I bet that not a single gay marriage opponent would have cried if equal marriage had triumphed in New York last week.
They would have been angry, sure. They would have moaned about the "demise" of the traditional family.
Perhaps they would have even been afraid.
But sad to the point of tears? No.
That's because marriage equality is not personal for them. Not in the way it's personal for us.
Last week there were plenty of tears from those in Times Square protesting the New York Senate's vote against our families, and plenty of anger in Union Square the next evening. I wound up crying into my partner's coat while she held the umbrella over both of us, shielding us from the rain.
Christine Quinn - New York City Council Speaker, open lesbian and equal marriage advocate - cried, too. Tearing up, she said in a press conference, "What I care about is my life isn't any better today."
As I'm writing this, a decision hasn't been made yet in New Jersey. Though I hope for a positive outcome, I'm preparing myself for the opposite.
The people over at the National Organization for Marriage, of course, think equal marriage is personal. That's why they're fighting so hard to keep us from marrying. I've met Maggie Gallagher, NOM's president, and she told me that she had her first child out of wedlock when she was at Yale. The father didn't stick around and didn't marry her- and basically, it seems to me that it became her life's work to find out why.
Her research into marriage and strong marriages and why people get married at all has somehow been perverted into fighting against marriages she doesn't like. She seems to feel that gay people are so icky and young men are so against the idea of marriage that if gay people can get married then young straight men will decide that marriage is even grosser than they originally thought.
This is clearly not the case. Marriage is not a fashion trend. Sure, a young man might not want the same pair of sneakers his grandmother wears - he might not even want to buy something he considers to be a gay sneaker (honestly, I have no idea what that would be. This is just an analogy.) - but whether he likes gay people or not won't deter him from buying into marriage.
People don't decide against marriage because they don't like the kinds of people who get married. They decide against marriage because they think it's patriarchal, or because they feel like they don't have enough money to help support someone, or because they simply don't like the person they're dating enough to marry them
On the other hand, there are people who are so invested in marriage that we will attend protest after protest and write letter after letter just to win the right to marry.
Those people are us.
We will not be deterred from marriage by recent losses in Maine and New York. We will not be deterred by the opposition's strategy to paint us as a bad influence on children.
And we will not be deterred from marriage just because people who disgust us - for example, those who run the National Organization for Marriage, socially conservative Republicans and hypocritical religious leaders - also get married.
For us, this is personal. We want to marry the people we love. And because it is this personal - because we cry every time we lose - we will keep fighting until we win.
2 Comments for “The Political Is Personal”
posted by Regan DuCasse on
SPEAK Jennifer!
It’s personal for us straight allies too. I have cried, I have been in real pain over the work invested in seeing my committed gay friends married. For them to be able to have the choice and decide for themselves what is best for themselves.
I’m in a mixed marriage. I’m black, my husband is white and not a day goes by that I’m not grateful to the Lovings of VA. That I don’t consider my uncle and his white wife especially brave for marrying in the 50’s when such marriages were rare and limited in legality in this country.
Someone stood up for me that I could marry who I loved, I won’t sit by and see other loving couples denied.
Yes, it’s VERY personal, Jennifer.
That is so.
I share the grief and tears. I share it, although I have the right to marry.
I also share the fury of the phony ‘I have gay friends’ marriage equality opponents who can say such things publicly, but have no such care for the equal measure and treatment of those ‘friends’ at the ballot box.
I remember having joyous tears too, for the victories in MA and IA and how forthright it all seemed and I wondered how there could be opposition in the first place to something a lot more simple than the opposition makes it seem.
At times, I’m weary and at sea as to what to do next. I love my friends, and their children.
I have such hopes and commitment that things will go right for them.
They don’t happen by themselves, just as tears don’t.
For now, yes…it’s VERY personal.
Love and it’s protection for gay folks…always will be.
posted by DragonScorpion on
That really is a great point. I had a similar perspective on it when Maine exercised popular sovereignty to vote away the civil rights of same-sex couples there. I recall at a news site seeing a picture of a young lady who was crying with great anguish. By her reaction I can only assume that she probably has a partner, and they were probably planning to marry soon.
Then, as I read comments to the article, I saw many posts praising the decision, talking about how sensible the voters were and just being quite ecstatic and glib about the whole thing. To be sure, not a damn one of them would have cried a drop, not a drop if same-sex marriage would have remained legal.
I thought how heartless and cruel they all must be not to empathize with the suffering that their backward beliefs and this legal travesty has wrought. What the hell is wrong with these people?
When I see this sort of thing; when I see this contrast between those struggling for something as basic as the right to marry the partner their heart has told them is right vs. those who want to selfishly keep this sort of right to themselves… And knowing fully that the harm that recognizing same-sex marriage would bring to heterosexual married couples is zero, while the harm that denying such marriages is great for those who genuinely want to share a life, love and a commitment together…
I can’t help but conclude these people are all just a bunch of bigots.
When I settle down some and think more clearly I realize that while many of them are indeed bigots â filled with mindless prejudice and no amount of civil debate, rational argumentation, or positive experiences with same-sex couples would compel them to change their mind â I know, too, that many more are simply misguided, uninformed, afraid.
They’ve been told the worst and assume it probably is. They had a chance to react, just in case, and they did. And thanks to conservative groups and the Republican party at various state and national levels, the vote that they’re being allowed to cast isn’t just a time-out. It’s something far more permanent. Something that will take years and years of hard work to overcome, barring some sort of unlikely miracle from the U.S. Supreme Court or an act of Congress.
Yes, the political is personal. And considering that people’s civil rights are on the ballot now, it is more personal than ever.
And this:
Wow, that is some seriously convoluted logic!