The PSOE arrived at its 41st Congress with a few problems and controversies, internal and external, in the background. But neither the leadership of Pedro Sánchez, nor the resignation of Lobato, nor the comments against Emiliano García Page, nor any of the proposals debated in Seville or the president’s promises have left as much commotion and concern as what happened with the trans rights When it seemed that the party was heading towards closing ranks around the trans law, the approval of two amendments to the framework document of Congress – the document that will mark the course of the party for the coming years – has once again turned the party upside down. socialist discourse on LGTBIQ+ rights.
Those last two acronyms – the Q for Queer and the +, which refers to other identities, will not be in the term with which the PSOE will refer to LGTBIQ+ people, a gesture loaded with symbolism and promoted by the faction of traditional feminism that harshly fought gender self-determination and the ministry of Irene Montero. The other amendment seems to talk about something obvious: that in sport men cannot compete in women’s categories, a statement that only confirms something that already happens, but that makes a veiled allusion to the participation of trans people.
Both proposals, approved, go against both the position that the party has tried to shore up in recent years and the Government’s action, and not only because of the trans law. The Ministry of Equality, in socialist hands, has a “General Directorate for real and effective equality.” of LGTBI+ people”.
Sumar, a coalition partner, has already warned that they will not “allow setbacks”: its spokesperson, Lara Hernández, regretted this Monday the positions that the PSOE had reached in this regard during its Congress. The former Minister of Equality, Irene Montero, also criticized the approved amendments: “A trans woman is a woman. The rest is transphobia, even if the PSOE says so.” The LGTBI+ State Federation assured that “any ideology that does not want to be left behind on the path towards real equality” has to understand that trans women “are women” and that the group also includes “+ dissidence and sexual, gender, family and physical.”
Internal commotion
But the commotion is also internal. Significant voices from the party regret what happened at the Seville Congress, which, they assure, does not correspond either to the majority sentiment or to the intention to change course. Since the negotiation of the trans law broke the PSOE, the tension has been constant. Although once the norm was approved, the mandate was to narrow the divisions and adopt the discourse of socialist feminists who do not see incompatibility between equality and LGTBIQ rights, the discordant positions have continued to make noise to the despair of those who try to redirect the party in the last few years.
The attempt to direct the party’s position and heal wounds crystallized with the appointment of Ana Redondo as Minister of Equality, a politician without a feminist profile (to avoid being placed on any side) who has defended the norm without fissures. However, Pedro Sánchez has now dispensed with Redondo in his new Socialist Executive. Although the decision is not related to the approval of the amendments, one thing or another can call into question, not only Redondo’s position, but that of the PSOE itself. The minister has been replaced by Pilar Bernabé, until now the Government delegate in Valencia, whom Sánchez wanted to reward for her performance during DANA.
The framework presentation with which the PSOE came to Congress mentioned the acronym LGBTIQ+ or LGBTIQ on several occasions. Among the 6,000 amendments received to that presentation, at least one asked to continue with the term LGTBI (the one used in the previous presentation, in 2021, when the socialist party was in full internal battle around the trans law) and not add the +, which was the final proposal of the speakers. The amendment was passed late on Saturday, after ten at night, when the presence of delegates was already scarce and a group of feminist activists from the orbit of Carmen Calvo and Ángeles Álvarez insisted that, even so, it would be would vote.
What is ‘queer’ and why does that acronym matter?
But what is it queer and the + and how important is this gesture? If we summarize a lot (a lot), the Anglo-Saxon term queer It encompasses a set of practices and ideas that reject the conception of gender, identity or sexual orientation as fixed labels and categories. It queer It crosses the boundaries of what is socially accepted, questions the binary system and moves away from the hegemonic postulates of the LGTBI community. Although it was first used as an insult (something similar to deviant, strange), starting in the 1980s the LGTBI community reappropriated the term. The + symbol seeks to include all identities and expressions not contained in the other acronyms.
The term is established, not only among the community, but in international organizations or treaties. UN Women is clear: “Working for the human rights of LGBTIQ+ people is indivisible from working for women’s rights and gender equality,” it says. in one of his arguments. The European Union has a strategy of “LGBTIQ” equality for the period from 2020 to 2025. “In recent decades, legislative evolution, jurisprudence and political initiatives have improved the lives of many people and have helped us build more egalitarian and welcoming societies, also for lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, non-binary, intersex and queer (LGBTIQ) people,” the introduction states.
However, in recent years a sector of feminism has pointed out ‘what queer‘ as a dangerous discourse for women’s rights. The confrontation has not only happened in Spain, but also in other countries, and especially in the United Kingdom. At the same time, from apparently opposite political positions, ultra groups and far-right parties have raised the flag of the fight against “gender ideology” and against the rights of LGTBIQ+ people.
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