LGBT major would benefit society

With National Coming Out Week at an end, the Daily Bruin sat
down with Ramón Ortega, external chair of La Familia, to
discuss the lack of a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender major on
campus.

***

Daily Bruin: What would be the most important contribution
of the major?

Ramón Ortega: The major would allow for more research on
LGBT issues, which would in turn hopefully educate people about the
LGBT community. If you have people doing research, you would hope
that there would be a lot more discourse created, preventing the
violence and hate crimes that occur every day.

DB: What LGBT studies does UCLA currently offer?

RO: They have several different courses. One is on the
psychology of the lesbian experience ““ that’s a really
popular one ““ and another is on transgendered people. But
there are more coming up. It’s interdisciplinary, so in other
departments there are some classes offered that are LGBT-related,
and there is also an LGBT minor. But there are huge areas within
LGBT studies to explore and do more research on. Ideally, it would
be to the benefit of society as a whole, because by establishing a
major it would be the first of its kind in any university. It would
hopefully inspire other universities to establish a major and do
away with a lot of the negative connotations involving the LGBT
community. The current state of the LGBT community in our society
needs to see a dramatic change for the better. I would compare the
LGBT struggle to the civil rights movement. I feel that in the
future people are going to look back at this time and see the
injustices that occured to the LGBT community. In the future people
are hopefully going to see that a lot of what we are taught is
wrong and oppressive.

DB: How would an LGBT major have changed your UCLA
experience?

RO: I would have been able to really submerge myself in learning
more about myself and my community.

DB: If there was a major, what classes should that major
concentrate on?

RO: With the current political situation, it would be imperative
to have classes that would deal with politics in a global context
““ not just on LGBT people in the United States. The LGBT
community suffers in different ways and the problems manifest in
different ways throughout the world. It would be beneficial to
learn about the situation in, for example, a developing country.
Also, many people think that there is a lack of sensitivity for
issues pertaining to LGBT people of color. It would be useful to
look specifically at how different communities of color are
affected, and at the relevance of socio-economic status. It’s
very different being a white middle-class male LGBT person than
being a working-class Chicana LGBT person.

DB: Why do you think there is currently no LGBT major on
campus?

RO: I think that right now there is no LGBT major because it
hasn’t been regarded or deemed important enough. There
isn’t an LGBT major anywhere, so UCLA would be the first if
we did it.

DB: Why do you think the major has not been deemed important
enough?

RO: I think a lot of it has to do with ignorance of its
importance on people’s lives. That’s a big issue.
General ignorance plays a large role. The stigma surrounding the
issue of being LGBT also plays a part.

Interview conducted by Colleen Honigsberg, Bruin senior
staff.