Today we mark the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, Intersexphobia and Transphobia (IADHOBIT) with the online launch of our zine – Queer Labour Behind the Label: a collection of stories from LGBTQI+ garment workers in Cambodia and Indonesia.
In recent years, fashion brands have tapped into the “pink pound”, releasing Pride collections and capitalising on LGBTQI+ struggles to sell fast-fashion. Meanwhile, garment workers in their supply chains – including queer workers – continue to face poverty wages, union busting, discrimination and other rights violations. Visibilising the stories of queer workers resisting intersecting labour rights violations and queerphobic treatment in their workplaces can help stop brands getting away with this pink-washing.
Queer Labour Behind the Label is a zine that brings together queer garment workers’ stories of everyday struggle, resistance and joy. We worked with Rainbow Community Kampuchea (RoCK) in Cambodia and Perempuan Mahardhika in Indonesia to gather the testimonies and images shared by workers that feature in this zine, which forms part of a proud queer history of DIY self-publishing. Throughout the zine we have used the local terms, language and phrases that workers themselves use to describe their identities.
On IDAHOBIT 2023, and every day, Labour Behind the Label stands with queer workers around the world in our ongoing struggle for a world free from all forms of Homophobia, Biphobia, Intersexphobia and Transphobia. The struggle for queer liberation is inseparable from the struggle for workers’ power and through collective action we will win!
If you love the online version of the Queer Labour Behind the Label Zine and would like a hard copy, you can sign up here throughout May and June 2023 and we will post copies to UK addresses. Keep an eye out for copies of the zine in independent bookshops and community spaces in London, Bristol and more!
