What is Columbia’s queer community? Is there a monolithic experience that can clump people from all races, ethnicities, religions, socioeconomic classes, and sexual orientations? On a very superficial level, there is a common misconception that we all went through a struggle for self-acceptance and identification when realizing our sexuality, gender, and gender expressions. However, when one delves a little further into this so-called experience, the superficially common story weakens when discussing queer activism.

These discussions on activism and identity are dominated by a white, upper-middle class experience. The result is a focus on issues and experiences that people of color and of a lower socioeconomic class can neither relate to, nor really have any interest in. The general machismo, Catholicism, and social conservatism of the Latino community, for example, are ignored when discussing the queer experience and ways of battling homophobia on and off campus. The dominance of a specific narrative marginalizes these people, who originally go to these spaces of discussion to find solace from marginalization.

I used to get really excited when people brought up race and socioeconomic status because I felt I could relate to the conversation on a higher level. But I realize it never really went anywhere. No more than fleeting remarks, “people of color,” “intersections of identity,” and “lower socioeconomic class” became obligatory buzzwords that people felt they needed to acknowledge to be politically correct. But what can I expect from a predominately white, upper-middle class space? The white, upper middle men who dominate these spaces are going to talk about what they know, excluding the marginalized students who stop participating (because they feel overwhelmed or uninterested, which has the effect of decreasing the diversity opinions on queer identity).

My ethnicity and all of my other identities have shaped, and continue to shape, the way I see the world. Acknowledging one’s privilege in coming from different communities is only the first step—or maybe the first half-step—that many people don’t want to pass. Each community has its own needs and the queer community at Columbia can’t pretend to encompass all these other racial and ethnic communities if it’s too preoccupied with a certain type of queer experience—that is the white, gay, middle class male .

To make these spaces less exclusive, we should set some ground rules. Specifically, we need to remind people that their story is part of a collective, not the story to describe the whole. We need to stop assuming that this queer community is monolithic, or that Columbia’s queer community is representative of all, if not most, queer communities in the country. Also, we should recognize that experiences are unique to each person and we can’t completely understand why people feel the way they do without discussion.

But I am just one person. Pretending I know how to solve the feeling of exclusiveness people get in these spaces is breaking my first rule; my story does not explain every other story. First, we need to actually have this discussion, more than just fleetingly, and open it up to more than just the people in these spaces. Then we can address solutions.

The author is a Columbia College sophomore majoring in Women’s and Gender Studies. He is the secretary of Everyone Allied Against Homophobia, the committee chair of Chicano Caucus and the secretary of Proud Colors.