Last year, Christian fundamentalist bigots found our queer edition of Honi Soit, titled Fagi Soit, so revolting that they stole hundreds of copies from stands and threw them into bins before most readers could get their hands on them. Many people were understandably shocked when this occurred, but while anti-queer censorship is fucked up, it isn’t new.
Just this year, bigots in Cumberland Council, including Labor members, found a children’s book on rainbow families so revolting that they voted to ban the book from council libraries.
Councils in Victoria caved to neo-Nazis and cancelled dozens of drag storytime events last year, citing safety concerns but failing to actually protect the queer performers.
Our ability to openly express ourselves as queer people is far from a guarantee. It’s the result of endless strikes, pickets, and protests by countless queer activists.
Every single time bigots try to censor us and justify it by vilifying us as too revolting to be in public, we have collectively done just that: revolted.
When Cumberland council censored queer books, we revolted, rallying to get the ban overturned (and we succeeded). Queer activists revolted against censorship of our art by bringing and passing motions of support for drag storytimes to local governments in NSW and organising our own events in response. While the fight continues at some local councils, NSW now supports drag storytime on a state-wide basis. When bigots threw Fagi Soit into bins around campus, we revolted by rallying and getting it reprinted.
In celebration of this continuous resistance against bigotry, Fagi Soit 2024’s theme is Revolting. That’s both the way bigots slander us as revolting, perverted, and immoral, and the way we revolt against bigotry, against oppression, and against capitalism. So, dear reader, hold your nose and grab your molotov cocktail, and enjoy the return of the newspaper that was simply too fabulous for the far-right.
Lastly, remember that the struggle carries on. The new Campus Access Policy (CAP) is an existential threat to queer activism at USYD. Activism is the most effective way for us to continuously resist anti-queer censorship, so this hateful attack on free-speech must be overturned. Make sure to join us at upcoming rallies for queer-specific issues and other student organising alike to call for an end to the CAP and to revolt for sex workers’ rights, refugee justice, queer liberation, and a free Palestine!
