Global shifts in LGBTQ+ rights reflect neoliberal individualism eroding collective solidarities, Gallup data reveals systemic tensions
Original framing: “Attitudes toward same-sex marriage and transgender issues are shifting, Gallup poll shows - AP News” — AP News (via Google News)
Indigenous epistemologies frame gender and sexuality as fluid, relational, and sacred, challenging the binary frameworks imposed by colonial modernity. The erasure of Two-Spirit, Hijra, and other indigenous traditions in mainstream narratives reflects a deeper epistemic violence that prioritizes Western 'progress' over ancestral knowledge. Indigenous queer activists, such as those in the *Red Ribbon Camp* in Canada, demonstrate how decolonial frameworks can center both cultural preservation and material justice.
The Gallup poll's framing of 'shifting attitudes' toward LGBTQ+ rights reflects a neoliberal co-optation of queer liberation, where visibility is conflated with progress while material conditions for the most vulnerable deteriorate.
This narrative obscures the colonial legacies that criminalized queer identities, the role of corporate elites in shaping 'acceptable' liberation, and the material violence that persists despite legal recognition. Indigenous epistemologies, such as Two-Spirit traditions, offer a radical alternative to assimilationist frameworks, while Global South movements like Argentina's *travesti* collectives demonstrate how liberation can be rooted in collective care rather than individual rights. The trickster's subversion—exemplified by Marsha P. Johnson's leadership or Hermes' boundary-crossing—reveals the absurdity of a 'progress' that leaves behind the most marginalized. A systemic solution requires decolonizing queer narratives, redistributing resources to those most impacted, and building cross-cultural solidarities that center survival over assimilation.