Ageing queer bodies in the neoliberal state – and the drag of retirement

The paper is discussing the limitation of agency in retirement institutions and the marginalization of older LGBTIQ* populations in Europe when engaging with neoliberal state bureaucracies concerning old age care. From an Austrian perspective it discusses the situation of LGBTIQ persons born until the 1980s with their historically grown (group) identities and their needs in the present and (near) future for old age care and retirement – which is currently not designed for them. The unfortunate intersectionality of old age and queerness invisibilizes, obscures, belittles and puts pressure on those who will need state (and community) care and/or housing. It may very well be that only certain performances of “good gays” will be “allowed” in regular care homes; LGBTIQ pensioners have considerably lower life-incomes than heterosexual retirees; especially activists/volunteers of the 1970s and 1980s may be facing huge pension gaps as well as survivors of the AIDS pandemic, who did not expect to get old. In state institutions, queer community interactions, the gender performances of LGBTI seniors and their desires as well as special needs of old intersex and trans bodies are not on the agenda. How can these sub-populations achieve visibility, compensation, and appropriate care?