Toward A More Colorful Queer Future
by Guest Contributor Alex Niculescu
Over the last few years mainstream gay advocacy groups have focused their efforts on one issue, a panacea to seemingly solve all forms of inequality that gays are faced with: marriage rights.
With the passage of Proposition 8 this summer in California, many people’s hopes that gays would achieve full equality in this country were dashed. What was even more distressing, however, was the wave of racist backlash against people of color in California, who were accused of being the cause of Prop 8’s passage (this is a completely unfounded claim, as studies have shown). When I look at the actions of HRC, GLAAD, and other mainstream gay advocacy groups from the past years, they make me sad to call myself queer. In particular, their perpetual focus on marriage rights as the most pressing issue facing queers, the only obstacle blocking the road to full equality, is an awfully myopic and misguided claim. To assume that marriage is the main issue all queers should be organizing around automatically constructs an essentialized version of a gay person, when the very existence of queer people should enough to contradict and confront any attempts to standardize our lives.
As anarchists say that “our dreams won’t fit in your ballot boxes,” queer bodies and experiences are too, well, queer, to fit in the state’s centuries-old definition of marriage. For queers to appeal for marriage is to desire assimilation into a heteronormative conception of sexuality, gender, and relationships, things which the government should have no business regulating or legislating in the first place. What scares me even more about assimilation is that it compels us to ignore the structures of power and interaction of power dynamics in this country. Supporting marriage is supporting a means of institutional oppression. Historically, marriage was never rooted in religion, but rather it was a way for the state to regulate the transfer of property from a womyn’s family to her husband. This effectively bound the wife into a slaveholding document – she too became part and parcel of the man’s life possessions. Consider the language that we use to describe when a womyn weds - Mrs. is a possessive form of Mr. For queers to appeal to an institution that has historically oppressed womyn (as well as non-whites – through miscegenation laws and the inability of slaves to exercise the so-called ‘human’ right of marriage, because, of course, it would humanize them in the face of their oppressors) baffles me.
We have seen these calls for assimilation as a route to acceptance before and it always ends up with the same results. Assimilation pretends to seize power for an entire identity group by imitating the dominant group. Instead, it simply reconfigures the structures of power in society and redistributes privilege in a way which capitalism, patriarchy, or any other dominant ideology can accommodate. In this instance, wealthy, white, monogamous gay couples who agree with the gender binary stand to benefit, which leaves out the majority of queers everywhere.
In fact, the “struggle” for assimilation, through marriage campaigns, actively silences every other queer who is not a member of this elite, privileged gay vanguard (as they have so positioned themselves), but who is enmeshed in the intersectionality of oppressions we are faced with everyday. As Audre Lorde once said, “There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives.” Where does a black lesbian womyn fit in the gay marriage campaign? An FTM trans immigrant from Latin America? A genderqueer working-class sex-worker from the rural Midwest?
Assimilation into state-sanctioned heteronormative and patriarchal institutions such as marriage and the military is not an option – why would we want “equality” in a state that denies those equalities to other citizens based on race, class, gender (identity), nationality, religious affiliation, or anything that allows our bodies and lives to be marked as “deviant?” Lacking marriage rights aren’t the problem – marriage, and any form of institutional oppression, is!
Mainstream gay activism is based on an outdated notion of change which is polite and gradual, a change which holds the door for the power-holders who will proceed to walk all over it, a change which actually reinforces the existing power structures it pretends to oppose. As a radical queer, I see myself as part of a larger struggle for equality, but not the state’s liberal definition of equality which hinges on white supremacist notions of individual rights and self-determination. I work for radical equality through collective liberation from all oppression. Where was the HRC in July 2007 when Victoria Aurellano, the inmate of an ICE detention center and an immigrant transwoman, died of AIDS, shackled to her bed after being denied medical treatment? Was it a gay rights issue? An immigrant rights issue? Or was it an issue of a legal system which reinforces white supremacy and patriarchy at all costs?
In our public struggle, dividing our bodies, choices and lives into neat categories of LGBT makes it that much easier for capitalism to slowly accommodate some by extending privileges, while continuing to invent new ways to marginalize others, all the while marketing to every new compartmentalized niche identity. The time has come to realize how queer liberation is, always has been, and must continue to be bound with the liberation of all oppressed peoples everywhere. No matter if you are a white lesbian or a Filipino MTF transperson, an injury to one is an injury to all, and to effectively achieve victory, we must constantly remind our aggressors of this, our promise of solidarity.
There was a time when queers didn’t ask for change, they made it happen. A time of militant, organized queer resistance to state power, when truly fierce trannies, dykes, fags, drag queens, and all other gender traitors battled cops in the streets instead of asking nicely. A time of White Night Riots, Stonewall, Sylvia Rivera, and the Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries. I believe that time is due for a comeback. We are beginning to look beyond the superficial, the figureheads, and take a peek at the privilege that keeps them in place. Even still, we can see that the dummy power-holders are not the ultimate problem, rather it is the coercive power bestowed upon them which perpetuates the systems of structural oppression, and it is this power we must seize and abolish.
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Wendi Muse wrote:
to be honest though, lots of things are rooted in white supremacy and property ownership, but we now engage in it as a means of asserting our equality, voting being one example of this. i understand the need to have a radical take on the queer movement, particularly as so many mainstream groups ignore the diversity within the lgbt community and its respective movements. HOWEVER, the unfortunate but realistic aspect of this struggle is that mainstream audiences would be hard-pressed to support something they saw as completely veering from their value system, even if they themselves are not adhering directly to it (hello? how much has the divorce rate gone up in the past few years?). a lot of people want same sex marriage NOT to fall in line with heteronormativity but to gain the rights and privileges granted to heterosexual married couples by law (i.e. tax breaks, secured insurance benefits without extra fees, adoption rights, etc). i think that this part of the argument for same sex marriage rights is somewhat forgotten but can also be very beneficial to those who assimilate and radicals alike.
and while i don’t like to compare the civil rights movement directly to lgbt movements (we discussed that a bit last week), the issue of “selling out” vs. going completely against the system was a huge issue during that movement as well, going all the way back to slavery. john brown and his revolutionary fighters scared white people, sure, but if anything, that type of direct revolt made people more afraid of blacks and abolitionists instead of humanizing them and making people think, “hey, let’s free these folks. give them rights!” the same went for the black panthers in the 60s and 70s. yes, their movements were powerful, and i don’t want to rob them of that with my words, but they did not lead to direct legislation benefiting blacks.
the name of the game is moderate compromise. this is what has worked for a very long time, save say the french revolution. and even then, in all the raging and chaos, there will little tangible progress made until we had the time to look back on it and assess the little changes happening beyond the guillotine.
i don’t think people who want to marry are purely imitating straight people. i think they are looking for benefits and (for them) a way to assert their love for their partner with federal and possibly religious backing. it doesn’t mean they are seeking to be just like straight folks. that cheapens and silences a ton of people when that assumption is made.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 11:57 am ¶
atlasien wrote:
Since I’m not a member of the community in question, it’s not my place to weigh in on these internal debates when it comes to specific experiences, or tell LGBTQ what they should or should be concentrating on. So I won’t.
However, I do see a GENERAL parallel in other discussions here… that is, radical critique of reformist initiatives. I do think radical critique is absolutely crucial in order to keep reformist movements honest. But to do this critique, radicals often position gradualist reform as somehow inimical to true, radical change.
And I don’t agree with that at all. I think that gradual reform and radical change often often go together. They can be like two different currents traveling in the same direction, one rapid, one slow. Often, you can be a part of both at the same time.
I totally agree with the author that the current social focus on marriage is not productive for the future… and I’d also mention that it discriminates against people of any sexuality or gender expression (including asexual) who live their lives singly by choice. But pragmatically speaking, a large majority of people believe in marriage as an institution. That belief is not going to vanish overnight.
Marriage solves emotional needs and certain financial needs as well. If you want to get rid of it, you have to get rid of the underlying problems first. Otherwise, it’s like telling someone, “I think you should take off your band-aid, but I can’t heal your cut.” I’ve seen similar critiques of adoption, which is also a sort of social band-aid.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 12:09 pm ¶
Alex wrote:
I definitely agree with the author. I would also like to point out that marriage is a terrible strategy for “moderate compromise”, as I think fights like Prop 8 demonstrate. It’s extremely polarizing, and part of the effect of that polarizing is a lack of other ideas around addressing the issues – one is either “for” or “against” gay marriage, and that’s the end of the conversation.
There are lots and lots of people who are in families of choice that are not based on “marriage” (theoretically life-long, theoretically monogamous sexual pair)… and lots of them are straight. People who’s households include grown siblings, or parents, or… By phrasing it in terms of gay marriage, we’re missing probably millions of potential allies to reforming the system of rights/privileges distribution to families.
I’d really recommend looking over http://www.beyondmarriage.org/ =)
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 12:37 pm ¶
Iggles wrote:
This is an incredible post!! Thank you for sharing.
You really called out what the negative aspects of assimilation are and why it doesn’t lead to true power for the group seeking acceptance:
We have seen these calls for assimilation as a route to acceptance before and it always ends up with the same results. Assimilation pretends to seize power for an entire identity group by imitating the dominant group. Instead, it simply reconfigures the structures of power in society and redistributes privilege in a way which capitalism, patriarchy, or any other dominant ideology can accommodate.
Assimilation isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. In the rush towards the perceived benefits we throw away the good things we currently have.
Your right, the markets will adapt and take economic advantage of having a new group to make money off of.
I’ve seen this happen to the black community after segregation ended. It was a terrible system of oppression but the lost of culture and economic stability (many black businesses closed in the post civil rights era due to competition with mainstream corporation — a la walmart vs mom & pop’s shops) ushered in a terrible crisis that we’re still undergoing today.
You gain the whole for the price of you’re soul. You’re an equal consumer, but there are still several systems of oppression that hinder in true chance of equality — and thanks to assimilation you no longer have your agency for change in place. It’s like this: everyone is fighting together for a goal. The goal is reached. The group goes their own ways. Down the road major problems occur but now everyone is on their own to cope.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 12:44 pm ¶
Catherine wrote:
“a lot of people want same sex marriage NOT to fall in line with heteronormativity but to gain the rights and privileges granted to heterosexual married couples by law (i.e. tax breaks, secured insurance benefits without extra fees, adoption rights, etc). i think that this part of the argument for same sex marriage rights is somewhat forgotten but can also be very beneficial to those who assimilate and radicals alike.”
I disagree. I think it is heteronormative to fight for the right to marry in order to gain rights and privileges granted to heterosexual married couples by law. I view those benefits as prizes that the government gives out, rewarding heterosexual couples for perpetuating the social norm. For me, the problem with the mainstream queer organizations fighting for queer marriage, is that they want queer married couples to attain the same status as the herosexual marriage “norm,” when in reality, we all know that the heterosexual marriage “norm” isn’t as clean or pure or simple as society holds it up to be, but the government rewards it anyway, over all other permutations and combinations of family structure. It’s a fight that would reward only a few. It’s fighting for privilege, not for equality and rights for everyone, regardless of marital status.
Let me be clear: I absolutely support queer marriage for the folks who do want to get married, and the right for people to love whomever they want, and be protected from discrimination and violence. My point is that the privileges given exclusively to heterosexual married couples should be available to EVERYONE, not just to heterosexual married couples, not just to queer married couples. What about secured insurance benefits without extra fees for the family in which a single daughter is living with and caring for her elderly widower father? What about tax breaks for the straights and queers who choose not to marry for a variety of reasons, and are raising families? How about extended hospital visitation rights for the transgendered man visiting his non-blood-related godmother?
Marriage as social or religious ritual, as a way for couples to publicly declare their love and promise to one another, is a beautiful thing. I tear up and cry when I watch vows being exchanged. I just believe that the legal perks that come with being a heterosexual married couple should be removed, and instead structured such that everyone in society gets those perks.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 12:59 pm ¶
deathblossom wrote:
Just because someone is not heterosexual does not mean that they are should not be allowed to engage in what is currently a majority-heterosexual act any more than someone who is a heterosexual should be expected to value the norms and traditions of a heteronormative society.
Do I agree that it is too focused on? Yes, I do. But the point is that wanting to be with someone is not “assimilation” – nor is wanting to have the same recognition not only in law benefits at the federal or the same health benefits or the same social recognition of your marriage. Yes, this system is unfair for people who choose not to get married – as someone who will most likely remain single and taxed out the ass for whatever time I have left, it sucks. But I don’t think the answer is to use queer people as the guinea pigs/last stand for your radical movement. Queer people will live forever in a straight society. We will always be the minority. We can’t bum off back Over the Rainbow anymore than black people can bum off back to Africa (and sorry, but black culture was lost the moment it was chained, stuck on a boat, beaten and sold In the Name of Christianity). As a culture that (purportedly) encompasses people of multiple genders, races, and creeds, it cannot have One True Culture nor should people be expected to drop their own culture the moment they come out of the closet – in many cultures, this institution is important and you cannot force someone to make it unimportant for the good of LBGT.
And honestly, I think the archaic view of marriage of women being property is part of straight people’s (sub)conscious thoughts about marriage and a large part of the reason why many are opposed to it – it upsets their little system and may, gosh, I don’t know, start giving people alternative views on how to share work and family responsibilities that do not fall along society’s gendered norms! Afterall, a marriage with no women cannot not simply relegate a woman to taking care of children and cleaning house in addition to working nor more than a marriage with no men teach a kid how to throw a softball! Or can it? So yes, I do think gay marriage challenges the institution’s heteronormative focus. If it didn’t, straight people wouldn’t cry ever you mentioned it.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 3:11 pm ¶
queerhapa wrote:
Regardless of the question of whether or not marriage is heteronormative and assimilationist (and I would say yes on both counts), I think the question that the article raises is that if gay marriage is not the #1 concern of most queers, particularly those of us who are not white, affluent, and gender-normative, why have the mainstream gay orgs made this their priority and poured all of their resources into this single issue? Could it have anything to do with the fact that the right to marry is *the* last hurdle of the white affluent gay man to achieve parity with his privileged straight brethren, leaving the rest of us queers behind, still struggling?
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 4:02 pm ¶
Persia wrote:
While I’m also not a member of the GLBT community, I want to point out that marriage is a relatively quick and very cheap way to give survival and burial rights, etc. to couples– people who can’t afford lawyers to draft the perfect legal document, etc. I know the face of the community is often white, cis, and well-to-do, but that’s not always the case.
I agree with atlasien that there is a relationship between gradual reform and radical change, and I think it’s good there are people pushing for both.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 4:03 pm ¶
Heather Leila wrote:
“Supporting marriage is supporting a means of institutional oppression. ”
“And honestly, I think the archaic view of marriage of women being property is part of straight people’s (sub)conscious thoughts about marriage.”
No way. I’m married and I am decidedly not my husband’s property. Don’t fail to recognize that there is a post-sexual revolution type of marriage that exists out there. And it’s not so rare.
As far as gay marriage not being radical enough…isn’t it possible that not everyone wants to make a radical or political statement with their marriage? Isn’t that what is being fought for? The right to not have to make a statement with the fairly mundane act of getting married? The only statement they might want to make is that they love someone and will do so, forever.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 4:10 pm ¶
Alex wrote:
@ Heather
Part of the problem with framing the distribution of familial rights through the vehicle of “marriage” is that “marriage” has a lot of meanings… There’s the government institution, the interpersonal relationship it implies, and the religious connotations – none of which necessarily depend on the other.
No one is saying that there’s something wrong with lifelong commitment between two people if that’s what makes them happy and stable. Or with people being bound together in the eyes of their god(s). The problem is that that is being enshrined by our government as *the* definition of family. When I hear queer people saying (or their allies saying for them), “oh, we just want to get married and have our love recognised. Why would you deny us that?”, what I really hear is “I’m not going to bother questioning the privilege hierarchy. I just want to be one of the Privileged.”
I think there is a big problem with the government being in the business of validating or invalidating personal relationships, and fighting for gay marriage addresses none of that problem.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 4:56 pm ¶
Tracey wrote:
@Catherine
Precisely!!!!! Co-sign a million times.
The rights granted in marriage need to be available to everyone. There is no legitimate reason a child should not be able to care for their parent and have the parent live with them in subsidized housing whereas a person could allow their spouse to live with them. There is no reason I should not be able to put a family member on my insurance whereas if they were a spouse I could.
Marriage says something about the relationships the government values despite what other reasons may be given for it. Marriage, as far as government sanctioning goes, has absolutely nothing to do with love. Not one thing to do with it. Marriage is the way in which the government determines how relationships are defined and which ones have the most value. The benefits associated with marriage need to be available to all and truly based on the relationship people have with each other, not marital status. If people want to define their relationships a certain way and/or have religious ceremonies that’s their personal choice. But when it comes to the government condoning and privileging some relationships and not others that becomes inherently problematic and discriminatory.
Many in the mainstream movement have made LGBTQ rights synonymous with same-sex marriage and that simply is not true. While LGBTQ youths are homeless, face police brutality, get almost no sex-education in schools and while gender presentation is policed on the job, street, restroom to spend over $100,000,000 on marriage campaigns and all but ignore these other issues is extremely problematic.
There is more to the LGBTQ struggle than same-sex marriage, much more. Dumping large amounts of money that could fund shelters, scholarships for kids disowned and cut-off by parents, fund support groups and therapeutic sessions and address the high rates of suicide, fund job training, address the extra problems faced by LGBTQ youth in the foster care system, fight discrimination in housing, etc. into marriage campaigns and then trying to whitewash the movement as much as possible is disgusting. Not to mention that it is done under the banner of normalcy. If this was about “love”(which has nothing to do with state-sanctioned marriage, nothing at all) then you wouldn’t have had organizations advising same-sex couples in California to be “normal” by not cross-dressing because in that situation the desire to be seen as “normal” was far more important than the right of people to express themselves at their own wedding.
But few of these issues make their way into the public discourse very often or for very long. Whenever gay rights are brought up it is almost always in the context of marriage “rights.” And I won’t even start on why I doubt most of the big marriage organizations will address the problems that may arise when gay marriage is legal and you have power imbalances in relationships that are exploited b/c one partner is dependent on the other for residency. Because, you know, for the likes of HRC that probably isn’t a gay issue. And I think very few will be likely to continue to fight for domestic partnership recognization even when there is gay marriage in place or recognize that domestic partnerships should be open to anyone despite the nature of the relationship (I went to a school that at first limited DP benefits to sexual relationships).
The gay movement has a history of whitewashing and focusing on assimilation tactics that leave out the non-gender conforming, non-upper/middle class, non-white/American, non-monogamous,etc. Many of the members and organizations who focus almost exclusively on marriage, such as the Human Rights Campaign, are composed of or targeted towards rich white gay men who are upset that them being gay means they loose out on some of the benefits afforded to other rich white men. That is in large part why marriage has become almost the sole focus of many groups and people. The rights marriage grants are important, but by no means is marriage the end all be all, but it is being treated as such.
There are ways to work towards the benefits conveyed by marriage that do not involve all out campaigns and that could garner support from many different non-traditional family members and that wouldn’t exhaust us financially and time-wise and would allow other issues to be spotlighted. I believe that as long as any marriage is recognized by the government, all marriages should be recognized and called marriage, but gay rights should not revolve around marriage.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 6:30 pm ¶
korshi wrote:
‘Mrs’ is not the possessive form of ‘Mr’, it’s a contraction of ‘Mistress’, as in an honorific title and the female form of ‘Master’. We just dropped the ‘t’ and ‘r’ a few hundred years ago.
I disagree that the historical meaning of marriage defines its present meaning. Whatever its history marriage is not currently in Western countries a method for passing on ownership of women, but a formalised way of transferring certain spousal rights and responsibilities to a particular person. I don’t know what particular place or time period you are talking about in your discussion of the history of marriage, but miscegenation, ownership or women or any other attribute are not essential to ‘marriage’. Insofar as marriage has any essential quality it is a contract between two people, and while any of the traits you have listed might have been attached to it at a particular time or place, they don’t define all it is or can be. Yes, there are many issues facing human beings, queer or otherwise in the world today, and yes it’s bad to care only about a single issue or your own community, but why can’t equal marriage rights be among our priorities, if we believe in it?
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 6:56 pm ¶
NancyP wrote:
1. The unfortunate fact is that the same-gender marriage issue was more or less forced on us by the conservatives, after courts (initially, Hawaii) considered the question of SGM seriously. As I remember and understand it, the BTLG legal organizations at that time believed that the time wasn’t right. However, these legal organizations weren’t involved in the cases as primary attorneys, and only got around to issuing amici curiae briefs when the cases reached appellate courts.
The “gay marriage” issue was a boon for the would-be political kingmakers of the religious right. The Republican Party and a few major religious right organizations did polling and focus groups on how to best get out the religious right vote, and gay marriage topped even abortion. Federal DOMA followed, before a single same-gender couple had the uncontested right to marry. Then Bush started to run into trouble, and state DOMAs and constitutional amendments were put on presidential election year (2004) and mid-cycle (2006) ballots in order to get out the religious-cultural conservative lower middle class and lower class vote.
The major LBTG organizations have been in reaction mode since Day One. The conservatives have dictated the field of battle and the terms under which battle is waged. Needless to say, this puts the TGLB community at a strategic disadvantage. In the period between 1992 and 2003, major GTBL organizations put HIV/AIDS first, ENDA second, hate crimes third, and issues such as marriage and military service were not on the strategic map. State organizations worked on repealing sodomy laws where present. Mixner made military service his hobbyhorse, but that wasn’t the doing of the major organizations. Mixner merely had the large amount of money to found his own organization, and for campaign contributions, and also had the face time with POTUS Clinton. Hence the rather unconsidered attempt to change the military code of justice and military regulations in the first few weeks after inauguration in 1993.
The GLBT organizations have not been able to control the terms of battle. Individual plaintiffs do whatever they dam’ well please.
2. “Mrs.” (originally “mistress”) is not the possessive of “Mr.” (originally “master”). Master and Mistress here indicate the senior male and female members of a householder family. Servants were never called by these titles because the titles implied possession of land or a business. Later the titles were used for heirs (children) as well.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 11:14 pm ¶
Cindy wrote:
The reason marriage is at the forefront is because of all the legal rights that come with it. If the LBGTQ community gains access to these rights, then there are a whole host of legal, civil, equal rights that will naturally follow. That’s why marriage rights are important.
Throwing the archaic definitions of marriage into the debate is a smoke and mirrors distraction used by every side. None of these issues is relevant today and one can be used to dismiss another. Claiming that gaining marriage rights will leave racial minorities within the LBGTQ community out in the cold is divisive speak. Yes, the LBGTQ community and their equal rights endeavors has a LONG way to go to be racially inclusive, but that doesn’t mean equal rights for LBGTQ will only apply to whites.
The battle for gay marriage also has far reaching effects for heterosexual domestic partnerships. The rights gains crosses over…this has already been shown in countries and states where there are gay marriage and domestic partnership laws.
I doubt few LBGTQ want a marriage that fits the heterosexist “norm”, but neither do a lot of heterosexual couples. Winning the marriage battle is about winning equal footing. No more no less. …that will mean a lot of equal footing for all the other arenas within the LBGTQ that need help too…including PoC.
Posted 24 Nov 2009 at 11:36 pm ¶
queerhapa wrote:
“The reason marriage is at the forefront is because of all the legal rights that come with it. If the LBGTQ community gains access to these rights, then there are a whole host of legal, civil, equal rights that will naturally follow. That’s why marriage rights are important.”
And these rights and benefits will STILL NOT BE AVAILABLE to those who are not married. Gay marriage will extend these rights and benefits only to those monogamous same-sex couples who wish to have their relationships recognized by the state. Rights and benefits should be a matter of citizenship and/or residency, and NOT of one’s relationship status.
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 1:17 am ¶
Versai wrote:
What about the lgbt poc who support the fight for marriage–like me? Just write me off as someone who has been brain washed, I guess.
When I came out in the early 90’s, I know plenty of people who have passed away–and lovers/partners etc who were barred from funerals. You could dedicate years to someone, nurse them through illness best you could, and then be cast out by family members because the law saw you as a total stranger (and deviant, to boot). This can/does still happen today.
My point is that for many people the drive to have rights for our relationships recognized/protected by the law is rooted in REAL experiences that shouldn’t just be brushed aside as insignificant.
Why does it appear that the queer anti-marriage people ONLY seem to be vocally anti-marriage when the issue is same-sex marriage? For example, when that Justice of the Peace refused to perform a serive for the heterosexual black / white couple, where was the anti-marriage message? I don’t recall seeing any blogs were the queer, anti-marriage folks were saying that the racism was wrong (of course!) but it’s a shame that the couple wanted to participate in a historically oppressive institution.
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 8:21 am ¶
Jess wrote:
I’d have to agree with those that say the old definition of marriage Niculescu cites hasn’t got much to do with what it means now. Granted, I am not gay either, so maybe I am missing something, but…
Yeah, marriage was (and still can be) an oppressive institution. But so were republics and I don’t think he would ask that gay people give up the right to vote or not take part in electoral politics. As altasien noted treating radical and gradualist change as mutually exclusive is inaccurate at best.
Saying the state shouldn’t be involved in people’s relationships is sort of true at one level, but we have the state in all kinds of relationships and wold accept that (gladly, I might add). Contracts are one area — even “personal” relationships have to be mediated that way sometimes. I mean, if you move in with a person you love and the relationship falls apart, what are you supposed to do if you bought a house? Who gets what? So it isn’t like there’s some world where if marriage didn’t exist such situations wouldn’t arise.
So marriage rights, in that sense, are one way of getting access to all the stuff straight couples have. Is it perfect? No, but then you would argue that because marriage was an oppressive institution the old laws against miscegenation should never have been fought either because interracial couples were just trying to assimilate.
Power imbalances in relationships happen now whether or not people are married, and I don’t see how marriage would change that much (except to offer some people a method of seeking redress — no bad thing).
I don’t see marriage as the beginning, in any case. I see it as a logical end. I mean, in one sense, we cold look at marriage as a latter-day battle, with the right wing culture warriors fighting a rearguard action. That’s why they are so vehement about things, I think — at so many levels they lost or are losing. (Yes, I am taking a bit from Faludi here). Put another way: by the time you get people to accept that gays can be married at all, you’ve already won a big chunk of the fight.
(Small quibble: Mr. and Mrs. are abbreviations for “Master” and “Mistress,” which are just masculine and feminine noun forms. I think when he mentioned one was the possessive of the other he was thinking of the old way of referring to couples as Mr. and Mrs. [man's name]. Sorry I am an etymology nerd).
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 9:22 am ¶
Cindy wrote:
I agree that marriage still does not address the issue of rights denied to people who do not fit into that category regardless of sexual orientation. Sometimes you have to first fight to get a seat at the table before you start rearranging the chairs.
Marriage rights don’t fix everything or even most things…it’s a start. There’s still much left to do in protecting/providing equal rights to everyone.
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 10:55 am ¶
Alex wrote:
@ Cindy
I’d be more willing to buy that if I’d heard anything from *any* non-explicitly-radical queer organisation about where we go after marriage. Or, god forbid, from organisations in the states that *do* have gay marriage. But the problem is the conversation about the distribution of the right associated with marriage isn’t, for the most part, happening. Marriage is the beginning and the end of the discussion.
I’m very grateful when people, like the author, take it upon themselves to start this type of conversation. =)
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 12:14 pm ¶
Catherine wrote:
@Versai
“What about the lgbt poc who support the fight for marriage–like me? Just write me off as someone who has been brain washed, I guess.”
No, it’s not about “writing off” people who support queer marriage. I believe that the legal benefits made available to all married couples should be removed as a marriage perk, and instead given to all citizens, regardless of marital status. That’s my long term view, and I hope that that is the long term view of everyone who cares about equality for all.
Short-term view: yes, I support queer marriage. I have had a lot of friends getting married, heterosexual and queer, and in many cases, the marriages helped one partner attain health benefits, citizenship status, whatever other benefits are given to legally sanctioned married couples, providing stability in a time when they needed it most. Seeing queer marriage attain equal legal footing with heterosexual marriage is very gratifying from a personal perspective, especially when I see my friends experience it. But it cannot be the end all be all, not when there are so many people who need those those rights and who cannot or will not marry.
“When I came out in the early 90’s, I know plenty of people who have passed away–and lovers/partners etc who were barred from funerals. You could dedicate years to someone, nurse them through illness best you could, and then be cast out by family members because the law saw you as a total stranger (and deviant, to boot). This can/does still happen today.”
If the laws changed such that queer lovers/partners were recognized as legal spouses, do you think that would necessarily change the minds of those close-minded family members? Maybe some, but some won’t give a darn what the law says and ban the partner from attending the funeral anyway, or wreak havoc when it comes time to settle the will/estate. It’s a sad reality – legal status may help change some minds, but some bigots refuse to be changed, even if the law holds their feet to the fire.
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 1:53 pm ¶
Kendra wrote:
I apologize, cuz I’m gonna derail a bit.
@ Wendi:
You’re entitled to your belief in moderate compromise. If this is what a group of people/social movement are working toward, then they can do just that.
But you must realize that white slavery abolitionists were usually ineffective, and they would be considered the old-time moderate compromisers. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” did more damage in my opinion, trying to present a “sensible” image of the all-sacrificing negro that wouldn’t hurt a fucking fly, let alone save himself if his mean old master was in danger. Most white abolitionists, like common whites of that era, did believe that blacks were inferior. Their reasoning was simply that blacks were too harmless, infantile to warrant such mistreatment. I do believe most were like Lincoln, believing that blacks and whites could not share the same society and would fare better in Africa.
I mean, you’re talking about American slavery, an institution which was first and foremost about money. Slave-owners did not give a damn about humanity, they were about capital at the expense of blacks who they conveniently did not view as human, or at least not fully human. Slave rebellion came in many forms, and I would not make any of it seem the least bit illegitimate just b/c these human reactions to continued oppression, mutilation, humiliation, just full on usurpation of one’s humanity, scared white people even more . . . made them think even less about considering blacks human and worthy of freedom. You better believe slave rebellion scared them; they wanted the slaves to continue to be powerless and without the ability to retaliate. The 13th amendment (which freed slaves) did not make things all sunshine and roses. Blacks really were not all that free. White men could still run into someone’s house, take away firearms, rape women, have sharecroppers working themselves to death just to try and keep their families alive, etc. You were still being policed because you were black.
I’m glad we had people like John Brown, Nat Turner, the house slaves who poisoned their oppressors, the field slaves using spirituals and other code music to communicate with each other, slaves who gathered in spiritual healing b/c they believed no one could take away their souls however mistreated their bodies were, etc. Times were so very different then. A mother might have to kill her own children as to protect them from a life which she could not guarantee.
Honestly, do we always have to wait for people to do right by us? We are entitled to our reactions! Do we always have to wait on the fucking government? No, and that’s why the BPP for self-defense (focus on self-defense) was not about relying on Uncle Sam. It was about black people doing for black people, by any means necessary. (Also, I’m not erasing the non-black members of the BPP; I appreciate the Asian brothers and sisters who were in solidarity, among others.) Without the BPP, the government might not have started a nationwide school lunch program. The BPP understood that children would perform better in school if they were fed during the day; they thought of that and provided for their children. They knew cops by and large could not be trusted. Cops killed many prolific members in sting operations. Cops even framed BPP members for crimes they did not commit, possibly in the case of Berkeley officer Tsukamoto. B/c the BPP for self-defense did not rely on the government, I don’t think that their goal was black legislation. I think that’s where I disagree with you. You should have chosen a different example, a group whose main goal was black legislation.
But it’s sad, to this very day we can’t get anti-lynching legislation. And we know how that was used to terrorize POC, namely blacks. Last lynching I heard of occurred in 1981. I’m pretty sure the practice continues, but it’s likely under the radar. A lot of things are under the radar.
But more on topic. I agree that marriage seems to be treated as the end all be all of LBTIQA issues. It reminds me of a conversation I had in a sociology class where women were asked how they would feel if rape didn’t exist. I was one of few who considered the fact that rape is not the end all be all (however horrifying an act it is); you would still have not-rape (thanks Latoya!), misogyny, lesser pay than men, constricting gender roles, sexual harassment, sexual assault, murder (serial killers can still target women), burglary, mental health disparities, all that jazz.
While marriage to same-sex monogamous couples might alleviate some burdens, it still wouldn’t stop police brutality, rape, sexual assault, burglary, arson, murder, mental health disparities, it wouldn’t even consider the protection of sex workers who are LGBTIQA, racism, transphobia, homophobia (whether internalized or inflicted), a whole host of issues.
And it doesn’t deconstruct marriage. It doesn’t suggest that these privileges become not-privileges and just become a right that every citizen is guaranteed to no matter their couplings or familial configurations.
That’s not to say that this movement could not go in that direction later on, but I find it questionable as the ones who would benefit the most are wealthy gay white men. I just worry that other issues will be eclipsed by this forthcoming and singular victory.
But I also don’t want the gay marriage movement to be unfairly targeted for issues which will persist regardless. I support gay marriage for same-sex couples who wish to marry, but also remain aware of other issues which are more likely to be ignored.
Anyway, as a heterosexual black woman, I’ve come to realize that state-sanctioned marriage is to me more of an economic issue. If I were to marry, my decision would be based on tax benefits, among other things. Assuming they still exist later on. And I see no purpose in a very expensive wedding. You would do better to invest that money for a down-payment on a house, or some other asset which can contribute to generational wealth.
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 5:29 pm ¶
April wrote:
Totally agree with Jess, down to noting the silly, inaccurate part about the origin of the title “Mrs.” But anyway…quite a few people here argue that conferring special privileges upon married couples, straight or gay, is discriminatory. I would argue against that notion–provisions for things such as the authority to make critical medical decisions, execute wills, etc., are necessary. Although that authority is generally conferred upon one’s parent or spouse, there are legal procedures already in existence to confer those authorities upon non-spousal parties. If someone is unwilling to take the steps to make sure their loved one is taken care of according to their wishes, because of anti-establishment/anti-traditional sentiment, cold feet, or otherwise, when those provisions are available, then I’m hard-pressed to see how these people are being “discriminated” against. They’re simply not exercising their rights.
Posted 25 Nov 2009 at 7:08 pm ¶
Versai wrote:
@Catherine
I don’t care about someone’s mind being changed, even though that would be nice. Being legally recognized as my partner’s, well partner, makes ME the person who has the legal standing to make decisions, etc. Not her family. Sure, the family can fight–but it’s nice to have the state backing me up.
Posted 26 Nov 2009 at 1:23 pm ¶
petitfour wrote:
@Versai “What about the lgbt poc who support the fight for marriage–like me? Just write me off as someone who has been brain washed, I guess.”
Yep, guess me and my girlfriend (whom yes, I’d like to be my wife), really are just brainwashed by the white affluent gays around us. Ugh.
Straight people don’t have to accept me, I just want tax benefits, built in inheritance, and protection for our future children. I don’t care about anarchically disbanding the institution of marriage and this whole “smash the state” argument leaves me cold.
Posted 28 Nov 2009 at 11:53 am ¶
alex wrote:
no benefits from the state that anyone wants should be conditional upon being married in a form the state recognizes as legitimate. we should be cared for regardless of how we form our relationships. if all you care about is the word “marriage” then give up. if you want all the legal benefits afforded to married couples, why not instead just argue for a kinda secular-universal “civil union” thing like european countries have and some states have, giving straight couples too the option of not having a “marriage” but rather a non-institution with benefits. i think people either want the benefits of marriage or they want the name marriage. if you want benefits: great, so do i and i’m not married. but i’m still queer. how are you helping me? if you want the name “marriage”: if you can change the church, hats off to you!
all the essay was trying to say was that maybe the next time there’s a “gay movement” it’ll be a movement that will include MORE people, and certainly more marginalized people. AIDS, anyone? what happened to real queer activism, that saved lives and rejuvenated politics?
it seems to me that the shining hope and promise of queer and trans people is that they can revolutionize society – down to the fundamentals of how we think about sex and gender. but with gay marriage as a social institution, the revolutionary aspects of queer and trans existence are threatened by a homogenizing influence that historically excludes deviant diversity
Posted 16 Dec 2009 at 12:43 am ¶