Millán Salcedo has come out of the closet and has returned to the stage. The comedian from La Mancha stars in a hybrid between anecdote and interview at the Infanta Isabel Theater in Madrid under the name Questionmelonin which role he made his intentions clear: more than 30 years after proclaiming himself “Faggot of Spain” in a sketchSalcedo called himself as such without masks involved.
My boyfriend and I were there and we looked at each other raptly. On our first dates, one of the aspects that united us was our shared admiration for the comedian and our encyclopedic knowledge of his work and miracles. It’s not that it caught anyone by surprise, but the public recognition of his sexual identity made us happy for him and for being witnesses of such a significant moment.
In the memoirs he published in 2003, In my 13Salcedo left that aspect of his life up in the air, claiming what was heard so often at the time: that it belonged to his private sphere and that it only mattered to him. It was cathartic to witness a man about to turn 70 finally feel free to share erotic anecdotes and even celebrate his success on dating apps. bears.
When the question period opened, I could not help but share with Salcedo and those present the joy that many of us feel about hearing him speak openly about his homosexuality. Carried away by emotion and habit, I concluded the soflamma with a resounding “welcome, daughter!” The audience applauded, but the comedian grimaced. He instantly explained that coming out wasn’t going to make him start speaking feminine or wrap himself in “any flag” or put on a “bata de cola.”
All the colors came up. Earth, swallow me. That my satisfaction at his step forward turned into an uncomfortable moment was the last of my intentions. I left the theater with a bitter taste in my mouth and without fully understanding what had happened. In any case, I take advantage of this column to make amends: welcome, Millán.
That same day we had learned that the PSOE decided not to include the acronym Q+ in its enunciation of the LGTBIQ+ group, and that joined the continued campaign of harassment against trans women, to the point of including the expression “biological sex” in its ideology.which goes back to the times when Martes and Trece still signed the year-end special.
The supposed victory of classical feminism – as if making identities invisible and leaving women out had once been feminist – within a party that considers itself progressive and the moment I experienced in the theater have something in common. In both cases, people who on paper are moving in the same direction look at each other with suspicion when differences are revealed in their way of understanding that path. In both cases, discourse analysis seems to deactivate a natural alliance. The notable difference is that Millán Salcedo makes humor, and the PSOE governs Spain.
The alleged division of the socialist party – only 218 of the 1,101 delegates voted for the restriction of acronyms – comes at a time when transphobic theses and antique They have infected ideologies beyond the right and the extreme right. And, somehow, there is always a scent of generational conflict with people whose postulates were modern forty years ago and now believe that feminism or the LGTBIQ+ collective have gone too far.
At the center of the debate, trans and queer lives are instrumentalized and twisted to scare a society that has gone from naturally accepting that rights were increasing – remember how in 2007 even the PP voted in favor of the then trans law – to being baited by interested debates that divert the focus from what is important to generate confusion. A great example is the presence of trans women in sport: in high competition it barely exists, but focusing on it radicalizes positions and complicates the lives of ordinary people who, in grassroots clubs, have until now lived included. .
I would like to put myself in the heads of those people who feel how the expansion and evolution of the ideas they fought for now seem threatening to them. I want to understand why historical feminists have developed a rampant hatred towards other women as oppressed by patriarchy as the one mostor how some gays who have lived in the closet prefer to distance themselves from the flag that allowed them to come out of it.
I know that The fear of change is human and almost always increases over the years.. I also know that I have no right to demand that anyone take communion with me, much less someone who has traveled a longer and more difficult life path than the one that has happened to me. But how grateful it is to listen to older people who celebrate these advances, how happy it is to contemplate how a Maruja Torres or a Pedro Almodóvar continue to get wet and take advantage of their loudspeaker to intervene in the public debate from the welcome to the new realities.
Trans and queer lives are not going to disappear due to the distrust of the PSOE; They have faced greater enemies. But, although it remains a nod to the most conservative part of the party, It is still painful how there are those who prefer to defend their territory by striking the person next to them instead of the person in front of them.
I wish with all my heart that Millán Salcedo lives and expresses himself freely from now on, and in whatever genre he wants, of course. He makes jokes, not politics. To those supposed feminists of the PSOE, who have decided to establish as their main enemy a group as historically mistreated as women themselves, I wish you a little memory: just enough to remember where feminism was in the future of history when someone screamed from a stand that freedoms and rights had gone too far.
#Millan
