We're Here! We're Queer! Fuck the Banks!

In: GLQ: a journal of lesbian and gay studies, Volume 28, Issue 2, p. 227-247

Abstract

Abstract
Literalizing the metaphor of José Esteban Muñoz's famous statement, "Queerness is not yet here. . . . The here and now is a prison house," this essay argues that the process of affectively reorienting space and minds toward abolition is a queer act. It posits that abolition and queerness overlap in their refusal to maintain faith in institutions to effect change, specifically through legal reforms that redouble the status quo while shunning broader visions of liberation. Queer abolitionist affects reorient space toward decolonial futures by challenging normative paradigms of power and its critique. In messy and imperfect ways, a queer abolitionist analysis understands love and collectivity more capaciously beyond the nuclear family unit to social relations not of domination but of transformation. By exploring the affective dimensions of queer abolition, this essay takes up the spatial and symbolic relationship between the Pride parade and the prison industrial complex. It brings together an analysis of public protest against the colonial-carceral state and prison education, specifically the Humanities Behind Bars program, in order to engage how queer affects strengthen and sustain the relationships so vital to abolitionist world making.