(no subject)

[rm]

I know someone has to be working on the compromise angle. I know that something is better than nothing, but wow, do I resent the New York Times telling me what should be "good enough" for me as a queer person.

I hate the gay marriage debate so much I don't even know where to start. It's just non-stop awful, overshaodws other critical issues for queer people and yet has symbolic primacy in terms of how we are perceived by the broader world. It's a fucking mess.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/22/opinion/22rauch.html


Meanwhile, I have cold and feel utterly like crap.

Comments

[winterknight.livejournal.com]

Gee, NYT, I never thought of letting the churches do their own thing! Well, it's all fixed now.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Seriously, also anyone with a brain knows churches can not marry whomever they damn well please. My parents are of different faiths -- lots of churches wouldn't marry them. Who cares?

I totally resent the idea that straight people get "marriage" whether it's in church or not but gay people get "civil marriage" -- hi we have no higher natures! WHUT?

[heron61.livejournal.com]

also anyone with a brain knows churches can not marry whomever they damn well please.

No kidding, the idea of putting in laws to "protect" that right is utterly ludicrious and completely unnecessary given the US Constitution.

As for the rest, I was deeply unimpressed, in addition to not having any patience with the idea of compromising with bigots, when I read crap like that I always wonder if there were people writing similar nonsense back in the late 1950s & early 1960s about compromising on eliminating the miscegenation laws.

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

This is the straw man used over and over and over about prop 8. THEY'LL MAKE US MARRY THOSE @#$@#$ OH NOES.

When in point of fact, churches have NEVER been required to marry (or allow to use their space) anybody who doesn't meet their religious tenets. Temples don't have to marry Catholics. And so on.

[demotu.livejournal.com]

I couldn't make it through that article. It was too depressing. Whenever people talk at length about making exceptions for religious bigotry I feel sick. Haven't we learned anything?

I don't know what we do here - I've honestly never heard a news story about the kind of case scenarios they bring up. Which doesn't mean they wouldn't come up in the States - we tend to be pretty anti-conflict here, in that I think all those things get solved behind the scenes and before they become legal issues. Though perhaps I've just missed the incidents.

[argentla.livejournal.com]

I hate the phrase "the gays" almost as much as I hate "the homosexuals."

Being queer but not gay, I also resent it, but that's not why I loathe it. I hate it for the same reason I hate when people refer to women as "females."

[rm.livejournal.com]

It's rather livestock-y isn't it?

[demotu.livejournal.com]

Yes - especially because it's not exclusively gays or even homosexuals who want same-sex marriage (which is what we referred to it as in Canada - it's really weird to me that the US walks around saying "gay marriage!", but maybe we're just oddly PC.)

[argentla.livejournal.com]

maybe we're just oddly PC

No need to apologize for living in a civilized country. ;P

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

There isn't? Sorry!

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

It's not PC, it's just more accurate, IMHO, since being in same-sex relationship doesn't serve to make me any gayer.

[demotu.livejournal.com]

Precisely.

ETA: But that kind of fluidity in sexuality is probably beyond the comprehension of most of the people speaking loudly against it.

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

It just makes me think of a Little Britain (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YHbTjpjUEI) sketch. All the import is rather undone if I can only picture it said by Matt Lucas in hot pants with a faux-Welsh accent.

[hexkitten.livejournal.com]

I apologize for my complete ignorance. What's the difference between being gay and being queer?

[digitalsidhe.livejournal.com]

*raises hand* I'm bisexual, over here. Queer, but not gay.

[shipchan.livejournal.com]

Plus being queer can also mean trans.

[ophymirage.livejournal.com]

"Queer" is often understood as a 'catchall' term covering lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender, and other identities.

it's easier to self-identify as 'queer' than as 'bisexual with strong lesbian leanings who's also a "perv"'.

[manycolored.livejournal.com]

I like "queer." I guess in classified ads, I'd be "bi-curious" but that seems to have so much baggage and doesn't even begin to cover how I do my gender!

[fragiletender.livejournal.com]

Ugh, I hated the way it talked about 'the gays' as though we were a different species.

[lefaym.livejournal.com]

Ugh, what condescending bullshit.

Shorter NYT: "We'll give the nice little herds of gays civil unions that are kinda like marriages to make them shut up, so long as they remember that they're not nearly as *speshul* as religious bigots."

Excuse me while I go throw up now.

[rm.livejournal.com]

This in the same issue wherein we find out that Rupert Evrett has reacted to not getting leading man roles since he came out by "taking it like a man."

The Times really makes me want to put my fist through something.

[lefaym.livejournal.com]

*headdesk*

*starts looking for things to destroy*

[redstapler.livejournal.com]

It also opened the article on that woman's health by basically saying, "She's a hot mess, but HER TITS ARE FABULOUS."

I was interested in the article until I saw that. Pity IT'S THE FIRST SENTENCE.

Bzzt.

[hexkitten.livejournal.com]

I didn't finish reading that article. I don't know if it's just me, but it seems to dehumanize gay people. It's like the writers think gay folks who want to marry are spoiled and ignorant children who don't really deserve the rights that married straight folks get.

[cozzene.livejournal.com]

but that's just it...a choice. we are spoiled and deprived of proper upbringings and by choosing to act this (read queer, gay, dykish, whatever) way we only deserve some partial 'civil' acknowledgment. It's pathetic and sad how much this reads like something from the Christian Science Monitor or the Catholic Times.

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

"What if a church auxiliary or charity is told it must grant spousal benefits to a secretary who marries her same-sex partner or else face legal penalties for discrimination based on sexual orientation or marital status? "

Then they can fucking OBEY STATE LAW.

[verasteine.livejournal.com]

I made it trough the article by the skin of my teeth. They do realise they are advocating taking discrimination and then sort of legalising it by putting it into writing, right? ::facepalm:: These authors are so far removed from the core arguments of the debate they are willing to settle for something that isn't even about the basic issue. Disturbing.

[sethg]

Orthodox Judaism does not recognize marriages between a Jew and a non-Jew as valid. Can Orthodox employers refuse to offer spousal benefits to intermarried couples? Can Catholics refuse to offer spousal benefits to people who have remarried? Can Dianic Wiccans refuse to offer spousal benefits to couples in which the wife pledged to obey the husband?

Or do only homophobes need to be compromised with?

[darthhellokitty.livejournal.com]

Can Orthodox employers refuse to offer spousal benefits to intermarried couples? Can Catholics refuse to offer spousal benefits to people who have remarried? Can Dianic Wiccans refuse to offer spousal benefits to couples in which the wife pledged to obey the husband?

I'd never thought of any of those before, but now I'm wondering - why, or why not?

I'm always pleased with a friend of mine who refuses to refer to "gay marriage". "We just want marriage."

[imaginarycircus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but its an Opinion piece. It's just what the authors think--right? I know that in publishing it and letting out in the world the NYTs is responsible. But I don't give Opinion pieces as much weight as other articles. Though the NYTs often gets it all wrong by putting articles about queer people in the lifestyle section with articles about clothes and furniture.

[baxaphobia.livejournal.com]

Feel better. I've had 3 colds this winter. Ugh.

[shipchan.livejournal.com]

It's cute the way bigots are given the same consideration as us. And by cute I mean infuriating.

[loveslashangst.livejournal.com]

*apoplectic*

No.

I can't read this crap any more.

I just can't.

I don't see any difference between the love I have for my husband of almost 14 years and the love the two of us share for our wife.

I don't get why the love I feel for my wife is less valid than the love I feel for my husband.

I don't get why some kinds of prejudice are okay and others are not.

Do I get to say "I hate all conservative Christians" now, and use that as a basis for whether or not I will wait on them in my parents' shop?

Moreover, can I continue to ban them from the shop until they stop being Christian?

Then, if I get enough like-minded shop owners together, can we steamroller legislation that bans all conservative Christians. We'll make it happen using HIGHLY inflammatory and misleading advertising.

Why not? I don't like them. They're icky. They make me uncomfortable. They act weird and say weird things and hang out with people who don't like me and who I don't like. If I had kids, they might be swayed by a lifestyle that promotes bad behavior and bad habits.

Why can't I make my prejudices into law? I'm not imposing anything on people, I'm just protecting my family.

*eyeroll*

I need to go away now before I start saying what I REALLY think.

[contrarywise]

Gah! Do these people have no concept of civil marriage? And were they keeping their heads up their asses while the Massachusetts same-sex marriage debate was going on in the state legislature and we were dealing with this exact issue? Apparently so on both counts. Because yeah, separate-but-equal oughta pass muster today, and writing bigotry into the laws of the nation is just dandy! Assbadgers!

[fireincarnation.livejournal.com]

Personally, I think government taking part in marriage at all is violation of church/state separation. I'd love to see everyone getting "domestic partnerships" from the government and "marriage" from their personal faith dispensary.

The article seems to miss an important point: Likelihood any anti-gay group will be harmed by equal marriage--small. Likelihood gay people are harmed by lack of marriage rights--huge.

I also agree that "marriage" is overshadowing other important rights. I was much more bothered when I was legally fired for being gay than I am bothered by not being able to marry.

[manycolored.livejournal.com]

Even when I was a teenager, and homosexuality seemed strange and icky, I thought, "Well, of course they can marry! I just don't want to think about it!" Now it's been 11 years since I made the adjustment to the wider world, and I have to be careful not to marginalize people who don't do the stereotypical thing by treating sexuality/sexual preference as irrelevant. As long as some segments of society MAKE it relevant by making a big deal about it, I can't let myself brush it off. But gay marriage is still a big, "Well, DUH!" for me. The mindset that feels threatened by gay marriage is alien to me, and very scary, so the idea of a "compromise" legal status doesn't make sense to me. Not unless you do away with straight marriages too, and give EVERYBODY civil unions regardless of the gender combinations and numbers involved.

The big philosophical reason I'm for gay marriage is that it'll destroy the Family. :) That is, the social control mechanism enforced by economic dependence and compulsory restrictive gender roles. I'm all in favor of families, even families with a working dad, a stay-home mom, and two or more kids living in a house in the suburbs. They're fine by me just as much as the working-mom-and-dad families, two-moms and two-dads families, two-dads-and-a-mom families, mom-and-her-mom families, and whatever other household structures we ingenious creatures can come up with.

[bodlon.livejournal.com]

I only just got to this. I could not finish the article because of the explosion of "WTF?!" between my ears. I may try again later.

SERIOUSLY?

*facepalm*