Heteronormativity is a descriptor that applies to a given culture – or, if one is wanting to get a little more orthodox leftist, a developmental stage of history – in which opposite sex attraction is promoted, celebrated, expected, assumed etc. as a norm. It often has associations with institutional monogamy, but more generally, it is defined as the opposite sex being a predominant or exclusive staple of the average person’s sexual diet; regardless of how big their portion sizes are, whether they like to often eat out or often cook their own meals at home, how diverse or narrow their tastes are, et cetera.
A vast majority of the time, it is a sort of derogatory or implied to be conspiratorial. This is mostly because the term predominantly exists in a specific realm of contemporary sociology and anthropology with its highly Critical (and hysterical) viewpoint of bourgeois society.
At first, one who wants to respectfully disagree with the thesis of the conspiracy of heteronormativity from the outset, or at least play devil’s advocate, might instinctively go to an argument relating to heterosexuality being important for the reproduction of the species and hence it would be unsurprising if the burden of heterosexuality would manifest in a majority of the population. It is a necessary evil!
But one who argues that way would be particularly naïve about who they are dealing with.
Argumentum ad biology or evolution or essence or teleology etc. be completely damned.
Fundamentally, the talk of heteronormativity is almost exclusively with the motivation to critique or oppose it. There would generally be little other reasons – in the context of modern anthropology – for the concept to exist. But the underlying reason for the motivation is something that is not so specifically centred around sexuality itself, but more general notions of Liberation (with a capital L).
The fear of heteronormativity is – when push comes to shove – the urge for a social revolution that results in the most uniform and consistent and non-discriminatory sexuality in all people. Not a mere simple accommodation of the anomalies, and it is very important to not give it the benefit of the doubt as to thinking it is that.
There are various ways one might helpfully diagnose and trace the genealogy of these anti-heteronormativity ideas in the preceding centuries of Western intellectual history. None of these ways are completely immune from falling victim to post hoc ergo propter hoc.
But nevertheless I’m going to give it a shot.
French utopian socialist Charles Fourier was born in 1772, was directly influential on Karl Marx and is credited with having invented the word “feminism” in 1837, the year he died. Along with his English utopian socialist parallel, Robert Owen, he inspired many catastrophic small-scale utopian socialist community experiments in North America in the 19th century. In his anonymous 1808 work Théorie des quatre mouvements et des destinées générales, he lays out his theory of passions. Fourier sees the satisfaction of instinctive passions as the ultimate human goal and the lifeblood of mankind. On top of that “There is not a single useless or bad passion, all personalities are good as they are … Passions, whatever they might be – even the most repulsive – both in man and in animals, lead to their various consequences according to geometrical principles observed by God.”
Merci, Monsieur Fourier, but I think I will stick to the safer insights of Kepler, Cassini and Huygens on this one.
Long before the contemporary notion of ‘sexual orientation’, there appears to have existed an early modern utopian motivation to fast-track the liberation of man to engage in any form of sexual activity from his pre-existing expectation of bourgeois sexual morality and marriage with nothing more than the opposite sex. The idea of a kind of sexual liberty in combination with some sort of homosexual discriminating tastes or bourgeois notions of monogamy is far more extraordinary than we might realise.
Some have considered Fourier the most immediate direct philosophical predecessor to Sigmund Freud; a name that has been extremely detrimentally neglected in contemporary debate over and criticism of social progressivism (especially regarding sex) whilst his ideas’ vast influence on contemporary society is so undeniable.
Both men saw an imperative detriment in the influence of civilisation in stifling the most primitive instincts; as it has been put by some, a pathological underdevelopment of the emotional sphere which prevent any appreciation for the higher aspects of the human psyche. The main differences between the two was that Fourier was much more cosmological than Freud, and Freud’s pleasure principle was far far more denouncing than Fourier of any and all culture and custom and civilisation on social organisms as a destructive force that stifles full potential of happiness.
Freud then found new utility in the 1930s with notorious Frankfurt School theorist Herbert Marcuse. He takes the Freudian understanding of repressive civilisation and – with an additional Marxian influence – gives it more specific application onto contemporary Western bourgeois capitalist society. He also puts forward his notion of surplus repression in capitalist society which includes – amongst many things – the component of genital sexuality and how it represses more primitive sexual instincts (with striking similarities to present-day denunciations of “genital fetishism” by transgender activists). Marcuse asserts all this in combination with a prediction of a “Liberation” from repressive civilisation in the future. This ideal future includes “a reactivation of all erotogenic zones and consequently a resurgence of pregenital polymorphous sexuality and a decline of genital supremacy.” The body is to become a instrument of pure indiscriminate pleasure. Any form of monogamy and family or historically customary commitment be damned.
This is all set forth in Marcuse’s 1955 book Eros and Civilisation which had a considerable influence on the New Left of the 1960s and its associated sexual liberation movements (especially Gay ones) and likely many other progressive movements since.
In my view, these all offer the most likely explanations for the most immediate source inspiration for the pearl-clutching over heteronormativity today, and how it disguises a covert yearning for a utopian future with an indiscriminate unbounded sexuality for all.
Would this be such a favourable state of affairs for the wellbeing of the average homosexual?
Well, probably not.
It cannot simultaneously be the case that the types of Liberation-minded queers have spent a lot of time and effort cultivating niche, unique and special customary localities and communities (mostly in cities) and creating niche artforms which they take specific pride and enjoyment in being niche and peculiar (and queer) but then having more ultimate motivations for a complete social revolution that makes the very notion of queer redundant or non-existent. There cannot simultaneously be a means to an end and an end in itself. These two notions fundamentally contradict each other.
There might certainly be the temptation of the potential ideal future with no possible homophobia because there is no differences of sexuality between any people for discrimination to occur. But that is a ludicrous dangerous utopian lie.
On top of all this, the Marcusean-inspired Liberation movements have also had little inbuilt mechanisms to prevent the crossing of extremely dangerous boundaries, such as the advocacy for the Liberation of adults to indulge in paedophilic urges which had some unfortunate crossover with Gay Liberation groups.
Don’t make me tap the sign.
It seems clear that whatever heteronormativity really is, it provides some kind of invaluable grounding that all actors in a community derive some kind of referential benefit from; a Chestertonian fence. With the recent conflicts between the slightly old-fashioned-minded queers and the transgenderists, there has been a completely unacknowledged vindication of the conservative instinct that has existed in various homosexual perspectives over the years. The primary scrutiny of heteronormativity morphs itself into that of cisnormativity (a concept that also exists for no other purpose than a being punching bag, as opposed to being merely descriptive, and certainly not prescriptive), as there is no maintained pre-existing groundedness to hold this stupid progression back.
Is there a potential future or doctrine that can shun progressivism and celebrate the inherited wisdom of the past which can provide a groundedness and prosperity for gay men? Given the vastly wide range of cultural and political circumstances, that have existed favourably and unfabourably for homosexuals in the past (both under and not under an institutional backdrop of Abrahamic faiths) there is a whole history of non-progressive positive possibilities to explore. This is all contrary to the pathetic progressive revisionist notion that all homosexuality everywhere under the institutional backdrop of Abrahamic faiths was nothing but damning repression and hostility towards the slightest expressions of it, right up until the year 1969. That simply ain’t it.
My own current view is that homosexuals are quite capable of being served well politically by non-universalising liberal progressive philosophies that are so often claimed to be the only avenue that will serve them properly, especially those regarding contemporary notions of human rights.
Just as leftists and progressives portray the only acceptable path to the material prosperity, transcending poverty, access to healthcare etc. of the people to be a meticulous totalising administrative system of public servants, shunning more pre-existing bourgeois notions of property, organic exchange, prudence, low time preference etc., the only means for the homosexual to gain life satisfaction is through such insatiable appetite for totalising progress of all of society at the same time.
An alternative might draw direct influence from Aristotelean legal and ethical theory and his more restrained takes on universality, particularity and practicality. This might result in a state of affairs where there is a little bit more physical/geographical explicit separation between communities which have higher or lower representation of homosexuals than we are contemporarily used to, but it is fundamentally one in which legitimate conscientious objectors to totalising progressive ideology (whoever they may be) can live in more peace than they do now, where less false witness is borne against them for their alleged covert (or overt) homophobia.
Living in peace ought to be a more fundamental goal, and the predominant ones who are opposed to it are those with their appetite for progress (as opposed to those with their fruitless efforts for defensive counter-progress) and their hatred of heteronormativity and all its damning repressions and civilisational discontents.