This paper looks beyond “identity politics” through the figure of the fag hag. In the “identity politics” of the 1980s and 1990s, a person's politics were based solidly in what one identified as: straight woman, gay man, Asian American, and so on. Who one identified with, it was presumed, was—or should be—identical to what one identified as. This kind of identity politics, which was very productive in effecting important social change, has now reached an impasse. Groups of people identifying differently cannot seem to find common ground on which to work together collectively, leaving the political left divided, unable to collect into a mass force. There is now a felt need for a new kind of identity politics that moves beyond this impasse.

Meanwhile, the fag hag has been gaining visibility, popularity, and even respectability. What defines the fag hag is not—or not only—what she identifies as (usually, straight woman), but more importantly who she identifies with (gay men). Further, she embodies the possibility and pleasures of a radical disjunction between identifying as and identifying with. A new identity politics that can get beyond the impasse of “positivist” identity politics will follow the fag hag's lead in validating an identifying with distinct from an identifying as—and indeed, in relishing the dialectic between identifying as and identifying with.