am part of, because I cannot speak for anyone else. Please feel free to substitute your own terms.

The Guardian (just for example) run a list of "Queer Books" for Pride Month. I know that some of those books are written by people who do or did explicetly reject the term "queer". Just for example, Anne Lister wrote in detail in her diaries about how much this term hurt and distressed her, but still - The Guardian calls her "queer". It would kind of shock me if The Guardian also ran a list of "Cunty Books" for International Women's Day or "Jock Books" for Saint Andrew's Day or "Paddy Books" for Saint Patrick's Day. Go ahead and add your own.

Why is "queer" up for grabs, even for people who by no stretch of the imagination have ever been or ever would be in any danger of suffering any negative consequences of being called "queer'?

@HopRockers thank you. Great tip

This is a hopeful sign. Boyne was subjected to a massive pile on here a couple of years back. Maybe the TRAs and fauxminists in Ireland will hold their fire in the light of recent events both here and in Scotland.

I find it hard to warm to Boyne after he wrote an historically illiterate sentimental novel set in a concentration camp, was told how offensive that was, and then wrote another one.

Archived copy here: archive.ph/LcJA4

Maybe he's a poor writer. Wouldn't know as I've never read him. Not my kind of novelist just going off reviews.

But he we go again. 250 ' feminists ' tried to cancel Frankie Gaffney in 2017 - with some success. Some of the most privileged women in Ireland tried to destroy a working class writer who dared to complain about being described as privileged.

I'm more of a Gaffney than a Boyne. More Kevin than Sebastian Barry. But that's just me. I can't pick and choose who the howling mob get to drag to the guillotine.

I love John Boyne, I think he is a wonderful writer. He wrote a fictional book that yes was historically inaccurate. People loved it so much that it was used as a teaching tool about the holocaust which was ill advised and was never his intention. The sequel, which is brilliant btw, was partly an attempt to address this.
I think we need more articles like this, clear, well written and unapologetic.

I find it unsettling too. I used to be walking out with friends and plenty of times blokes would holler “queer” or “bender”. Also “fat” at a chubby friend. Imagine a celebratory list of ‘Fat Authors’.