Queer Uncle Sam: The Politics of the Ballot Box and the Bedroom

From Harvey Milk to Tammy Baldwin, the Briggs Initiative to Proposition 8, the Lavender Scare and “Boys Beware” to the Grindr app, the rising political activity of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender people helped push the community from an unknown counterculture to a powerful mainstream lobby. Though it is easy to argue that all the shirts in the collection are political, the items in this exhibit deal directly with not only issues of political leaders and elections, but also the politics of people’s private lives.

Has the ballot box been an effective means of addressing LGBT issues? In what ways are mainstream politics unable to address the variety of the community’s concerns?