The Queer Sexual Joy Project: Mobilizing Queer and Trans Joy for Gender-Based Violence Prevention Education

• In Event: Saturday Roundtable Session 3:05 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Queer and Trans Futurities Imagined Through Mind, Body, and Spirit (Table 23)

Abstract

The Queer Sexual Joy project aims to conceptualize consent outside of a liberal, colonial, cis-heteronormative framework. Building upon the lineage of care networks established by 2SLGBTQ+ communities through the HIV/AIDS crisis and BDSM communities, the project investigates how queer and trans sexual joy disrupts the colonial, racist, homophobic, transphobic, sexist, ableist cultural norms that lead to GBV. The project engaged 100 2SLGBTQ+ youth to examine their experiences of great consensual sex, as well as the barriers they faced in accessing it. The paper shares overarching findings from the study and argues that queer and trans epistemologies offer an alternative framework for GBV prevention education, one which challenges cis-heteronormative scripts to create less violent, more just and mutually pleasurable sexual cultures.

Author

• JJ Wright, MacEwan University