ABSTRACT
In this presentation, Raha Iranian Feminist Collective considers the “after marriage” moment from transnational perspective, drawing especially from our experiences as feminists of different genders and sexualities in the US and Iranian contexts. We consider this next phase of activism for gender and sexual justice by first examining the shortcomings of the mainstream US LGBTQ movement’s politics of inclusion, focusing on its increasing alignment with nationalism and imperialism. We then offer a vision of a more capacious politics of sexuality, love, and caring. We do this by drawing from a comparative, transnational understanding of the relationship between identity, state and social institutions in order to reanimate the concept of freedom. Instead of counterposing the US and Iran, we argue that there is much to be learned from engaging with the differences and similarities across both locations when it comes to thinking about what forms gender and sexual justice can take in the future. We conclude that such a broader, comparative politics of sexuality can productively engage with different national and cultural contexts, while leading towards a more robust vision of sexual freedom and justice not constrained by the regulatory regimes of marriage, nationalism and global imperial power.
