Freedom to Differ. Diane Helene Miller
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representative status for all lesbians. The entire question, so highly controversial in the lesbian and gay movement, of “which version of lesbian or gay ought to be rendered visible” (Butler 1993, 311) is sidestepped by the presence of such a highly placed politician and a National Guard colonel. Moreover, the movement’s true diversity—the differences of race, class, and other characteristics among lesbians and gay men—is replaced by a homogenizing image of white, professional lesbians. These particular representations become the ground on which gay and lesbian activists must do battle, whether or not they have or would have chosen it.
It is possible to see in the Achtenberg and Cammermeyer debates a microcosm of the anti-gay and “pro-gay” arguments and to analyze both the value and the limitations of these arguments for achieving their respective political goals.19 Such issues as whether homosexuality is a choice or is biologically given, the separation of public and private realms, the historical and contemporary discourses of perversion, the threat lesbianism poses to male dominance and ideals of masculinity, and the controversy over “family values” are all addressed in these discussions. Each issue provides a link between political or military competence and the discourse of sexuality. Such pairings have become increasingly familiar in the political climate of the 1990s, most notably since the Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas hearings and the advent of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Centrally, and underlying these other disputes, rests the issue of whether homosexuality refers primarily to a category of human beings or to a particular sort of behavior. The ways in which this question is addressed, on the Senate floor and in the courtroom, both reflect and create a narrow, limited, and limiting conception of homosexuality in general and lesbianism in particular. Bringing to bear the understandings gleaned from a variety of theoretical contexts allows us to examine such representations and to analyze their advantages and drawbacks for the project of lesbian and gay liberation.
Informed by the literature of feminist, lesbian, gay, and queer studies, this book investigates how struggles over the meanings of lesbian identity manifest themselves within particular, concrete battles. It examines, as well, how lesbian specificity may be sacrificed within the broader struggle for gay and lesbian rights. My analysis draws on the stories of two women who, despite their very different backgrounds and objectives, shared a willingness to stand up for their beliefs and a refusal to hide or deny who they were. Their freedom to differ was met with hostile opposition, from Congress and from the military. It is as a result of their integrity and courage in facing these challenges that their personal stories became visible to a nation.
CONCLUSION
In a context of gay civil rights and lesbian feminism, right-wing backlash and “lesbian chic,” this book examines the political and social construction of “the lesbian” in the 1990s. By analyzing the discourse surrounding the struggles of two lesbians whose stories attracted national media attention, I explore the kinds of lesbian representations that emerge from debates within military and political institutions. In a broader frame, I investigate the complexity of notions of visibility and voice in assertions of lesbian identity, as well as the promise and the threats that accompany the highlighting of these metaphors as liberatory strategies.
This study will contribute to scholarship in rhetorical, feminist, and gay and lesbian studies, all of which intersect in instances of lesbian representation. Lesbian oppression is accomplished in part through rhetorical means, particularly the suppression of language and the denial of representations. However, when such suppression is no longer entirely effective, new language and representations, whether generated by opponents or proponents, can themselves further the cause of oppression. In addition, the language and images a group employs to portray its own struggle shape both the manner in which the group envisions its liberation and the ways in which its detractors formulate their opposition. By focusing on a marginalized group that has only recently begun to generate images and language that reach a public audience, this study reveals how choices about representation shape the possibilities for individual identity, group identity, and a liberatory vision. Those choices, at the same time, help define how a group articulates its struggles, its defeats, and its triumphs.
The price of increasing power is increasing opposition.
—from The I Ching (in Lorde 1984, 158)
INTRODUCTION
In May 1993, a debate raged for three days in the U.S. Senate chamber, marking what its participants proclaimed a “historic” event. With Bill Clinton’s choice of Roberta Achtenberg for the position of assistant secretary for Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Achtenberg became the first “out” lesbian in history to be nominated for a United States cabinet post. During the nomination hearing held before the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on April 291 and the subsequent Senate filibuster that continued for nine and a half hours on May 19 and 20 and concluded with more discussion and a vote on May 24, Achtenberg’s professional qualifications for the post became intimately tied in debate to her identification as a lesbian, despite the efforts of her supporters to keep her sexual orientation in the background. In its candid discussion of the relevance of Achtenberg’s “homosexual lifestyle” to her personal and political competence, the Senate debate offers a rare glimpse of the political and social construction of homosexuality in general, and lesbianism in particular, in process.
As the first openly gay or lesbian person ever nominated for the president’s cabinet, Achtenberg faced hostility and severe censure from conservative members of the Senate, most notably Senator Jesse Helms and other conservative Republicans. During the acrimonious debate on the Senate floor over Achtenberg’s nomination, Helms and others expressed their opposition to confirming someone whom Helms had referred to in a newspaper interview as a “damn lesbian.”2 Thus the issue of sexual orientation and its relationship to politics was raised even before the official debate began, setting the tone and framework for the discussion and positioning the “lesbian issue” at the forefront of the debate. The language and meanings that shaped the debate, as well as the outcome of the confirmation proceedings, reflect existing cultural meanings of lesbianism and produce new ones.
In this way, Achtenberg’s ultimate confirmation tells only part of the story. The discussion surrounding a presidential nomination, while ostensibly centering on the nominee herself, also conveys the senators’ approval or disapproval of broader policy matters. “Without a doubt, the Senate interprets its role in the confirmation process as not simply screening the personal qualities of the nominees but is instead using the confirmation process to highlight its policy differences with the administration” (King and Riddlesperger 1991, 197).3 Indeed, an article in the New York Times relates that “Republican strategists have noted that President Clinton has suffered political damage from his support for gay rights, and the campaign to defeat Ms. Achtenberg appeared to be part of a strategy to underscore differences between the two parties” (Krauss 1993, A12). Such observations are particularly meaningful in light of the fact that Achtenberg’s nomination was announced during the controversy over lifting the ban on gays in the military, at a time when Clinton was faced with “fierce resistance” from both “top military officers and some lawmakers” (Reuters 1993). At the time of the Achtenberg confirmation proceedings, the Senate Armed Services Committee was in the process of holding hearings on lifting the military ban.4 Because “the confirmation process provides the Senate with a forum to express its opinions on the president’s policies” (King and Riddlesperger 1991, 192), the Achtenberg debate must be viewed in the context of a larger struggle for political control.
In this understanding of the political process, the Achtenberg confirmation proceedings, like the nomination itself, were at once remarkable and quite predictable in their reassertion of heterosexuality as the unmarked norm, in relation to which homosexuality