Columns

Hello lovelies,

Welcome to this column, and for those new to town, welcome to Dunnaz. I hope you have a great year at Otago as you load yourself up with a huge student debt and try to get yourself a degree. I also really hope that you get the most out of what you can learn here outside of your official studies as you meet new people, join clubs, and learn more about what makes you unique.

This column is all about identity. The identities we are most interested in are sex, sexuality and gender, however, we are fascinated by the diversity of humanity and will endeavour to explore it in all its grisly glory. We will cast our fabulous queer eye around and identify things, people and situations which could do with being looked at from a different perspective. What the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy team did for fashion, we will do for media, culture, religion, politics and society.

But why the word “queer,” I hear you ask? Isn’t that, like, offensive or some shit? Well, darlings, I am here to inform you that whilst it has historically been used as a slur against us, we are currently reclaiming it. We are literally transforming the power of it. At the moment it is the only word that can be used inclusively of all forms of sex, sexuality and gender identities. This includes, but is in no way limited to, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and asexual. The word especially makes sense in a university context, as some subject areas include queer theory, OUSA runs the Queer Support Centre, and UniQ is the University Queer Club on campus. You should check them out.

Finally, doesn’t “queer” mean weird or different? Yes it does, and that is part of the appeal. Many people who claim the word want to intentionally disassociate themselves from the heteronormative and patriarchal structures of our society. Who wants to be normal, anyway? We will look at this in more detail later in the series.

If you have any questions, feedback or a potential column topic drop me some mail: queer@critic.co.nz

Yours Fabulously,

Sir Lloyd Queerington