Jim Burroway has an excellent post at Box Turtle Bulletin on the contrasting messages in the Maine election: Frank Schubert's ugly, fear-inflected slurs against marriage equality (when he even bothers to address marriage, which isn't very often), vs. our hopeful appeals to the better angels of the electorate.
Jim is worried that this is a recipe for us losing, and he has a point. Schubert has worked hard to create doubts among many moderate heterosexuals about what would happen if same-sex marriage were legalized. These are fraudulent doubts, but they are nontheless effective ones.
Jim's concerns about our response are well-taken, but he doesn't offer a better strategy for us. I think that's because there isn't one.
Here is the gist of his analysis:
". . . people don't see how same-sex marriage will impact them and their families - especially not enough to pay attention to the issue and go out and vote in an off-year election on someone else's problem. . . . So how do you fix it? Change the topic from something nobody personally cares about to something everyone cares about."
In both California and Maine - and in Washington, which keeps getting left out - the other side appeals to education as the primary self-interest that heterosexuals care about. As Jim notes, there simply isn't much reason for the 95-97% of Americans who are heterosexual to care about same-sex marriage, but everyone (even us!) cares about education.
But it's not just "education" that is being appealed to; it is centuries of prejudice about the "Homosexual Menace" when it comes to children. The savvy characters running the anti-marriage campaigns know enough to finesse their leverage of prejudice. But when you start insinuating that legalizing homosexual marriage will lead to second graders learning about gay sex, it's hardly accurate to claim your argument is a high-minded one about education.
That is why fear works for the other side. That gut-level dread and misunderstanding is exactly what we have spent generations trying to erode in people's consciousness. The other side is not interested in conscious thought, they're manipulating unarticulated bias, which they get to take for granted as part of their voters' psyche.
We don't have any similar bias to work with. Or even rational fears. The only thing we have in our toolbox is what is best about people: their sense of justice, understanding and fairness about how majorities can advantage themselves, even without meaning to disadvantage a minority. As I was reading Jim's piece, I kept wondering what kind of campaign we would run if we tried to emulate Frank Schubert's tactics. We just don't have the fundamental material to work with - accumulated prejudice - that he has.
That is, in fact, the dilemma any very tiny minority with a long history of being misunderstood has in a majoritarian culture. Burdened with all those harmful stereotypes, and lacking any constitutional protection against laws that single them out, a minority's only remedy is an appeal to the majority to move beyond the stereotypes, the little formless fears. If there is some way to present that as involving the self-interest of the majority, I would dearly love to know it.
Perhaps I'm being too narrow in my thinking, and I'm certainly open to suggestions. But the only two heterosexual self-interests I can think of are both weak tea. The first is that heterosexuals have an interest in protecting themselves from being deceived by people who are in the closet. Marriage is the arena where the closet becomes the most potentially dangerous for heterosexuals. Don't ask, don't tell works well enough when people are single, but if the gold standard of heterosexuality is entering into a marriage, then heterosexuals have a self-interest in making sure we are not deceiving both ourselves and consequently, them. But try making a 30-second spot out of that.
The other heterosexual self-interest is the purely political one of reasonably-minded people protecting themselves from the aggrandizement of the religious right. As I've argued, I think it is in the President's self-interest to make sure we win both of these elections, because losses will energize some of his most virulent opponents. But he's being advised by a lot of very smart people, and he doesn't seem to see this as worrisome.
And that leaves us where we started. We simply don't have anything bleak or cynical to use in these campaigns. That is certainly a weakness in a political campaign where the other side does have those tools. But we can only work with what we have. We can't run a negative campaign because we don't have anything for people to vote against.
14 Comments for “Frank Schubert and His Dark Materials”
posted by Kyle on
We actually do have something, but I don’t know how effective it would be. We focus on the bigotry and the historic example of what extreme bigotry has led to. I’m not saying make ads with pictures of lynchings and concentration camps, but there are lots of real life examples of people who have been brutally murdered for being gay (i.e. Matthew Sheppard) that could be worked into a fearful ad.
This is no more dishonest then the right-wing’s focus on the red herring of grade school curricula.
posted by TS on
I say our tactics should center on capitalizing on the fact that we are only able to make the positive appeal (that’s all we have going for us) and they are only able to make the negative appeal (that’s all they have going for them). I think that setting up a situation in which our moral high ground dawns on people, without pontificating or manipulating, is the best strategy, short term and long term.
If I were in charge in Maine, I would run a final campaign that basically says “We’re confident you’ll do what’s right. Please think very carefully. Cut through the hype; cast off the manipulation. Scrutinize everything you have thought, and everything you have been told. We ask you to exercise your reason and manifest your belief in justice. There are some who want you to go into the voting booth and react: not to empathize, not to consider the consequences of your decision. All we want you to do is think. And we believe you can, and you will. Mainers for Marriage Equality or whatever they’re called thanks you for your attention, your thoughts, and your support.”
Any good totalitarian knows that resisters who will not fight must be taken away in the darkness. By demanding this plebiscite, they have confronted us in public, under the glaring lights. A victory would be good, but letting them punch us in the face without retaliating, showing the whole world that they are brutes and we are enlightened, might turn out just as good.
posted by David Link on
TS, I certainly hope you’re doing at least one shift for GOTV. Your second paragraph is a model of the right argument, and I bet you’d be awfully persuasive. Go get us five voters!
posted by Jerry on
I don’t know if there are any clergy in Maine who openly support same sex couples marrying. Here in Washington DC we have had 250 clergy from different denominations sign on as supporters of civil marriage for same sex couples. If even on of those ministers wants to perform a marriage ceremony in his church, and the government says no, he is being denied the right to practice his religion freely. The question we need to keep asking is do we allow one denomination or even a dozen denominations from denying the rights of others to practice their beliefs according to their own understanding.
Why does the Pope or Mormon leader get preferences that other religious leaders are denied?
posted by Jerry on
TS said if he were in charge in Maine. I don’t know how popular the governor is, but he was interviewed on the Rachel Maddow show the other night and he made a compelling argument for keeping the law just passed that he signed. He spoke openly about his former support of civil unions but after investigation had come to realize they are not and can never be equal to civil marriage.
If that clip can be run, I think many people would be positively influenced.
posted by Debrah on
An extremely insightful post, along with the link provided.
On-target when illuminating the fact that most people are dispassionate about same-sex marriage. Issues really do get reduced to the “local” and the “personal”—how a particular issue affects the individual in his/her daily life.
But dialogue always has to go from the insightful….to the ridiculously inciteful it would seem.
Observers are forever assaulted by wrenching and overwrought allusions to other “groups” who have little option or choice. Their very physicality does not allow their identities to become moving targets…….when more comfortable and convenient.
When even mention of potential strategies like “ads with pictures of lynchings and concentration camps” can be uttered (as in a previous comment and among so many when this issue is debated) alongside a quest such as same-sex marriage……
…….one knows the “idea people” are fast asleep.
I really believe that most of us want happiness for others as well as for ourselves. I know of no one who is trying to impede anyone’s happiness and fulfillment.
This cause is simply not one of “civil rights”, fundamentally, but one of demand and self-indulgence and forcing other people—who, by the way, couldn’t care less with whom anyone finds love—to assign a definition to something that is really quite absurd.
How convenient it must be to have the freedom to be in the closet.
Or by choice, out.
How convenient it must be to have the freedom to be socially out of the closet.
And professionally, in.
Such people are able to take positions and engage myriad issues without also having to reveal the true motives for positions taken. Thereby, cowardly avoiding detractors and keeping a soft cushion under their double-dipping duffs.
How convenient.
Try asking Martina Navratilova if she regrets not having been married to her former longtime partners. Unlike a hetero man or woman with great wealth, Navratilova was able to walk away from those relationships without relinquishing her wealth.
Same-sex marriage? Maybe today, yes……maybe tomorrow, having all those pesky hetero responsibilities might not so grand.
Back in the closet.
Ask any other “minority group” if their obligations and struggles are laced with such convenient vacillation.
That said, I would never work against same-sex marriage. Why would one care to?
However, I’m quite certain that in Seattle, where a large number of my relatives reside, my very handsome gay cousin Chris will be working feverishly to get out the vote.
posted by cls on
We could also go negative if we wanted, and probably should. I would run ads on “who is buying this election?” “Why won’t the anti-equality lobby admit who is funding them?” Millions of dollars are channeled to NOM which then refuses to comply with laws for electioneering. NOM promises that they will hide the true donors. I looked at NOM’s filing with the IRS and it is filled with a large number of massive contributions yet the name of the donor is always left blank. In addition NOM filed their IRS form but refused to answer the question as to whether they lobby on legislation. I think ads focusing on the hidden nature of the antigay funding would help.
posted by Rich on
I think our best strategy is empathy. Try running an ad where a women runs into a hospital emergency room proclaiming that her husband was in a car accident and was being treated inside. Cut to the nurse asking her to produce her marriage license to prove she is actually married to the patient. Or a parent rushing into a school office to see her child injured on the soccer
field…only to be asked for the child’s birth certificate, or scene where a hetero couple get a $30 marriage license followed by a gay couple being told their legal bill for the contracts is $12,000. The general populace should regularly be reminded of the myriad benefits, rights, privileges and immunities they enjoy that we do not. Then remind them that the American Ideal of Freedom and Equality must apply to all if we are to be true to our principles and honor those who have given their lives so we may enjoy those freedoms.
posted by North Dallas Thirty on
The question we need to keep asking is do we allow one denomination or even a dozen denominations from denying the rights of others to practice their beliefs according to their own understanding.
Glad to know that the gay liberal community also believes that the FLDS, to name one, should have their multiple marriages and child marriages recognized legally.
A victory would be good, but letting them punch us in the face without retaliating, showing the whole world that they are brutes and we are enlightened, might turn out just as good.
Unfortunately, given the history of the gay commmunity of protesting and attacking Mormons, mailing white powder to churches, vandalizing churches, standing outside businesses harassing patrons and trying to get people fired over a $100 contribution, and calling people who express their faith “dumb bitches”, no one believes that.
Perhaps if the gay community had dealt with its own brutes, rather than promoting and supporting them, that wouldn’t be a problem.
posted by Debrah on
“Unfortunately, given the history of the gay commmunity of protesting and attacking Mormons, mailing white powder to churches, vandalizing churches, standing outside businesses harassing patrons and trying to get people fired over a $100 contribution, and calling people who express their faith “dumb bitches”, no one believes that.”
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No one who follows news events can argue with that.
“Perhaps if the gay community had dealt with its own brutes, rather than promoting and supporting them, that wouldn’t be a problem.”
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Excellent.
When you have gay men attacking a woman half their own age in such ways that would rival the most bigoted groups out there, you know someone’s man-gina needs a rest.
And yes, Carrie Prejean is an imbecile; however, snuggling alongside the pathetically obnoxious Perez Hilton on this issue did no one any good.
Yes, let’s talk about bigotry and sludge.
Then travel to a few of those gay websites and check the archives and the comment sections.
Hypocrites, much?
posted by Throbert McGee on
Try running an ad where a women runs into a hospital emergency room proclaiming that her husband was in a car accident and was being treated inside. Cut to the nurse asking her to produce her marriage license to prove she is actually married to the patient.
Um, ahem. AHEM, AHEM. Should the worse-case scenario come to pass in both Washington and Maine on Election Tuesday, registered same-sex “domestic partners” in BOTH states will continue to have the same rights as married spouses in many contexts. That’s because the worst-case scenario in both states would be a reversion to a limited form of domestic-partnership law that provided SOME of the benefits of marriage, but not all of them. These narrow/limited/weak forms of domestic partnership include such rights as:
• Legal recognition as each other’s next-of-kin
• Hospital visitation, health care decision?making, and information?access rights
• Inheritance rights and administration of the estate when the domestic partner dies without a will
• Rights regarding cemetery plots, disposition of remains, anatomical donations, and ordering of autopsies
• A surviving domestic partner may bring a wrongful death action based on the death of the other partner
There are other potential ramifications of the “weak” DP laws, and they may vary slightly between Maine and Washington, but one thing you’ll notice is that the list doesn’t say anything about insurance coverage or worker’s comp or disability benefits; NOR does it say anything about adoption or child support or child custody. So, broadly speaking, the two main areas where “weak” DP laws differ from “strong” DP laws are insurance (which includes a right to monetary compensation if one partner dies on the job, for instance), and parenting-related stuff.
And the difference between “strong” DP laws and “Same-Sex Marriage” is: the word “marriage.” (By definition, “strong” domestic partnership laws are intended to be as robust and comprehensive as possible, and as similar to actual marriage as possible, without using the word “marriage.”)
So anyway, the ad described above — a woman rushing into the emergency room because her husband’s been in an accident — might be useful to run in states that don’t have ANY kind of domestic-partnership laws for same-sex couples (like here in Virginia), but it’d be pointless in Maine or Washington, because the right of same-sex partners to be recognized as “next of kin” for medical decision making purposes is not in jeopardy in either state.
posted by Throbert McGee on
or scene where a hetero couple get a $30 marriage license followed by a gay couple being told their legal bill for the contracts is $12,000
Please. It doesn’t cost $12,000 to create a durable-power-of-attorney document and a “living will” and a plain-old-will — you can print out the necessary forms on your home computer for free and have them ALL notarized for under $20. Or if you want to be extra sure, you can spend a couple hundred bucks (but not five figures!) to have a lawyer and his/her assistants do the paperwork for you. The only people who might need to spend thousands upon thousands of dollars on legal fees are those with really substantial estates to protect — but then, those people would be willing to spend the thousands of dollars even if they were heterosexual, and they sure as hell wouldn’t be counting on a $30 marriage license to ensure that their fortunes are protected.
posted by Rob on
And the difference between “strong” DP laws and “Same-Sex Marriage” is: the word “marriage.” (By definition, “strong” domestic partnership laws are intended to be as robust and comprehensive as possible, and as similar to actual marriage as possible, without using the word “marriage.”)
Then it begs the question: why have domestic partnerships if they’re the same thing as marriage? You’re just creating a redundancy. Domestic/civil partnerships/unions will never be enough in a cultural and legal sense.
posted by Tom on
I think we are finally beginning to learn the lesson that the only argument that will work is one that appeals to the majority’s self-interest. But neither David nor any of the commenters is articulating the right kind of interest. An “interest in preventing the aggrandizement of the religious right” is not the kind of interest that Schubert is talking about. And the commenters above who argue that marriage inequality can lead to anti-gay lynchings are once again missing the point: the argument has to be about *their* interests, not ours.
The interest at stake has to be tangible and/or easily identifiable by the electorate: money, property, family, liberty, safety. The “interest in not being deceived by closet cases” – as bizarre as it is – is actually closer to the mark. It probably fails as a candidate argument only b/c it wouldn’t work with married straights, who would have no reason to fear such deception.
Appeals to morals, fairness and honesty only get you 48%. If we want 50% plus one, we need to develop something new, even if it is a creative stretch. That is exactly what Schubert did.