Agreed, and also, it has always struck me as a little bit of a double-standard in queer politics when people used to point out the exclusion of queerness from mainstream capitalist products as evidence of their marginalization (e.g., there are no m/m or f/f wedding cards)
Yet, when they start being included, they are like “well, that’s just capitalism taking advantage of us, so it doesn’t count.” Like, you can’t use your EXCLUSION from something as evidence of general societal marginalization and then claim that once you’ve started to be included, it is politically meaningless. You don’t really get to have it both ways. That’s moving the political goal posts.
I get that we shouldn’t consider Target pride merchandise as like the pinnacle of queer politics or even the pinnacle of queer inclusion. I get that inclusion in capitalist intuitions is a very ambivalent form of social progress. But the truth is, capitalism is a big part of what creates our social reality right now (unfortunately).
Capitalism makes TV shows, and movies, and books, and ads, and greeting cards, and toys, and clothing, and, and…
When every single aspect of commercial social reality excludes queerness, that DOES create a real sense of social alienation. I don’t love that capitalism is responsible for creating so much of our collective social reality. But granting that it does, I think we’re forced to accept that our inclusion in it IS politically and socially important.
And yes we should still be trying to resist capitalism as the primary means of meeting human needs. But we can resist treating capitalism as an inevitability or an inherent good, AND ALSO acknowledge that our inclusion within it remains politically important while it still holds so much power and responsibility for creating our shared reality.
