Well, I guess without people getting emotionally ambushed by blog posts, the Internet would pretty much shut down, wouldn’t it?
Ben Wolfson, of all people, has stepped up the political blogging over at Unfogged recently. On Sunday he posted about California’s Proposition 8, a constitutional amendment that would revoke the newly recognized right to contract same-sex marriages in that state. Ben nicely shreds the claims of a pro-8 website targeted at young voters. This being Unfogged, the commenters get a lot of things exactly right. Rottin’ in Denmark says, “Gay marriage is one of my favorite issues too, just because it’s interesting to see people oppose it without making one argument in good faith.” And CN notes, “Anti-gay activists are among the people I respect least in this world. In terms of moral courage they’re on a level with those who say we have to act bravely and decisively to defend the human race by sterilizing the less intelligent.”
When I was in grad school I taught a course on queer issues from a philosophical perspective, and we spent a lecture period or two each semester analyzing arguments for and against same-sex marriage. We never found a single argument against it that held up to scrutiny. (Honestly, if you think you’ve got one, put it in comments and we’ll see if it works; I’ll bet it doesn’t.) So I’m used to thinking about the subject.
I’m also used to the homophobia of the Mormon church, or I thought I was. But I followed some links from Ben’s post and from comments, and did some Google searches of my own, and I found myself getting more and more upset and angry about something I’d thought I was done with.
Part of what upset me was discovering that, not surprisingly, high officials of the church have joined other anti-same-sex-marriage activists in telling lies to persuade people. When you don’t have any legitimate arguments to make, you have to make stuff up. In this case, the Salt Lake Tribune quotes Mormon Apostle David Bednar saying that if same-sex marriage remains legal n California, “[t]here could be sanctions against us for teaching our doctrine.” Now this is patent nonsense. Bednar isn’t a lawyer, but he had a Ph.D., taught management, was a college president, and is no doubt a fairly bright guy to have risen as high as he has in the church hierarchy. I’m not a lawyer, either, but I can tell you a little story about a thing called the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment that means the government can’t force any church to conduct ceremonies it doesn’t want to conduct (such as same-sex marriages) or teach what it doesn’t believe or refrain from teaching what it does believe. If Bednar is half as bright as I suspect he is, he understands this. He’s just lying, repeating a talking point that apparently did well in focus groups and was adopted by the whole pro-8 campaign.
The lying upsets me, but I think what’s worse is the image I can’t shake of thousands of Mormons listening to the lies, accepting them without question because they come form a church leader, and acting on them to donate money and volunteer time to the cause of passing the anti-gay proposition. Another Apostle, Russell Ballard, told young Mormons with California ties to “go viral” with the message. And the audience was receptive: “Brianne Burhan, 19, thought the presentation was well-organized and thorough. ‘You could feel the love from the apostles,’ she said, adding she is planning to make a video for Facebook.”
“You could feel the love from the apostles.” This is an utterly typical Mormon move, attributing the best of intentions to members of the hierarchy no matter what they’re actually preaching. And because it’s so typical, and the whole chirpy, can-do, top-down Mormon response to Prop 8 is so typical, it reminds me of my own family, still part of the Mormonism I was raised in.
My family members have had varying reactions to my being gay. My siblings don’t make a big deal out of it, although I don’t know whether in all cases their tolerance of and decency towards a gay family member bleeds over into politics. My parents have had a much harder time with my being gay, and my dad, especially, has socially conservative political commitments that go along with his exacting religious orthodoxy. We haven’t talked about it, but I’m sure he’s against same-sex marriage, although since nobody in the family lives in California we don’t have to hear about it.
I also think back to my time as a Mormon, to all the people I knew who, whatever their virtues, were quick to condemn gays and lesbians as perverts and sinners. One of the last times I attended church was as a student at Brigham Young University, out of the closet only to a few close friends and otherwise completely invisible in my queerness. Our Priesthood Quorum lesson that week was taught by a blond business major, who somehow managed to turn the topic of the lesson into a courageous denunciation, in front of a bunch of 22- to 25-year-old dudes, of the disgusting abomination of homosexuality. It was all I could do not to explode and either tell the asshole off or storm out of the room. In the event, I just sat there, white with rage. Afterwards, my best friend, who had been sitting next to me, gave me a hug and told me he understood why I wanted to be done with the Mormon church.
I’m sorry I don’t know where I’m going with this. Some take-away points, I guess, are that I still have issues with my family and the repressive religion I was raised in, that some Mormons are anti-gay assholes, and that dishonest, bigoted campaigns for regressive policies sometimes work. I’ll add to this litany of the obvious that same-sex marriage doesn’t hurt anybody, but the Mormon church’s anti-same-sex-marriage efforts hurt thousands of queer Mormon young people who are taught to hate a part of themselves, and they hurt Mormon families who love their out, queer family members and don’t see them as threats to “the family,” to children, to Western civilization, or to whatever it is that’s so fragile it will fall apart if gays and lesbians continue to get married in California.
I suppose I really just wanted to “go viral.” It’s not a radical notion that people who love each other should have the right to be married. It takes a willful disregard for reality to believe that the love of two men or two women for each other can’t be as strong as heterosexual love. It apparently does take courage, fearlessness, to see through the absurd pronouncements of church leaders and slickly produced television ads. Let me quote the late, great Bryan Waterman, who wrote so movingly about TGW’s own brush with same-sex marriage, first quoting St. Paul:
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away. When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Then Waterman:
About halfway through the reading I had the thought that just about everything these verses say love is not actually applies quite aptly to politicians, religious leaders, and everyday voters who think they have the right to dictate which kinds of couples are “traditional” enough to have a traditional wedding; I was struck too by the notion here that it’s not just faith and hope that are held at lower esteem than love; even expressions of religious certainty and divine revelation — prophecy, tongues, and the like — are deemed fallible and subordinate to love’s sovereign power.
West Coasters, what’s a good group to donate to to fight Proposition 8?
dan savage is encouraging people to donate to http://www.noonprop8.com by promising to respond personally to each and every email that he gets from those who have donated $25 or more. i think today might be the last day of his special deal. so if you donate, dave, please be sure to send dan savage a link to your post today.
i wish he we our friend. maybe this is the first step.
thanks for this post.
s/b were our friend, obvs.
I found the post Ben linked to, from a Catholic priest in Fresno who was very recently taken away from his congregation [is this syntax correct? I don’t know if Catholic priests are considered to have “a congregation”] for speaking out against 8, very worthwhile and moving. Dave, did you see the story I linked to last week, a Mormon father writing about his happiness to see his gay son marrying (in California)?
Well written Dave, what a devisive subject this issue has become. I think my brother has it right when he said that most people are Fucktards. And although many are lead astray, there are still many Mormons who think that the leadership is wrong, and that we should embrace our GLBT brothers and sisters, and promote equality for all.
Dave, I share your anger about this issue. There is clearly no policy arguments that can be made against same sex marriage, so Prop 8 people have resorted to scare tactics and lies – the kind of emotional politics that Plato warned us about.
The thing that sickens me most (and there’s a whole lot here) is the use of the California Constitution as a tool to take away same sex rights. To all you teachers and other civil servants in the state of California: that oath you took to defend the California Constitution will mean that you defend Prop 8 if it passes. How’s that for a morbid thought?
3: I think “congregation” is generic enough that you can use it for Catholics, although I think “parish” might be more Catholicky. I too found that post moving. What was familiar about it was a hierarchical church acting efficiently and bureaucratically against someone whose mind and heart are too big for orthodoxy. What was strange from a Mormon background was a priest defying the hierarchy in the first place.
And the story you linked last week was really touching. Like Marleyfan says, there are fucktards and then there are decent and even good people everywhere.
To my mind, there is great hypocrisy in the Mormon church’s opposition to gay marriage. With their history of practicing polygamy in the 19th century and being persecuted by the US government for such, they ought to be the last organization around judging how others define marriage. The statements from church leaders that Dave quotes may not only be lousy arguments and even lies, they also ignore the organization’s own history with defining marriage in its own kooky way
And let me be clear, here, that I am not comparing same-sex marriage between two loving partners to polygamy, which often involves the subjugation of women and children. Rather, I am pointing out the Mormon church’s hypocrisy and denial of their own history that is involved in their attack of same sex marriage.
“. . .acting efficiently and bureaucratically against someone whose mind and heart were too big for orthodoxy.” This statement sums up one of my real frustrations with organized religion: that in making themselves the sherrif’s of “the good,” and then narrowly defining that good, they manage to police out so many other forms of goodness that would enrich the organization–and sometimes break the heart of the big-hearted people the are policing out in the process. Shame on them.
Here’s the non-homophobic Mormon argument for Prop. 8, if you are interested:
Under California’s Domestic Partnership laws, gay unions already have every single right and privilege that married couples have. They can be in the emergency room, can be joint tenants under property laws, take the tax benefits, etc. If a landlord or hospital denies these rights, they can sue. They are on fully equal footing. The only thing that the recent California court decision does is mandate that domestic partnerships are called “marriage.” The proposition wants to undo this, and maintain a linguistic, but not a legal, distinction between domestic partnerships and marriage. Why? Because the supporters sincerely believe that society is stronger when it promotes families headed by a heterosexual couple. Now whether that belief is true or not is, as the poet Rumsfeld would say, a known unknown. It will take a hundred years to get any good data on it. But it is not necessarily a troglodytic position to stand, with WFB, athwart history and yell “Stop,” in the face of the unknown.
(Just to show my cards a bit, I’m an active Mormon who is voting No on Prop 8, but I happen to respect some people who will be voting yes on it.)
I had struggled for years with my Mormonism, looking for an excuse to remain in the faith of my fathers in spite of the doubts that had stripped me of all orthodoxy. I was nostalgic, and wanted to believe that the church could still be a vehicle for great good in the world. The church’s position on homosexuality and gay marriage were what ultimately pushed me out the door, and I stated as much in my official resignation of church membership.
On the bright side of LDS membership, by not resigning when I did, Susan is now in a position to resign in direct response to Prop 8. I am sort of jealous.
Dave, as long as marriage is offered to some, I can’t think of any philosophical argument for denying the right to anyone, however what kind of philosophical argument can be made for the idea of marriage as a good idea in the first place? Boooo marriage!
I just got an email claiming that the “No on Prop 8” ads are starting to work, but they are seriously underfunded. While 60,000 people have donated to pro-prop 8 groups, half that number have donated to anti-prop 8 groups.
Please, click on the link below and give. Every bit helps, so even if it’s just $10 or $25, you’ll be doing some real good in the world.
Click here and give.
9: Wow, Paul. I hardly know where to begin. You seem like a thoughtful, engaged person, and I appreciate that you will be voting no on Prop 8. Here’s why others should too, and why it IS really important. I will take your points one by one.
– “Under California’s Domestic Partnership laws, gay unions already have every single right and privilege that married couples have…The only thing that the recent California court decision does is mandate that domestic partnerships are called ‘marriage.’ ”
Yes, and it is important that gay men and women can “marry” rather than simply become “domestic partners.” Why? Because there is a world of difference in perception.
Would you seriously argue that blacks and whites should not be able to “marry,” but only get “domestically partnered”? Does that sound racist to you? It should, because it is. And yes, it is homophobic to decide that a similar constraint should be put upon two loving, committed same-sex partners.
– “The proposition wants to undo this, and maintain a linguistic, but not a legal, distinction between domestic partnerships and marriage. Why? Because the supporters sincerely believe that society is stronger when it promotes families headed by a heterosexual couple…It will take a hundred years to get any good data on it. But it is not necessarily a troglodytic position to stand, with WFB, athwart history and yell “Stop,” in the face of the unknown.”
Yes, it is troglodytic. Put simply, society is stronger when it promotes families with two loving parents. Raise your hand if you know of a dysfunctional family with heterosexual parents! Can you seriously argue that ANY heterosexual-parented family is de facto preferable to same-sex parenting? That’s ludicrous.
Also, and this is a huge point: It is utterly specious to make an anti-gay-marriage argument based on children. How many straight couples choose not to have children? Or cannot have children? Or get married after they’ve passed child-bearing years? Should they not be allowed to marry? Should I not be allowed to “marry” my girlfriend because we may or may not have children, and may or may not be good parents? Again, ludicrous.
The bottom line is, there is no good reason, apart from homophobia, to declare that gays shouldn’t be allowed to marry. It is a CIVIL act. Not a religious one. It doesn’t change ANYTHING for the churches, the straight people, or anyone else. It is a way of recognizing a relationship and ensuring rights.
Again, Paul, I appreciate your voting no on 8. Thank you. Please urge your friends and family in California to do so as well. This is a huge, huge issue. There are thousands of young men and women struggling with coming out as gay people, and knowing that the state of California refuses to take away an EXISTING RIGHT would be a tremendous step for them, and for all of us.
(Sorry if this sounds like a rant – I’m writing fast)
Also: Echoing Trixie, Dan Savage and TIm, NoonProp8.com is a great organization. RB And I have been volunteering, phone banking and giving money to them; they are organized and efficient. And they — we — desperately need more $$ to win. The Mormon church alone has poured millions of dollars into the Yes on 8 side, and in votes like these, the side with the most $$, meaning the most ads on TV, wins.
So please, if you can spare anything at all, do donate a few bucks to noonprop8.com. If we win on Nov. 4, we are on the road to equality. If not, it will be another generation at least before such a vote would come up again in California.
Finally, if you have friends / relatives / acquaintances / whoever in California, please urge them to vote no on 8. We are running neck and neck with the opposition and need every vote we can possibly get.
Thanks for this timely post, Dave. Lately, I’ve been much more worried about this campaign than the other, more-well-funded one we’ve all been obsessed with. It’s really pretty appalling that only 30,000 people have donated to the No on 8 campaign, especially when there are an estimated 2 million LGBT people in CA alone (I got the same email as Tim today)… I work in conservative Orange County, and driving down each day from Long Beach, I inevitably end up seeing at least a few cars with “Yes on 8” bumper stickers, which makes me wonder how many of my students feel the same way… Anyway, yes, please donate. Here’s yet another link to the same site.
It’s not just California. Arizona is sponsoring a similar constitutional amendment as a preventative. And pressure in Mormon churches to be for the amendment is FIERCE. Calls from Stake Presidents to donate money, ex-bishops coming to classes and asking for names of people who will put signs in their yards, announcements in every church bulletin, phone calls, and meeting talks saying that you must vote X way or you are a bad Mormon. I feel physically ill about this.
I am an active Mormon who is openly for gay rights [and I might add, I am a pillar in my religious community], and this is an incredibly depressing situation for me. I am angry, apologetic to all of my gay friends. I am also[apparently] suspect in a religious community that I am beginning to understand, not only doesn’t value gays and their families, but people such as myself. I have managed to compromise for years in order to be part of the Mormon community, but I feel those last precious strands of the ties breaking. What about that beautiful church and state separation that I used to think Mormons respected? Now we are in bed with the freakin’ evangelical nutcases, united in–no, not an anti-poverty, service initiative–but united in hate.
I’m pissing mad.
Was I clear that I am angry? Cause I AM.
Paul W: Thanks for putting that argument out there. As you state it, there are two parts. (1) The only difference for same-sex couples seeking legal recognition for their relationships in California if Prop 8 passes is that their partnerships will be called civil unions rather than marriages — the status quo before this spring’s state Supreme Court decision, apparently since 2007. (2) “Society is stronger when it promotes families headed by a heterosexual couple,” and it can do this in part by drawing a linguistic line in the sand.
I saw variants of (1) on the pro-8 websites I looked at, under headings such as “Proposition 8 Is Not Anti-Gay.” The idea behind it seems to be that since all the legal rights and responsibilities of marriage under California law can be had without the word “marriage,” barring same-sex couples from actually marrying does them little or no harm — so you can vote for Prop 8 and still consider yourself tolerant or even progressive and still face your gay friends or family members.
I have a couple of disagreements with (1). First and less importantly, even if all the legal appurtenances of marriage in California were available to same-sex couples before the SSC decision, I suspect calling it “marriage” would have a legal effect outside of California. We’d need a lawyer who’s involved in this sort of stuff to answer (Eleanor’s Papa, you reading?), but were Californian domestic partnerships or civil unions or whatever recognized by, say, Massachusetts before the SSC decision? In other words, do states and countries that recognize same-sex marriages also recognize the particular domestic partnership contracts of non-SSM states? And how much more of a pain is it for (suddenly partnered rather than married) California couples to deal with this if they, say, move to Mass., or to Spain, and have to clarify the legal status of their relationship for whatever reason? Which box do they check on an immigration form in Canada?
But I’m not sure about the law there. My real objection to (1) is that it assumes that marriage is merely a legal status such that if you grant its legal appurtenances* but deny the word, you don’t really change anything. Now, this assumption is contradicted by the assumption behind (2), and the assumption motivating the whole pro-8 campaign: that marriage is more than a legal status, that it actually matters when you call a couple “married.”
Things get a bit tricky here, since Prop 8 is about a legal issue, and it’s tempting to limit the discussion to the legal realm. But marriage means a lot of things — it’s not just a legal contract. For many or most people, getting married is a public expression of love and commitment, a recognition and celebration of a relationship by family and community, a milestone in life’s journey, etc. Now of course, marriage discrimination has forced gay and lesbian couples to get creative in finding ways of celebrating their relationships when they are not recognized as marriages in a legal sense. But if you think there’s something special about marriage that goes beyond a collection of contractual rights and duties, you must admit that denying it to same-sex couples is in fact a meaningful denial. (A common proposal here is just to say “civil unions for everybody, gay or straight,” and let churches, communities, or individuals decide whether to call relationships “marriages” or not. This proposal, not surprisingly, doesn’t tend to get much support from people who otherwise say they subscribe to (1).)
That leaves us with (2). You cite in its favor Buckley and the broadly conservative stance that changing fundamental social institutions is a dangerous thing to do. I can sometimes see the wisdom in this general approach. But to me it’s not persuasive in cases where (a) a class of people who have historically been oppressed in some way are being disadvantaged by the status quo and (b) there’s little reason to think that the proposed change will actually harm society — little reason beyond the reflexive nervousness about change embodied in the conservative attitude. (a) is clearly the case. (b) is almost as clearly the case: same-sex marriages take place in other countries and in one other U.S. state (soon two!) and in California right now, and civil unions take place in many more jurisdictions, and nothing bad seems to have happened. Further, conservatives almost unanimously endorse marriage as a good thing for society, and the arguments for that position tend to apply to same-sex couples as well. Basically, the extremely vague hints and worries of (2) are not enough to outweigh the positive arguments for sam-sex marriage.
Whew. I see that while I’ve been typing, LP has probably already answered — I’ll go back and read her comment.
Anyway, I just gave some money to NoOnProp8. Feels good.
*Sorry to keep using this word, but it’s the best I can find here.
hey i just gave some money too.
but then i forgot all about letting dan savage know.
dave, will you be getting an email from dan?
p.s. appurtenances.
No, I skipped the Dan Savage thing. Turns out, it’s to get an answer to a question. I don’t have any Savage Love questions and tend to think the people who ask them are idiots (albeit entertaining idiots!). This is mitigated by the fact that my boyfriend has a question he wants to ask Dan, although it’s on behalf of a friend of ours and really is a question for a shrink, not a sex columnist, and I don’t know how the boyfriend would formulate the question anyway.
Dear Dan: Am I a bad boyfriend for not making up a question for you?
Rogan — Yeah, I resigned my membership over same-sex-marriage stuff, too. Lucky Susan that she gets to do it now. Prop 8 is a much bigger story than what set me off.
I’ve been trying lately to be a pragmatist about religion — “whatever gets you through the night” — but this kind of thing makes it hard. Ginny, as your comments illustrate, it’s hard to be a member of a community that promotes something you feel is deeply wrong. My response was to leave, but I can kinda understand why people stay, and I do think people like you are in a position to do good by being open about your disagreements with your religious community on such fundamental matters.
“I suspect calling it “marriage” would have a legal effect outside of California. We’d need a lawyer who’s involved in this sort of stuff to answer.”
I’m a lawyer, but no expert in this field. This is my thought: under the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the US Constitution, there is generally mandatory interstate recognition of same-sex marriages. [This was historically used to have mixed raced marriages recognized in states that did not recognize them.]
The Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 claimed to limit mandatory interstate recognition of same-sex marriages. This is, in my opinion, a legally sticky point. Since when can Congress pass a law limiting the scope of the Constitution? [answer, they can’t, as the Constitution is a higher authority]. So I believe that once gay marriage is firmly established in several key states, there will be lawsuits under Full Faith and Credit Clause of the US Constitution to declare that part of the DOMA unconstitutional.
Congress has tried to limit who has the right to sue under DOMA, [by limiting standing] but again, that is like a lesser law trying to limit a higher law. It will be very interesting legal territory in a few years.
Was that clear, or just full of lawyerish jargon?
in re “I do think people like you are in a position to do good by being open about your disagreements with your religious community on such fundamental matters.”
I would like to think so, but in a community like the Mormons [you are either for us or you are against us mentality] my support of gay rights is less likely to make my fellow parisioners question their own/ the church’s stance than it is to make them suspicious of me. [AHHH, despite all of these years, she really isn’t one of us]. And all of my little deviances from the Mormon mainstream, which up until now have been considered charming and quirky, are now to be reinterpreted [so, that was a sign that she was falling away]. This doesn’t mean that I don’t make my voice heard, it is just a recognition that in this kind of culture, MY voice is only listened to inasmuch as I am trusted, and disagreeing on such a fundamental issue may well disintegrate trust.
My understanding of the Full Faith and Credit Clause is that there’s a well-established public-policy exception that covers same-sex marriage, and that states that outlawed mixed-race marriages didn’t in fact have to recognize them. I am not a lawyer, though.
23. No, you were quite clear.
21. Dave, I am beginning to think that Mormonism is a lost cause. How much respect could you have for a non-racist member of the KKK that held on to his family’s traditions and hoped to reform them? Some dogs are just better to put down.
Is it fair to compare Mormonism to the KKK? Lets ask ourselves some questions to find out:
What moral principles is Mormonism known for outside of Mormonism?
Conventional wisdom still sees that Mormons are good neighbors with strong big families. Outsiders tend to see Mormons as cliquish folks who are very involved in Mormon activities and helping other Mormons. Mormons seldom open up their meeting houses for community events, and Mormons seldom have any official organized presence in larger community activities. Rank and file Mormons pay a lot of money to their church, which in turn promises them that they are using those monies for service in the world. This service usually has to do with buying a lot of something and shipping it off to some needy corner of the globe. Sometimes Mormon women form Mormon quilting circles where they make pioneer blankets for poor people in steaming jungles. THE MAIN CAUSE TO INSPIRE MORMON COMMUNITY ACTIVISM IN THE LAST DECADE HAS BEEN ACTION AGAINST THE ADVANCEMENT OF GAY RIGHTS.
What do gay people think of Mormons?
Most black people see the KKK as the enemy. Most gay people see the Mormon church as the enemy.
Does Mormonism teach people moral principles?
No. It teaches people to be OBEDIENT to church leaders. If you ask your average Mormon why he is involved in good works he will say, “Because God teaches us through His prophets that this is the path of happiness.” Note: this is obedience, not morality. Ask your average Mormon to explain why racism is bad. If she gives you a good answer, she probably went to a college other than BYU. Mormonism as a church hardly touches the subject of ‘racism.’ It will go so far as to say ‘racism is bad,’ but Mormonism doesn’t try to help its members develop substantial understanding of the moral ideas behind an issue like racism. Mormonism, as an institution, generates moral cripples who look to their leaders for moral guidance, rather than looking into their own souls. I have known plenty of moral Mormons, but they were moral in spite of their religion, and not because of it.
So we have a church full of obedient moral cripples which is becoming increasingly known for strong anti-gay rhetoric and activism. We have a persecuted minority group that sees Mormons as antagonists. What we don’t have is a history of violence against gays (though one of Mathew Shepherd’s murderer’s was Mormon), but then again the modern KKK tends to avoid violence as well. If we aren’t in KKK territory yet, we are getting close.
Like I said, I am against Prop 8, but let me continue trying to form some creditable rejoinders on behalf of the pro Prop 8 folks.
LP: I think the analogy with anti-miscegenation laws is incredibly powerful rhetorically, but the response is that there is something fundamentally different the two cases. Anti-miscegenation laws were explicitly about maintaining a system of white supremacy. They had no other intent. Western culture’s restriction of marriage to heterosexuals did not have at its core an intent (setting aside its effects) to subjugate homosexuals, and indeed arguments can be made that there are (non-invidious) reasons to restrict marriage to heterosexuals. Several courts, including the high court of the State of New York (not the most conservative court in the world) analyzed this distinction in determining that while anti-miscegenation laws violate the constitutional guarantees of equal protection, heterosexist marriage laws do not.
I think your second point is weaker. Essentially, you argue that the gender of parents is irrelevant because we can point to a lot of dysfunctional heterosexual couples and a lot of loving gay couples, and in any event, lots of people don’t have kids at all. On the first point, I think the best response is that we need data, not anecdotes, and it is just too soon to make the call on whether kids benefits from having one parent of each gender. I’ve seen studies that go both ways. On the second point (not everyone has kids), I think this is just a complaint about the under- and over-inclusiveness of legal standards, and can be levelled at a lot of laws (some 14 year olds are great drivers!). If there is a benefit to children (and therefore society as a whole) to being raised in a heterosexual couple, then there is some justification for social support for that structure even if it is under or over-inclusive.
Dave: On your legal point, I don’t think the term “marriage” will make any difference for gay couples who emigrate from California to another state (I know nothing about Canada). Their new state will recognize their status (or not) depending on its own laws. The federal Defense of Marriage Act, and the mini-DOMAs that many states passed, ensured that one states decision to extend gay marriage could not overrun other states’ marriage regimes.
On your larger point, I think you are right marriage is more than just a legal status, and anti-SSMers would agree. The rhetorical function of pointing out the legal equivalence of marriage and domestic partnerships is to put the argument on the grounds anti-SSMers want to fight on — meaning, institutions, society, rather than the far tougher-to-justify issues of denying particularized legal entitlements (wills, health care, etc) to gays.
I have a harder time justifying the Buckley approach as applied here. On your (2)(a) principle, I would return to what I wrote above in distinguishing anti-miscenation laws — heteronormativity did not grow out of intent to oppress gays, which complicates application of your principle. On (2)(b), I guess I would point to the law of unintended consequences and a kind of intellectual humility that is hesitant to say, “Well, nothing bad has happened over the last five years, so full steam ahead!”
I think, win or lose on prop 8, gays (in California or not) should just simply *take* the term marriage, rather than ask for it. The first time I met a gay friend of mine, he referred to his partner as his “husband” and talked about his “wedding” and when he got “married.” He lived in NY, and clearly this was a “commitment ceremony” or something short of marriage, but to him and his partner it was a marriage, and he did not care that the state refused to acknowledge what his relationship actually was. Nobody can do anything about what you call your own relationship (he would alter forms so that they reflected his situation), and he already had all the legal rights associated with marriage. This might be a better long term strategy than a bloody, state-by-state fight that entrenched the opposition. (The most effective tool in getting people to vote for Prop 8 is the clip of Gavin Newsome gloating that gay marriage “is coming, whether you like it or not.”)
Paul –
“Anti-miscegenation laws were explicitly about maintaining a system of white supremacy… Western culture’s restriction of marriage to heterosexuals did not have at its core an intent (setting aside its effects) to subjugate homosexuals.”
If you do not think that anti-gay-marriage laws are explicitly about maintaining a system of heterosexual supremacy, then I don’t know what to tell you. No, gays were not enslaved as blacks were, but the theory behind the two laws is completely and utterly the same: White + white marriage / heterosexual marriage is the “norm” and anything else is “other” / “dangerous.”
As regards my second point, you say we need more data before we can know whether children suffer because they have same-sex parents. But the argument itself is nonsensical. If they DO suffer, it is because society frowns upon them — because they feel ostracized or “different” or not accepted. In this case, is the answer to say, “Let’s not allow same-sex couples to marry and have children, because it’s just too detrimental to them!” No, the answer is to take steps to teach society not to judge and discriminate against them. Allowing gay parents to marry is one huge step in that direction.
Besides, even if Prop 8 is voted in, and California still has domestic partnerships, gay people will keep on having kids and growing their families. That’s not going to change. So, when you say “But it is not necessarily a troglodytic position to stand, with WFB, athwart history and yell “Stop,” in the face of the unknown,” the fact remains, voting yes on Prop 8 will not stop gay people from having families. It will only assure them that society continues to see them as second-class citizens — surely a far worse fate to bestow on a child.
Whenever thinking people try to make arguments for voting against same-sex marriage, it always feels tortured, roundabout, like they’re grasping at straws. I know, because I did the exact same thing myself. I was terribly homophobic before I realized I was gay. After my best friend in high school told me he was gay, I told him, You know, if you think that’s how you are, whatever, but I don’t ever want to hear about it again.” Now I can’t for the life of me imagine the logic of that, but I remember the feeling.
What is Mormonism’s reason for existence?
As a house for priesthood authority and ordinances? As a community of like-minded individuals? It is an open-ended question, one which I wouldn’t expect many believing Mormons to try to answer after my last rant, but I think it is an honest question all the same.
Is Mormon morality primarily the product of common decency, or does it stem from divine (and unique?) teachings from God through Mormon prophets?
I get way too bothered by this, but when I see people I love, ie. most of my extended family, getting up in arms over an issue for the first time in living memory, and when that issue happens to be the persecution of gay men and women, I see freaking red. It pisses me off so much. I can’t even help myself… grrrrr.
LP: You’re misunderstanding me on the anti-miscegenation point. When those laws were passed, the legislators said (sometimes in the legislative history itself), “The purpose of this law keep a bright line distinction between the races because whites are superior to blacks.” When the state got into the marriage game a few centuries back, it adopted its categories from what society (and the churches) were then using — marriage is a male and a female. There was no intent (like I said, I’m not talking about effects) to create or maintain a social order where heterosexuals were deemed superior to homosexuals. It’s a subtle point, granted, but it does undermine the analogy.
You write “If they DO suffer, it is because society frowns upon them.” Maybe, maybe not. I don’t know this and neither do you. The kids in my son’s elementary school that come from same sex parent homes are certainly not treated like second class citizens (granted, I’m in the Bay Area).
In any event, I can’t continue to carry this torch. If you are really interested in a thoughtful argument against gay marriage (and they are few and far between), here is one: http://www.janegalt.net/blog/archives/005244.html
Paul –
I don’t mean to chase you off. But you are absolutely right that “they are few and far between” Many otherwise thoughtful people truly believed blacks and whites should be segregated 50 years ago. No thinking person today believes so. I believe that 50 years from now, the same will be true of opinions on same-sex marriage.
And I challenge you to go anywhere BUT the Bay Area and tell me that kids of same-sex couples are not treated like second-class citizens. You know as well as I do that the opposite is true. All I’m asking is that we take a logical, reasonable step — affirming a right that ALREADY exists! — to help end this entrenched unfairness.
One last thought, because I fear I’m driving you into the opposite camp. THANK YOU, again, for voting no on 8. Really and truly. It means a lot.
Don’t worry about driving me anywhere, I just thought I’d provide an interlocutor for you guys. And I do think it’s a tougher issue than some of us are willing to recognize.
Thanks for the conversation, Paul W. I’ve renounced McMegan and all her works, so I’m not going to spend the time arguing with that old Jane Galt post (although it’s been done).
Rogan, you must be getting some good weed these days. The Mormon Church and the KKK aren’t seriously comparable. One has all the complexities and contradictions of an organized religious body, the other is an avowedly racist terrorist organization.
paul,
i want to thank you for your thoughtful comments today. and also for your vote on november 4.
what i don’t understand is why you are continuing to argue for prop 8 given that you are voting against it.
what is it exactly that you are hoping to accomplish (with this audience or otherwise?) why not spend your admirable skills trying to convince people in your circles who are voting otherwise?
sorry for my ignorance.
a thoughtful discourse is of course always valuable. but every argument you have referenced is to me still terribly homophobic. and i agree with LP that in another generation this issue will echo the same way that the civil rights arguments of the 60’s resonate now.
i don’t know what else to say.
Well, I asked in the post for people to put forward arguments against same-sex marriage that they thought were plausible. Paul was just following instructions.
I consider myself pretty open-minded, but I find myself torn between wanting to want to understand cogent, intelligent, viable arguments against SSM, and feeling incredibly sick that this is being debated or even, really, discussed.
If you’re a rational (not to mention a decent) person, it’s a fucking no-brainer. Seconding Trixie, “I don’t know what else to say.”
I seem to remember Belle Waring posted a kind-of plausible devil’s advocate argument against gay marriage at her blog a year or so ago.
Dammit, Modesto, I was just about to post a link to Belle’s classic post.
And for me, Jeremy, rationality is about being able to discuss points of view with which I don’t agree, exploring their strengths and weaknesses and the strengths and weaknesses of my own reasons.
Eh, that last bit sounds snide. I sympathize with you guys who think this kind of discussion is sickening. I agree it’s sickening that having this kind of discussion is necessary, and I hope that the day comes when it won’t be. But there are loads of people out there who oppose marriage equality, some of them for reasons like the ones Paul articulated. So it’s useful to discuss the arguments and show how weak they really are. Persuasion and all that.
“If you’re a rational (not to mention a decent) person, it’s a fucking no-brainer”
whoa, you lost me there. Binary thinking is oversimplistic. Plenty of rational and decent people on both sides here, basing their arguments on different value systems.
awesome!
this is exactly what farrell and i have been discussing in our backyard for the past hour (sorry for the yelling, neighbors, tee-hee!!)
farrell’s point was yours, dave. it’s important, however distasteful it may be, to analyze all the opinions in order to understand the landscape of the discussion.
i, however, find it absurd (and again, especially sorry to gabrielle and beau, if we woke you up with what must have sounded like a fight), that this would need to be a discussion that required any dissection of the issues whatsoever. to me it sounds just like other ignorant arguments from times long ago that are now embarrassing.
what we are still stuck wondering, though, is a question for you, paul. (and we have gotten through a lot of this rhetoric on our own tonight, now it’s just down to plain curiosity)
why are you voting no on prop 8?
It is so interesting to read the various arguments certainly against and (bravely? at least on this site) for prop 8 and the discussion of gay rights and religion in general. At comment #42 there is nothing much to add except a personal thought. We pulled our boys out of the Mormon church just before the oldest reached 12. I had been lingering, I could nod and cherry pick and excuse poor behavior because I really liked a lot of the people. I like the stories and music and would have probably hung on the margins for years. But it hit me hard as I watched my own children on the verge of discovering their own social sexual identity – I was not going to risk their sense of self or their respect of others. The “proclamation of the family” is an evil document and gay or straight, my boys were not going to be measured by it. My wish for them is to love and make connections and community with other people based on chemistry and respect, not “divine” definition. It is so bizzare to me that the fight for an initiative like prop 8 is supposedly in the interest of children. Why would you not want a world that is more loving and accepting and fair for all children? I understand that I am being simplistic and even sappy, I understand that we are lining up one value system next to another, but I am mamabear at heart. I want my boys to have committed relationships that they can legalize as they see fit and the possibility of children if they choose. To me this is so basic, so deep, I agree with Dave, it saddens me that we are even having to have this discussion. The country is going to hell in a financial handbasket and people are spending time and money propagating hate and discrimination. They all need to be knocked in the side of the head. How is that for a cohesive argument? Just wack them on the head with their own signs and be done.
Well, I’m voting no on Prop 8 because:
— as a general matter, it is utterly stupid that the California constitution can be amended by a simple majority vote on a ballot proposition. The constitution is supposed to be a guard against majoritarianism, and this process undermines the whole point of a constitution. In NY, by contrast, to amend the constitution you need two consecutive legislatures to approve an amendment by supermajority. It never happens because it’s easier to call a constitutional convention. California is messed up, and one of my little protests is voting against any constitutional amendment (and almost every proposition).
— on the merits, I think the court got it right that the denial of the right to marry to gays violates the state constitution’s guarantee of equal protection, and while the arguments to the contrary have some force, I think (as it sounds like all of you do, without all the handwringing) they ultimately are unconvincing. More simply, I don’t think the case has been made that the societal benefits of the marriage restriction outweigh the costs borne by gay couples who want the state to call their relationships marriage.
Dave, thanks for opening up the discussion. I should have just linked to that Belle post from the beginning, as she states the case much better than I could.
Dave, the KKK might not be the right comparison point, but Mormonism is risking permanent association with homophobia. Move over polygamy!
Some topics are so close to my heart that paradoxically, I hardly know how to articulate my feelings about them. As many of you know I care about this more than just about any political issue out there, and have been rabidly following this discussion all day between classes and such, yet have been unable to add to it because it makes me too emotional. I guess I’m not adding much now either, except I just have to say how greatly I value all of your passion and smartness and activism and fighting of the good fight and helping put into words exactly how I feel. And Paul, I admire that you can see this issue so three-dimensionally–I cannot–and that you took the time to talk about it here. Trixie, Jeremy, Rogan, Dave, Pandora: you speak my mind for me.
Trixie, it cracks me up that you and Farrell got into a neighbor-waking row over a TGW thread. That’s so awesome.
Paul, I think you did a decent job presenting an anti-SSM argument. It’s such a weak side, though, that it’s really hard to keep up an argument for.
Rogan, I agree.
Swells, thanks for chiming in.
And Pandora: I totally, totally agree. I see Mormonism as containing a lot of good and a lot of bad, but one area in which it’s totally unacceptable is in dealing with young people’s sexuality.
#43 and #46: Your comments in particular make a lot of sense to me. I find it so difficult to intellectualize something this close to me personally, and while I admire those who can, I’m going to have to go with my gut on this one.
As someone who just barely survived socialization within the Mormon church, I find it absolutely disgusting that the church is allowed to pour millions into political causes and still retain the isolationist, tax-exempt status of a religion. It’s horrifying that people who believe in paying tithing–which is a great idea for HELPING PEOPLE–have no choice but to see their money spent on promoting hate. And it breaks my heart that people in my family constantly have to choose between obeying their faith or supporting their lesbian daughter/sister/granddaughter. The church puts their back against the wall, even if they’ve figured out how to live the contradiction for themselves.
Saying I “barely survived” isn’t hyperbole. I realized at the beginning of my 20s that if I tried to live within Mormonism, I would end up killing myself, period. Lots of people I knew had been driven out of their families and hounded out of BYU. Others lost themselves in drugs and alcohol, and many more simply lost the fight within themselves and chose to die. So I left. But the church has to know it has blood on its hands, and promoting hate only continues its shameful treatment of what it calls “so-called homosexuals.”
To be honest, it’s been so long now that I feel more anger than sorrow. But for a long while I was very, very sad to leave my culture, Now I just think that Mormons should keep their heterosexual heaven and leave everyone else to live in a pluralist civil society, happily and in peace.
I hesitate to ask this, since so many people state that they are disgusted that there is any need to discuss this at all. Still, I must know.
Here is my question: What civil right is being denied a gay person who isn’t allowed SSM? They have the exact same right as everyone else. ie to marry a person of the opposite sex. In asking for SSM they are not asking for “equal” rights, they already have that, they are asking for a new right to be extended to them.
It tires me out when they compare it to the struggle for racial equality. Its not the same at all. Gay or straight, everyone has the same right –marry the opposite sex. Granted, gay people are not into that, and that is why they want a totally new, separate right extended to them. I wish they would recognize that is what they are asking, and maybe show some reasons, some benefits, some responsibilties they would accept in return for that right. Then I think the conversation could begin.
I feel frustrated when I see people turning this into a “discrimination” issue. How is it discrimination? They have the exact same marriage right as everyone else, its just doesn’t happen to be the thing they want. They want a new and different right, they want it automatically granted and anyone who pauses to scrutinize that request is a bigot. (Or in the KKK according to some of the commenters.)
Providing the same marriage option has already been done. Gays want more marriage options. Fine, but there is where the slippery slope arguments become absolutely valid. Where does it stop? Why let it start? Why not just keep marriage they way it has always been and accomodate other arrangements in society as just that —other arrangements.
Dear Lurker,
Was it extending a “new right” to every citizen of the United States when it was finally decided in the Supreme Court (Loving v. Virginia, 1967 (thanks, Parrish!)) that it was unconstitutional for states to bar interracial marriage? Before that, did everybody have the same right, you know, to marry a member of the opposite sex but the same race, even if they didn’t want to exercise it? Should everyone just have been happy with the option to marry within his or her race (and let’s just try to define what “race” means, btw)? Should people who had fallen in love with someone of a different race have said, “Oh well, I guess marriage isn’t for me. Ho hum. I’ll forever be filing my taxes as a single person and won’t have the right to inherit property from the love of my life or visit her/him in the hospital, but so what? I wouldn’t want, you know, special treatment or anything.”?
It’s not special treatment to ask for the very same rights extended to other couples; it’s equality.
…they already have that, they are asking for a new right to be extended to them.
There are some of us who believe that a government cannot “extend rights.” In other words, that we are born with all of our rights, and that a government can only act to infringe upon our already existing rights.
Moreover, the closest act to extending a right that a government can accomplish, as in this case, is when a group is attempting to prevent one from participating equally in society. Insuring that every member of a society has equal rights and protection under the law is the stated goal of our liberal democracy.
I wish they would recognize that is what they are asking, and maybe show some reasons, some benefits, some responsibilties they would accept in return for that right.
What responsibilites do straight people have to accept in exchange for the right to marry?
Gay or straight, everyone has the same right –marry the opposite sex. Granted, gay people are not into that…
And I don’t mean to sound like I’m attacking you on this, but I find this statement a little offensive. Do you think that SSM is some kind of fetish?
A reader emails this link, where you can find all the Mormons who’ve contributed to Yes on 8. Urg.
And hey, a lurker! I didn’t see you the other day. What a stupid question! For an answer, consider the concept of a Hobson’s choice: You can take any horse you want, as long as you take the one nearest the door. Now that’s not how straight people see the current, unequal marriage regime, since under this regime they can have what they want — marriage to someone they love. But for gay people, marrying someone of the opposite sex is like having to take the broken old beast that Hobson puts near the door of the inn — better to say “no, thanks.” Are you promoting sham marriages, lurker? If not, it’s disingenuous to claim to be “frustrated” that those gays don’t take advantage of the marital opportunities available under the law. “Why are they always demanding extra rights, like the right to marry the person they love?”
The question is of the scope of the right to marry. Think of all the fairy tales in which the princess must marry the mean old (but rich!) baron but somehow finds true love in the arms of a stable hand. Do we say, “You can marry the baron or you can be an old maid, or you can have a secret affair with the stable hand”? No, we want her to marry the stable hand. Here in the West, arranged marriage is not the point. We want someone to marry the person he/she loves. Why define the scope of the right to marry like that? Well, we have notions of marriage as partnership, as emotional and physical nurturing, as a positive social structure that contributes to human flourishing when it is entered into in good faith. Do you disagree? Why don’t you want gays and lesbians to be able to marry the people they love?
I’m late in reading this post, but thanks for writing it, Dave. And thanks to Paul W and Ginny for your support and vote against Prop 8. http://www.noonprop8.com still can use donations and time. As Bay Area residents, Cody and I have donated and will begin volunteering at the phone bank this weekend. We also have a yard sign urging our neighbors and passers-by to vote No on 8.
I resigned my church membership in 2000, when Prop 22 was on the California ballot and I was on the other coast and being asked by church leaders to support it financially and spiritually. Prior to Prop 22, I remember that the most fear-inducing argument to me as a mormon was the supposed threat that allowing same-sex marriage would pose to the religious liberty of the church. It is a weak, but highly charged argument that is still being used today in support of Prop 8. I received an email yesterday from a mormon friend that I’m sure is in response to the “going viral” message, urging me as a California resident to support Prop 8. The main message in that email was appealing to fear about loss of religious liberty. Thanks for the discussion of that particular issue in previous posts — I think that addressing this argument may be the most persuasive approach to getting people to reconsider their support for Prop 8.
I think, perhaps, and perhaps subconsciously, the Mormon church opposes SSM not only on its preposterous moral grounds, but also out of its unspoken fear that were SSM permissible, then–slippery slope–why not polygamous marriage? And if yes to polygamous marriage, then, based on its own theology and history, then why couldn’t fundamentalist Mormons be “real” Mormons? And if fundamentalist Mormons could be “real” Mormons, then how the hell does the heirarchy keep being heirarchical? You know, who’s gonna be the guy “really” speaking for God? And all that. . . .
Oh, and Dave, very nice post, way up there at the top of this thread. Sorry to see that the old shit–the repressive Mormon shit, the family’s denialism–still has a bite to it, at times. You are great, and, well, an inspiration, still, on how to ethically and morally deal with the nonesense some of us inherited.
I ment “nonsense.” I feel like such a blockhead when I msispell words on TGW!
If you have ever been mormon, and lived in California, Hawaii, or Utah, please take a look at http://www.mormonsfor8.com and help identify any mormon donors there that you know. Right now, of the large contributions to Prop 8, 46%, or about 9 million dollars are identified as coming from Mormon donors. Clearly the pro-8 movement would be in much worse financial shape if it weren’t for mormon leaders’ pressure to donate. mormonsfor8 is neutral on prop 8, but is pro- information about prop 8, trying to make it clear where the money is coming from.
Ugh, darn it…. so late to this post and all these wonderful, thoughtful comments.
As a gay man married to a (recovered) Mormon, I am exposed to both sides of this issue on a near-constant basis.
I have nothing new to add to the discussion above, but I must say my heart swells more and more to know that we have tremendous support on the right side. (That’s “right” as in correct.) And a little bit of my heart breaks away every time the LDS church opens its big, hypocritically intolerant mouth.
I donated to No on 8 and pray there are many reasons to celebrate on Election Day.
FYI – the church has donated over 22 million to this issue so far – most from out of state donations – 1 million for one donor just this week. It makes you wonder what 22 million dollars would do for hungry children. Just a thought. You know, a “what would Jesus really care about” thought.