The Pitfalls of Normalization
The Pitfalls of Normalization
The Dutch Case and the Future of Equality
This chapter explains that the attainment of marriage equality in Holland in 2001, and the accompanying further “normalization” of homosexuality, has had two troubling effects. First, it has allowed political parties and politicians, across the political spectrum from the far right to the far left, to use acceptance of homosexuality as an ideological benchmark to test whetherother minorities, most prominently Muslim immigrants, can ever be “truly Dutch.” The chapter explores how, from this perspective, Muslim immigration is conceived as a threat to the stability of the Dutch progressive moral order and to Dutch cultural and sexual liberties. Gay rights and gender equality have thus become a normative framework that help to shape a critique of Islam and multiculturalism. Second, the normalization of homosexuality has led lesbians and gay men to embrace heteronormative discourses and presentations that minimize overt expressions of sexuality and gender variance. The chapter explains that this mainstreaming of homosexuality leaves ongoing problems, such as the high rates of suicide attempts by LGBT youth and anti-gay violence in Holland, unaddressed and unchallenged.
Keywords: LGBT rights, Holland, Muslim immigrants, multiculturalism, heteronormativity, LGBT youth, anti-gay violence
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