[Moving Toward the Ugly: A Politic Beyond Desirability] mia mingus.

*Femmes Of Color Symposium Keynote Speech, Oakland, CA (8/21/11)

Good afternoon, and thank you for having me. It is lovely to be here with you all. Thank you to the symposium organizers who have asked me to be here and for your hard work putting this gathering on. And thank you to ALL the folks who have made it possible for us to be here, including the people who built this building and who clean it and care for it everyday; including the people who are being violently exploited in this country and around the globe for their resources and labor so that we can exist in this air conditioned hotel with access to clean water and food, able to sit in relative safety from military attacks or the police barging in. And including and honoring native and first nations communities upon whose land we are currently on and whose colonization and genocide have also allowed us to be here. For this too, must be part of our work, for it is intimately connected to being femme.

I would like to call into the room the many other comrades who move with me in this work for community, revolution and liberation. Especially, other queer disabled women, gender non- conforming and trans people of color. I do this work with and for them as well as for those yet to come. I do this work because it is what I wish I had had when I was growing up and coming into political consciousness.

I want to bring them into the room because I want to seriously resist, challenge and shift a culture of celebrityism in our movements. I do not, and cannot do this work alone. It is built on the backs of poor people, queers, women of color, disabled folks and so many more who have come before me. It has taken so much for me to be able to be here today as I am, about to speak to you about being femme as a disabled queer woman of color. Has taken so much for us to even get to the point where gender and femme would be considered worthy political subjects to speak on. Taken so many (in particular) women of color who have struggled long and hard to claim a place and be seen as women against the loud static noise of white-womanhood; who have fought to connect gender and race and left a legacy of brilliant work, poetry and story for us to learn from. Taken so many disabled women of color working to have our lives seen (by other women of color) and our bodies understood as worthy, refusing to let disability be in opposition to “woman.” Refusing to let able-bodied femmes dictate what femme gets to be and demanding accountability to ableist notions of gender, beauty, sexuality and desire that supposedly represent “all of us.” Thank you.