Abstract
Queer (In)Justice: The Criminalization of LGBT People in the United States centers the queer experience of the criminal legal system in both the broader lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered movement, and our national crime and punishment discourse. After a look back at colonial legacies, the authors illuminate the queer criminal archetype. These archetypal narratives, far more powerful than stereotypes, are “recurring, culturally ingrained representations that evoke strong, often subterranean emotional associations or responses” (p. 23). Queer criminal archetypes conflate homosexuality and gender nonconformity with notions of danger, deception, disease, and treachery and almost always overlap with other controlling narratives to deem immigrants, people of color, and the poor inherently criminal. With the omnipresent intersecting archetypes, anxiety often beats out reason within the minds of citizens and the state.
The notion of criminal archetypes is inherent to the text and the process of criminality. From the initial social construction of crime to pervasive discrimination in the courtroom to sentencing based on homophobia and heterosexism, the queer criminal archetype is behind the likelihood of law enforcement to arrest a transgendered woman for merely walking or a prosecutor’s suggestion that prison is not such a punishment for a homosexual, thus, the appropriateness of the death penalty. The authors make an undeniable case that fighting the criminalization of queers in the United States is extremely urgent to anyone who is working for social justice. Recent tragic examples of injustice perforate the text, superb evidence that the central argument cannot be ignored or written off as the “bad apple” actions of the few. On the contrary, the system is foundationally unjust and demands action, “All of us are accountable for the roles we play in reinforcing or dismantling the violence endemic to policing and punishment systems” (p. xx).
Integral to the text is a lesson on mass incarceration, the prison industrial complex, and current grassroots community-based efforts to end the reliance on the criminal legal system for community safety. Various archetypal narratives (white supremacy, patriarchy, xenophobia) intersect and push forward racialized and violent policing of gender nonconformity by law enforcement on the ground, as well as judges, juries, and prisons. Intersectionality is foundational to the realities of queer injustice.
Those who are engaged in social justice work across disciplines would benefit from considering this text in their work, a part of the puzzle demanding complex solutions to multifaceted injustices. The authors question notions of “us” and “them”—so often used to create distance and to rationalize injustice and the lack of action—and caution against the overreliance on traditional crime and punishment, including hate crime legislation: “Queer criminalizing archetypes stick to all of us like unwanted burrs, no matter how much distance we try to put between ‘us’ and ‘them.’ The choice to pursue strategies that rely on increased policing and punishment to produce safety for queers requires a leap of faith that the system can and will be able to distinguish between the ‘good’ or reputable gay, lesbian, or transgender victim and the ‘bad,’ presumptively criminalized queers” (p. 146). This call for systemic change is particularly relevant to social work.
Missing from examples of grassroots organizing work to transform the system is an exploration of any work occurring to quell these injustices from within the system. For instance, do any judges, police departments, or prosecutors heed these systemic injustices in action? Are any formal criminal legal institutions taking steps to achieve a more just system? Because of intersectionalty and the interdisciplinary realities, ideas for disciplines to apply specific skills, spaces, and power to transform the criminal legal system would be helpful.
Queer (In)Justice is an in-depth account of historical and current intersecting injustices and a clear invitation for multiple disciplines to join the collaborative fight to end the criminalization of queers and to increase justice. As most social workers know, the work is never easy and often complicated. This book is an important and integral tool for all as we move forward in the collaborative work of social justice.