In the last several years, state legislatures have introduced a disturbing array of anti-LGBTQIA+ bills that take aim at queer and trans children. Many of these bills have become law. These bills and laws involve, for example, various limitations on gender-affirming care, prohibitions on the discussion of LGBTQIA+ identity in classrooms, and banning drag shows. In the same period, school boards and parent groups have increased their efforts to ban books from school and public libraries, with a special focus on books that discuss LGBTQIA+ identity. The basic fear animating these bills, laws, and policies is that exposure to LGBTQIA+ people, or even to LGBTQIA+-supportive ideas, will somehow turn straight children queer. Although these particular laws are new, the general goal behind them, to protect children by shielding them from queerness, has been in circulation for a long time. Clifford Rosky dubbed the anxiety underlying such laws “the fear of the queer child.”

In the past, the LGBTQIA+ civil rights movement has responded to these types of attacks by arguing that sexuality is immutable and, thus, that exposure to queer adults will not make children queer or trans. While the immutability argument seems to have been effective, particularly in the fight for marriage equality and extension of anti-discrimination laws to LGBTQIA+ people, we argue that it is beginning to outlive its general usefulness, and is largely useless when it comes to protecting “multi-generation” queer families in particular. An argument solely rooted in the biological nature of queerness could be misused by opponents of LGBTQIA+ rights to prevent queer people from becoming parents, given that they may be more likely to have queer children. If we accept that the development of a person’s sexuality is complex and subject to many possible influences, some biological and some not, the immutability argument is much weaker than it might have originally seemed. After all, many immutable traits are passed from parent to child. It is not unexpected that this may be the case with sexual orientation as well. One might think that multi-generation queer families could be held up as examples of the immutable nature of sexuality. Instead, however, foregrounding the existence of such families opens the door to accusations of indoctrination, recruitment, or grooming from opponents of LGBTQIA+ rights. This is likely the reason that these families are often closeted or erased by the LGBTQIA+ rights movement. While it may have been politically expedient to keep these families out of the public eye in the past, multi-generation queer families have much to offer the LGBTQIA+ movement, particularly in responding to the fear of the queer child.

Focusing on immutability in response to fear of the queer child puts activists on the defensive. Anti-LGBTQIA+ activists argue that children can be made queer by exposure to queer adults or queer ideas. LGBTQIA+ activists often counter by arguing that queerness is biologically determined and cannot be changed no matter how a child is raised and to what a child is exposed. But by focusing on the etiology of queerness, in general, and its immutability, in particular, activists miss the mark: simply put, they avoid arguing that there is nothing wrong with being queer, regardless of how sexuality develops.

Responding aggressively to the “fear of the queer child” is especially important in the face of the current food of anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation focusing on queer children. Instead of arguing that LGBTQIA+ people should be treated equally because they have an immutable and/or innate trait, the LGBTQIA+ rights movement should argue that queer people are worthy of equal treatment and protection because that is what all people deserve. Indeed, U.S. law prevents discrimination based on many non-immutable characteristics that society has decided are worthy of protection.

Taking an aggressive response to “the fear of the queer child” trope provides a more expansive way to defend LGBTQIA+ rights. The LGBTQIA+ rights movement should not repeat what occurred during the fight for same-sex marriage, when, in selecting plaintiffs for test cases and spokespeople for the cause, advocates chose queer families with either straight children or children too young to declare their sexuality. Instead, the movement should center multi-generation queer families, their concerns, and their perspectives. As part of this recalibration, multi-generation queer families could share their unique perspectives about how queer culture affects the way children in these families are raised, specifically how children are exposed to a more flexible view of gender and sexuality and encouraged to embrace and be open about their queerness.

Multi-generation queer families would be particularly meaningful in today’s fight for LGBTQIA+ rights, given that trans and queer children specifically are the latest target of anti-LGBTQIA+ state laws and bills. These new anti-LGBTQIA+ laws and bills are based on the fear that exposure to queer adults makes children queer. As such, multi-generation queer families, where queer children have been exposed to queer adults throughout their lives, are well-positioned to address this fear and undercut its power; such families show that even if it is true that queer adults can make children queer, this is not a problem. Multi-generation queer families can demonstrate that being a queer child or growing into a queer adult is not an adverse outcome that society should aim to avoid by shielding children from queerness. In this moment, members of multi-generation queer families should be recognized as particularly appropriate spokespeople for LGBTQIA+ rights, at least as appropriate as straight parents of queer children or the straight children of queer parents.

In her article about the selection of plaintiffs for marriage equality cases, Cynthia Godsoe argued that “fronting straight-acting plaintiffs leaves intact the problematic traditional marital hegemony; squanders the potential of diversity to enrich all families; and risks perpetuating the harmful norms that LGB families and cultures are second-best.” Our article develops these themes as they relate to multi-generation queer families and expands Godsoe’s argument beyond plaintiff selection in the litigation context. Centering multi-generation queer families in various contexts challenges the problematic idea––pervasive in even the LGBTQIA+ rights movement––that queer parents should strive to have families that look similar to straight families, which includes raising straight children. This idea is rooted, in part, in the assumption that queer families are just like straight, cisgender families, and obscures the unique culture these families have. Multi-generation queer families are in a unique position to challenge the “fear of the queer child” framework16 and instead create a new paradigm for how society at large, and queer people in particular, view queerness. As threats to trans and queer people increase, tolerance is no longer enough. Focusing on multi-generation queer families will help the LGBTQIA+ rights movement move beyond arguments based on the idea that queerness is a burden that must be bravely suffered, and towards the idea that queerness is a way of life that should be celebrated. Through discussion of immutability arguments and how state courts have dealt with queer people’s attempts to keep or obtain custody and visitation of their children, we show how multi-generation queer families are especially well suited to challenge problematic assumptions about queerness that are entrenched in our legal system and how foregrounding such families is an important strategy for LGBTQIA+ rights.

This article argues that the time has come for a more direct response to the fear of the queer child. As part of making the strongest case for LGBTQIA+ rights, advocates should uplift the stories of queer children of queer parents and queer parents with queer children. The LGBTQIA+ movement will benefit from the centering of multi-generation queer families. The article discusses the weaknesses of the immutability argument, and how multi-generation queer families are uniquely positioned to respond to the weaknesses of that argument. The article then traces how the law has forced queer adults to closet themselves, with a specific focus on how the fear of the queer child influences child custody and visitation cases. The article concludes by arguing that the LGBTQIA+ rights movement would benefit from centering multi-generation queer families, including by using these families as plaintiffs in test cases and by ensuring their perspectives are represented in the movement.

Keep Reading Multi-Generation Queer Families: Foregrounding the LGBTQIA+ Children of LGBTQIA+ People