"Why I Hate Gay Marriage" Part II.
In response to some of the feedback I've received on my "Why I Hate Gay Marriage" piece below, I want to add the following addendum to further clarify my argument. You can direct your comments to the original post, immediately below this one.
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My argument below is much more complicated then "gay marriage is not black" or "gay marriage is a white thing." Moreover, i'm not suggesting that gay people who want to get married are nothing more then misguided, simple minded, anti-radicals that have given into the status quo. Instead, I'm calling attention to the ways in which it might be possible and politically regenerative for us to re-think some of our investments in marriage per se and instead shift them to a broader discussion about the material benefits of the institution.
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My argument is not simply some utopian, naive, or politically impossible dream---quite the opposite. It's actually quite practical and far-reaching. If activists were to shift their rhetoric from talk of "gay marriage" (as well as "marriage equality") to instead a call for the dismantling and redistribution of the privileges of marriage to groups whose kinship relations stand outside of the "marriage norm"-- politically we would have many more allies for this cause.
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For instance, the type of politics that I am calling for could be extremely appealing to single (straight) black women--- a group that has historically been demonized, punished, and denied valuable resources because of their "unmarried" status. The same is true for elderly people that live in kinship arrangements that are not linked to marriage. If our focus is on a redistribution of the privileges traditionally associated with marriage then indeed gay people would not necessarily be the single (or even greatest) benefactors of such a redistribution. Again---the masses and majority of "non-normative" (i.e. non-nuclear) people of color households in the U.S. could benefit tremendously from such a redistribution of wealth.
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Moreover, this really isnt a question of being against the activists who have called for "gay marriage" (Indeed, I myself have been involved with some of the premiere groups making such calls) so much as it is a critique of the long-term political efficacy of this cause.
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My argument is not simply some utopian, naive, or politically impossible dream---quite the opposite. It's actually quite practical and far-reaching. If activists were to shift their rhetoric from talk of "gay marriage" (as well as "marriage equality") to instead a call for the dismantling and redistribution of the privileges of marriage to groups whose kinship relations stand outside of the "marriage norm"-- politically we would have many more allies for this cause.
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For instance, the type of politics that I am calling for could be extremely appealing to single (straight) black women--- a group that has historically been demonized, punished, and denied valuable resources because of their "unmarried" status. The same is true for elderly people that live in kinship arrangements that are not linked to marriage. If our focus is on a redistribution of the privileges traditionally associated with marriage then indeed gay people would not necessarily be the single (or even greatest) benefactors of such a redistribution. Again---the masses and majority of "non-normative" (i.e. non-nuclear) people of color households in the U.S. could benefit tremendously from such a redistribution of wealth.
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Moreover, this really isnt a question of being against the activists who have called for "gay marriage" (Indeed, I myself have been involved with some of the premiere groups making such calls) so much as it is a critique of the long-term political efficacy of this cause.
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I think the real challenge for contemporary activists is how to fight the homophobic impulse behind most anti-gay (marriage) legislation without reinscribing the marriage norm as the only legitimate, state sanctioned or viable arrangement for queer people.
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In this regard there are a few books that I would encourage people to consider. The first is Historian Lisa Duggan's excellent work The Twilight of Equality: Neoliberalism, Cultural Politics, and the Attack on Democracy (Beacon Press, 2003), as well as the introduction and chapters five and seven from philosopher Judith Butler's most recent collection of essays, Undoing Gender (Routledge Press, 2003). I would also highly recommend the insights of my NYU colleague Richard Kim, a senior writer for The Nation.
