Microlabel (noun) 
Used to describe specific terms for identities that may fall within other labels.
Example: The term agender can be considered a specific gender identity that may fall under the broader nonbinary identity. 

 

There is a question I am asked, whether it be in my role as an educator or by my own parents, of “does there really need to be a word for that?” and the short answer is yes.

Spoiler alert: the long answer is also yes.

Within the LGBTQ+ community, and even within the TGI community, there have always been discussions about how many letters get to be included in the acronym, how many identities can one person hold before they start to look foolish, what words will last through the decade, and which are the product of people wanting to feel “special.” There are all sorts of negative stigmas attached to something as personal as the language we use to define ourselves, and terms deemed as microlabels continue to be the moving line with which many queer people delineate themselves as either “just like everybody else” or “making everything about their identity.”

From an advocate’s standpoint, I think this label elitism is just stirring mud into the water. I will not value one person’s rights over another’s simply because someone’s identities are more well-known by the mainstream. It is more important for us to stay focused on progressing the rights of people affected by anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, rather than trying to appeal to what will make us seem more “normal.”

The way that people define where they come from can be shrunk all the way down to the neighborhood one occupies. As someone from California, I grew up with a completely different experience of the United States than someone in Kansas, or Connecticut, or Illinois. And as someone from San Diego, my experience of California is different from someone’s in Fullerton, or Bakersfield, or Eureka.

When I moved away from Southern California, I was able to immediately connect with a complete stranger as we narrowed the scope of hometowns all the way to a 20-minute drive between high schools. We both knew the exact stereotypes that came from each other’s regions, and commiserated in both how different our little slice of San Diego was from, say, the coast, as well as what our new homes lacked in comparison.

So, of course, I’m going to use microlabels to define my experience as a queer person. And they are going to be relevant in some circles and superfluous in others.

Because sometimes I am the only Californian in the room, and sometimes I get to bond with someone because they went to the same sixth-grade camp as I did.