So, in-between endlessly laughing about preachy nimrods wringing their hands about the threat of “cultural marxism”* regarding LGBT rights, I came across a term I hadn’t seen before: Homintern.
A play on words similar to the abbreviation Comintern, it was a reference to an imagined elite class of gay artists that exerted control and influence over popular culture, and something something communism because why not. It was a term used frequently in the National Review all through the 1950s and 1960s because of course it was. William F Buckley warned against their machinations on his television show Firing Line.
Behind it all is this conflation of queerness, cultural marginalization, and artistic credibility which is already hard enough to deconstruct anyway if it wasn’t used so patronizingly. And yeah, I’m aware that it likely started as a campy joke in the first place, but it’s not like it’s the first or even last time jokes made by a marginalized culture regarding their interaction with the privileged culture were turned against them.
*PROTIP: If you use the phrase “cutural marxism” unironically, I automatically lump you in on an intellectual level with the people that think Onion articles are real. Same with the term “misandry”.
Rani Baker Digs You. 
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