IGF CultureWatch

Did gay marriage destroy heterosexual marriage in Scandinavia, as anti-gay pundit Stanley Kurtz claims? A resounding "no" comes from M.V. Lee Badgett, writing at Slate.com:

Reports of the death of marriage in Scandinavia are greatly exaggerated; giving gay couples the right to wed did not lead to massive matrimonial flight by heterosexuals. ...

No matter how you slice the demographic data, rates of nonmarital births and cohabitation do not increase as a result of the passage of laws that give same-sex partners the right to registered partnership. To put it simply: Giving gay couples rights does not inexplicably cause heterosexuals to flee marriage, as Kurtz would have us believe.

So there. Also, over at MarriageDebate.com, Barry Deutsch argues that around the industrialized world the state of gay rights correlates with fewer abortions, with pro-gay countries like the Netherlands, France and Germany having very low abortion rates. He speculates that more sexually liberal attitudes are associated with both gay-friendly laws and widespread use of contraceptives, which would account for the correlation. But don't expect anti-abortion conservatives to go for that one.

Cal Thomas, one of the most widely circulated
religious-right columnists, seems ready to admit defeat on
same-sex marriage. In his latest column he bitterly laments what this nation has come to, then writes:

"'Pro family' groups have given it their best shot, but this debate is over. They would do better to spend their energy and resources building up their side of the cultural divide and demonstrating how their own precepts are supposed to work. Divorce remains a great threat to family stability, and there are far more heterosexuals divorcing and cohabiting than homosexuals wishing to 'marry.' If conservative religious people wish to exert maximum
influence on culture, they will redirect their attention to repairing their own cracked foundation."

Can't argue with that. As columnist Max Boot writes in an L.A Times piece headlined The Right Can't Win This Fight:

"Faced with virtually inevitable defeat, Republicans would be wise not to expend too much political capital pushing for a gay marriage amendment to
the Constitution. They will only make themselves look 'intolerant' to
soccer moms whose views on this subject, as on so many others, will soon be as liberal as elite opinion already is."

Be prepared for continuing shifts in both public and elite opinion - for the next few years, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

(Thanks to Walter Olson for the heads up.)
- Stephen H. Miller

Warning: Litigation Ahead

I was just reading about individual retirement accounts. It seems there is something called "Spousal Exceptions to Minimum Distribution Rules," which means that a surviving spouse can roll a late spouse's IRA over into the survivor's account, and withdraw these funds over his or her life expectancy -- maximizing the benefit of the tax-deferred (or tax-free, with a Roth IRA) compounding. Yet another of the myriad ways in which legal marriage is treated as "the real thing." But will Massachusetts same-sex couples be able to claim such benefits, in light of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which bars federal recognition of state-sanctioned gay marriages? The road ahead is going to be extremely litigious, it seems.

The Washington Post has a scary look at the Christian right, profiling Tradition Values Coalition leader Lou Sheldon and his equally hateful (if more polished) daughter, Andrea. Here's how they and their allies view things:

"Pearl Harbor," [Lou Sheldon] says, surveying Tuesday's front pages. "What Pearl Harbor did to American patriotism, May 17 should do to the Christian level of awareness."

Many evangelical leaders saw May 17 as a kind of Armageddon. James Dobson of Focus on the Family said, "Barring a miracle, the family as it has been known for more than five millennia will crumble." R. Albert Mohler of the Southern Baptist Convention compared the day to Sept. 11, 2001, and called it a "moral disaster."

But when confronted with the unexpected lack of passion by the evangelical grass roots over this matter, and congressional momentum for the anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment that seems to be "fizzling," Sheldon obfuscates:

[O]nce gay couples start coming home from Massachusetts and demanding recognition of their marriages by their own states, Sheldon figures America will wake up. "It's a sleeping giant out there," he says. "We're talking about tens of millions of people. And when they wake up I feel bad for the homosexuals."

An ugly sentiment, just as you'd expect.

Gays joining a London rally criticizing Israel and supporting the Palestinian intifada were attacked by Palestinians, reports Gay.com:

They marched with placards reading "Israel: stop persecuting Palestine! Palestine: stop persecuting queers!" As soon as they arrived in Trafalgar Square to join the demonstration, the gay protesters were surrounded by an angry, screaming mob of Islamic fundamentalists, Anglican clergymen, members of the Socialist Workers Party, the Stop the War Coalition, and officials from the protest organizers, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC). They variously attacked the gay activists as racists, Zionists, CIA and MI5 agents, supporters of the Sharon government and [accused them of] dividing the Free Palestine movement.

Said gay activist Peter Tatchell, "For over 30 years I have supported the Palestinian struggle for national liberation, but it would be wrong to remain silent while the PLO, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority are abducting, brutalising and murdering lesbian and gay Palestinians. Freedom for Palestine must be freedom for all Palestinians -- straight and gay."

Hello, these are terrorists and terrorist sympathizers. They set out to deliberately murder children and other civilians. Maybe there's a link there to the fact that they also don't respect gay rights. You think?

In "A Gay Man's Case Against Gay Marriage," Michael Bronski writes:

"The best argument against same-sex marriage is the argument against marriage."

He adds, "Don't get me wrong. I completely support giving gay men and lesbians the right to partake of civil marriage, and the basic economic benefits that come with it," but goes on to argue:

"We -- homosexuals and heterosexuals alike -- might do better by spending some time rethinking how we want to live our emotional and sexual, private and public lives. ... Now that we have it, I wonder if people will think it was worth the fight."

In the Florida Baptist Witness, an editorial headlined "Ten Reasons to Oppose Gay Marriage" includes:

"Many homosexuals are on our side. While the homosexual lobby has pushed for the 'right' to 'marry' as part of its broader public policy strategy to gain acceptance and endorsement, it's clear that many homosexuals really don't want to marry. Indeed, homosexuals see marriage as a key feature of the heterosexual culture which they wish to demolish in their attempt to radically change sexual morality in our society."

Connect the dots.

The Family Research Council issued a statement in support of the proposed anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment, headlined "FRC Calls on Congress to Defend Marriage and States' Rights," claiming it's necessary to amend the federal Constitution "to protect state marriage laws." But that's simply a lie. They're not seeking to "defend states' rights." They want a uniform national definition of marriage -- theirs -- to be imposed on all states. It's real chutzpah to say that nationalizing marriage law and overturning at least one state's marriage measure (in Massachusetts) and quite possibly Vermont's civil union law as well, is "defending states' rights."

Another FRC release makes clear that its motivation is anti-gay animus and homophobia, plain and simple:

"If we do not immediately pass a Constitutional amendment protecting marriage, we will not only lose the institution of marriage in our nation, but eventually all critics of the homosexual lifestyle will be silenced. Churches will be muted, schools will be forced to promote homosexuality as a consequence-free alternative lifestyle, and our nation will find itself embroiled in a cultural, legal and moral quagmire."

The ex-gays at Exodus International go even further, as they chime in with "the legalization of same-sex marriage is a deathblow to children."

Meanwhile, the "mainstream" conservative Heritage Foundation, which enjoys close links to the Bush administration, has plastered its home page with a plethora of anti-gay marriage/pro Federal Marriage Amendment columns -- as if the lead item on the conservative agenda were to rewrite the nation's most sacred document, imposing one federal standard that forces states to exclude gays from marriage. And the culture warfare goes on, and on.

Much media coverage and opinion sharing on the first day of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts. Andrew Sullivan is in fine form with this op-ed in the NY Times. An excerpt:

"It's hard for heterosexuals to imagine being denied this moment. It is, after all, regarded in our civil religion as the "happiest day of your life." And that is why the denial of such a moment to gay family members is so jarring and cruel. It rends people from their own families; it builds an invisible but unscalable wall between them and the people they love and need. ...

"I remember the moment I figured out I was gay. Right then, I realized starkly what it meant: there would never be a time when my own family would get together to celebrate a new, future family. I would never have a relationship as valid as my parents' or my brother's or my sister's. It's hard to describe what this realization does to a young psyche, but it is profound."

The AP reports that opponents of allowing gay couples to wed say their motive isn't based on hatred. But fundamentally, they believe that gay people are radically inferior to themselves, and that we sully and besmirch their marriages by claiming a right to our own. And that dismissive antipathy may be even worse than outright hate.

On Monday, May 17, Massachusetts becomes the first U.S. state to officially recognize same-sex marriages -- so watch the religious right become increasingly intemperate.

Here's an interesting piece from the Alliance for Marriage. Note the language -- Massachusetts is set to "invalidate" its marriage laws, apparently by not excluding same-sex couples. It's as if the Supreme Court ruling in Brown vs. Board of Education (which celebrates its 50th anniversary on May 17) invalidated public education by not allowing states to exclude students on the basis of their race.

Also worth noting is the way the Alliance for Marriage and other religious right groups now have thoroughly incorporated the whole multi-culti look of the left. By the way, Alliance leader Walter Fauntroy, you may remember, is the same anti-gay African-American clergyman who helped lead the rally last August in Washington marking the 40th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington. As Rick Rosendall reminds us, at the same rally National Gay & Lesbian Task Force head Matt Foreman deliberately avoided any mention of the gay marriage fight, so as not to be rude (or worse, I suppose, racially insensitive) to the homophobes on the podium.

Finally, don't put too much stock in the Alliance's claim of mounting support for a federal constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. It reamins extremely unlikely that such a measure would get out of congress, although it may be put to a vote this year to give the religious right a "scorecard' to take into the elections. Much more probable, however, is that a growing number of states will experience "gay panic" and pass state-level laws and amendments against gay marriages.

Expect the years ahead to bring only small pockets of marriage equality, but given time these scattered lights can grow and overwhelm the darkness of fear and prejudice that would keep us forever separate and unequal.

More Recent Postings

5/09/04 - 5/15/04

Anti-gay activist Robert Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute (an affiliate of Concerned Women for America), calls the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal the result of a "perfect storm" of perversion in American culture. And you know who is responsible, don't you:

Where did those soldiers get the idea to engage in sadomasochistic activity and to videotape it in voyeuristic fashion? Easy. It's found on thousands of Internet porn sites and in the pages of "gay" publications, where S&M events are advertised alongside ads for Subarus, liquor and drugs to treat HIV and hepatitis.

Yes, homosexual perversion has corrupted our fighting men and women. But then Knight goes off on a really strange tangent:

We were told that men "marrying" men and women "marrying" women is inevitable - not only for America, but for the world. Imagine how those images of men kissing men outside San Francisco City Hall after being "married" play in the Muslim world. We couldn't offer the mullahs a more perfect picture of American decadence.

So I guess we're also being blamed for offending the Islamic fundamentalists who sponsor worldwide terrorism. But one could guess that the mullahs and Knight are really brothers under the skin.
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Eugene Volokh, who teaches law at UCLA and spearheads the popular "Volokh Conspiracy" blogsite (basically libertarian-conservative), takes on the recently enacted Virginia law that forbids recognition of any "private contract or other arrangement between persons of the same sex purporting to bestow the privileges or obligations of marriage." Quite rightly characterizing this as an assault on the right of contract, Volokh writes:

"What's the harm of two people of the same sex promising each other that they'll share property, or support each other? The ability to make legally binding contracts...is the power to plan for the future with confidence -- to defer short-term gratification today with the expectation that one will get benefits over the long term. Contract law is premised on the recognition that this power is valuable both to the individual and to society ... and on the recognition that it is generally best to let people decide for themselves the proper terms of the contracts..."

Volokh also recently took on anti-gay marriage polemicist David Frum,
who asserts Massachusetts same-sex marriage would force other states to recognize gay unions. Vokokh, an expet in constitutional law, puts Frum in his place.

By the way, isn't it interesting that some conservatives oppose any state being allowed to recognize same-sex marriage for fear that all states would have to recognize it, and then support a federal constitutional amendment that would forbid any state from recognizing such marriages (so much for states' rights!).